In today's world, Web applications play a very important role in individual life as well as in any country's development. Web applications have gone through a very rapid growth in the recent years and their adoption is moving faster than that was expected few years ago. Now-a-days, billions of transactions are done online with the aid of different Web applications. Though these applications are used by hundreds of people, in many cases the security level is weak, which makes them vulnerable to get compromised. In most of the scenarios, a user has to be identified before any communication is established with the backend database. An arbitrary user should not be allowed access to the system without proof of valid credentials. However, a crafted injection gives access to unauthorized users. This is mostly accomplished via SQL Injection input. In spite of the development of different approaches to prevent SQL injection, it still remains an alarming threat to Web applications. In this paper, we present a detailed survey on various types of SQL Injection vulnerabilities, attacks, and their prevention techniques. Alongside presenting our findings from the study, we also note down future expectations and possible development of countermeasures against SQL Injection attacks.


This paper examines the mechanisms by which democracy clauses promote democracy and domestic political stability. It begins by noting that political instability in one country can have a negative spillover and impede the economic success of regional integration. Domestic political instability may also hinder cooperation among member states. Thus, domestic political stability is a collective good for regional integration organization (RIO) member states. Legalizing democratic conditionality helps member states to overcome collective action problems and equips RIOs with the necessary credibility, justification, and tools for intervention in member states' domestic political affairs. In addition, RIOs deepen economic integration among member states, which in turn raises the stakes for the member states to collectively defend democratic institutions and inflates the costs of sanctions for countries under threat. We test the main arguments using data gathered for 40 RIOs in the world. The econometric analyses of RIO coup rates and democratic backsliding rates demonstrate that democracy clauses are indeed effective in preventing coups and backsliding within countries that are members of RIOs with such clauses. Moreover, an analysis of democratic gains indicates that democracy clauses are also effective in the promotion of democracy within RIO member states.


Load balancing for clusters has been investigated extensively, mainly focusing on the effective usage of global CPU and memory resources. However, previous CPU- or memory-centric load balancing schemes suffer significant performance drop under I/O-intensive workloads due to the imbalance of I/O load. To solve this problem, we propose two simple yet effective I/O-aware load-balancing schemes for two types of clusters: (1) homogeneous clusters where nodes are identical and (2) heterogeneous clusters, which are comprised of a variety of nodes with different performance characteristics in computing power, memory capacity, and disk speed. In addition to assigning I/O-intensive sequential and parallel jobs to nodes with light I/O loads, the proposed schemes judiciously take into account both CPU and memory load sharing in the system. Therefore, our schemes are able to maintain high performance for a wide spectrum of workloads. We develop analytic models to study mean slowdowns, task arrival, and transfer processes in system levels. Using a set of real I/O-intensive parallel applications and synthetic parallel jobs with various I/O characteristics, we show that our proposed schemes consistently improve the performance over existing non-I/O-aware load-balancing schemes, including CPU- and Memory-aware schemes and a PBS-like batch scheduler for parallel and sequential jobs, for a diverse set of workload conditions. Importantly, this performance improvement becomes much more pronounced when the applications are I/O-intensive. For example, the proposed approaches deliver 23.6--88.0 % performance improvements for I/O-intensive applications such as LU decomposition, Sparse Cholesky, Titan, Parallel text searching, and Data Mining. When I/O load is low or well balanced, the proposed schemes are capable of maintaining the same level of performance as the existing non-I/O-aware schemes.


Significance To better understand how diet influences brain aging, we focus here on the presymptomatic period during which prevention may be most effective. Large-scale life span neuroimaging datasets show functional communication between brain regions destabilizes with age, typically starting in the late 40s, and that destabilization correlates with poorer cognition and accelerates with insulin resistance. Targeted experiments show that this biomarker for brain aging is reliably modulated with consumption of different fuel sources: Glucose decreases, and ketones increase the stability of brain networks. This effect replicated across both changes to total diet as well as fuel-specific calorie-matched bolus, producing changes in overall brain activity that suggest that network "switching" may reflect the brain's adaptive response to conserve energy under resource constraint. Epidemiological studies suggest that insulin resistance accelerates progression of age-based cognitive impairment, which neuroimaging has linked to brain glucose hypometabolism. As cellular inputs, ketones increase Gibbs free energy change for ATP by 27% compared to glucose. Here we test whether dietary changes are capable of modulating sustained functional communication between brain regions (network stability) by changing their predominant dietary fuel from glucose to ketones. We first established network stability as a biomarker for brain aging using two large-scale (n = 292, ages 20 to 85 y; n = 636, ages 18 to 88 y) 3 T functional MRI (fMRI) datasets. To determine whether diet can influence brain network stability, we additionally scanned 42 adults, age < 50 y, using ultrahigh-field (7 T) ultrafast (802 ms) fMRI optimized for single-participant-level detection sensitivity. One cohort was scanned under standard diet, overnight fasting, and ketogenic diet conditions. To isolate the impact of fuel type, an independent overnight fasted cohort was scanned before and after administration of a calorie-matched glucose and exogenous ketone ester (d-β-hydroxybutyrate) bolus. Across the life span, brain network destabilization correlated with decreased brain activity and cognitive acuity. Effects emerged at 47 y, with the most rapid degeneration occurring at 60 y. Networks were destabilized by glucose and stabilized by ketones, irrespective of whether ketosis was achieved with a ketogenic diet or exogenous ketone ester. Together, our results suggest that brain network destabilization may reflect early signs of hypometabolism, associated with dementia. Dietary interventions resulting in ketone utilization increase available energy and thus may show potential in protecting the aging brain.


Climate change is a topic that permeates today's scientific, political, and social discourse. It is a term that is both widely known and hotly debated across the country and across the globe. While an ever-increasing majority of the scientific and political realms has come to the conclusion that meaningful climate change regulation is necessary to prevent negative repercussions across the globe, there is little consensus on what that regulation should look like or how to bring it about. The nature of greenhouse gases, or GHGs, makes international cooperation a must if the world hopes to prevent and avoid the experts' predictions of widespread negative environmental effects. Because each state only incurs a fraction of the total cost of its own emissions, as GHGs act on a global rather than regional scale, the emission of GHGs has created a tragedy of the commons: each state has an incentive to overuse, even though the optimal solution is for each and every state to limit its emissions. States acting in their own best interests will therefore continue to emit GHGs unless they can be sure that all other states will agree to and adhere to meaningful regulation. In the abstract, this solution seems simple enough: in order to prevent the negative effects associated with climate change, all states must agree to limit emissions and each state must be assured that all other states will not defect. However, on the international level where each state is sovereign, there is no enforcement mechanism to guarantee that states refrain from defecting. Therefore, in order for GHG regulation to succeed, there must  J.D. Candidate, Class of 2011 at Washington and Lee University School of Law. This Note was prepared as part of Professor Hari Osofsky's seminar on climate change and environmental law. Thank you to Professor Osofsky for her comments and feedback and for all of the members of the class whose feedback was instrumental in the development of this Note. Thank you to all of the members of the Journal of Energy, Climate, and the Environment for their help and patience in preparing this essay for publication. Finally, thank you to Matthew Fielding for his assistance, guidance and patience, in this and all other endeavors. 128 2 WASH. & LEE J. ENERGY, CLIMATE, & ENV'T 127 (2011) be some mechanism by which the incentive to defect is replaced by an incentive to cooperate. In order to determine what type of mechanism is most appropriate for the regulation of climate change, one must examine the international system to understand how and why states act as they do. While it is generally assumed that states act in their own best interests, many theorists believe that these interests are shaped and informed by social and cultural norms. According to this understanding, it is possible to influence state behavior by changing the social and cultural norms of international society. As applied to the issue at hand, this means that the incentive to defect might be transformed into an incentive to cooperate if the social and cultural rules require states to cooperate when it comes to GHG emissions. Scientists predict that time is running out for meaningful regulation, and that absent some drastic change GHG emissions will create a negative feedback loop in which the negative effects of climate change will become unstoppable. If the world hopes to change this outcome, one or more states must adopt meaningful climate change regulation and hope that in so doing they will be able to affect the social and cultural norms of international society, thereby incentivizing states to cooperate rather than defect on GHG emission regulation. This Note suggests that the optimal state to take this leadership role is the United States. Still, even if the U.S. were to take this role beginning tomorrow, its chances of success remain dismal. Essentially, it must race against the clock to change the norms of international society, while incurring the costs of GHG regulation, and hope that such actions will lead to international cooperation. While the U.S. may determine that this slight chance of success is not worth the cost, absent the strong leadership of one or more countries actively advocating for all states to adopt GHG emissions regulation, meaningful climate change regulation is a hopeless endeavor.


Asserted liberty rights not enumerated in the U.S. Constitution are generally considered under the substantive due process doctrine. Courts look only at narrowly defined interests and their history and traditions, and recognize only fundamental rights. This approach, however, fails to acknowledge the existence of nonfundamental rights that deserve recognition and a level of protection from improper legislation. As a supplement to its incomplete substantive clue process jurisprudence, the Supreme Court should examine the Ninth Amendment's history and traditions. Looking to this history and tradition will provide better guideposts for what types of rights should be protected. Employing the Ninth Amendment_ in this way will also help alleviate three primary reasons for the Amendment's disuse: the Ninth Amendment was not meant to apply against states, judges have no power to protect unenumerated rights, and the Ninth Amendment was only relevant under the now-disfavored penumbras and emanations test.


