We studied vegetation change on 142 permanently marked transects spread throughout tussock grasslands of Otago and Canterbury, in areas subject to both pastoral and conservation management. The transects were established between 1982 and 1986 and re-measured between 1993 and 1999, providing a record of vegetation change at each site over an interval varying from 10 to 15 years. Each transect consisted of 50 quadrats, each 0.25m 2 , in which the presence of all vascular plant species had been recorded. For each transect, we calculated the change between measurements in the mean number of species recorded per quadrat, and the change in the total number of species recorded per transect. Averaged across all transects, there was a significant decline in species richness between measurements at both the quadrat and transect scales. Small herbs (those ≤ 2 cm tall, excluding Hieracium species) showed the greatest decline. On average, more than one quarter of the small herb species present in a quadrat at the first measurement had disappeared within 10 years. Larger herbs, ferns, rushes, sedges and grasses (excluding Chionochloa species) also declined significantly in species richness, reflecting declines in the abundance of species in these groups. Woody species richness remained constant, while species in the genera Chionochloa and Hieracium increased significantly in mean quadrat species richness, reflecting increases in the abundance of these species along transects. The rate of decline in mean quadrat species richness was unrelated to, changes in the abundance of either Chionochloa or Hieracium species, or to an overall increase in total vegetation cover on transects. The rate of decline in species richness was also unrelated to the level of grazing or burning between measurements. However, the rate of decline in species richness was greater at lower elevation, on schist rock and on yellow-brown and yellow-grey soils. Our results suggest that a major compositional change is occurring in these' grasslands at a rate that is independent of local variation in management and independent of the widespread invasion of these grasslands by Hieracium species.


Summary The accuracy of macroeconomic forecast depends on various factors, most importantly the mix of analytical methods used by the individual forecasters, the way that their personal experience is shaping their identification strategies, but also their efficiency in translating new information into revised forecasts. In this paper we use a broad sample of forecasts of German GDP and its components to analyze the impact of institutions and information on forecast accuracy. We find that forecast errors are a linear function of the forecast horizon, which serves as an indicator of the information available at the time a forecast is produced. This result is robust over a variety of different specifications. As better information seems to be the key to achieving better forecasts, approaches for acquiring reliable information early seem to be a good investment. By contrast, the institutional factors tend to be small and statistically insignificant. It has to remain open, whether this is the consequence of the efficiency-enhancing competition among German research institutions or rather the reflection of an abundance of forecast suppliers.


This case study examines the personal experiences of an elite athlete, coach, and sport psychology consultant (SPC) during the athlete's preparation and performance in a recent Olympic Games. The qualitative research details how the consultancy process was affected by the athlete's late admission of the deteriorating relationship with his coach. The concepts of closeness, commitment, complementarity, and co-orientation provided a theoretical perspective to the SPC's interpretation of athlete performance and the interpersonal conflict that developed between athlete and coach. The basic performance demand model provided an applied perspective. The SPC's commentary adopts a reflexive discursive style that also focuses on the SPC's role in the consultancy process and the effectiveness of the performance demand model materials. Five important recommendations arise from the case study, and these might inform other SPCs' future athlete–coach consultancies and interventions.


Innovation strategy represents one of the most important research topics concerning the family business phenomenon. The purpose of the research is to investigate the relevance of innovation strategy comparing family firms (FFs) and non-family firms (NFFs), with a particular reference to technological innovation. It has been achieved by taking into consideration the relevance of R&D investments in innovation, and the different innovation configurations chosen by FFs and NFFs. Referring to De Massis, Frattini and Lichtenthaler (2013) and Gudmundson, Hartman and Tower (1999), the approach used is both qualitative and quantitative, as it is based on empirical evidences and information measuring as well. According to several scholars, FFs find innovative strategies more appealing as opposed to NFFs. FFs are more likely to set out longer term plans for their investments than NFFs. Finally, most of the FFs investigated in the study have chosen a combination of internal and external innovation via strong networks of third parties in R&D. The implications arising from this research are both theoretical and practical, as this matter is pertinent for both scholars and practitioners. The limitations instead could be overcome by using relevant econometric models to replicate the effect of a series of external and internal variables on the innovative policy.


This volume contains a representative selection of talks and writings by Martha Harris and Donald Meltzer on the key developmental phase of adolescence, from their teachings both separately and together over many years. Similar books on this topic by these authors have existed for some time in Italian and in Spanish but not until now in English.
Notes about the author(s):

Donald Meltzer (1923–2004) is widely known as a psychoanalyst and teacher throughout Europe and South America. He is the author of many works on psychoanalytic theory and practice, including The Psychoanalytical Process, Sexual States of Mind, Explorations in Autism, The Kleinian Development, Dream Life, Studies in Extended Metapsychology, and The Claustrum, all published by Karnac Books.

Martha Harris (1919-1987) read English at University College London and then Psychology at Oxford. She taught in a Froebel Teacher Training College and was trained as a Psychologist at Guys Hospital, as a Child Psychotherapist at the Tavistock Clinic, where she was for many years responsible for the child psychotherapy training in the department of Children and Families, and as a Psychoanalyst at the British Institute of Psychoanalysis. Together with her first husband Roland Harris (a teacher) she started a pioneering schools counselling service. With her second husband Donald Meltzer she wrote a psychoanalytical model of The Child in the Family in the Community for multidisciplinary use in schools and therapeutic units.

Meg Harris Williams, a writer and artist, studied English at the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford and art at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, and has had a lifelong psychoanalytic education. She has written and lectured extensively in the UK and abroad on psychoanalysis and literature, and teaches at the Tavistock Centre in London, and the University of Surrey. She is married with four children and lives in Farnham, Surrey.


Spectrum balancing is an established optimization approach in multi-carrier digital subscriber line (DSL) systems. It has previously been applied to very different performance objectives such as sum-rate, min-rate, or fairness maximization and sum-power minimization. In this work we study the maximization of the service coverage, which will be defined as the number of DSL lines which can be granted an operator-specified high-bandwidth service. The proposed algorithm is based on a previously described mathematical decomposition framework. We extend this framework for our new problem and enhance its scalability by various low-complexity heuristics. Simulations demonstrate the applicability of our algorithm for DSL networks of realistic sizes. More precisely, our results obtained in thousand 25 user near-far DSL scenarios show an average gain in service coverage of more than 13% compared to state-of-the-art sum-rate maximizing spectrum balancing algorithms.


The percentage alteration of the Mediterranean forest landscape is one of the primary indicators for its degradation. In this sense, the land cover abundances change analysis by using mixture linear algorithms (MLA), is presented like a good alternative to study this degradation. This research analyzes the use of two information sources like Remote Sensing (Landsat-ETM+) and Field Radiometry (GER 1500) to obtain mixture hyperplanes. These are calculated by models based on least square estimations, assuming that each pure land cover (endmember) belonging to any geographic area, behaves as a random variable which distribution function is known. The mixture hyperplanes provide spectral signatures with a suitable correlation level with regard to the supplied from remote satellite sensors once corrected, for the same geographical zone. These established hyperplanes can be used in future researches about Mediterranean forest landscape changes, because they can represent the different levels of its degradation. In this sense, it is proposed that they will feed a land cover spectral library with free accessibility.


Evidence is accumulating about the nature and prevalence of appearance-related distress across a variety of clinical populations. Health professionals working with specific patient groups are often aware of these difficulties and their detrimental effect on quality of life and wellbeing. However, many health professionals lack knowledge and skills on how to support patients, either within the team or via referral to relevant service providers who have expertise in managing appearance-related distress. This is mainly owing to a lack of information about screening, assessment measures and available interventions. The aim of this article is to consider how health professionals can support patients who experience distress as a result of living with a long-term physical health condition that has altered their appearance. This article summarises the challenges for patients and health professionals surrounding body image, altered appearance and associated distress. Gaps in relation to screening measures, differing types of intervention, appearance-related skills training for healthcare teams, care pathways and access to services are identified. A summary of the limited range of interventions currently available has been mapped onto a stepped model of care, ranging from self-help to intensive therapies. Finally, readers are pointed to helpful resources for understanding, identifying, addressing and signposting patients with appearance-related distress.


GenBank, the national repository for nucleotide sequence data, has implemented a new model of scientific data management, which we term electronic data publishing. In traditional publishing, both scientific conclusions and supporting data are communicated via the printed page, and in electronic journal publishing, both types of information are communicated via electronic media. In electronic data publishing, by contrast, conclusions are published in a journal while data are published via a network-accessible, electronic database.


