Celebration greeted last week's announcements by international teams of scientists that they have sequenced the genomes of the principal malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum , and the mosquito that carries it.

But the consensus emerging among researchers as they digest the findings is that the greatest barrier to overcoming malaria, the killer of more than a million children a year, is not a lack of knowledge but a severe lack of funding to develop new candidate vaccines and drugs.

"My guess is that in 10 years' time this probably will be seen as a very important event," said Professor Brian Greenwood, a malaria expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. But although better knowledge of the parasite's proteins will enable immunologists to identify more candidate molecules for vaccines, this will not in itself bring vaccines to market more quickly, he warned. "It is …


Introduction: Substance abuse is a common problem and a major public health dilemma with a high incidence of morbidity and mortality. Therefore, due to the increase of drug abuse in recent years, especially among young people and its complications, including loss of life, unwanted pregnancy, suicide commitment, as well as violence and given that our country has a young population, so the present study, aimed to investigate the substance abuse among the students in Yazd, a central city in Iran. Materials and Methods: In this cross sectional study 1020 students studying in high school (the first period - the second period) were investigated in the 2015-2016 academic year in the city of Yazd. Multi-stage sampling method using cluster and stratified sampling was used. Information were collected through a standardized questionnaire based on World Health Organization method known as Global school-based student health survey (GSHS) which was translated to Persian. After completion of the questionnaire by students, the collected data were analyzed by SPSS software version 16 and through statistical tests of significance. Results: The results showed 18.1% of students had at least one history of drug use. 9.5% of students had a history of cannabis use, 12.5% had a history of amphetamines use, 10.8% had a history of taking psychotropic pills, 12.2% had a history of heroin use, 12.9% had a history of opium use, and finally, 9.6% had a history of crack use. There was no significant association between parents education and drug abuse in students. Conclusion: According to high prevalence and diversity of substance abuse among students, recommend educational program in school and parents supervision. Promotion of parents and teachers knowledge about symptoms of abuse is needed. Family support of adolescents is effective for prevention


Two familiar notions of correlation are rediscovered as the extreme operating points for distributed synthesis of a discrete memoryless channel, in which a stochastic channel output is generated based on a compressed description of the channel input. Wyner's common information is the minimum description rate needed. However, when common randomness independent of the input is available, the necessary description rate reduces to Shannon's mutual information. This paper characterizes the optimal tradeoff between the amount of common randomness used and the required rate of description. We also include a number of related derivations, including the effect of limited local randomness, rate requirements for secrecy, applications to game theory, and new insights into common information duality. Our proof makes use of a soft covering lemma, known in the literature for its role in quantifying the resolvability of a channel. The direct proof (achievability) constructs a feasible joint distribution over all parts of the system using a soft covering, from which the behavior of the encoder and decoder is inferred, with no explicit reference to joint typicality or binning. Of auxiliary interest, this paper also generalizes and strengthens this soft covering tool.


Knowledge space theory (Doignon & Falmagne, 1985; Albert & Lukas, 1999; Doignon & Falmagne, 1999) offers a rigorous and efficient formal framework for the construction, validation, and application of e-assessment and e-learning adaptive systems. This theory is at the basis of some existing e-learning and e-assessment adaptive systems in the U. S. and in Europe. Such systems are based on a fixed and local domain of knowledge, where fixed means that the domain does not change in time, and local refers to the fact that the items are stored and available locally. In this paper we present some theoretical notes on the efficient construction and application of knowledge spaces for knowledge domains that are both dynamic and distributed in space. This goes in the direction of an exploitation of new technologies like the GRID for building the next generation of learning environments.