A good brain needs a good vacuum cleaner. Microglia are highly motile phagocytic cells that infiltrate and take up residence in the developing brain, where they are thought to provide a surveillance and scavenging function. However, although microglia have been shown to engulf and clear damaged cellular debris after brain insult, it remains less clear what role microglia play in the uninjured brain. Here, we show that microglia actively engulf synaptic material and play a major role in synaptic pruning during postnatal development in mice. These findings link microglia surveillance to synaptic maturation and suggest that deficits in microglia function may contribute to synaptic abnormalities seen in some neurodevelopmental disorders.


Workflows have been widely used for coordinating structured processes, whereas group support systems are used to facilitate ad hoc and unstructured collaboration activities. In many business settings, it is beneficial to use both workflows and group support systems. However, how to integrate workflow systems and group support systems have not been well studied in the literature. In this paper, we propose a scalable middleware framework, namely event management system, which can support high-degree decoupling between workflow and groupware. The event management architecture and its main functionalities as well as the implementation techniques are presented. We delineate the applicability of event-based integration by comparing with other integration paradigms.


Intellectual property (IP) law and philosophy is an interdisciplinary approach to scholarship that applies insights and methods from philosophy to the legal, normative, theoretical, political, and empirical questions presented by the project of organizing and regulating the creation and dissemination of knowledge, technology, and culture. In this chapter, I outline four types of IP-law-and-philosophy scholarship, focusing specifically on the discipline of analytic philosophy (with appropriate caveats about the coherence of that discipline). These modes of scholarship can be categorized as: (1) the jurisprudence of the IP system; (2) philosophical analysis of IP law; (3) applied philosophy in IP; and (4) normative theory of IP. Category (4) is obviously a special case of category (3), focusing specifically on applications of moral philosophy. Within each category, I provide illustrative examples of past scholarship and suggestions for further research.


Streambank retreat is a natural fluvial process altered by a variety of direct and indirect human activities that is controlled by interactions between a range of hydrological, geomorphological and vegetative factors. These may include climate, discharge, bed slope, bank material and stratigraphy, bank height, bank angle, curvature and the various attributes of bank vegetation. There has been considerable progress in our understanding of these processes and their interactions in temperate regions, but our knowledge of bank retreat in tropical streams is relatively poor. Few quantitative studies of bank retreat or erosion are published for the tropics. In particular, there is a paucity of data on vegetation characteristics, their interaction with retreat-causing variables and their contribution to bank retreat or erosion. This thesis addresses these issues by investigating the response of 34 sites in three north-eastern Queensland streams (2 wet tropics, 1 wet-dry tropics) to the 2003/2004 wet season, observing rates and types of bank retreat and the suite of driving forces that were responsible for this retreat.

Variations exist in streambank retreat rate between climatological regions. Banks of streams
tropical environments tend to retreat at greater rates because they experience greater specific stream power, more frequent bankfull events and higher annual flows than streams in other regions. Global trends also exist between bank retreat and stream width and drainage area. However, no global trends appear to exist between bank retreat relative to channel size and stream width. Modelling retreat of the study banks against climatological regime showed that they retreated at equivalent rates to streams of similar size elsewhere but at lower rates than streams from similar climatological regimes. These comparisons are only valid as far as datasets of differing quality and quantity allow. Analysis of 2003/2004 wet season hydrology suggested that these low rates could be partly attributed to the high recurrence possibility of the wet season.

Variations in streambank retreat rate also exist within climatological regimes. The largely
heterogeneous nature of streams and associated variability of dominant erosion driving forces is responsible for this variation. This study did not identify any direct relationship between streambank retreat and any measured variable. However, thresholds existed with regard to specific stream power (> 130 W m-2), curvature ( 3.2 m) and bank angle (> 45o), which explained the variability of bank retreat rates. Bank retreat was low until these thresholds were passed. When these thresholds were exceeded, retreat rates were more variable, with the steep banks retreating faster than more gradually sloped banks. There was no direct relationship between root area ratio (RAR) at any point on the bank and bank retreat. However, an exponential decay relationship existed between RAR at depths of 3 m and maximum bank angle: banks occupied by dense basal root networks were less steep, indicating an indirect relationship between bank retreat and basal RAR.

Variations in erosion at different depths down a bank can ultimately control overall bank retreat. Thus, variations in local factors and their control of erosion are as important to measure as retreat itself. Specifically, the variations in RARs and their interactions with other local factors, such as depth or sediment characteristics are a major control of scour rates. Erosion rate variability in the study streams decreased logarithmically with both increasing RAR and gravel content of the bank. Thus, those banks with denser root networks and greater coarse fragment content were less likely to erode. The absence of erosion of gravel-dominated strata in this study is anomalous, but may be partly attributed to the low magnitude and short duration of the flows of the 2003/2004 wet season.

Riparian influence on bank erosion and retreat is largely attributed to its effect on bank
sediment strength and cohesion, but its influence on flow redirection away from the bank is also important. Root densities play a major part in these processes – greater densities provide increased cohesion, improved armouring of the bank from primary and secondary flows and sediment aggregation due to the input of organic matter. Root densities generally vary according to above-ground vegetation characteristics, sediment characteristics (moisture, texture, gravel content) and depth. There were linear relationships between root density (using RAR as the measure) and tree density that declined in strength with increasing depth at the 34 study banks. RARs at shallow depths were shown to be highly variable where trees were tall. RAR also varied greatly with depth. Wet tropics banks showed marked drops in RAR at depths of 2.5-3.0 m. A similarly significant decline was evident in wet-dry tropics banks at 2.0 m. No significant relationship existed between sediment and RAR.

This thesis has highlighted the multi-faceted and complex nature of bank erosion and retreat in tropical Queensland streams, as reported in the literature for many temperate systems and the few tropical systems that have been studied. It suggests that specific stream power, curvature, bank geometry, RAR and gravel content and the interaction between these variables are all important in understanding bank erosion and retreat. But despite the extremes of the climate in the study region, erosion responses to a flood of moderate magnitude were within the range expected from other studies, suggesting, albeit with a small dataset, an adaptation of these systems to regular flooding. A larger dataset, including data on their reaction to events of larger magnitude may alter this relationship. It is clear that knowledge of these fluvial processes and characteristics in association with an appreciation of other local and catchment-based processes is essential for the development of appropriate catchment-wide and reach-based management plans


Joshua M. Duke's recent JEI article on institutions and land use conflicts (2004) runs along lines largely congruent with my own thinking, though his excellent general theory is far better thought out and written than I could do. I applaud his splendid contribution to the literature in institutional economics bearing on land use, most especially his choice of references that are highly suggestive and his synthesis thereof. This note is offered to illustrate possible extensions of Duke's line of thought, drawing as an example from one reference I have found particularly useful. Duke cited Rutherford H. Platt's Land Use and Society: Geography, Law, and Public Policy (1996). Not only did it aid Duke's specific discussion of power balance in making land use decisions (2004,236) but more broadly Platt's book also contains an excellent general model of land-law interaction. Platt's part 1 consists of chapters on "Land Resources and Issues in the United States" and the "The Interaction of Geography and Law." Part 2 includes "English Roots of Modern Land Use Controls," "Property Rights: The Owner as Planner," and "Local Governments in the United States." Part 3 encompasses "Urban Reforms of the 19th Century," "Land Use Zo~ing: Origins and Practice," "Constitutional and Policy Issues of Urban Planning," and "Beyond Zoning: Urban Land Use Control by Other Means." Part 4, a search for broader land use policies, considers "State and Regional Land Use Programs," "Federal Lands: Policies in Conflict," "Congress and Land Use," and "Conclusion: Successes, Failures, and Fundamentals." A useful and separate index of the court cases cited follows the book's general index. Platt, a geographer and lawyer, first explained that geography "asks what land is like, why it is used in a particular way, and whether it could be better utilized to achieve specified goals (e.g., housing, food supply, environmental sustainability)." Land use law, he wrote, "addresses how desirable uses ofland may be achieved, and who has the authority to decide among competing uses" (1996,29). Acutely observing the major institutional economics problem of externalities, Platt wrote


In this paper, we found a strong positive post-rescue performance for acquiring firms. Furthermore, we observed even more dramatic recovery effects when we focused on accounting accrual components, such as the credit sale increases or reduction of PPE depreciation value. We found that investors have been dubious with the solvency of the troubled firms at least one year before the announcement date of their acquisition. As a result, they sold the troubled firms' stocks heavily leading to sluggish sales that hover at a considerably low level during a one year period. However, once they are rescued by an acquiring firm, the target firm's business recovers dramatically. Focusing on accounting accrual components (changes in ratio of receivables to total assets for one year preceding the rescue), we found a 35.92% average difference for three-year CARs between the highest and lowest ranked firms (reversed out into the acquiring firm's stock appreciation). We also found a 35.29% average difference for three year CARs between high vs. low firm ratio changes of depreciation costs against total assets for the year preceding the announcement. Finally, we found the reversal effect on troubled firms who underwent a large stock sell-off, and found that a greater stock sell-off is strongly correlated to a more drastic reversal for the acquiring firm's stock appreciation after buyout.


Existing neural network based one-class learning methods mainly use various forms of auto-encoders or GAN style adversarial training to learn a latent representation of the given one class of data. This paper proposes an entirely different approach based on a novel regularization, called holistic regularization (or H-regularization), which enables the system to consider the data holistically, not to produce a model that biases towards some features. Combined with a proposed 2-norm instancelevel data normalization, we obtain an effective one-class learning method, called HRN. To our knowledge, the proposed regularization and the normalization method have not been reported before. Experimental evaluation using both benchmark image classification and traditional anomaly detection datasets show that HRN markedly outperforms the state-of-the-art existing deep/non-deep learning models. The code of HRN can be found here3.