Motion-induced blindness (MIB) and binocular rivalry (BR) are popular paradigms to study visual awareness. It has been suggested that both phenomena are related and share a common oscillator (Carter & Pettigrew, 2003). In two experiments we tried to determine whether BR affects MIB by creating an experimental paradigm that can elicit both. In the first experiment eighteen observers fixated the center of a display with a moving mask and a superimposed stationary target in a split-screen Wheatstone configuration for 30 sec. Each observer reported disappearance and reappearance of a salient target dot in the upper visual field by pressing and releasing a labeled key. The mask was a rotating grid of crosses or a drifting sine-wave grating. In a within-subjects design the mask was presented in rivalry or not; with opposite rotation and orthogonal drift in the left and right eye or with the same rotation and drift in both eyes. In addition, the target was presented to both eyes (binocular target) or to one eye only (dichoptic target). Results show that MIB as measured by normalized disappearance was significantly increased for dichoptic targets but remained unaffected by binocular rivalry in the different masks. Independence of MIB from BR was confirmed in a second experiment in which isoluminant red and green target dots were presented to the left or right eye and observers reported perceived color as a measure of binocular rivalry in addition to target disappearance. In conclusion, our preliminary results suggest that MIB is independent of BR. Further analyses on the dynamics of target perception will inform whether or not the two phenomena fluctuate independently of each other.


The effect of cultivar and environment on the stomatal conductance and plant water relations of lychee (Litchi chinensis Sonn.) was investigated. Diurnal changes in stomatal conductance (gs) and leaf water potentials (Ψ1) were determined for leaves of irrigated trees of cv. 'Bengal' and cv. 'Kwai May Pink' between July and December 1990. Leaves of Bengal always had much higher gs than Kwai May Pink in winter, but as summer approached, this difference became less. Ψ1 values at midday for Bengal were always much lower than for Kwai May Pink. The linear model, E = G(Ψ1-Ψsoil), where E is transpiration rate and G is whole plant conductance, was found to be valid for nearly all the data sets collected. The values of G for Kwai May Pink were higher than for Bengal, especially in summer, and the average values of G (Bengal 4.1 and Kwai May Pink 6.3 mmol H2O m-2 s-1 Mpa-1) indicate that the lychee has a relatively efficient water transport system compared with other fruit tree species. Laboratory measurements of the responses of these cultivars confirmed observed differences in gs in the field. The responses of each cultivar to irradiance (I), leaf temperature (Tl) and leaf-air water vapour pressure deficit (D) were obtained and used to model the orchard data. The equation (see pdf) where Topt is the temperature for maximum gs, gdark is the basal gs in the dark at given T1 and D, and kI, kT and kD are constants fitted by non-linear least squares, provided an acceptable fit for both cultivars (R2 = 0.68 for Bengal and 0.55 for Kwai May Pink). The fit was not improved by including Ψ1 in the model. There was a significant difference between cultivars in kT, the temperature sensitivity coefficient. Possible implications of inter-cultivar differences in temperature sensitivity are discussed.


The Black female is assaulted in her tender years by all those common forces of nature at the same time she is caught in the tripartite crossfire of masculine prejudice, white illogical hate and Black lack of power. The fact that the adult American Negro female emerges a formidable character is often met with amazement, distaste and even belligerence. It is seldom accepted as an inevitable outcome of the struggle won by survivors and deserves respect if not enthusiastic admiration.


Genes, Peoples and Languages by Luigi Cavalli-Sforza Princeton University Press The New York Times has hailed Genes, Peoples, and Languages, the new book by Professor Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, the dean of population geneticists, for "dismantling the idea of race." In the New York Review of Books, Jared Diamond salutes Cavalli- Sforza for "demolishing scientists' attempts to classify human populations into races in the same way that they classify birds and other species into races". Cavalli-Sforza himself has written, "The classification into races has proved to be a futile exercise"; that his research is "expected to undermine the popular belief that there are clearly defined races, [and] to contribute to the elimination of racism"; and that "The idea of race in the human species serves no purpose." Don't believe any of this. This is merely a politically correct smoke screen that Cavalli-Sforza regularly pumps out that keeps his life's work - identifying the myriad races of mankind and compiling their genealogies - from being defended by the commissars of acceptable thinking at Stanford. What's striking is how the press falls for his squid ink, even though Cavalli-Sforza can't resist proudly putting his genetic map showing the main races of mankind right on the cover of his 1994 magnum opus, "The History and Geography of Human Genes." This is Cavalli-Sforza's own description of the map that is the capstone of his half century of labor in human genetics: "The color map of the world shows very distinctly the differences that we know exist among the continents: Africans (yellow), Caucasoids (green), Mongoloids ... (purple), and Australian Aborigines (red). The map does not show well the strong Caucasoid component in northern Africa, but it does show the unity of the other Caucasoids from Europe, and in West, South, and much of Central Asia." Basically, all his number-crunching has produced a map that looks about like what you'd get if you gave Strom Thurmond a paper napkin and a box of crayons and had him draw a racial map of the world. In fact, at the global level, Cavalli-Sforza has largely confirmed the prejudices of the more worldly 19th Century imperialists. Rudyard Kipling and Cecil Rhodes could have hunkered down together and whipped up something rather like this map in honor of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. Cavalli-Sforza's new book, Genes, Peoples, and Languages, is a surprisingly readable updating of a series of lectures on his work that he's been giving for years. …


Many students will have started their digital footprint before they have even begun their University experience but do our students know what they should or shouldn't post on social media and the consequences that any ill-considered posts may have on their future employability? At VetEd 2017 we presented a needs analysis survey which identified key areas of digital identity, wellbeing and professionalism which concerned undergraduate veterinary students. We went on to develop resources to support students in recognizing the impact of their online presence and introduced these into our curriculum.

The "Digital Professionalism & Your Online Presence" activity was integrated as a required activity in the Professional and Legal Responsibilities section of the Professional and Clinical experience (PaCE) programme in the third and fourth year of the BVMS programme at Glasgow University Vet School. Students were required to review online resources designed to enhance their awareness of their own online presence and to understand the privacy settings on various social media accounts. They were then tasked with viewing their own online self from the point of view of an employer and report their findings. This self-directed online task was well received by students and provoked some interesting discussions. It was simple to introduce and required relatively low staff input to run. This poster will present further details of the implementation of these activities, an analysis of the student experience and our planned next steps.


Trilateration is one of the well-known threat models to the user's location privacy in location-based apps; especially those contain highly sensitive information such as dating apps. The threat model mainly bases on the publicly shown distance from a targeted victim to the adversary to pinpoint the victim's location. As a countermeasure, most of location-based apps have already implemented the "hide distance" function, or added noise to the publicly shown distance in order to protect their user's location privacy. The effectiveness of such approaches however is still questionable. Therefore, in this paper, we investigate how the popular location-based dating apps are currently protecting their user's privacy by testing three popular GLBT-focused apps: Grindr, Jack'd, and Hornet. We found that Jack'd has the most privacy issues among the three apps. As one of our findings, we also show how the adversary can still figure out the location of a targeted victim even when the "show distance" function is disabled in Grindr. Without using sophisticated hacking techniques, our proposed model (called colluding-trilateration) is still very effective and efficient at locating the targeted victim, and of course in a so-called "legal" manner, because we only utilize the information that can be obtained just as same as any other ordinary user. In case of Hornet, although it has adopted location obfuscation in its system, we were not only able to discover its noise-adding pattern by conducting empirical analysis, but also able to apply the colluding trilateration used in Grindr to locate the targeted victim regardless of the location obfuscation. Our study thus raises an urgent alarm to the users of those location-based apps in general and GLBT-focused dating apps in particular about their privacy. Finally, the paper concludes by suggesting some possible solutions from the viewpoints of both the LBS provider and the user considering the implementation cost and the trade-off of utility.


How the insane asylum became a laboratory of democracy is revealed in this provocative look at the treatment of the mentally ill in nineteenth-century France. Political thinkers reasoned that if government was to rest in the hands of individuals, then measures should be taken to understand the deepest reaches of the self, including the state of madness. Marcel Gauchet and Gladys Swain maintain that the asylum originally embodied the revolutionary hope of curing all the insane by saving the glimmer of sanity left in them. Their analysis of why this utopian vision failed ultimately constitutes both a powerful argument for liberalism and a direct challenge to Michel Foucault's indictment of liberal institutions.The creation of an artificial environment was meant to encourage the mentally ill to live as social beings, in conditions that resembled as much as possible those prevailing in real life. The asylum was therefore the first instance of a modern utopian community in which a scientifically designed environment was supposed to achieve complete control over the minds of a whole category of human beings. Gauchet and Swain argue that the social domination of the inner self, far from being the hidden truth of emancipation, represented the failure of its overly optimistic beginnings."Madness and Democracy" combines rich details of nineteenth-century asylum life with reflections on the crucial role of subjectivity and difference within modernism. Its final achievement is to show that the lessons learned from the failure of the asylum led to the rise of psychoanalysis, an endeavor focused on individual care and on the cooperation between psychiatrist and patient. By linking the rise of liberalism to a chapter in the history of psychiatry, Gauchet and Swain offer a fascinating reassessment of political modernity.