Childhood overweight and obesity across the United States (US) have increased with one-third of Florida's youth are either overweight or obese. While public health (PH) efforts must continue to address prevention, understanding the behavioral impact of overweight/obesity among adolescents is imperative. Using the Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS), the prevalence and the correlates of extreme weight loss behavior/practice among multi-ethnic adolescents of Florida were examined cross-sectionally. A representative sample from 75 public High School students in Grades 9 through 12 in 2005 (n=4,564) were included. Analysis accounted for the sampling design and non-response effects. Extreme weight loss behavior or extreme dieter (outcome) was defined as those who used at least one of the three unhealthy methods to lose weight. Prevalence of extreme weight loss behaviors included were (1) fasting for 24 hours or more (11.7%); (2) use of diet pills/powder/liquid without doctor's advice (6.02%); and (3) use laxatives or purging (5.05%). About 15.1% (n=599) were using at least one of the three methods to lose weight. About 52.5% of extreme dieters were whites, with 25.8% blacks, 19.7% Hispanics, and 2.0% others. Compared to the boys (referent group), girls were 15 times (adjusted OR: 15.4; 95% CI: 9.3 – 25.5) likely to be extreme dieters. Over 52% of extreme dieters were in healthy weight as defined by age-sex-specific BMI percentile. Culturally sensitive and comprehensive health education programs addressing several health risk behaviors could be beneficial for adolescents.


Hedging under a parallel shift of the interest rate curve is well-known for a long date in finance literature. It is based on the use of a duration-convexity approximation essentially pioneered by Fisher-Weil [2]. However the situation is inaccurately formulated such that the obtained result is very questionable. Motivations and enhancement of such approximation have been performed in our recent working paper [5],"Enhancement of the Fisher-Weil bond technique immunization". So it is seen that the introduction of a term measuring the passage of time and high order sensitivities lead to very accurate approximation of the zero-coupon price change. As a result, the immunization of a portfolio made by coupon-bearing bonds may be reduced to a non-linear and integer minimization problem. In the present work, we show that actually a mixed-integer linear programming is needed to be considered. This last can be handled by making use of standard solvers as the CPLEX software.


Real life problems are known to be messy, dynamic and multi-objective, and involve high levels of uncertainty and constraints. Because traditional problem-solving methods are no longer capable of handling this level of complexity, heuristic search methods have attracted increasing attention in recent years for solving such problems. Inspired by nature, biology, statistical mechanics, physics and neuroscience, heuristics techniques are used to solve many problems where traditional methods have failed. Data Mining: A Hueristic Approach will be a repository for the applications of these techniques in the area of data mining.


For nearly 100 years, the James River has been the primary source of seed oysters for Virginia. A disease caused by Minchinia nelsoni (MSX) killed most oysters in high-salinity waters in the lower river in 1959 and 1960, and planting has not been resumed in these areas (Andrews 1983). Large populations of oysters on Hampton Bar and near the mouth of the river which served as broodstocks were destroyed. After 1960, setting declined drastically in regularity and intensity to about one tenth of that which occurred in the 1950's. Setting patterns suggest two types of seed areas in Chesapeake Bay: (1) high freshwater discharge, open or flushing estuaries with light spatfalls that decrease in intensity with distance from the river mouth; the James River is a typical example; and (2) low discharge, trap-type estuaries where intensive sets are heaviest near the head of the saline sector; examples are the Piankatank and Great Wicomico rivers in Virginia. Larval transport systems in the two estuarine types differ in quantity of larvae retained and regularity of spatfalls. Hourly plankton samples in the James River during 10 days in 1964 and 1965 revealed regular cyclic abundance of larvae with tidal stages. Larvae were 5 to 10 times more numerous during high-tide periods than at low-tide periods. Mostly early-stage larvae were distributed randomly throughout vertical columns of water. Larvae of other bivalve species exhibited similar distributions and fluctuations in abundance with tidal stages. Patterns of larval distribution were similar for all depths at five stations, both in the channel and over oyster beds, during 16 tidal cycles in 1965. Frequent recruitment of new larval broods and disappearance of most oyster larvae before ages of 3 to 5 days suggest losses due to physical dispersion and predation. Only when larvae reached advanced umbo stages did they actively select deeper water strata in the channel which provided a transport system to carry them upriver. In the 1950's, spatfall occurred every week in the James River from 1 July to 1 October each year; since 1960, light, erratic setting has prevailed every year. If one assumes that predation, larval ecology, and physical transport systems have not changed, it appears that broodstocks have become inadequate, or that larvae were killed by toxic substances.