This paper confronts many years of displacement-based readings of Charlotte Brontë's Shirley (1849) with a historicized "surface reading" that connects the manual labor of two very distinct constituencies in the novel: hardened Luddite machine breakers and dispossessed middle-class women. A surface-level line of inquiry into manufactured objects reveals an inverted network from the mill to the parlor; the redundancy of human hands caused by mechanization in the mill is concurrent with a surplus of female handiwork in the novel's middle-class homes. I argue that this inversion makes sense if we situate the novel in its 1811–12 setting—the unique historical moment when the term "manufacture" began to accrue paradoxically opposed meanings. Brontë's oscillation between mechanized and manual forms of manufacture in Shirley marks the early boundaries of what would eventually become the rigidly defined separate spheres of mid-century Victorian life.


Today's battery powered electric vehicles still face many issues: (1) Ways of improving the regenerative braking energy; (2) how to maximally extend the driving-range of electric vehicles (EVs) and prolong the service life of batteries; (3) how to satisfy the energy requirements of the EVs both in steady and dynamic state. The electrochemical double-layer capacitors, also called ultra-capacitors (UCs), have the merits of high energy density and instantaneous power output capability, and are usually combined with power battery packs to form a hybrid power supply system (HPSS). The power circuit topology of the HPSS has been illustrated in this paper. In the proposed HPSS, all the UCs are in series, which may cause an imbalanced voltage distribution of each unit, moreover, the energy allocation between the batteries and UCs should also be considered. An energy-management scheme to solve this problem has been presented. Moreover, due to the parameter variations caused by temperature changes and produced errors, the modelling procedure of the HPSS becomes very difficult, so an H ∞ current controller is presented. The proposed hybrid power source circuit is implemented on a laboratory hardware setup using a digital signal processor (DSP). Simulation and experimental results have been put forward to demonstrate the feasibility and validity of the approach.


Serotonin infused into the lateral ventricle in rats produced a dose-dependent depression of the acoustic startle reflex. When infused onto the spinal cord, serotonin produced a dose-dependent increase in startle. Thus the same neurotransmitter can modulate the same behavior in opposite ways, depending on which part of the central nervous system is involved.


Echocardiography is a potential alternative to X-ray fluoroscopy in cardiac catheterization given its richness in soft tissue information and its lack of ionizing radiation. However, its small field of view and acoustic artifacts make direct automatic segmentation of the catheters very challenging. In this study, a fast catheter segmentation framework for echocardiographic imaging guided by the segmentation of corresponding X-ray fluoroscopic imaging is proposed. The complete framework consists of: 1) catheter initialization in the first X-ray frame; 2) catheter tracking in the rest of the X-ray sequence; 3) fast registration of corresponding X-ray and ultrasound frames; and 4) catheter segmentation in ultrasound images guided by the results of both X-ray tracking and fast registration. The main contributions include: 1) a Kalman filter-based growing strategy with more clinical data evaluation; 2) a SURF detector applied in a constrained search space for catheter segmentation in ultrasound images; 3) a two layer hierarchical graph model to integrate and smooth catheter fragments into a complete catheter; and 4) the integration of these components into a system for clinical applications. This framework is evaluated on five sequences of porcine data and four sequences of patient data comprising more than 3000 X-ray frames and more than 1000 ultrasound frames. The results show that our algorithm is able to track the catheter in ultrasound images at 1.3 s per frame, with an error of less than 2 mm. However, although this may satisfy the accuracy for visualization purposes and is also fast, the algorithm still needs to be further accelerated for real-time clinical applications.


The dilution of atmospheric carbon dioxide by carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is estimated to be about 3½ pct, on the basis of radiocarbon assays of tree rings of known ages from several trees of different genera, after allowance has been made for effects attributable to ecological differences. The cumulative mass of fossil carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere is 3.3 x 1017 gm, equivalent to about 14 pct of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Based on these data, the fractional part of the atmospheric carbon dioxide which enters the ocean each year is estimated to be 0.062. Radiocarbon assays of several nineteenth-century marine shells and of their modern counterparts indicate a one to two per cent dilution of shallow oceanic carbonates by carbon dioxide from fossil fuels. Use of these data in a simplified mathematical model of atmosphere-ocean yields information on mixing times of the ocean.


Many recent articles written by U.S. legal practitioners and law scholars in the wake of the financial crisis address regulatory reforms included in or omitted from the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act) and related agency initiatives. In contrast, this article focuses on institutional reforms - specifically those instituted at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) since President Barack Obama took office in January 2009. In an article published in the Villanova Law Review last year, I assessed the early reform efforts at the SEC in the Obama era from the vantage point of change leadership literature (a branch of business management scholarship). This article updates the preliminary findings reported in the Villanova Law Review article in light of the enactment and initial phases of implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act (which was in the final stages of congressional action when work on the Villanova Law Review article was completed in the spring of 2010) and the subsequent change in the composition of Congress as a result of the mid-term elections in November 2010. The article begins by identifying and assessing ongoing evidence of effective change leadership at the SEC in accordance with the framework used in my earlier article and continues by briefly addressing the potential effects of shortfalls in SEC funding. The article then concludes by making tentative predictions about the future of institutional reform at the SEC in this new political environment.


Sexual dimorphism in birds may be expressed as differences in body size, plumage, color and/or behavior. Many species are monomorphic in color, making sex determination difficult in the field. An example of the latter are mockingbirds, which are passerines of the genus Mimus , endemic to the Americas. In order to distinguish between male and female mockingbirds using external body measurements that are easy to take, the objective of this work was to quantify morphometric differences between sexes in adults of the following species: M . thenca (45 specimens), M . patagonicus (95), M . saturninus (88), M . triurus (152), and M . dorsalis (7). We measured the following variables: culmen length, bill height and width, tarsus length, middle toe length, wing chord and tail length. Measurements were generally larger in males than in females except for bill width in M . saturninus and M . triurus , culmen length in M . thenca and M . dorsalis , and bill height in M . dorsalis . There were significant differences between sexes in wing chord for M . patagonicus , M . saturninus and M . triurus ; tail length for M . patagonicus and M . triurus ; tarsus length for M . patagonicus ; and in middle toe length for M . triurus . No significant differences in measurements were found between sexes for M . thenca . Significant discriminant functions were obtained for M . patagonicus , M . saturninus and M . triurus , with a percentage of correct classification less than 80%. Only a few variables were useful for sex determination in the studied Mimus species, i.e. wing chord, tail length, middle toe length and tarsus length for three, two, one and one species, respectively.


We generate an original dataset on bribe payments at two competing ports in Southern Africa that allows us to take an unusually close look at the relationship between bureaucratic organization, bribe-setting behavior and the costs corruption imposes on users of public services. We find that the way bureaucracies are organized can generate different opportunities for bureaucrats to engage in "collusive" or "coercive" types of corruption. We then observe how firms adjust their shipping and sourcing strategies in response to different types of corruption. "Collusive" corruption is cost-reducing for firms, increasing usage of the corrupt port, while "coercive" corruption is cost-increasing, reducing demand for port services. Our findings therefore suggest that firms respond to the opportunities and challenges created by different types of corruption, organizing production in a way that increases or decreases demand for the public service.


Pharmaceutically active compounds are the emerging water contaminant and recently numerous studies have reported their continuous release in aquatic system posing an adverse impact on living organism on ecology. Simvastatin belongs to the drug class 3-Hydoxy-3-Methyl Glutaryl Coenzyme-A (HMG-CoA) reductase inhibitor. The present study focuses on the efficient loading of simvastatin drug onto the surface of Pleurotus florida biomass (PFB). The isothermal, kinetic and thermodynamic parameters were examined and the results showed that maximum simvastatin uptake was observed at 5.49 mg.g-1 with removal efficiency 72.56%. The maximum sorption capacity calculated from the Langmuir isotherm model was found to be 76.92 mg.g-1 and the separation factor value lies between zero and one indicating favorable isothermal process. The kinetic design was well illustrated by the pseudo second order model. Thermodynamic parameters imply that the adsorption of simvastatin on PFB was an endothermic process and the functionalities responsible for the simvastatin uptake were accomplished by Fourier Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) spectroscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Results depict the applicability of oyster fungi as economically viable tool for the pharmaceutical enriched effluent treatment.


abstract Over the last two decades, the notion of institutional thickness has become a key reference for a large body of work that has sought to provide profound insights into the link between institutions and regional development. However, only few attempts have been made to reassess the concept, to improve its methodology, and to reflect on its empirical application. The aim of this article is to revise the original concept of institutional thickness. We draw on and seek to contribute to current work in economic geography and related disciplines on the role of organizations and institutions in regional development. We identify some crucial limitations and provide suggestions for how they can be addressed. It is argued that much can be gained by (1) explicitly elaborating on the relation between the organizational and institutional dimensions of thickness, (2) moving beyond overly static views on thickness, (3) developing a multiscalar approach to thickness, and (4) identifying features for assessing thickness in absolute and relative terms.


ABSTRACT The Arikaree Group is an important constituent of the Tertiary sequence in the northern High Plains of the western United States. The "Upper Harrison" beds form a distinct formation-rank unit within the Arikaree Group. The bulk of the unit consists of air-fall pyroclastic debris; epiclastic detritus is only a subordinate part of the sediment. In the Agate Fossil Beds area, the "Upper Harrison" beds constitute a valley-fill sequence along the edge of a broad, shallow southeast-trending paleovalley. The valley fill has fluvial and eolian components. The fluvial component represents in-channel deposition within a sandy braided system. Large-scale trough cross-strata are the most common sedimentary structure in the fluvial deposits. The eolian component consists of unreworked ash-fall mat rial. This sediment lacks current-produced sedimentary structures. In the Agate area, the fluvial and eolian components of the "Upper Harrison" beds differ from those in the subjacent Harrison Formation. Parallel laminae predominate in stream-channel deposits of the Harrison Formation and are associated with stream marginal dunes. The temporal change in fluvial style and in the character of associated eolian deposits observed between the Harrison Formation and the "Upper Harrison" beds suggests an increase in stream discharge with the passage of time and development of an effective vegetation cover. The latter may have resulted from the establishment of prairie grasses in the region. The absence of thick vertical accretion deposits is used to assign the fluvial facies of the "Upper Harrison" beds a braided-stream origin. The stratification sequence contains large-scale trough cross-strata but not large-scale planar-tabular cross-strata. The absence of planar-tabular cross-strata is atypical of stratification sequences of sandy braided systems.