Abstract Niger (Guizotia abyssinica Cass) is an important minor oilseed crop of hilly and tribal regions and it is used for oil as well as for various other purposes only by the tribal people. Therefore, a systematic study was arranged to document about the increase in the seed yield of niger crop in relation to honeybees (Aphis mellifera), as a pollinator in niger crop with paired plot technique at the Niger Research Station (NRS) at Navsari Agricultural University (NAU) and at farmer's field, Vanarasi, Navsari, Gujarat (India) and also studied its relation in terms of cost benefit ratio (CB). The trial was conducted at Niger Research Station (NRS), Vanarasi for 3 years (2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16) and also at farmer's field to ascertain the role and involvement of honey bees (Aphis mellifera) in swelling the seed yield of niger crop (due to pollination) and its effect on income due to increase in the niger seed yield. Significant differences were observed for number of capitula/plant, number of seeds/capitula, 1000 seed weight and seed yield in both the location for the consecutive 3 years. However, the seed yield and gross returns were considerably higher in first location of T1 Natural plot/open pollinated with beehive (Aphis mellifera) in all the 3 years data with the maximum seed yield with the gross return was obtained in this treatment.


Many of the artificial intelligence techniques developed to date rely on heuristic search through large spaces. Unfortunately, the size of these spaces and corresponding computational effort reduce the applicability of otherwise novel and effective algorithms. A number of parallel and distributed approaches to search have considerably improved the performance of certain aspects of the search process. In this paper we describe the EUREKA system, which combines the benefits of many different approaches to parallel heuristic search. EUREKA uses a machine learning system to decide upon the optimal parallel search strategy for a given problem space. When a new search task is input to the system, EUREKA gathers information about the search space and automatically selects the appropriate search strategy. EUREKA includes diverse approaches to task distribution, load balancing, and tree ordering, and has been tested on a MIMD parallel processor, a distributed network of workstations, and a single workstation using multithreading. Results in the fifteen puzzle domain, robot arm path planning domain, and an artificial domain indicate that EUREKA outperforms any existing strategy used exclusively for all problem instances.


Several magnesium matrix composites were investigated by means of mechanical spectroscopy. A modulus anomaly has been observed in the composites reinforced with fibers while the phenomenon does not occur with particles. This effect is attributed to bonding and debonding of fibers to the matrix, which is due to thermal stress relaxation by motion of dislocations. The modulus anomaly depends strongly on the orientation of the glide plane of the dislocations with respect to the matrix–fiber interface and on the aspect ratio of the fibers.


We investigate the survivable traffic grooming problem with inverse multiplexing in telecommunication mesh networks employing next-generation SONET/SDH and WDM. With the support of virtual concatenation, a connection of any bandwidth can be provisioned as several subconnections (i.e., inverse multiplexed) over diverse paths. Therefore, it is important to efficiently groom and protect these low-speed subconnections onto high-capacity wavelength channels, considering the typical constraints. We propose and investigate the characteristics of survivable multipath traffic grooming with protection-at-connection and protection-at-lightpath levels for grooming connections with shared protection, subject to the constraints of the inverse-multiplexing factor, differential-delay constraint, and grooming ports. Since this problem is NP-complete, we propose effective heuristics using a novel analytical model. Our results show that (1) the network performance, in metrics of bandwidth blocking ratio and resource overbuild, can be notably improved by exploiting the inverse-multiplexing capability, (2) tight constraints have negative impact on performance, (3) protection-at-connection performs better in most cases of multipath provisioning when the constraints are not too tight, and (4) protection-at-lightpath achieves better performance when the number of grooming ports is moderate or small.


Introduction: Regarding the advantages of breastfeeding in terms of nutritional values and immunity, saving 5.1 million children annually, it seems that related factors should be recognized in this field and mothers must be encouraged to use their own milk to feed infants. Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate and compare the quality of breastfeeding in postpartum mother's undergone cesarean and vaginal delivery. Materials and Methods: In this causal-comparative study, 113 mothers and newborn infants by cesarean section and normal delivery in 2015 in Military Family Hospitals, Najmieh, Besat, Chamran and Hagar in Tehran were compared. The quality of breastfeeding was evaluated using infant breastfeeding evaluation checklist. Results: Breastfeeding quality of women›s means and standard deviations in normal vaginal delivery and cesarean were 110.66 ± 12.36 and 114.35 ± 5.89, respectively (P=0.045). Discussion and Conclusions: The study showed that mothers who deliver vaginally compared to caesarean have a better quality of breastfeeding. Mothers who had natural delivery were more successful at breastfeeding and higher quality of life.


In this paper, we focus on an interface problem. Two fluids immiscible satisfying stationary Navier-Stokes equations, with transmission boundary conditions on the interface are considered. We use topological optimization tools to get a topological sensitivity of a given cost function, in order to do numerical simulations locating the interface that separates the two fluids. In fact the obtained numerical results permit to see the comportment or the behavior of the fluids when changing the pressure in one compartment.


1. Rest and equilibrium length muscle sarcomeres are composed of thin filaments (actin) which traverse the sarcomeres from the Z membranes up to the H band; at this level the filaments are considerably thicker and less numerous. 2. Shortening of muscle is associated with a transformation of thin into thick filaments in the A band. 3. These observations are discussed in terms of interaction of actin and myosin to form a supercoiled structure as the basis of contraction.


Abstract Piezoelectric wafer active sensors (PWAS) are lightweight and inexpensive transducers that enable a large class of structural health monitoring (SHM) applications such as: (a) embedded guided wave ultrasonics, i.e., pitch-catch, pulse-echo, phased arrays; (b) high-frequency modal sensing, i.e., electro-mechanical impedance method; and (c) passive detection. The focus of this paper is on the challenges posed by using PWAS transducers in the composite laminate structures as different from the metallic structures on which this methodology was initially developed. After a brief introduction, the paper reviews the PWAS-based SHM principles. It follows with a discussion of guided wave propagation in composites and PWAS tuning effects. Then, the mechanical effect is discussed on the integration of piezoelectric wafer inside the laminate using a compression after impact. Experiments were performed on a glass fibre laminate, employing PWAS to measure the attenuation coefficient. Finally, the paper presents some experimental and multi-physics finite element method (MP-FEM) results on guided wave propagation in composite laminate specimens.


Code-based game-playing is a popular methodology for proving security of cryptographic constructions and side-channel countermeasures. This methodology relies on treating cryptographic proofs as an instance of relational program verification (between probabilistic programs), and decomposing the latter into a series of elementary relational program verification steps. In this paper, we develop principled methods for proving such elementary steps for probabilistic programs that operate over finite fields and related algebraic structures. We focus on three essential properties: program equivalence, information flow, and uniformity. We give characterizations of these properties based on deducibility and other notions from symbolic cryptography. We use (sometimes improve) tools from symbolic cryptography to obtain decision procedures or sound proof methods for program equivalence, information flow, and uniformity. Finally, we evaluate our approach using examples drawn from provable security and from side-channel analysis - for the latter, we focus on the masking countermeasure against differential power analysis. A partial implementation of our approach is integrated in EasyCrypt, a proof assistant for provable security, and in MaskVerif, a fully automated prover for masked implementations.


Australia is one of a small number of countries to criminalise forced marriage, introduced into the Criminal Code 1995 in 2013 as a slavery-like practice. However, unlike other nations where forced marriage is a criminal offence, there has been little formal examination of the nature and context of forced marriage in Australia and the consequences (positive and negative) of criminalising this practice. This report uses interviews with victim/survivors of forced marriage, community members and government and non-government stakeholders in Australia and New Zealand (where forced marriage is not criminalised) to describe the perceptions and realities of forced marriage, including the circumstances of the marriage, experiences of victim/survivors while married and their help-seeking behaviours, and post-marriage support and consequences. It also examines the course of intervention adopted in Australia to respond to forced marriage and the cultural challenges to these interventions.


Dealing with problems of corrosion in a tritiated medium requires a thorough knowledge of this medium. This knowledge starts with a description of the various processes, i.e., the manufacture of tritiated end products and waste reprocessing. These operations make use of loops that are exposed to the corrosive media throughout the various continuous or batch processes. The problems of corrosion in several installations are dealt with by various resources, methods, or techniques directly adapted to these installations. These are physicochemical analyses to ascertain the composition of the concentrated or diluted tritiated media (water, gas), characterization of surfaces of superalloys or stainless steels in the tritiated media, in-depth televisual examinations of the process itself, and examinations of components corroded in the manufacture of tritiated products or in dismantling.