While trademarks are designed to promote a competitive and productive marketplace, the current system of trademark registration is run by the Patent & Trademark Office as a monopoly of questionable productivity. The average time that it takes for the Patent & Trademark Office to process a trademark application is over a year, and as a result, trademark applicants risk investing substantial sums of money into a mark to discover much later that the Patent & Trademark Office will not register it. This Article considers a possible solution - a system of privatized trademark registration. The system would contain several features: 1) Multiple "entities" serving as registrars: Various private entities would compete with each other and register trademarks while sharing one database for pending and registered trademarks. Market mechanisms would thus encourage speedier and more effective registrations. 2) Optional expedited process: Different entities could employ price discrimination calibrated to the speed with which a trademark applicant wants to use his mark. 3) Quality control mechanisms: For example, to ensure the quality of the registration process, a rating system would permit clients to provide feedback after registration and years later. An entity providing ineffective services or issuing trademarks that later faced serious litigation would earn poor ratings while a reliable entity would fare well. To explore the viability of trademark privatization, the Article relies on both the theoretical privatization literature and practical examples in which government exclusivity has been removed from intellectual property (and other) decision-making. By challenging assumptions about the status quo surrounding the monopoly of the Patent & Trademark Office, the Article seeks to open a more general discussion about improvements to the existing system of trademark registration.


Packet tracing is a popular and efficient method for accelerating ray tracing. However, packet traversal techniques become inefficient when they are applied to path tracing since the secondary rays are incoherent. In this paper, we present a simple technique for improving the coherency of secondary rays. This technique uses the same sequence of random numbers for generating secondary rays for all the pixels in each sample. This improves the efficiency of the packet tracing algorithm but creates structured noise patterns in the image. We propose an interleaved sampling scheme that reduces the correlation in the noise and makes it virtually imperceptible in the final image. Coherent path tracing is unbiased, simple to implement, and outperforms standard path tracing with packet tracing, while producing images with similar RMS error values.


Background: The conflict in Afghanistan has exposed more Canadian Forces personnel to a greater degree of adversity than at any time in recent memory. We determined the incidence of Afghanistan deployment–related mental disorders and associated risk factors among personnel previously deployed in support of this mission. Methods: The study population consisted of 30 513 Canadian Forces personnel who began a deployment in support of the mission in Afghanistan before Jan. 1, 2009. The primary outcome was a mental disorder perceived by a Canadian Forces clinician to be related to the Afghanistan deployment. Data on diagnoses and perceptions were abstracted from medical records of a stratified random sample of 2014 personnel. Sample design weights were used in all analyses to generate descriptive statistics for the entire study population. Results: Over a median follow-up of 1364 days, 13.5% (95% confidence interval [CI] 12.1%–14.8%) of the study population had a mental disorder that was attributed to the Afghanistan deployment. Posttraumatic stress disorder was the most common diagnosis (in 8.0%, 95% CI 7.0%–9.0%, of personnel). Deployment to higher-threat locations, service in the Canadian Army and lower rank were independent risk factors associated with an Afghanistan-related diagnosis (e.g., hazard ratio for deployment to Kandahar Province 5.6, 95% CI 2.6–12.5, relative to deployment to the United Arab Emirates). In contrast, sex, Reserve Forces status, multiple deployments and deployment length were not independent risk factors. Interpretation: An important minority of Canadian Forces personnel deployed in support of the Afghanistan mission had a diagnosis of a mental disorder perceived to be related to the deployment. Determining long-term outcomes is an important next step.