Rationale: Gap junctions mediate cell-to-cell electric coupling of cardiomyocytes. The primary gap junction protein in the working myocardium, connexin43 (Cx43), exhibits increased localization at the lateral membranes of cardiomyocytes in a variety of heart diseases, although the precise location and function of this population is unknown. Objective: To define the subcellular location of lateralized gap junctions at the light and electron microscopic level, and further characterize the biochemical regulation of gap junction turnover. Methods and Results: By electron microscopy, we characterized gap junctions formed between cardiomyocyte lateral membranes in failing canine ventricular myocardium. These gap junctions were varied in structure and appeared to be extensively internalizing. Internalized gap junctions were incorporated into multilamellar membrane structures, with features characteristic of autophagosomes. Intracellular Cx43 extensively colocalized with the autophagosome marker GFP-LC3 when both proteins were exogenously expressed in HeLa cells, and endogenous Cx43 colocalized with GFP-LC3 in neonatal rat ventricular myocytes. Furthermore, a distinct phosphorylated form of Cx43, as well as the autophagosome-targeted form of LC3 (microtubule-associated protein light chain 3) targeted to lipid rafts in cardiac tissue, and both were increased in heart failure. Conclusions: Our data demonstrate a previously unrecognized pathway of gap junction internalization and degradation in the heart and identify a cellular pathway with potential therapeutic implications.


It is argued that relations between the discourses of sociology and literature need to be rethought outside the appropriative, yet in appropriate, terms of 'the sociology of ...'. The work of Foucault, and particularly his location of the joint emergence of literature and the human sciences at a single 'moment', are enlisted towards this end. While the human sciences are seen to rely, broadly, on a number of fictional postulates and categories, literature can also be seen as a source of serious and advanced social theory. To illustrate this second point, the article concludes with a preliminary analysis of the baptism passage from Mervyn Peake's Titus Groan.


This paper reviews the application of a scenario for the 2015 agricultural policy and markets for the irrigated agriculture in Europe. Scenarios for irrigated agriculture 2015 are also described in detail including Reformed CAP and biomass demand. It is applied at the basin level for the Guadalquivir River in southern Spain. The methodology is based upon residual value of water and it combines budget and farm analysis at municipality level, with the Guadalquivir basin divided at 50 'comarcas'; in each of them 24 possible crops are selected with specific 'comarca' data bases. The 2015 scenario studies the present level of water use and value, and makes an analysis for 2015.This model allows the knowledge of water value and irrigated agriculture at 'comarca' level and 'aggregated basin level'.


Nowadays, the video documents like educational courses available on the web increases significantly. However, the information retrieval systems today can not return to the users (students or teachers) of parts of those videos that meet their exact needs expressed by a query consisting of semantic information. In this paper, we present a model of pedagogical knowledge of current videos. This knowledge is used throughout the process of indexing and semantic search segments instructional videos. Our experimental results show that the proposed approach is promising.


According to the India Energy Security Scenario 2047, the number of residential air conditioner (A/C) units may increase seven-fold by 2037 as compared to 2017. Also, the related energy consumption might increase four times in the next two decades, according to India's National Cooling Action Plan. Therefore, the study of occupant cooling behaviour is essential to reduce and manage the significant electricity demand, helping to formulate and implement climate-specific cooling policies, and to adopt low-energy and low-cost technologies at mass-market scale. The study aims to analyse residential electricity consumption in order to investigate occupant behaviour, especially for thermal comfort by using space cooling and mechanical ventilation technologies. Among the five climate zones in India, this study focuses on the occupant behaviour in a warm-humid climate using Auroville as a case study, where climate analysis of the past 30 years demonstrated progression towards unprecedented warmer weather in the last five years. In this study, electricity consumption data from 18 households (flats) were monitored for seven months (November 2018–June 2019). The study also elaborated the limitations faced while monitoring and proposed a data filling methodology to create a complete daily profile for analysing occupant behaviour through electricity consumption. The results of the data-driven approach demonstrated the characteristics and complexities in occupant behaviour and insight on the operation of different technologies to attain thermal comfort in residential buildings in an increasingly warming climate.


The evaporative emission and leak of vehicle fuel cause serious pollution to the environment. In order to find out the main influencing factors of the leak detection process of vehicle fuel evaporation system, the leak process and main influencing factors of vehicle fuel evaporation system were studied by means of simulation calculation and experimental research. The leak detection model of fuel evaporation system was established. The pressure decay process was simulated and calculated by Matlab/Simulink, and the calculated value was compared with the experimental value. The maximum relative error does not exceed 9.52%, indicating that the established mathematical model of pressure change is in good agreement with the test results, and the established mathematical model has high accuracy. Based on the positive pressure decay method, an experimental bench for leak detection of the fuel evaporation system was built, and the influence of different initial pressures and fuel volumes on the leak detection process of the fuel evaporation system under two leak hole diameters of 1 mm and 0.5 mm was studied. The results show that different initial pressures correspond to different decay rates. The greater the initial pressure is, the higher the pressure decay rate becomes. The higher the pressure decay rate is, the clearer the signal is, which is more conducive to leak detection. The fuel volume has a great influence on the pressure decay process, especially when the fuel volume is 80%, the difference in fuel volume is also 30%, and the pressure difference between 50% and 80% fuel volume is much larger than that between 20% and 50% fuel volume. Therefore, it is more important to select the appropriate range of fuel volume when conducting leak detection of fuel evaporation system.


Several cognitive, behavioral, and emotional experiences are found across healthy and clinical populations and across distinct diagnostic categories. The present research was aimed at identifying processes (e.g., functional impairment, perfectionism, unwanted thought) that may operate across disorders to differentiate normal from abnormal experiences or increase risk for anxiety or mood symptoms. In Study 1, individuals diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), non-GAD high worriers, and normal worriers completed measures of perceived functioning and performance standards. Widespread functional impairments were reported both by individuals with GAD and by non-GAD high worriers. However, only non-GAD high worriers showed elevated performance standards, suggesting that different processes may account for the functional impairments perceived by these groups (i.e., recognition of diminished personal functioning versus inflated standards). Study 2 tested the association of appraisals of worried, ruminative, and obsessional thoughts to outcomes assessed concurrently and at 1-month follow-up. Across thought types, negative and positive appraisals were cross-sectionally associated with greater negative outcomes; positive appraisals were further associated with greater positive outcomes. Negative and positive appraisals of worry and rumination were also associated with increased negative outcomes at follow-up. These results suggest several similarities across thought types in the relationship between appraisals and outcomes, providing support for further transdiagnostic study of these processes. In Study 3, healthy participants were randomly assigned to receive negative, normalizing, or no feedback about their worried, ruminative, and obsessional thoughts to test the hypothesis that negative appraisals would lead to negative outcomes across thought types. Individuals' preexisting beliefs about thoughts were also expected to predict outcomes, both alone and in interaction with experimental condition. Unexpectedly, individuals in the Negative Feedback condition reported less negative outcomes than those in the other conditions, but these results were qualified by an interaction between preexisting beliefs and experimental condition across all thought types. These results suggest that preexisting negative beliefs about different forms of unwanted thought function as a cognitive vulnerability in interaction with specific stressors. Collectively, these studies suggest several features that may operate transdiagnostically to increase risk for symptom development or to differentiate normal from abnormal experiences of anxiety and depression. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Psychology First Advisor Ayelet Meron Ruscio This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: http://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/755


A review. Extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) are biopolymers of microbial origin and consist mainly of polysaccharides, proteins, lipids and nucleic acids. The EPS mediate adhesion to surfaces and form a hydrogel matrix for biofilms and other microbial aggregates. This matrix can be considered as \"house\" of the microorganisms which allows for the formation of stable communities (\"microconsortia\") of synergistic strains and enables them to degrade recalcitrant substances. EPS retain water and prevent desiccation. Cohesion and adhesion are provided by a network of fluctuating adhesion points. External pressure can change the structure from a gel to a highly viscous liq. Due to their sorptive properties, dissolved nutrients from the water phase are accumulated and increase the survival chances of biofilm organisms in oligotrophic environments. The matrix facilitates gene exchange and regulation processes via signaling mols. It provides a template for extracellular enzymes and prevents that they are washed out. Thus, it is of great importance for the degrdn. of solids and particles. Remnants of lysed cells are retained and can be utilized as food source. Thus, biofilms can be considered as a natural example for sustainable use of nutrients. Some EPS are biotechnol. employed as additives for food, drilling fluids and as biosurfactants.


A mechanistic study has been performed to show that a reduced mixed metal oxide derived from tin, iron, and aluminum oxides can remove oxygen from carbon dioxide. Thermogravimetric analysis confirms that reduction of the mixed-metal oxide likely involves the reduction of SnO2and Fe2O3 phases. The reduced mixed-metal oxide can remove oxygen from carbon dioxide and this is shown using isotopically labelled C18O2 and mass spectroscopy. The 18O-labelled mixed-metal oxide can transfer the abstracted oxygen to a different carbonaceous compound, in this case carbon monoxide. Oxygen is readily exchanged in the mixed-metal oxide. Under both oxidizing and reducing conditions 18O is exchanged with unlabelled O resulting in the observation of all isotopomers.