This manual has been written to respond to the need of making available an exhaustive compilation in the Italian language of the main topics and problems of the political economy of development in poor countries. So far, a discussion of such topics in Italian has not been available. The drafting of this manual has benefitted from the teaching and research experience of several academics of the faculty of economics of the university of Florence. Part 1 focuses on key methodological approaches derived from the theory of collective choices. In turn, Part 2 discusses the orthodox and heterodox macroeconomic reforms applied in developing countries, and their problems. Part 3 illustrates the domestic policies that have been or should have been adopted in the field of food security, land reform, environmental sustainability, taxation, social spending, labor markets and population. Part 4 discusses then the domestic policy reforms in the field of international trade, foreign direct investments, capital flows and international migration. Last, Part 5 illustrates the historical experience of five policy regimes (i.e. the import substituting industrialization, redistributive approaches, the Asian Miracle, Washington Consensus, and Sustainable Development) that have been introduced in the non-socialist developing countries between the decolonization of the 1950s and the present time. The methodological approach followed in the manual starts from an evaluation of the real-life impact on growth, income distribution, the wellbeing of the population, and the environment of the policies adopted during each policy regime and in the main economic areas. Whenever the policy measures introduced in the past generated unsatisfactory results, the manual suggests possible alternatives inspired by the structuralist and Keynesian schools.


Increased levels of nitrate in ground water have made many wells unsuitable as sources for drinking water. In this thesis an ion-exchang eassisted electromembrane process, suitable for nitrate removal, is investigated both theoretically and experimentally. An ion-exchange textile material is introduced as a conducting spacer in the feed compartment of an electropermutation cell. The sheet shaped structure of the textile makes it easy to incorporate into the cell. High permeability and fast ion-exchange kinetics, compared to ion-exchange resins, are other attractive features of the ion-exchange textile. A steady-state model based on the conservation of the ionic species is developed. The governing equations on the microscopic level are volume averaged to give macro-homogeneous equations. The model equations are analyzed and relevant simplifications are motivated and introduced. Dimensionless parameters governing the continuous electropermutation process are identified and their influence on the process are discussed. The mathematical model can be used as a tool when optimising the process parameters and designing equipment. An experimental study that aimed to show the positive influence of using the ion-exchange textile in the feed compartment of an continuous electropermutation process is presented. The incorporation of the ion-exchange textile significantly improves the nitrate removal rate at the same time as the power consumption is decreased. A superficial solution of sodium nitrate with a initial nitrate concentration of 105 ppm was treated. A product stream with less than 20 ppm nitrate could be obtained, in a single pass mode of operation. Its concluded from these experiments that continuous electropermutation using ion-exchange textile provides an interesting alternative for nitrate removal, in drinking water production. The predictions of the mathematical model are compared with experimental results and a good agreement is obtained. Enhanced water dissociation is known to take place at the surface of ion-exchange membranes in electromembrane processes operated above the limiting current density. A model for this enhanced water dissociation in presented in the thesis. The model makes it possible to incorporate the effect of water dissociation as a heterogeneous surface reaction. Results from simulations of electropermutation with and without ion-exchange textile incorporated are presented. The influence of the water dissociation is investigated with the developed model.


ABSTRACT In this paper we model growth using a scale-neutral approach to innovation allowing differences between regions to emerge due to regional mechanisms. In this model, agglomeration is growth enhancing as the scale effect for innovation arises from greater access to knowledge rather than any assumed scale effects in growth-modelling techniques. Furthermore, entrepreneurs are assumed to choose the location of firms endogenously so as to minimize the costs of innovation, transport and living. The effects of such mechanisms are such that any policies that increase knowledge spillovers between locations will enhance growth and equality, but may be destabilizing for agglomeration.


Abstract Coral bioherms of the Vršatec Limestone that formed massive, several tens of meters thick complexes during the Jurassic were important sources of carbonate production, with carbonate sediment exported to deeper parts of the Pieniny Klippen Basin (Western Carpathians). However, the age of these carbonate factories remains controversial. New analyses of benthic foraminiferal assemblages occurring in coral bioherms and peri-biohermal deposits of the Vršatec Limestone at five sites in the western Pieniny Klippen Belt (Vršatec-Castle, Vršatec-Javorníky, Malé Hradište, Malé Hradište-Kalvária, and Drieňová Hora) show that these sediments were deposited during the Bajocian and were lateral equivalents of crinoidal limestones and breccias, in contrast to previous studies suggesting that they were deposited during the Oxfordian. First, all sites are characterized by similar composition of foraminiferal assemblages on the basis of presence–absence data, although foraminiferal assemblages in biosparitic facies at Vršatec are dominated by miliolids whereas biomicritic facies at Malé Hradište are dominated by the spirillinid Paalzowella. The composition of foraminiferal assemblages does not differ between the lower and upper parts of the Vršatec Limestone. Second, foraminifer species that were assumed to appear for the first time in the Oxfordian already occur in the Middle Jurassic sediments of the northern Tethyan shelf. Third, the first and last appearances of foraminifers documented in other Tethyan regions are in accordance with stratigraphic analyses and ammonoid occurrences, demonstrating that bioherm-forming coral communities developed on the Czorzstyn Ridge during the Bajocian. Several species of foraminifers of the Vršatec Limestone appeared for the first time during the middle or late Aalenian (Labalina occulta, Paalzowella feifeli) and during the Bajocian (Hungarillina lokutiense, Radiospirillina umbonata, Ophthalmidium caucasicum, O. terquemi, O. obscurum, Paalzowella turbinella, Cornuspira tubicomprimata, Nubecularia reicheli) or appeared for the last time in the Bajocian (Tethysiella pilleri) or Early Bathonian (Ophthalmidium caucasicum, O. obscurum). The composition and diversity of communities with benthic foraminifers of the Vršatec Limestone is similar to the composition of foraminiferal communities on carbonate platform environments with corals of the French Jura and Burgundy during the Bajocian.


This paper summarises some of the key findings of the post-intervention study of the project "Women on the Move". The intervention targeted women traumatised by war and violence and took place between 2012 and 2016 in the county of Kajo-Keji, South Sudan. We examined the impact of the project's trauma-informed sport and play-based intervention on women's mental health and perceived availability of social support. The intervention provided psychosocial support, aimed at strengthening the women's resilience and coping abilities as well as improving their health and promoting social cohesion. We used a quasi-experimental study design with measurement points preand postintervention (nine months and three and a half years after the start of the activities, respectively). The questionnaire analysed a range of variables (demographics, health, challenges, coping abilities, social support and income generating activities), most of which were investigated with the use of culturally adapted versions of internationally validated psychometric scales. The results indicate that the women's perceived availability of social support increased and their mental health improved significantly over the course of the project.


Abstract Gene regulatory networks capture interactions between genes and other cell substances, resulting in various models for the fundamental biological process of transcription and translation. The expression levels of the genes are typically measured in mRNA concentrations in micro-array experiments. In a so called genetic perturbation experiment, small perturbations are applied to equilibrium states and the resulting changes in expression activity are measured. This paper develops a novel algorithm that identifies a sparse stable genetic network that explains noisy genetic perturbation experiments obtained at equilibrium. Our identification algorithm can also incorporate a variety of possible prior knowledge of the network structure, which can be either qualitative, specifying positive, negative or no interactions between genes, or quantitative, specifying a range of interaction strength. Our method is based on a convex programming relaxation for handling the sparsity constraint, and therefore is applicable to the identification of genome-scale genetic networks.


In this publication we present Immersive Networking as a novel framework for connecting people and places and things in virtual environments with augmented reality to be used in eg. Virtual training environments. The research is mandated by technology advances in internetworking underpinned by 5G networks and Internet-of-Things. These advances present new possibilities and challenges to integrate people, places and things in virtual environments. Existing frameworks such as MPEG-V possess representational capabilities but have insufficient support for integrating entities from the real world via heterogeneous infrastructure. MPEG-V for instance makes no statements about distributed control. Seamless experiences in virtual environment require self-organization of connectivity between people, places and things via heterogeneous 5G and Internet-ofThings infrastructures. A second important aspect of the quality of our experience is the immediacy of responses. Both aspects of seamless and self-organizing connections between entities require that we push control to the end-devices co-located with the entities themselves. These end-devices may incorporate sensing gateways and interaction devices, which include both local and non-local information from the virtual environment in the interaction. Thus delegation of control to end-devices requires means for the organizing or relations and clustering by relevance. This capability is particularly important as the projected number of devices and sensors to be connected via the Internet-of-Things is projected to be in the order of 50 billion by 2020. Immersive Networking supported by MediaSense [1] constitutes a scalable self-organizing means for connecting people and places and things in virtual environments with augmented reality. MediaSense moves control to the edge enabling immediacy in experiences based on seamless self-organization through clustering of entities in relations organized by relevance. We conclude by validating our approach in several scenarios evaluating the relevance and application in human decision-making.