"Sport, Tradition and Freedom" entails a philosophical examination of the relationship between traditions of rationality and understandings of freedom in sport. Chapter One introduces the ideas of freedom and virtue. Chapter Two involves a critical and historical exploration of the traditions of conservatism, liberalism and Marxism and the effects that these traditions have had on accounts of freedom in sport. Chapter Three examines the issue of freedom in sport from a social critical-formalist perspective, particularly addressing the influence that the process of commodification in advanced capitalism has had on sport. It also endeavours to suggest that the virtues, as explained by Alisdair Maclntyre, are important to the protection of formal freedom in sport, from the effects of advanced capitalism. Chapter Four examines the link between the modern liberal tradition and the virtue tradition. This link is made via the ideas of self-determination and authentic social unions which both traditions share. This chapter also investigates the influence that these various traditions have had on the framing and solution to issues in sport, using the drug issue as a paradigm case. The conclusion suggests that it may be profitable to explore the rationality of less dominant traditions in society when investigating sport. Inquiry revealed that many traditions of understanding in sport rely heavily on elements from political traditions in society. Freedom in sport has been linked to conservative notions of a craft, to liberal notions of play and the independent individual and to accounts of freedom which support the dominant capitalist institutions of society. The examination by social critical theorists of the freedom of authentic social practices and the location of this freedom in the formal rules of sport, provided an alternative to these previous explanations which had located freedom in either the attitude of the player or the economic institutions of society. On the formalist view of sport, freedom is located in the pursuit of gratuitous difficulty, which the rules of sport make possible. The protection of this freedom from social abrogation involves virtue, the formation of authentic social unions, and judgement in sporting participation. The concluding chapter suggested that the protection of formal freedom and the importance of judgement and "seeing without illusion" in sport is critical to issues such as feminism, professionalism and creativity in sport.


Fossils are essential to the reconstruction of the evolution of life and episodes in Earth history. Knowledge of biomineralization - the processes associated with the formation of mineralized biological structures - is essential to properly evaluate data derived from fossils. This book emphasizes skeletal formation and fossilization in a geologic framework in order to understand evolution, relationships between fossil groups, and the use of biomineral materials as geochemical proxies for understanding ancient oceans and climates. The focus is on shells and skeletons of calcareous organisms, and the book explores the fine structures and mode of growth of the characteristic crystalline units, taking advantage of most recent physical methodological advances. The book is richly illustrated and will be of great interest to advanced students and researchers in paleontology, Earth history, evolution, sedimentology, geochemistry, and materials science.


Abstract International humanitarian law is designed to deal with entities or countries, which are engaged in traditional conflicts between them (wars), also using traditional means and methods of fighting. By witnessing the rise of new entities active at the international level (groups and militant organizations) which have been engaged in nonconventional and asymmetric conflicts with States or with each other, using new means and methods of fighting, as well as widening disparities of power and technological progress between countries themselves, necessitate the adaption of international humanitarian law in terms of texts and mechanisms of field application. Particlar focus on the principles of proportionality and distinction between civilians and military fighters is required.


In order to circumvent limitations in traditional radiographic bone density assessment, a custom quantitative ultrasound device and protocols were developed for assessment of live bottlenose dolphins, Tursiops truncatus. In laboratory measurements on disarticulated pectoral flippers collected post-mortem, a strong correlation was established between bone mineral density (BMD) as measured with quantitative ultrasound and X-ray (r=0.93). A primary target skeletal site in the radius of the dolphin pectoral fin was comprehensively defined. BMD distribution patterns throughout the radius were characterized and a single region of interest (ROI) with a high correlation to the density of the overall bone (r=0.98) was selected. Statistical tests demonstrated no statistically significant differences in any subset based on sex, age, total body length, handedness, nutritional status, or geographical affinity, supporting inclusion of all specimens as a normative reference dataset for bone density in bottlenose dolphins. Initial trials to develop clinical protocols and establish ultrasound of bone as truly non-invasive were conducted on captive dolphins. Successful assessments were subsequently conducted to ultrasonically assess BMD in wild dolphins during capture-release health assessments.