While useful proposals to reform International Financial Institutions (IFIs) have been widely discussed, the lack of meaningful financial accountability has received little attention. Considering the substantial damage done by IFIs, this is surprising both from an ethical and an economist's point of view. In a market economy anyone must face the economic consequences of their actions and decisions. If consultants give advice negligently or without obeying minimal professional standards, they have to pay compensation for the damage they have caused. National liability and tort laws serve the purpose of compensating those suffering unlawful damages and of deterring such behavior. By contrast, tortious damage caused by IFIs must be paid by IFIs' borrowers, including many of the world's poorest people. IFIs may even gain financially from their own negligence by extending new loans necessary to repair damages done by their prior loans. One failed adjustment program calls for the next. This mechanism makes IFI-flops generate IFI-jobs and additional income. This perverted incentive system rewarding errors, negligence, and even violations of the very constitutions of IFIs is absolutely at odds with the principles on which Western market economies rest. It must be brought to an end. This essay presents the idea of financial accountability, showing how easily reforms making IFIs financially accountable could be implemented. Moreover, embracing financial accountability would bring IFI operations closer to the intentions of their founders, who wanted IFIs subject to the basic legal and economic concepts of financial accountability not exempt from it. The market mechanism and its beneficial incentive system must finally be brought to IFIs.


Concerts of electro-acoustic music regularly feature works written for various speaker layouts. Except in the most luxurious of circumstances, this implies compromises in placement, frequent interruptions of the concert experience to relocate speakers, and/or error-prone equipment rewiring or reconfiguration during the concert. To overcome this, an Ambisonic higher-order playback system can be used to create virtual speakers at any position as mandated by the compositions. As a bonus, the performer can then be given realtime control of the source positions in addition to their levels, increasing the creative freedom of live sound diffusion. Deployments at LAC 2009 and the 2009 DEGEM concert at musikFabrik in Cologne have yielded very good results and were met with general approval. Additionally, two informal listening tests with a group of film sound artists and electroacoustic composers were conducted to gather expert opinions on advantages and shortcomings of the proposed virtual speaker system.


In this paper we investigate the possible impact on the ecosystems of the active ingredients in pharmaceutical and personal care products (PPCPs). These molecules are in their nature biologically active substances whose effects, once released into the environment, remain unclear. Commonly used drugs and cosmetics have been detected in drinking and surface waters suggesting possible consequences for environment and human health. Considering the possible bioaccumulation in the food chain and chronic toxicity due to a combination effect it is necessary to better understand their environmental fate. Pharmacologically and cosmetic active substances involved in our study were chosen according to their wide application in central Europe and to their suspected toxicity and bioaccumulation (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs NSAIDs, sunscreen agents, antiseptics). For isolation and identification of the selected compounds GC-MS procedure has been developed in our laboratory. To determine the presence of PPCP in the Slovene aquatic environment, different water samples (river, potable, well, lake, sea, swimming pool and waste water) were analyzed. The results show that the average PPCP contamination in Slovenian waters is comparable to published results for Central and Western Europe. To understand the environmental fate of these substances we studied the biodegradation paths in controlled conditions using laboratory scale bioreactor facilities. Degradation experiments were made with spiked water samples of different concentrations of pollutants (1μg/L-1ng/L) starting with activated biomass from the active wastewater treatment plant. After 6 months of continuous operation, a steady removal of all observed compounds (NSAID representatives) was achieved (up to 90%). In the future other PPCP representatives will be studied and the reactor configuration will be optimized.


Marching Cubes is a rendering technique that has many advantages for a lot of areas. It is a technique for representing scalar fields as a three-dimensional mesh. It is used for geographical applications as well as scientific ones, mainly in the medical industry to visually render medical data of the human body. But it's also an interesting technique to explore for the usage in computer games or other real-time applications since it can create some really interesting rendering. The main focus in this paper is to present a novel hybrid solution using marching cubes and heightmaps to render terrain; moreover, to find if it's suitable for real-time applications. The paper will follow a theoretical approach as well as an implementational one on the hybrid solution. The results across several tests for different scenarios show that the hybrid solution works well for today's real-time applications using a modern graphics card and CPU (Central Processing Unit).


Following the 2015 Paris Agreement, Indonesia joined a growing list of countries pledging to mitigate its greenhouse gases (GHGs) in a nationally determined contribution (NDC). Whether Indonesia will be able to achieve its proposed NDC reduction target of 29 percent (against a 2020 baseline) by 2030 will hinge on how effectively governments at different levels persuade consumer to purchase energy savings technologies or alter energy-intensive behaviors. In short, it will depend on how Indonesia governs its low carbon transition in fast-growing cities like Bogor. The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) can shed light on how governments and other stakeholders can help elicit these desired behavioral changes. The TPB holds behavioral change requires the intent to change behavior; intent is then triggered by 1) positive attitudes towards the behavior; 2) social norms promoting that behavior; and 3) a sense of control over that behavior. The article then employs structural equation modelling (SEM) to determine whether the constructs in the TPB hold on the intent to purchase energy savings appliances or use public transport for an original data set of 600 respondents from Bogor, Indonesia. The results suggests that the TPB generally holds on both energy savings options, with attitudes and control playing a greater role for appliances and social norms having a bigger effect on public transport. The policy implications of these findings for Bogor and other cities undergoing low carbon transitions in Indonesia are discussed in the


This paper examines public opinion on the effectiveness and consequences of voter identification laws in New Mexico. In particular, it focuses on the attitudes central to the court reasoning in the 2008 Supreme Court case which upheld an Indiana photo-ID law, Crawford v. Marion County Election Board. Questions include whether or not voters think the ID laws protect against fraud and prevent legitimate participation, as well as which point of view voters find more compelling and whether or not attitudes towards voter identification are related to voter confidence. While most voters think that voter ID laws prevent fraud, many voters think that ensuring access to the polls is more important than preventing fraud. Among other variables that explain differences among individuals, partisanship plays an important role.


Bamboos are grasses (Poaceae) that are widespread in tropical and subtropical regions. As monocots, woody bamboos have thin-wall hollow culms
with abundant parenchyma and the culms are connected by rhizomes. These
properties may imply that bamboos have specifc water use characteristics.
For example, the abundant parenchyma in culms provides a water reservoir
for internal water storage, which may influence the response of water use to
environmental factors; the connected rhizome provides passages for water
transfer between bamboo culms. However, only a few water-use related studies
have been conducted with thermal dissipation probe (TDP) and deuterium
(D2O) tracing method until now. Therefore, in the present study, we aimed at
exploring water use characteristics of four tropical bamboo species (Bambusa
vulgaris, Dendrocalamus asper, Gigantochloa atroviolacea and Gigantochloa
apus) with TDP and deuterium tracing method. At the meantime, to accurately
measure bamboo water use, we also tested and calibrated TDP on the studied bamboo species, and assessed the influence of bamboo water content on
TDP. Additionally, as a less used water use measurement method, potential
error sources of deuterium tracing method were explored when applying it on
bamboos to explore water use, storage and transfer.
As the frst step, the TDP method was calibrated with the stem heat balance method (SHB) and gravimetric readings in B. vulgaris culms in a pot
experiment. In this experiment, it was confrmed that the stem heat balance
method is well suited for bamboos but that thermal dissipation probes need to
be calibrated. In situ, TDP was further calibrated with SHB for the four bamboo species and species-specifc parameters for such calibration formulas were
derived. With the calibrated TDP, we monitored sap flux density (Js) of the
four bamboo species along with three tropical tree species (Gmelina arborea,
Shorea leprosula and Hevea brasiliensis) during a dry and a wet period. During
feld monitoring, we found that some bamboo species reached high maximal Js.
Across bamboo species, maximal Js increased with decreasing culm diameter.
In the diurnal course, Js in bamboos peaked much earlier than radiation andiv
vapor pressure defcit (VPD), and also much earlier than Js in trees. There
was a pronounced hysteresis between Js and VPD in bamboos, which was less
pronounced in trees. Three of the four bamboo species showed reduced Js at
high VPD values during the dry period, which was associated with a decrease
in soil moisture content. Possible roles of internal water storage, root pressure
and stomatal sensitivity are discussed.
Bamboos and other plants may substantially rely on stem water storage
for transpiration. Fluctuations in wood water content (θwood) may lead to errors when estimating transpiration based on Js measurements with the widely
used TDP method. To test the effects of θwood on Js, we conducted a culm
dehydration experiment, monitored bamboos with TDP, and implemented a
steady-state thermal model. Central to the calculation of Js, and thus a major
potential source of error, is the maximal temperature difference between probes
(∆Tmax) which are usually assumed to happen under "zero sap flow" condition.
In the culm dehydration experiment, θwood was found to be highly negatively
correlated with ∆Tmax. In the long-term feld monitoring, soil moisture content was also negatively correlated with daily ∆Tmax, indicating changes in
θwood and a seasonal decrease in stem water storage. The steady-state model
reproduced the θwood to ∆Tmax relationship of the dehydration experiment and
underlined a considerable sensitivity of Js estimates to θwood. Fluctuations
in θwood may lead to substantial underestimation of Js, and subsequently of
transpiration, in commonly applied estimation schemes. However, our model
results suggest that such underestimation can be quantifed and subsequently
corrected when key wood properties are known. Our study gives insights into
the relationship between θwood and TDP-derived Js and examines potential
estimation biases.
Deuterium tracing method was also applied on bamboos to explore water
use, storage and transfer, and its potential error sources were explored. The
deuterium-derived sap velocities correlated with the TDP-derived velocities in
two of the three species. In all species, the deuterium residence time in bamboo
culms was little influenced by the contribution of the culm water storage
to transpiration as estimated by TDPs at different culm heights. Potential
reasons include a small water storage volume in the culms, a low estimated
contribution of the storage to transpiration and high sap flux densities. Daily
culm water use rates estimated by the deuterium and the TDP approaches
correlated linearly (R2 = 0.9) but were by 70% in the deuterium estimates. After
the experiment, culms were cut down and analyzed for residual deuterium,
but concentrations were low which indicates that retention did not play av
major role in causing errors of the deuterium tracing approach. In culms
neighboring the deuterium labeled culms of B. vulgaris and G. apus, elevated
deuterium concentrations were detected indicating water transfer between
culms. Based on the differences in daily water use on labeled culms and the
enhanced deuterium concentrations in neighboring culms of these two species,
we inferred that fve neighboring culms might receive water from the labeled
culms. On contrast, in culms neighboring labeled D. asper culms, only slightly
elevated deuterium concentrations were observed which implies a limited role
by water transfer. However, incomplete mixing as indicated by high variation
among three TDP sensors at a given height may be of particular importance
for deuterium tracing in D. asper. In conclusion, species-specifc differences
among big clumpy bamboos are indicated and the deuterium tracing points to
water transfer among culms.