In this thesis we investigate astrophysical phenomena which arise in models with compact extra dimensions, focussing on the cosmological consequences of strings which wrap cycles in the internal space. Embedding our strings in the Klebanov-Strassler geometry we develop a concrete model of cosmic necklaces and investigate the formation of primordial black holes and dark matter relics from necklace collapse. Using data from the EGRET cosmic ray experiment, we place bounds on the parameters which define the warped deformed conifold, including the value of the warp factor and the radius of the compact space. Chapter 1 provides a brief overview, while background material is included in chapter 2, and these results are presented in chapter 3. In chapter 4 we analyse the dynamics of wound strings with angular momentum in the compact dimensions and determine the equation of motion for a self-oscillating loop. Finally, in chapter 5 we suggest a field-theoretic dual for wound-string necklaces based on a modification of the standard Abelian-Higgs model. After introducing spatially-dependent couplings for the scalar and vector fields, we propose a static, non-cylindrically symmetric solution of the resulting field equations which describes a "pinched" string with neighbouring vortex and anti-vortex regions. The similarities between pinched strings and the four-dimensional appearance of wound-string states are then examined and a correspondence between field theory and string theory parameters is suggested. We find that the topological winding number of the field theory vortex may be expressed in terms of parameters which define the winding of the dual string around the compact space. According to this relation, the topological charge is equal to unity when the string has zero windings, and the standard Nielsen-Olesen duality is recovered in this limit. One key result of this work is an estimate of the Higgs boson mass (at critical coupling) in terms of the parameters which define the Klebanov-Strassler geometry and which, in principle, may be constrained by cosmological observations.


The Neoproterozoic contains severe glacial intervals (750–580 Ma) including two extending to low palaeomagnetic latitudes. Paucity of radiometric dates indicates the need for chronostratigraphic tools. Whereas the marine 87Sr/86Sr signatures show a steady rise, δ13C fluctuates, the most reproducible variations being negative signatures in carbonate caps to glacial units, but more diagenetic work is needed. Four conceptual models for the icehouse conditions are contrasted: Zipper-Rift Earth (diachronous glaciation related to continental rift margins), High-tilt Earth (high-obliquity and preferential low-latitude glaciation), Snowball Earth (extreme glaciation related to runaway ice–albedo feedback) and Slushball Earth (coexistence of unfrozen oceans and sea-level glaciers in the tropics). Climate models readily simulate runaway glaciation, but the Earth may not be able to recover from it. The Slushball state requires more extensive modelling. Biogeochemical models highlight the lack of CO2 buffering in the Neoproterozoic and the likely transition from a methane- to a CO2-dominated climate system. Relevant processes include tropical weathering of volcanic provinces, and new land biotas stimulating both clay mineral formation and P delivery to the oceans, facilitating organic C burial. Hence a step change in the Earth System was probably both facilitated by organisms and responsible for moderating Phanerozoic climate.


I. INTRODUCTION In recent years there has been dramatic growth in the hedge fund industry, accompanied by an equally sizable increase in the public notoriety of such funds. Hedge funds currently control a substantial portion of trading in many financial markets and are subject to less federal regulation than nearly any other type of financial entity or institution.1 Their significant holdings, opaque nature and lack of governmental oversight place hedge funds squarely in the spotlight of the public and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC").2 In the ten year period from 1999 to 2008, the SEC brought over 130 enforcement actions against hedge funds.3 Specifically, the SEC has recently made cases involving insider trading within hedge funds a priority, a change that can be attributed to the perception that there is widespread insider trading in these funds.4 This Note illustrates why the structure of hedge funds makes them prone to instances of insider trading and why the SEC struggles to deal with this problem. Part II of this Note details the basic structure of hedge funds and how they operate on a day-to-day basis. Part III examines the relevant legal theories, case law and federal securities laws governing insider trading cases. Part IV discusses the susceptibility of hedge funds to insider trading due to their structure and the organization of the financial markets in which they operate. Part V describes how the SEC brings an insider trading enforcement action against a hedge fund and the problems that come along with it. Part VI highlights several recent insider trading cases involving hedge funds and their advisers. Part VII concludes by explaining what action the SEC should take. II. THE STRUCTURE OF HEDGE FUNDS While the term "hedge fund" has become well-known in recent years, no formal definition exists for what classifies a business entity as a "hedge fund."5 Instead, hedge funds are categorized by the following characteristics: a business that is not an investment company, holding a wide range of securities and other assets, and not required to register its holdings with the SEC.6 Furthermore, hedge funds are known to have a small number of investors, can use leverage without restriction, and provide performance fees for their advisers.7 Hedge funds are structured to avoid tax consequences and to limit their liability. These goals are accomplished by organizing funds as limited partnerships or limited liability corporations.8 Investors in these funds tend to be "wealthy individuals and institutions," because regulatory restrictions require minimum investments in hedge funds ranging from $100,000 to as high as $5 million.9 Alfred Winslow Jones established the first hedge fund in 1947 and labeled it to reflect its investment strategy of "hedging" its bets, accomplished through the short-selling of some securities while simultaneously taking long positions in others.10 However, the term "hedge fund" is no longer associated with that practice, instead referring to entities that are "private and unregistered investment pooI[s]."" While numbers can never be exact due to their unregistered status, there are approximately 6,000 to 9,000 hedge funds that are believed to collectively maintain over $1 trillion worth of assets in total.12 The exponential growth of the hedge fund industry in the last several decades can be credited to their unregulated nature, which allows them to take advantage of market conditions by investing in a wide range of securities without being affected by leverage requirements.13 Hedge funds tend to be much more highly leveraged than other investment vehicles. Leverage is "[t]he use of credit or borrowed funds to. . .increase an investment's rate of return."14 Other investment vehicles like mutual funds and investment banks are subject to restrictions on the amount of leverage that they can use to purchase securities.15 Hedge funds, however, have none of these restrictions. …


HIV integration occurs in chromatin sites that favor the release of high levels of viral progeny, alternatively the virus is also able to discreetly coexist with the host. The viral infection perturbs the cellular environment inducing the remodeling of the nuclear landscape. Indeed, HIV-1 triggers the nuclear clustering of the host factor CPSF6, but the underlying mechanism is poorly understood. Our data indicate that HIV usurps a recently discovered biological phenomenon, called liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS), to hijack the host cell. We observed CPSF6 clusters as part of HIV-induced membraneless organelles (HIV-1 MLOs) in macrophages, which are one of the main HIV target cells. We describe that HIV-1 MLOs follow phase separation rules and represent functional biomolecular condensates. We highlight HIV-1 MLOs as hubs of nuclear reverse transcription, while the double stranded viral DNA, once formed, rapidly migrates outside these structures. Transcription-competent proviruses localize outside, but near HIV-1 MLOs, in LEDGF-abundant regions, known to be active chromatin sites. Therefore, HIV-1 MLOs orchestrate viral events prior to the integration step and create a favorable environment for the viral replication. This study uncovers single functional host-viral complexes in their nuclear landscape, which is markedly restructured by HIV-1.


The Ezafe particle is well known from recent work on Persian syntax, but its historical origins and developmental pathways have received less attention. This chapter redresses the balance by considering the Ezafe in a related West Iranian language, Northern Kurdish. In Northern Kurdish, the Ezafe has largely retained its demonstrative/relativizer origins, and also occurs as a nominalizer in the sense employed in this volume. In Modern Persian, however, these characteristics have entirely disappeared, and the Ezafe is merely a NP-internal Linker. I suggest that there is no reason to afford Persian any special priority when evaluating the developmental pathways of the Ezafe particle as a whole within the West Iranian languages. I also discuss an additional development within Northern Kurdish, where the Ezafe particle has become part of the predicate complex, echoing similar developments in a number of unrelated languages.


Objectives: To quantitatively synthesize both the prevalence of anxiety caseness in informal dementia caregivers, and the efficacy of low-intensity CBT-based interventions on the outcomes of anxiety, depression, burden, and distress (defined as stress/strain).

Methods: Systematic literature searches were conducted using electronic databases for published and unpublished literature. A random-effects meta-analysis was conducted using events and sample size data to obtain a pooled anxiety prevalence estimate. Four random-effects meta-analyses were conducted using pre and post intervention outcome measures to obtain pooled effects of low-intensity CBT-based intervention on anxiety, depression, burden and distress.

Results: Ten studies were included in the analysis of anxiety prevalence, resulting in a pooled estimate of anxiety prevalence at 32.1 percent (95% CI 20.6% to 46.2%, p=0.01). Significant heterogeneity was found, which could not be fully explored by subsequent sensitivity and subgroup analyses, due the limited number of studies. The number of studies included in the low-intensity CBT-based intervention meta-analyses differed across outcomes (anxiety N = 5; depression N = 12; burden N = 3; distress N = 6). The meta-analyses demonstrated significant reductions of all outcome variables. Small effects sizes were found for the reduction of anxiety (g = 0.35), depression (g = 0.27) and distress (g = 0.33). A medium effect was found for burden (g = 0.53).

Conclusions: Anxiety is a prevalent psychological difficulty experienced by informal dementia caregivers and should be afforded greater attention in the dementia caregiver literature. Low-intensity CBT-based interventions show initial promise in reducing anxiety, depression, burden and distress in dementia caregivers, however more research is required to establish the most important aspects of such interventions. Additional research recommendations and clinical implications are discussed. Limitations of both studies should be considered prior to generalising results.