Continued reliance on the androgen receptor (AR) is now understood as a core mechanism in castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), the most advanced form of this disease. While established and novel AR pathway-targeting agents display clinical efficacy in metastatic CRPC, dose-limiting side effects remain problematic for all current agents. In this study, we report the discovery and development of ARN-509, a competitive AR inhibitor that is fully antagonistic to AR overexpression, a common and important feature of CRPC. ARN-509 was optimized for inhibition of AR transcriptional activity and prostate cancer cell proliferation, pharmacokinetics, and in vivo efficacy. In contrast to bicalutamide, ARN-509 lacked significant agonist activity in preclinical models of CRPC. Moreover, ARN-509 lacked inducing activity for AR nuclear localization or DNA binding. In a clinically valid murine xenograft model of human CRPC, ARN-509 showed greater efficacy than MDV3100. Maximal therapeutic response in this model was achieved at 30 mg/kg/d of ARN-509, whereas the same response required 100 mg/kg/d of MDV3100 and higher steady-state plasma concentrations. Thus, ARN-509 exhibits characteristics predicting a higher therapeutic index with a greater potential to reach maximally efficacious doses in man than current AR antagonists. Our findings offer preclinical proof of principle for ARN-509 as a promising therapeutic in both castration-sensitive and castration-resistant forms of prostate cancer.


Abstract:Vein quartz as a raw material for prehistoric stone tools is a much maligned material, very often treated to a cursory analysis only, if it is analysed at all. This paper examines the role of quartz in Neolithic stone tool traditions through the typo-technological analysis based on experimental archaeology of a Neolithic quartz assemblage from Thornhill, Co. Londonderry, Northern Ireland, and a comparison with a Mesolithic quartz assemblage from Belderrig, Co. Mayo, Ireland. The analysis shows that the Neolithic quartz tradition is distinctly different from the preceding Mesolithic and appears geared towards the production and use of smaller, thinner flakes knapped using a wider range of techniques, combinations of techniques and technical procedures than in the Later Mesolithic. The use of the bipolar technique is interpreted as a social choice based on the lithic traditions of the Neolithic community and not directly related to the use of quartz cobbles or the knapping of small cores. Differences and similarities were noted between the manufacture techniques and treatment of quartz and flint by the community at Thornhill. Moreover, a complex pattern of deposition of both artefactual and natural quartz was identified in the pits and structures, suggesting that quartz played a complex dual role for the inhabitants of the site.


In this review we provide a systematic analysis of transcriptomic signatures derived from 42 breast cancer gene expression studies, in an effort to identify the most relevant breast cancer biomarkers using a meta-analysis method. Meta-data revealed a set of 117 genes that were the most commonly affected ranging from 12% to 36% of overlap among breast cancer gene expression studies. Data mining analysis of transcripts and protein-protein interactions of these commonly modulated genes indicate three functional modules significantly affected among signatures, one module related with the response to steroid hormone stimulus, and two modules related to the cell cycle. Analysis of a publicly available gene expression data showed that the obtained meta-signature is capable of predicting overall survival (P < 0.0001) and relapse-free survival (P < 0.0001) in patients with early-stage breast carcinomas. In addition, the identified meta-signature improves breast cancer patient stratification independently of traditional prognostic factors in a multivariate Cox proportional-hazards analysis.


When the wind speed is low enough, wave breaking does not lead to bubble clouds of substantial size. The collective mode of oscillations that is dominant at high wind speeds may be neglected. In this case, wave breaking that is still the major source of noise is approximated by a finite area of the sea surface over which single bubbles are entrained and emit individual acoustic pulses. Each breaking wave has a certain emission characteristics depending on bubble size distribution, density, wave size, rate of entrainment, etc. An empirical correlation between the whitecap coverage ratio and the wind speed is employed to infer the size of the bubble entrainment area. The contribution of all waves are summed and the ambient noise levels are computed as a function of the wind speed. The results are in good agreement with field measurements. [Work supported by the Office of Naval Research.]