SUMMARY Hydrocarbon profiles on the cuticle of social insects act as multi-component recognition cues used to identify membership in a species, a colony or, within colonies, cues about its reproductive status or task group. To examine the role of structural complexity in ant hydrocarbon recognition cues, we studied the species recognition response of two ant species, Linepithema humile and Aphaenogaster cockerelli, and the recognition of conspecifics by L. humile. The cuticular hydrocarbons of ants are composed of molecules of varying chain lengths from three structural classes, n-alkanes, methyl-branched alkanes and n-alkenes. We employed species recognition bioassays that measured the aggressive response of both species of ants to mixtures of hydrocarbon classes, single structural classes of hydrocarbons (n-alkanes, methyl-branched alkanes and n-alkenes), and controls. The results showed that a combination of at least two hydrocarbon structural classes was necessary to elicit an aggressive species recognition response. Moreover, no single class of hydrocarbons was more important than the others in eliciting a response. Similarly, in the recognition of conspecifics, Linepithema humile did not respond to a mixture of n-alkane cuticular hydrocarbons presented alone, but supplementation of nestmate hydrocarbon profiles with the n-alkanes did elicit high levels of aggression. Thus both L. humile and A. cockerelli required mixtures of hydrocarbons of different structural classes to recognize species and colony membership. It appears that information on species and colony membership is not in isolated components of the profile, but instead in the mixture of structural classes found in cuticular hydrocarbon profiles.


The Himalayan countries Nepal and Bhutan have been confronted with similar climate change and energy emergencies for quite a long time. Its influence is felt as a barrier in financial, social, infrastructural, and political development. Despite having an enormous amount of renewable energy sources, these countries are unable to fulfil their current energy demand. While the power sector is entirely dependent on hydropower, other sectors depend on fossil fuel imports from India. This study offers a pathway for energy independency, energy for all and transition towards a 100% renewables based energy system. The modelling of the energy sector is done using the LUT Energy System Transition model for a period from 2015 to 2050 in a 5-year time step. This study covers the main energy sectors: power, heat, and transport. Two scenarios are visualised, one considering greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions and the associated mitigation cost and another without these costs, though both scenarios aim at achieving a high share of renewable energy by 2050. A substantial drop in levelised cost of energy is observed for the scenario without GHG emission cost, however, taxing GHG emissions will accelerate the energy transition with the levelised cost of energy on a similar level. It is well possible to transition from 90 €/MWh in 2015 to 49 €/MWh by 2050 for the entire energy system by utilizing indigenous low-cost renewable energy. Solar photovoltaics and hydropower will play a dominant role in 2050, having a share of 67% and 31% respectively. Consequently, this leads to zero GHG emissions. An energy transition towards a sustainable and secure energy system for all by 2050 is well possible in Nepal and Bhutan only through 100% renewable sources and it is both technically and economically feasible despite having substantial limitations in infrastructure and economic development currently.


SUMMARY

Properties of homogeneous and inhomogeneous plane waves propagating in unbounded viscoelastic anisotropic media in an arbitrarily specified direction are studied numerically. The analytical expressions and algebraic equations of the sixth degree derived in the companion paper (Paper I, this issue) are used for this purpose. Studied characteristics are phase velocity, amplitude decay along the propagation direction, attenuation, attenuation angle and polarization vector. Simple analytical expressions are used to describe the behaviour of SH plane waves propagating in a plane of symmetry of a viscoelastic anisotropic medium. Characteristics of P and S plane waves are determined by solving a complex-valued algebraic equation of the sixth degree. Combined effects of attenuation and anisotropy are illustrated on several models of viscoelastic anisotropic media. The explanation of the so-called forbidden directions known from the directional specification of the slowness vector is given. Non-physical results related to forbidden directions do not arise in the algorithm used.


This study quantifies the main reproductive features of the long-lived red coral Corallium rubrum , an octocoral endemic to the Mediterranean Sea and neighboring Atlantic areas and one of the most valuable of all marine species, at different depths (38-40 m versus 96-115 m) in north-western Sardinian waters (Central-Western Mediterranean Sea). Different population structures between depths were observed with shallow colonies smaller (in basal diameter and height) than deeper ones. Both populations were all gonochoric at polyp and colony level and fertile. The sex-ratio was balanced in the deep red corals while in the shallow ones it was significantly biased towards female probably in response to perturbations such as mass mortality events more common at shallow levels. Deep and shallow colonies were found to have a synchronous female sexual products development in the two depths investigated. C. rubrum produced large female sexual products in both depth intervals in relationship with its reproductive mode, confirming a long oogenic development. In contrast to reproductive timing, the volume occupied by female sexual products per polyp was different between the populations, being higher in the deep than in the shallow populations. C. rubrum exhibited a reproductive strategy characterized by a relative low number of female sexual products per polyp revealing significant differences among the two depth ranges analyzed with a lower mean value of sexual products in the shallow colonies (mean fecundity per polyp: 1.14) than in the deeper ones (mean fecundity per polyp: 2.09). These results indicate differences in reproductive parameters such as sexual products distribution and reproductive output (fecundity) were observed between shallow and deep populations of C. rubrum , in particular within deep dwelling populations.


This study provides a guide to accounting research on private firms with an emphasis on the European setting. We start by providing an overview of private firm financial reporting regulation in Europe and indicate how this institutional framework can be used to identify promising research settings that in part generalise beyond the European setting. Next, we discuss the availability of private firm accounting data and the underlying data generating process that involves private firms' original reports, governmental and private data aggregators, and commercial data providers. We show how this process generates insightful data, but at the same time causes complex sample selection issues that researchers should take into account when assessing prior findings and developing new research projects. Finally, we identify potential areas of future work by reviewing the extant literature along the three main motivations for conducting private firm work: (i) to learn more about private firms per se, (ii) to learn more about what distinguishes private firms from public firms, and (iii) to obtain insights from private firms that generalise across all firms.


In this study four ruminant species of Nuremberg Zoo were evaluated for subacute ruminal acidosis according to the feeding management. Parameters of microbiological fermentation of the rumen as well as rumen tissue samples were examined. Additionally, investigations on claw health, in terms of laminitis were made. Three of the four species, all grass- and roughage feeders, showed severe characteristics of subacute ruminal acidosis due to a diet high in fermentable carbohydrates and low in fibre. One species, classified as intermediate feeder, appeared to tolerate the diet with this high concentrate rate, since no pathological variations were present. These results demonstrated that subacute ruminal acidosis is still a serious problem in captive wild ruminants, which are often fed wrong diets with a high concentration of easily digestible carbohydrates.


This paper discusses the design of an electrostatic generator, power supply component of the self-powered microsystem, which is able to provide enough energy to power smart sensor chains or if necessary also other electronic monitoring devices. One of the requirements for this analyzer is the mobility, so designing the power supply expects use of an alternative way of getting electricity to power the device, rather than rely on periodic supply of external energy in the form of charging batteries, etc. In this case the most suitable method to use is so-called energy harvesting – a way how to gather energy. This uses the principle of non-electric conversion of energy into electrical energy in the form of converters. The present study describes the topology design of such structures of electrostatic generator. Structure is designed and modeled as a three-dimensional silicon based MEMS. Innovative approach involving the achievement of very low resonant frequency of the structure, while the minimum area of the chip, the ability to work in all 3 axes of coordinate system and ability to be tuned to reach desired parameters proves promising directions of possible further development of this issue. The work includes simulation of electro-mechanical and electrical properties of the structure, description of its behavior in different operating modes and phases of activity. Simulation results were compared with measured values of the produced prototype chip. These results can suggest possible modifications to the proposed structure for further optimization and application environment adaptation.


OBJECTIVE
The authors investigated sleep-related functioning in euthymic patients with bipolar disorder.

METHOD
Euthymic patients with bipolar disorder (N=20), patients with insomnia (N=20), and subjects with good sleep (N=20) were compared on data from interviews and questionnaires and on findings from eight consecutive days and nights of sleep diary keeping (subjective sleep estimate) and actigraphy (objective sleep estimate).

RESULTS
Seventy percent of the euthymic patients with bipolar disorder exhibited a clinically significant sleep disturbance. Compared with the other groups, the bipolar disorder group exhibited impaired sleep efficiency, higher levels of anxiety and fear about poor sleep, lower daytime activity levels, and a tendency to misperceive sleep. The bipolar disorder group held a level of dysfunctional beliefs about sleep that was comparable to that in the insomnia group and significantly higher than that in the good sleeper group.