Integration of geophysical logs with sedimentological, biostratigraphic, and physical properties data from poorly recovered chert-rich sequences at Ocean Drilling Program Leg 198 Sites 1207 and 1213 allows us to propose an Aptian–Albian (Early Cretaceous) depositional history for Shatsky Rise (North Pacific Ocean). The logs indicate that the lower Aptian and lower Albian deposits are relatively lithified and unporous compared to contiguous sediments. These characteristics are best explained by increased siliceous cementation that resulted from an elevated flux of radiolarians to the seafloor. The intervals of increased biosiliceous production may record a biotic response to enhanced nutrient delivery, coeval with (but longer in duration than) oceanic anoxic events (OAEs) 1a (early Aptian) and 1b (early Albian). On Shatsky Rise, OAE 1a is represented by organic-carbon-rich sediments, but OAE 1b is not. Thus "black shale" deposition in the Pacific Ocean was only possible when a "carbon-burial threshold" was crossed. We speculate that this threshold was related to the balance between productivity and carbon oxidation and that, ultimately, the supply of biolimiting nutrients through hydrothermal alteration of basalt may have been the key to the development of "black shale" in the Pacific basin.


Bacillus anthracis is a spore-forming bacterium that is included on the list of select agents compiled by the Centers for Disease Control. When a B. anthracis spore germinates, a protective layer of peptidoglycan known as the cortex must be depolymerized by germinationspecific lytic enzymes (GSLEs) before the bacterium can become a metabolically active vegetative cell. By exploiting cortex lytic enzymes it may be possible to control germination. This could be beneficial in elucidating ways to enhance current decontamination methods. In this work we created in-frame deletion mutants to study not only the role of one GSLE, SleL, but by creating multi-deletion mutants, we were able to analyze how the protein cooperates with other lytic enzymes to efficiently hydrolyze the cortical PG. We determined that SleL plays an auxiliary role in complete peptidoglycan hydrolysis, secondary to cortex lytic enzymes CwlJ1, CwlJ2, and SleB. The loss of sleL results in a delay in the loss of optical density during germination. However, spores are capable of completing germination as long as CwlJ1 or SleB remains active. HPLC analysis of muropeptides collected from B. anthracis sleL strains indicates that SleL is an N-acetylglucosamidase that acts on cortical PG to produce small muropeptides which are quickly released from the germinating spore. By analyzing the in vitro and in vivo activities of SleL we confirmed the enzymatic activity of the protein, characterized its substrates, and studied the roles of its putative LysM domains in substrate binding and spore-protein association. We were able to show that purified SleL is capable of depolymerizing partially digested spore PG resulting in the production of Nacetylglucosaminidase products that are readily released as small muropeptides. In vitro, loss of (iii) the LysM domain(s) decreases hydrolysis effectiveness. The reduction in hydrolysis is likely due to LysM domains being involved in substrate recognition and PG binding. When the SleL derivatives are expressed in vivo those proteins lacking one or both LysM domains do not associate with the spore, suggesting that LysM is involved in directing protein localization.


The cells of the nervous system can be characterized by their well formed cell processes and by the cell-to-cell relationships that they form. The neuron displays essentially cylindrical processes, i.e. round in cross section, which form synaptic junctions with either other neuronal processes or with other target cells. A variety of pathologic processes involve alterations of either the neuronal processes or the synapses. On the other hand, the functional, peripheral portions of the processes of the glial cells are largely sheet-like in nature. Frequently, the connecting link between the functional sheet-like process and the glial cell body is round in section like the neuronal process, but the peripheral parts of the process are not. Thus, the interfascicular oligodendroglial cell elaborates several sheet-like processes, each of which forms a segment of the myelin sheath. An unusual cell junction, the transverse bands is present at the interface of the oligodendroglial process and the axonal surface. Numerous pathological alterations occur in the oligodendroglial cells that may lead to demyelination. These may sometimes be the result of defects in the glial process, conceivably in the transverse bands or the tight junction which isolates the interlamellar spaces from the extracellular space. Finally, the astrocytes, too, form elaborate sheet-like processes that separate most of the central nervous system from the mesodermal and mesenchymal tissues as well as surround some neuronal surfaces, including certain synapses. Gap junctions and other adhesive devices are found between astrocytic processes. Several pathological conditions are characterized by defects or anomalies in the astrocytic periphery.


Focusing on the 'second reign' of Queen Elizabeth I (1588-1603), this thesis constitutes the first significant socio-political examination of Elizabethan Devon – a geographically peripheral county, yet strategically central in matters pertaining to national defence and security. A complex web of personal associations and informal alliances underpinned politics and governance in Tudor England; but whereas a great deal is now understood about relations between both the political elite and the organs of government at the centre of affairs, many questions still remain unanswered about how networks of political actors functioned at a provincial and neighbourhood level, and how these networks kept in touch with one another, central government and the court. Consequently, this study is primarily concerned with power and communication. In particular, it investigates and models the interconnected networks of government within late-Elizabethan Devon and explains precisely how the county's officials (at every level) shared information with the Crown and each other. The raison d'être of this study is, therefore, to probe the character and articulation of the power geometries at the south-western fringe of Elizabethan England. The closing years of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I represent a decisive phase in the evolution of the English nation state, one that saw the appointment of lord lieutenants on a more widespread and long-standing basis, the consistent training of certain sections of the county militias, the expansion of the pre-existing government post-stage service, a heightened degree of dealings between every echelon of administration and an obvious increase in the amount of information that flowed from the localities into the capital. The primary causes of each of these developments were the Elizabethan war with Spain (1585-1604) and the rebellion in Ireland (1594-1603), and it is demonstrated throughout this thesis that Devon, a strategically essential county during this period of political turmoil, provides an excellent case study for evaluating the impact that each had on the Crown's ability to control the periphery whilst being spatially anchored at the court. Furthermore, by examining each of these developments the thesis fundamentally undercuts the tenacious assertion that geographically marginal regions of Tudor territory were inward-looking, remote and disconnected from events that were unfolding on a national and international level. URI http://hdl.handle.net/10026.1/1469 Collections 01 Research Theses Main Collection Publisher University of Plymouth Commissioning body Faculty of Arts Networks, News and Communication: Political Elites and Community Relations in Elizabethan Devon, 1588-1603 


Abstract. We describe CO2 concentration measurement systems based on relatively inexpensive single-cell non-dispersive infrared CO2 sensors. The systems utilize signal averaging to obtain precision (1-σ in 100 s) of 0.1 parts per million dry air mole fraction (ppm), frequent calibrations and sample drying in order to achieve state-of-the-art compatibility, and can run autonomously for months at a time. Laboratory tests indicate compatibility among four to six systems to be ±0.1 ppm (1-σ), and field measurements of known reference-gases yield median errors of 0.01 to 0.17 ppm with 1-σ variance of ±0.1 to 0.2 ppm. From May to August 2007, a system co-located with a NOAA-ESRL dual-cell NDIR system at the WLEF tall tower in Wisconsin measured daytime-only daily averages of CO2 that differ by 0.26 ± 0.15 ppm (median ± 1 σ), and from August 2005 to April 2011 a system co-located with weekly NOAA-ESRL network flask collection at Niwot Ridge, Colorado measured coincident CO2 concentrations that differed by −0.06 ± 0.30 ppm (n = 585). Data from these systems are now supporting a wide range of analyses and this approach may be applicable in future studies where accuracy and initial cost of the sensors are priorities.


By the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, the United States had to face a number of interrelated crises: the economic and financial crisis of 2008-09 coincided with the military overexpansion resulting from interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq. These developments culminated in a crisis of foreign-policy identity: the notion refers to a situation in which well-established conceptions of a country's role in the international system are questioned, and new conceptions are created and reproduced. For the U.S., this manifested in a challenge to the unipolar leadership role that had been widely accepted in the post-Cold War era. Surprisingly, this did not lead to the disappearance of discourses of "American exceptionalism" and "greatness." On the contrary, these ideas gained even greater significance in the foreign-policy debates of the 2010s, although their precise meaning was the subject of intense contestation. What explains this resurgence of exceptionalist rhetoric, and how can we characterize the different themes that appeared in these debates? The article introduces a new theoretical framework for understanding discourses of U.S. exceptionalism, and briefly examines the discourses of the Obama and the Trump presidencies. This analysis can highlight how the use of certain terms may accompany decisive changes in U.S. foreign policy, and how especially the presidency of Donald Trump signals a shift in the understanding of U.S. national role conception.


The ex-nova RR Pic presents a periodic hump in its light curve which is considered to refer to its orbital period. By analyzing all available epochs of these hump maxima in the literature and then combining them with those from new light curves obtained in 2013 and 2014, we establish an unique cycle count scheme valid during the past 50 years and derive an ephemeris with the orbital period 0.145025959(15) days. The O—C diagram of this linear ephemeris reveals systematic deviations that could have different causes. One of them could be a light-travel-time effect caused by the presence of a hypothetical third body near the star/brown dwarf mass limit, with an orbital period of the order of 70 years. We also examine the difficulty of the problematic of detecting substellar or planetary companions of close red-dwarf white-dwarf binaries (including cataclysmic variables) and discuss other possible mechanisms responsible for the observed deviations in O—C. For RR Pic, we propose strategies to solve this question by new observations.