Users often struggle to stay digitally secure. Despite a multitude of security advice, they find it challenging to identify threats and develop appropriate behaviors to prevent potential attacks, especially in complex domains such as software updating. Our work seeks to improve the efficacy of security advice by exploring a new approach: video entertainment education (e.g. edutainment). Prior work has shown that negative experiences can be powerful teachers and has suggested that security stories users see on TV may actually teach them new behaviors. Building on this foundation, we conducted a participatory design study (n=13) to develop a video that entertains users into updating their software. This edutainment video was professionally produced and compared to text-based security advice in a controlled experiment (n=151). Based on this experiment, we find preliminary evidence that our security edutainment video increases users' likelihood of updating their software more than traditional textbased security advice. This suggests that edutainment holds promise for digital security education and that edutainment videos may eventually become viable replacements for corporate security videos and some text-based security advice.


Previous studies have found improvements in mood (e.g., depression, anxiety) following selenium (Se) supplementation of individuals with adequate Se status. We investigated whether Se status and increased Se intakes were related to mood states and cognitive function in individuals with chronically low Se status. Plasma Se and glutathione peroxidase activity (GSH‐Px) were determined in 60 Chinese men (aged 18–49 y) living in Xichang County, Sichuan Province, China, an area known for having the world's lowest intakes of Se. Mood states were measured with a Chinese version of the Profile of Mood States, while cognitive function was determined by measuring performance on a battery of computerized tasks assessing attention, perception, memory, reasoning and psychomotor skills. Baseline plasma Se concentration was negatively associated with anxiety (p=0.05), depression (p=0.05), tiredness (p=0.009), confusion (p=0.04), and with total mood disturbance (p=0.05), a summary measure. Plasma Se concentration was positively associated with performance on two perceptual tasks, search (p=0.03) and matching (p=0.01), while GSH‐Px was negatively associated with performance on a reasoning task (p=0.02). However, subsequent food fortification providing 200 μg Se/d for 15 wk markedly improved Se status but did not improve mood or cognitive performance. Results, while consistent with findings in individuals with adequate Se status, suggest that other factors mediate the relationship between Se and mood and cognitive function.


Local skin blood flow (SkBF) responses can be modified by vasoactive neurotransmitters released from sensory nerves, notably, capsaicin-sensitive primary afferents (CSPAs). Age-specific CSPA function was examined in this study by assessing the SkBF response to acute capsaicin (CPZ). Eight young (18-30 years), 8 middle-aged (40-55 years), and 9 older (65-80 years) healthy men participated in the study. Treatment patches of varying CPZ concentration (ethanol and 0.001%-10.0% CPZ) were applied to sites on the ventral forearm. SkBF was measured with a laser Doppler imager. There were significant (p <.001) age-specific differences in the SkBF response to CPZ. In the older group, SkBF was reduced at least 2-fold at all concentrations of CPZ compared with the younger group. The middle-aged group showed an intermediate response. SkBF was significantly elevated above that obtained with a vehicle solution when sites were treated with CPZ concentrations > or = 0.1% in middle-aged and younger skin, whereas a significant elevation in SkBF was only achieved with 10% CPZ in older skin. The elevated SkBF in the young and middle-aged groups at higher concentrations of CPZ was the result of both an increased area of vasodilation and an increased magnitude of vasodilation within the vasodilated areas. In the older group, the increase in cutaneous vascular conductance at the highest concentration of CPZ was entirely the result of an increased area of vasodilation. These results suggest impaired CSPA function in aged skin and age-specific differences in the ability of sensory nerves to modify local inflammatory SkBF responses.


The Theatre of Photography research group convened by Wiebke Leister explores staging practices that engage both the camera and its visual histories into modes of theatre production, thus stressing how photography is performative, as such, when giving and enhancing the condition of the resulting images, i.e.
scenarios that only exist for the camera. Including who is staged in those frames – the fame of the proscenium arch, the view finder of the camera and the border of the photographic image – and who or
what might exist beyond it, off-frame, as if it had never been staged. In particular the relationship between model and photographer, which meanders between recording, reacting to cues, acting out and re-enacting, and how these translate to audiences. Invaded participants include a range of practitioners, theorists and historians approaching the subject from different photography, theatre and performance angles.
The first meeting was held on 15th May 2015, 2:00- 6:00pm at the Swedenborg Society as part of the Moose on the Loose Research festival. Successive events on 12th February 2016 and 8th July 2016 to further discuss the intersection of photography and theatre, to take their multiple encounters as an opportunity to consider and rethink the often overused or misconceived concepts of 'performance'.