CONCLUSIONS
Insomnia is a significant problem among euthymic patients with bipolar disorder. Components of cognitive behavior therapy for insomnia, especially stimulus control and cognitive therapy, may be a helpful adjunct to treatment for patients with bipolar disorder.


An $(r, s)$-formation is a concatenation of $s$ permutations of $r$ letters. If $u$ is a sequence with $r$ distinct letters, then let $\mathit{Ex}(u, n)$ be the maximum length of any $r$-sparse sequence with $n$ distinct letters which has no subsequence isomorphic to $u$. For every sequence $u$ define $\mathit{fw}(u)$, the formation width of $u$, to be the minimum $s$ for which there exists $r$ such that there is a subsequence isomorphic to $u$ in every $(r, s)$-formation. We use $\mathit{fw}(u)$ to prove upper bounds on $\mathit{Ex}(u, n)$ for sequences $u$ such that $u$ contains an alternation with the same formation width as $u$.
We generalize Nivasch's bounds on $\mathit{Ex}((ab)^{t}, n)$ by showing that $\mathit{fw}((12 \ldots l)^{t})=2t-1$ and $\mathit{Ex}((12\ldots l)^{t}, n) =n2^{\frac{1}{(t-2)!}\alpha(n)^{t-2}\pm O(\alpha(n)^{t-3})}$ for every $l \geq 2$ and $t\geq 3$, such that $\alpha(n)$ denotes the inverse Ackermann function. Upper bounds on $\mathit{Ex}((12 \ldots l)^{t} , n)$ have been used in other papers to bound the maximum number of edges in $k$-quasiplanar graphs on $n$ vertices with no pair of edges intersecting in more than $O(1)$ points.
If $u$ is any sequence of the form $a v a v' a$ such that $a$ is a letter, $v$ is a nonempty sequence excluding $a$ with no repeated letters and $v'$ is obtained from $v$ by only moving the first letter of $v$ to another place in $v$, then we show that $\mathit{fw}(u)=4$ and $\mathit{Ex}(u, n) =\Theta(n\alpha(n))$. Furthermore we prove that $\mathit{fw}(abc(acb)^{t})=2t+1$ and $\mathit{Ex}(abc(acb)^{t}, n) = n2^{\frac{1}{(t-1)!}\alpha(n)^{t-1}\pm O(\alpha(n)^{t-2})}$ for every $t\geq 2$.


The aim of this paper is to contribute to the discussion surrounding national identity by considering a particular set of empirical data on perceptions of 'Irishness'. Based on ethnographic research carried out in Pakistani communities in Dublin, this paper considers various interpretations of Irish identity through the lens of young second-generation Pakistani Irish men. The data presented highlight that for these young men, 'Irishness' has multiple meanings. The views of the participants raise several types of Irish identity and how these types manifest themselves in the everyday lives of Pakistanis. To frame the discussion, the paper examines three terms: cultural nation, civic nation, and ethnic nation. According to the cultural nation, 'Irishness' is a matter of lifestyle to which one adheres; the civic nation defines Irish identity on citizenship; and the ethnic nation defines as 'Irish' those individuals believed to have Irish ancestry or blood. A key finding is that respondents are perceived by people of Irish ancestry as threatening to mainstream views of 'Irishness'. As such, young second-generation Pakistani Irish men are less likely to be viewed as members of a common, shared national community in Ireland.


We present a new complexity theoretic approach to real-time computations. We define timed ω-languages as a new formal model for such computations, that we believe to allow a unified treatment of all variants of real-time computations that are meaningful in practice. To our knowledge, such a practically meaningful formal definition does not exist at this time.
In order to support our claim that timed ω-languages capture all the real-time characteristics that are important in practice, we use this formalism to model the two most important features of real-time algorithms, namely the presence of deadlines and the real-time arrival of input data. We emphasize the expressive power of our model by using it to formalize aspects from the areas of real-time database systems and ad hoc networks.
We also offer a complexity theoretic characterization of parallel real-time computations. First, we define complexity classes that capture the intuitive notion of resource requirements for real-time computations in a parallel environment. Then, we show that real-time algorithms form an infinite hierarchy with respect to the number of processors used, and that all the problems solvable in nondeterministic logarithmic space (NLOGSPACE) can be solved in real time by a parallel machine, no matter how tight the real-time constraints are. As well, we show that, once real-time constraints are dropped, several other real-time problems are in effect in NLOGSPACE. Therefore, we conjecture that NLOGSPACE contains exactly all the computations that admit feasible (poly(n ) processors) real-time parallel implementations.
In the context of these results, the issue of real-time optimization problems is investigated. We identify the class of such problems that are solvable in real time, and we show that, for a large class of optimization problems, a parallel algorithm can report in real time a solution that is arbitrarily better than the solution reported by a sequential algorithm.
We also address the problem of real-time approximation algorithms. We identify problems that do not admit good approximation solutions in real time. We also show that bin packing admits a good real-time approximation algorithm.


Pain is a life-long symptom in sickle cell disease (SCD) and a predictor of disease progression and mortality, but little is known about its molecular mechanisms. Here, we characterized pain in a targeted knockin mouse model of SCD (TOW mouse) that exclusively expresses human alleles encoding normal α- and sickle β-globin. TOW mice exhibited ongoing spontaneous pain behavior and increased sensitivity to evoked pain compared with littermate control mice expressing normal human hemoglobins. PKCδ activation was elevated in the superficial laminae of the spinal cord dorsal horn in TOW mice, specifically in GABAergic inhibitory neurons. Functional inhibition and neuron-specific silencing of PKCδ attenuated spontaneous pain, mechanical allodynia, and heat hyperalgesia in TOW mice. Furthermore, we took a hematopoietic stem cell transplantation approach to generating a SCD model in PKCδ-deficient mice. Neither spontaneous pain nor evoked pain was detected in the mice lacking PKCδ despite full establishment of SCD phenotypes. These findings support a critical role of spinal PKCδ in the development of chronic pain in SCD, which may become a potential target for pharmacological interventions.


The snow-water equivalent of late-winter snowpack is of utmost importance for hydropower production in areas where a large proportion of the reservoir water emanates from snowmelt. Impulse radar can be used to estimate the snow-water equivalent of the snowpack and thus the expected snowmelt discharge. Impulse radar is now in operational use in some Scandinavian basins. With radar technology the radar wave propagation time in the snowpack is converted into snow-water equivalent with help of a parameter usually termed the a -value. Use of radar technology during late winter brings about risk for measurements on wet snow. The a -value for dry snow cannot be used directly for wet snow. We have found that a liquid-water content of 5% (by volume) reduces the a -value by approximately 20%. In this paper an equation, based on snow density and snow liquid water content, for calculation of wet-snow a -value is presented.


As dynamic content becomes increasingly dominant, it becomes an important research topic as how the edge resources such as client-side proxies, which are otherwise underutilized for such content, can be put into use. However, it is unclear what will be the best strategy and the design/deployment tradeoffs lie therein. In this paper, using one representative e-commerce benchmark, we report our experience of an extensive investigation of different offloading and caching options. Our results point out that, while great benefits can be reached in general, advanced offloading strategies can be overly complex and even counter-productive. In contrast, simple augmentation at proxies to enable fragment caching and page composition achieves most of the benefit without compromising important considerations such as security.


Whilst B cells in human blood can be shown to express interleukin-2 receptor (IL-2R) p55 and p75 chains, using a high-sensitivity immunofluorescence procedure, fresh tonsil B cells did not show detectable levels of expression. Culture of tonsil B cells led to low levels of expression of the p55 chain of the IL-2R, an effect which was dependent on protein synthesis. The level of expression of IL-2R chains could be modulated by culturing in the presence of a number of factors which activate B cells. p55 levels were more readily modulated than p75 levels. IL-4 and combinations of IL-4 with anti-IgM, IL-2 or tumour necrosis factor-beta (TNF-beta) modulated p55 levels, but IL-5 did not. Changes in IL-2R expression were small when compared with other B-cell activation markers such as CD23. When unfractionated tonsil cells were activated with a polyclonal stimulus, the major change was the expression of p55 by T-cell blasts--p75 expression remained low in T and B cells, and p55 expression by B cells remained low.