The precise flow-rate measurement is a basic problem in the management and the exploitation of a hydraulic power-plant. The efficiency characterisation of an hydraulic machinery or of a water distribution net is linked to the accurate knowledge of the flow-rate. As well as the usual measurement methods, acoustic discharge measurement has become of great importance during the last ten years, specially due to the last development in the field of electronic and signal processing. The acoustic flow measurement uncertainties show that geometry, integration method, influence of the flow field and the interaction between the acoustic transducer and the pipe have an important influence on the measurement accuracy. In this work, the influence of the flow field on the accuracy is of great importance. To estimate the uncertainties of the acoustic discharge measurement for disturbed flow fields, laboratory tests are carried out at the hydraulic machinery laboratory LMH in order to qualify the measurement accuracy depending on the upstream distortion induced by different typical pipe configurations. Furthermore, numerical flow computations with software packages are performed to simulate the turbulent flow profiles at the location of the acoustic flow measurement. These simulations are performed for laboratory and also industrial flow configurations. Comparative discharge measurements for typical disturbed flow fields are performed on a special test rig of LMH between a reference electromagnetic flow meter and an 8 paths in two crossed planes acoustic flow-meter. The accuracy analysis, based upon all laboratory measurements shows that globally the measurement quality is excellent even in the case of a heavily disturbed flow field in the meter section. A specific analysis has to be performed at the flow-rate measurement installation in order to take into account the pipe configuration influence (for example an elbow or a gate), the developing length between the meter section and the disturbance and finally the use of crossed planes. Such analysis allows the reduction of the acoustic measurement uncertainties. The protrusion effect can also introduce an important measurement error in the acoustic measurement. Laboratory measurements in the high speed cavitation tunnel of LMH show clearly the influence of the protrusion effect. In such small dimensions in comparison with the industrial pipes, these effects are amplified and they introduce important errors. The second part of this work is based on the simulation of the velocity profiles at the location of the metering section by numerical flow computations. Comparisons between numerical results and Laser Doppler flow measurements show that the simulation and the flow physics results are in agreement with each other. Based on these convincing results, numerical flow computations are performed for an industrial power-plant in order to obtain an approximation of the flow profile in the metering section. Based on these results, an optimisation of the acoustic path installation is proposed in order to limit the uncertainties due to the flow-field in the pipe. This study is applied to the laboratory configurations and allows one to find the optimum measured orientations of the acoustic paths. Finally, this study also applies to an industrial installation.


One of the key characteristics of multicellular organisms is the ability to establish and maintain shapes, or morphologies, under a variety of physical and chemical perturbations. A quantitative description of the underlying morphological dynamics is a critical step to fully understand the self-organising properties of multicellular systems. Although many powerful mathematical tools have been developed to analyse stochastic dynamics, rarely these are applied to experimental developmental biology. Here, we take root tip regeneration in the plant model system Arabidopsis thaliana as an example of robust morphogenesis in living tissue, and present a novel approach to quantify and model the relaxation of the system to its unperturbed morphology. By generating and analysing time-lapse series of regenerating root tips captured with confocal microscopy, we are able to extract and model the dynamics of key morphological traits at cellular resolution. We present a linear stability analysis of its Markovian dynamics, with the stationary state representing the intact root in the space of morphological traits. This analysis suggests the intriguing co-existence of two distinct temporal scales during the process of root regeneration in Arabidopsis. We discuss the possible biological implications of our specific results, and suggest future experiments to further probe the self-organising properties of living tissue.


A panel of eleven monoclonal antibodies of the IgG and IgM class were developed against the HM 175 strain of the Hepatitis A virus. Immunoglobulin specificity for the Hepatitis A virus was determined and the antibodies were applied toward the development of an antigen capture assay linked to a nucleic acid amplification step, (RT-PCR), for detection of the Hepatitis A virus. The neutralizing mouse monoclonal antibody and a rabbit polyvalent serum were assessed as capture antibodies for the immunoaffinity stage of the assay. Fifty microliter microfuge tubes were coated with the capture antibody. Formalin inactivated HAV was diluted to concentrations ranging from 108 to 102 virions per aliquot. After incubation the virion capsids were disrupted by heating and the viral genome was reverse transcribed. A conserved diagnostic sequence of 191 base pairs was selected for amplification and detection of the HA virus. After the RT step, the reaction was supplemented for the PCR step. After amplification, the amplified products were resolved by agarose gel electrophoresis. The genome regions of capsid proteins VP1 and VP3 of the Hepatitis A virus (HAV) were individually amplified by PCR. Oligonucleotide primers containing flanking restriction endonuclease sequences were designed for amplification of the capsid genes. The expression vectors pTTQ18 and pAX4b+ were selected for generation of /3-galactosidase HAV fusion peptides. The fusion products contained either the alpha (a) fragment (pTTQ18) or the entire j8-galactosidase peptide (pAX4b+). The recombinant peptides were expressed in Escherichia coli. Rabbit anti-HAV sera raised against the intact HA virion reacted with the recombinant peptides by immunoblot and enzyme immunoassay. A neutralizing mouse monoclonal antibody generated against the intact HAV reacted only against the VP1 recombinant peptide by immunoblot and enzyme immunoassay. Affinity purification of the recombinant HAV peptides resulted in higher recovery of the fusion peptide containing the entire /3-galactosidase molecule. Cleavage of the VP1 recombinant peptide generated in the pAX expression vector system was assessed. The cleaved peptides reacted with both the rabbit polyvalent and the monoclonal antibody. A peptide corresponding to the expected size of VP1 (33 kDa) was demonstrated by immunoblot.


Banishment policies grant police the authority to formally ban individuals from entering public housing and arrest them for trespassing if they violate the ban. Despite its widespread use and the social consequences resulting from it, an empirical evaluation of the effectiveness of banishment has not been performed. Understanding banishment enforcement is an evolution of broken windows policing, this study explores how effective bans are at reducing crime in public housing. We analyze crime data, spanning the years 2001–2012, from six public housing communities and 13 surrounding communities in one southeastern U.S. city. Using Arellano-Bond dynamic panel models, we investigate whether or not issuing bans predicts reductions in property and violent crimes as well as increases in drug and trespass arrests in public housing. We find that this brand of broken windows policing does reduce crime, albeit relatively small reductions and only for property crime, while resulting in an increase in trespass arrests. Given our findings that these policies have only a modest impact on property crime, yet produce relatively larger increases in arrests for minor offenses in communities of color, and ultimately have no significant impact on violent crime, it will be important for police, communities, and policy makers to discuss whether the returns are worth the potential costs.


We report here the isolation and characterization of amino acid-requiring mutant strains of Rhizobium etli. We observe that the phenotype of most mutations, even when causing a strict auxotrophy, is overcome by cross-feeding from the host plant Phaseolus vulgaris, thereby allowing bacterial production of Nod factors and, consequently, nodule induction. Conversely, light and electron microscopy analysis reveals that the nodules induced by all mutants, including those with normal external morphology, are halted or strongly altered at intermediate or late stages of development. Moreover, some mutants induce nodules that display novel symbiotic phenotypes, such as specific alterations of the invaded cells or the presence of a reduced number of abnormally shaped uninvaded cells. Other mutants induce nodules showing an early and vast necrosis of the central tissue, a phenotype not previously observed in bean nodules, not even in nodules induced by a Fix- mutant. These observations indicate that amino acid auxotrophs represent a powerful tool to study the development of globose determinate-type nodules and emphasize the importance of establishing their histology and cytology before considerations of metabolic exchange are made.


Modern Synthesis Processes and Reactivity of Fluorinated Compounds focuses on the exceptional character of fluorine and fluorinated compounds. This comprehensive work explores examples taken from all classes of fluorine chemistry and illustrates the extreme reactivity of fluorinating media and the peculiar synthesis routes to fluorinated materials. The book provides advanced and updated information on the latest synthesis routes to fluorocompounds and the involved reaction mechanisms. Special attention is given to the unique reactivity of fluorine and fluorinated media, along with the correlation of those properties to valuable applications of fluorinated compounds. Contains quality content edited, and contributed, by leading scholars in the fieldPresents applied guidance on the preparation of original fluorinated compounds, potentially transferable from the lab scale to industrial applicationsProvides practical synthesis information for a wide audience interested in fluorine compounds in many branches of chemistry, materials science, and physics


The Brazilian presence in international commerce, despite the regional leadership in Latin America and the global importance of Brazil as an emerging economy, is quite limited, reaching only 1% of the world's total trade. Nevertheless, the agribusiness sector is responsible for half of the country's export and Brazil is the world leader in sugar, coffee, orange juice, tobacco, soybean and beef export. Export growth is considered to be a key factor for the economic development of the country and many governmental programs are being carried out. The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply (MAPA), through its Cooperative Department (DENACOOP), has joined these efforts. The DENACOOP export consortia program is focused on building strategic alliance in agribusiness production chain. After successful experiences in implementing in grain and honey sector, an applied research project was set up focusing on a flower production chain in Northeast of Brazil, which has the potential to improve socio-economic indicators of a low income region. To carry out the project the Federal University of Vicosa research team has developed a design and implemen-tation procedure, which was based on structuring and translating the requirements of organizations and producers into contract's clause. The consortium main clauses established that all the purchase and sale of agricultural inputs, the internal and external seedling market, roses, ornamental and vase flowers will be done together. The commercialization and the post-harvest activities will be done through the creation of a distribution center. Recently flower producers have signed the export consortium contract. The consortium is expected to improve the competitiveness of the flower production chain in the state of Ceara and increase the current minor importance of Brazil in the international flower trade.


Commercial buildings have long since been a primary target for applications from a number of areas: from cyber-physical systems to building energy use to improved human interactions in built environments. While technological advances have been made in these areas, such solutions rarely experience widespread adoption due to the lack of a common descriptive schema which would reduce the now-prohibitive cost of porting these applications and systems to different buildings. Recent attempts have sought to address this issue through data standards and metadata schemes, but fail to capture the set of relationships and entities required by real applications. Building upon these works, this paper describes Brick, a uniform schema for representing metadata in buildings. Our schema defines a concrete ontology for sensors, subsystems and relationships among them, which enables portable applications. We demonstrate the completeness and effectiveness of Brick by using it to represent the entire vendor-specific sensor metadata of six diverse buildings across different campuses, comprising 17,700 data points, and running eight complex unmodified applications on these buildings.


Background: Although the hospital inpatient setting arguably provides an ideal opportunity to engage patients in smoking cessation interventions, this is done infrequently. We therefore aimed to systematically review the perceived barriers to the implementation of smoking cessation interventions in the hospital inpatient setting. Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted specific to hospital-based healthcare workers' perceived barriers to implementing smoking cessation interventions. Reported barriers were categorised using the capability, opportunity and motivation (COM-B) framework. Results: Eighteen studies were selected for inclusion, which consisted of cross-sectional surveys and interviews. The most commonly identified barrier in capability was lack of knowledge (56% of studies); in Opportunity, it was a lack of time (78%); while in Motivation, a lack of perceived patient motivation to quit smoking (44%). Seventeen other barriers were also endorsed, but less frequently. Conclusion: Healthcare workers report a plethora of barriers to providing smoking cessation interventions in hospital settings, which cover all aspects of the COM-B framework. These impediments need to be addressed in a multidisciplinary approach, at clinical, educational, and administrative levels, to improve intervention provision.


VASKO, Z., A. OSTOJIC, S. MIRJANIC and L. J. DRINIC, 2013. Interaction between unemployment and the cultivation of arable land – regional approach. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 19: 995-1002 It is historical trend that the labor force from rural areas migrate to urban areas. Employment in agriculture is decreasing because of the intensification of agricultural production, and because of the lack of economic interest to deal with this produc tion. In less developed countries, this trend is so obvious that a significant portion of agricultural land remains uncultivated. In situations of high unemployment and its increase, there is the argument that agriculture is an opportunity for a temporary selfemployment labour force that lost jobs in the industry and other non-agricultural activities. Therefore, the working hypothesis tested whether the increase in unemployment reduces overall uncultivated agricultural land, as one of the logical consequences of engagement one part of unemployed labour force in agriculture. This phenomenon has been studied on the example of six regions in the Republic of Srpska, one of the two entities of BaH, in the period of 2002-10. The research confirmed that only in Bijeljina region, there was a high correlation between unemployment and uncultivated land. According to the evaluated regression model in regions of Trebinje, Banja Luka and Prijedor, increase in unemployment in the current year have resulted in the reduction of uncultivated land in the next year, but the evaluated models were not statistically significant. The general conclu sion was that there was not significant interdependence between increasing unemployment and decreasing uncultivated land.


KIKINDONOV, G., 2009. Simple and triple-cross hybrids sugar beet hybrids. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 15: 20-25 The use of monogerm pollen sterility lines as maternal components of sugar beet hybrids allows full hybridization in the technical seed production. Because of the long-term self-pollination and the narrow genetic basis the male sterile lines are still with lower productivity, quality parameters and disease resistance. Test results of simple and triple-cross hybrids of six MS lines with two diploid and two tetraploid multigerm pollinators have been discussed. The participation of a second "O" type in maternal components' breeding scheme increases to some extent the productivity of the MS-simple hybrids because of the increased heterozygousity, but this does not reflect in relatively higher productivity and quality of the triple-cross hybrids – diploid and triploid. The differences between the simple and the triple-cross hybrids of sugar beet are due to the different combining ability of the parents in the respective crosses. The conclusion is that the inclusion of second "O" type in the sugar beet breeding scheme is not expedient, because this does not bring to higher productivity and quality of the raw material of the triple-cross sugar beet hybrids.


One approach to computer object recognition and modeling the brain's ventral stream involves unsupervised learning of representations that are invariant to common transformations. However, applications of these ideas have usually been limited to 2D affine transformations, e.g., translation and scaling, since they are easiest to solve via convolution. In accord with a recent theory of transformation-invariance [1], we propose a model that, while capturing other common convolutional networks as special cases, can also be used with arbitrary identity-preserving transformations. The model's wiring can be learned from videos of transforming objects—or any other grouping of images into sets by their depicted object. Through a series of successively more complex empirical tests, we study the invariance/discriminability properties of this model with respect to different transformations. First, we empirically confirm theoretical predictions (from [1]) for the case of 2D affine transformations. Next, we apply the model to non-affine transformations; as expected, it performs well on face verification tasks requiring invariance to the relatively smooth transformations of 3D rotation-in-depth and changes in illumination direction. Surprisingly, it can also tolerate clutter "transformations" which map an image of a face on one background to an image of the same face on a different background. Motivated by these empirical findings, we tested the same model on face verification benchmark tasks from the computer vision literature: Labeled Faces in the Wild, PubFig [2, 3, 4] and a new dataset we gathered—achieving strong performance in these highly unconstrained cases as well.


Objective : To support the assessment and improvement of research data management (RDM) practices to increase its reliability, this paper describes the development of a capability maturity model (CMM) for RDM. Improved RDM is now a critical need, but low awareness of – or lack of – data management is still common among research projects. Methods : A CMM includes four key elements: key practices, key process areas, maturity levels, and generic processes . These elements were determined for RDM by a review and synthesis of the published literature on and best practices for RDM. Results : The RDM CMM includes five chapters describing five key process areas for research data management: 1) data management in general; 2) data acquisition, processing, and quality assurance; 3) data description and representation; 4) data dissemination; and 5) repository services and preservation. In each chapter, key data management practices are organized into four groups according to the CMM's generic processes : commitment to perform, ability to perform, tasks performed, and process assessment (combining the original measurement and verification). For each area of practice, the document provides a rubric to help projects or organizations assess their level of maturity in RDM. Conclusions : By helping organizations identify areas of strength and weakness, the RDM CMM provides guidance on where effort is needed to improve the practice of RDM.


Description: As the environmental impact of existing construction and building materials comes under increasing scrutiny, the search for more eco-efficient solutions has intensified. Nanotechnology offers great potential in this area and is already being widely used to great success. Nanotechnology in eco-efficient construction is an authoritative guide to the role of nanotechnology in the development of eco-efficient construction materials and sustainable construction. Following an introduction to the use of nanotechnology in eco-efficient construction materials, part one considers such infrastructural applications as nanoengineered cement-based materials, nanoparticles for high-performance and self-sensing concrete, and the use of nanotechnology to improve the bulk and surface properties of steel for structural applications. Nanoclay-modified asphalt mixtures and safety issues relating to nanomaterials for construction applications are also reviewed before part two goes on to discuss applications for building energy efficiency. Topics explored include thin films and nanostructured coatings, switchable glazing technology and third generation photovoltaic (PV) cells, high-performance thermal insulation materials, and silica nanogel for energy-efficient windows. Finally, photocatalytic applications are the focus of part three, which investigates nanoparticles for pollution control, self-cleaning and photosterilisation, and the role of nanotechnology in manufacturing paints and purifying water for eco-efficient buildings. Nanotechnology in eco-efficient construction is a technical guide for all those involved in the design, production and application of eco-efficient construction materials, including civil engineers, materials scientists, researchers and architects within any field of nanotechnology, eco-efficient materials or the construction industry.-Provides an authoritative guide to the role of nanotechnology in the development of eco-efficient construction materials and sustainable construction-Examines the use of nanotechnology in eco-efficient construction materials-Considers a range of important infrastructural applications, before discussing applications for building energy efficiency Contents: Contributor contact details