ABSTRACT Cryptococcosis is an infectious disease of global significance for which new therapies are needed. Repurposing previously developed drugs for new indications can expedite the translation of new therapies from bench to beside. Here, we characterized the anti-cryptococcal activity and antifungal mechanism of estrogen receptor antagonists related to the breast cancer drugs tamoxifen and toremifene. Tamoxifen and toremifene are fungicidal and synergize with fluconazole and amphotericin B in vitro. In a mouse model of disseminated cryptococcosis, tamoxifen at concentrations achievable in humans combines with fluconazole to decrease brain burden by ~1 log10. In addition, these drugs inhibit the growth of Cryptococcus neoformans within macrophages, a niche not accessible by current antifungal drugs. Toremifene and tamoxifen directly bind to the essential EF hand protein calmodulin, as determined by thermal shift assays with purified C. neoformans calmodulin (Cam1), prevent Cam1 from binding to its well-characterized substrate calcineurin (Cna1), and block Cna1 activation. In whole cells, toremifene and tamoxifen block the calcineurin-dependent nuclear localization of the transcription factor Crz1. A large-scale chemical genetic screen with a library of C. neoformans deletion mutants identified a second EF hand-containing protein, which we have named calmodulin-like protein 1 (CNAG_05655), as a potential target, and further analysis showed that toremifene directly binds Cml1 and modulates its ability to bind and activate Cna1. Importantly, tamoxifen analogs (idoxifene and methylene-idoxifene) with increased calmodulin antagonism display improved anti-cryptococcal activity, indicating that calmodulin inhibition can be used to guide a systematic optimization of the anti-cryptococcal activity of the triphenylethylene scaffold. IMPORTANCE Worldwide, cryptococcosis affects approximately 1 million people annually and kills more HIV/AIDS patients per year than tuberculosis. The gold standard therapy for cryptococcosis is amphotericin B plus 5-flucytosine, but this regimen is not readily available in regions where resources are limited and where the burden of disease is highest. Herein, we show that molecules related to the breast cancer drug tamoxifen are fungicidal for Cryptococcus and display a number of pharmacological properties desirable for an anti-cryptococcal drug, including synergistic fungicidal activity with fluconazole in vitro and in vivo, oral bioavailability, and activity within macrophages. We have also demonstrated that this class of molecules targets calmodulin as part of their mechanism of action and that tamoxifen analogs with increased calmodulin antagonism have improved anti-cryptococcal activity. Taken together, these results indicate that tamoxifen is a pharmacologically attractive scaffold for the development of new anti-cryptococcal drugs and provide a mechanistic basis for its further optimization. Worldwide, cryptococcosis affects approximately 1 million people annually and kills more HIV/AIDS patients per year than tuberculosis. The gold standard therapy for cryptococcosis is amphotericin B plus 5-flucytosine, but this regimen is not readily available in regions where resources are limited and where the burden of disease is highest. Herein, we show that molecules related to the breast cancer drug tamoxifen are fungicidal for Cryptococcus and display a number of pharmacological properties desirable for an anti-cryptococcal drug, including synergistic fungicidal activity with fluconazole in vitro and in vivo, oral bioavailability, and activity within macrophages. We have also demonstrated that this class of molecules targets calmodulin as part of their mechanism of action and that tamoxifen analogs with increased calmodulin antagonism have improved anti-cryptococcal activity. Taken together, these results indicate that tamoxifen is a pharmacologically attractive scaffold for the development of new anti-cryptococcal drugs and provide a mechanistic basis for its further optimization.


The micromolar equilibrium constants for heme dissociation from IsdG and IsdI reported in the literature call into question whether these enzymes are actually members of the iron-regulated surface determinant system of Staphylococcus aureus, which harvests heme iron from a host during infection. In order to address this question, the heme dissociation constants for IsdG and IsdI were reevaluated using three approaches. The heme dissociation equilibrium constants were measured using a UV/Vis absorption-detected assay analyzed with an assumption-free model, and using a newly developed fluorescence-detected assay. The heme dissociation rate constants were estimated using apomyoglobin competition assays. Analyses of the UV/Vis absorption data revealed a critical flaw in the previous measurements; heme is 99.9% protein-bound at the micromolar concentrations needed for UV/Vis absorption spectroscopy, which renders accurate equilibrium constant measurement nearly impossible. However, fluorescence can be measured for more dilute samples, and analyses of these data resulted in dissociation equilibrium constants of 1.4 ± 0.6 nM and 12.9 ± 1.3 nM for IsdG and IsdI, respectively. Analyses of the kinetic data obtained from apomyoglobin competition assays estimated heme dissociation rate constants of 0.022 ± 0.002 s-1 for IsdG and 0.092 ± 0.008 s-1 for IsdI. Based upon these data, and what is known regarding the post-translational regulation of IsdG and IsdI, it is proposed that only IsdG is a member of the heme iron acquisition pathway and IsdI regulates heme homeostasis. Furthermore, the nanomolar dissociation constants mean that heme is bound tightly by IsdG and indicates that competitive inhibition of this protein will be difficult. Instead, uncompetitive inhibition based upon a detailed understanding of enzyme mechanism is a more promising antibiotic development strategy.


In amphibian embryos, formation of the basic body plan depends on positional differences in the mesoderm. Although peptide growth factors involved in mesoderm induction have tentatively been identified, additional signals are required to generate pattern in this tissue. We have isolated a Xenopus cDNA for a Wnt-1 related gene, designated Xwnt-8, which is activated in response to mesoderm-inducing growth factors. Xwnt-8 transcripts are transiently expressed, being most abundant during gastrulation at which time expression is confined primarily to ventral mesodermal cells. Embryos dorsoanteriorized by exposure to lithium exhibit greatly reduced levels of Xwnt-8 mRNA, supporting a correlation between Xwnt-8 expression and a ventral mesodermal cell fate. Surprisingly, ectopic expression of Xwnt-8 in embryos causes a dorsoanterior-enhanced phenotype. These findings suggest that Xwnt-8 may be a secondary signalling agent which is produced in response to mesoderm-inducing factors and is involved in the early steps of mesodermal patterning.


Should the Federal government and the remaining American states adopt the line item veto? What are its effects? We use regression discontinuity design to claim that in states with the line item veto, divided government has a causal negative effect on the tax level. By investigating a panel of 38 American states from 1960 to 2006, we estimate a significant discontinuous increase of 13% in the tax level as the party affiliated with the Governor in the state Legislature switches from being the minority party to being the majority. In the nine states that have block veto, we find no significant discontinuity in the tax level. We also find little evidence to suggest that the partisan identity of the majority party in the Legislature has a causal effect on the state tax level. JEL: H00, H11, H20, H30, H71.


Modern statistical parsers are robust and quite fast, but their output is relatively shallow when compared to formal grammar parsers. We suggest to extend statistical approaches to a more deep-linguistic analysis while at the same time keeping the speed and low complexity of a statistical parser. The resulting parsing architecture suggested, implemented and evaluated here is highly robust and hybrid on a number of levels, combining statistical and rule-based approaches, constituency and dependency grammar, shallow and deep processing, full and near-full parsing. With its parsing speed of about 300,000 words per hour and state-of-the-art performance the parser is reliable for a number of large-scale applications discussed in the article.


This paper investigates two different views concerning the number of deictic degrees of demonstratives in Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). The first view claims that CA has a medial category of demonstratives in addition to proximals and distals; the second view postulates that there are only proximals and distals in CA. The study examines the dialectal origin of singular and dual CA demonstratives based on writings of ancient grammarians in addition to investigating the Semitic origin of these demonstratives. It is argued that the demonstrative system in CA is the result of a combination of two dialectal demonstrative systems: one of these had been used in Old ?ijaazi, while the other had been used in Old Tamiimi Arabic. Each of these dialects had only proximals and distals but no medials. Demonstratives in these dialects had dissimilar forms for distals. ?ijaazi distals had two suffixes attached to the proximal base, while Tamiimi ones had one suffix only. The presence of these different forms led grammarians representing the first view to the fallacy that demonstratives with one suffix are medials, while those with two suffixes are distals. However, the supposed medials are in fact the distals that were used in Old Tamiimi; their distance value is the same as that of Old Hijaazi distals.


According to an influential objection, which Martha Nussbaum has powerfully restated, expressing anger in democratic public discourse is counterproductive from the standpoint of justice. To resist this challenge, this article articulates a crucial yet underappreciated sense in which angry discourse is epistemically productive. Drawing on recent developments in the philosophy of emotion, which emphasize the distinctive phenomenology of emotion, I argue that conveying anger to one's listeners is epistemically valuable in two respects: first, it can direct listeners' attention to elusive morally relevant features of the situation; second, it enables them to register injustices that their existing evaluative categories are not yet suited to capturing. Thus, when employed skillfully, angry speech promotes a greater understanding of existing injustices. This epistemic role is indispensable in highly divided societies, where the injustices endured by some groups are often invisible to, or misunderstood by, other groups. Finally, I defuse the most forceful objections to this defense – that anger is likely to be manipulated, that it is epistemically misleading, and that my defense presupposes unrealistic levels of trust – partly by showing that they overlook the systemic character of democratic discourse.


This poster presents a new 3D WebGIS System—called QueryArch3D— that allows archaeologists to search and query segmented 3D models that are linked to a spatial database via a virtual reality landscape—in this case the ancient Maya city and UNESCO World Heritage site of Copan, Honduras. In 2009, the MayaArch3D Project (http://mayaarch3d.unm.edu) was begun to explore the possibilities of integrating GIS and 3D digital tools for research on ancient architecture and landscapes.  This interdisciplinary, international project brings together art historians, archaeologists, and cultural resource managers with experts in remote sensing, photogrammetry, 3D modeling, and virtual reality.  Some of the questions that we seek to address using the QueryArch3D tool include: What are the research possibilities for 3D models linked to underlying archaeological data?  How can we store and curate 3D models for the future? How can we create an online resource for researchers of Maya architecture where they can compare and study geo-referenced 3D models and attribute data? How can we perform quantitative and qualitative comparisons with other Maya structures and analyze architecture in larger spatial and temporal contexts?  Like traditional databases, this tool can curate, query, and compare 2D digital objects (such as drawings, maps, diagrams, text, photographs, and videos). However, what is unique and technologically cutting-edge is that QueryArch3D enables users to 1) integrate and edit 2D and 3D data of multiple resolutions , 2) to perform attribute and spatial queries of archaeological data, and 3) to visualize, compare and analyze 3D buildings and artifacts—all in a single online , navigable virtual reality landscape. Developed in collaboration with Dr. Giorgio Agugiaro and Dr. Fabio Remondino at the Bruno Kessler Foundation (FBK) in Trento, Italy, the QueryArch3D tool links both low resolution models and high resolution reality-based and hybrid models to an open source spatial database (PostgreSQL with PostGIS) via a virtual reality environment that runs on the Unity 3 game engine. The poster summarizes the plans that the project has for its next stage of development, and concludes with a critical assessment of the research possibilities that QueryArch3D can offer archaeologists in terms of organizing, searching, and visualizing data, and identifying patterns over space and time.