We report a novel storage technology of proteins with surface-perfluorinated poly(ethylene glycol) compartments in 2H,3H-perfluoropentane. The compartments were obtained from self-folding and self-assembly of an amphiphilic random copolymer bearing poly(ethylene glycol) and perfluoroalkyl pendants in the hydrofluorocarbon. Lysozyme and α-chymotrypsin as model proteins were efficiently encapsulated within the PEG compartments and quantitatively recovered therefrom with water. The recovered lysozyme maintained the original higher order structure without denaturation to show enzymatic activity for the hydrolysis of Micrococcus lysodeikticus as high as its original counterpart in water. The storage technology was further effective to inhibit inactivation of α-chymotrypsin.


Abstract. The presence of vegetation alters hydrological cycles of ecosystems. Complex plant–soil interactions govern the fate of precipitation input and water transitions through ecosystem compartments. Disentangling these interactions is a major challenge in the field of ecohydrology and a pivotal foundation for understanding the carbon cycle of semi-arid ecosystems. Stable water isotopes can be used in this context as tracer to quantify water movement through soil–vegetation–atmosphere interfaces. The aim of this study is to disentangle vegetation effects on soil water infiltration and distribution as well as dynamics of soil evaporation and grassland water use in a Mediterranean cork oak woodland during dry conditions. An irrigation experiment using δ18O labelled water was carried out in order to quantify distinct effects of tree and herbaceous vegetation on the infiltration and distribution of event water in the soil profile. Dynamic responses of soil and herbaceous vegetation fluxes to precipitation regarding event water use, water uptake depth plasticity, and contribution to ecosystem soil evaporation and transpiration were quantified. Total water loss to the atmosphere from bare soil was as high as from vegetated soil, utilizing large amounts of unproductive evaporation for transpiration, but infiltration rates decreased. No adjustments of main root water uptake depth to changes in water availability could be observed during the experiment. This forces understorey plants to compete with adjacent trees for water in deeper soil layers at the onset of summer. Thus, understorey plants are subjected to chronic water deficits faster, leading to premature senescence at the onset of drought. Despite this water competition, the presence of cork oak trees fosters infiltration and reduces evapotranspirative water losses from the understorey and the soil, both due to altered microclimatic conditions under crown shading. This study highlights complex soil–plant–atmosphere and inter-species interactions controlling rain pulse transitions through a typical Mediterranean savannah ecosystem, disentangled by the use of stable water isotopes.


Atmospheres of evolved AGB stars are heavily affected by pulsation, dust formation and mass loss, and they can become very extended. Time series of observed high-resolution spectra proved to be a useful tool to study atmospheric dynamics throughout the outer layers of these pulsating red giants. Originating at various depths, different molecular spectral lines observed in the near-infrared can be used to probe gas velocities there for different phases during the lightcycle. Dynamic model atmospheres are needed to represent the complicated structures of Mira variables properly. An important aspect which should be reproduced by the models is the variation of line profiles due to the influence of gas velocities. Based on a dynamic model, synthetic spectra (containing CO and CN lines) were calculated, using an LTE radiative transfer code that includes velocity effects. It is shown that profiles of lines that sample different depths qualitatively reproduce the behaviour expected from observations.


Cassava is ideal for production and provision of carbohydrates in the marginal and drought-prone areas, which comprise about 80% of Kenya. However, its potential utilisation as a food security crop remains low in these areas. A major constraint to cassava production is lack of adequate disease and pest-free planting materials greatly exacerbated by its low multiplication rate. The Kenya Agricultural Research Institute Katumani Centre has established cassava agronomic demonstrations, multiplication and distribution programmes. 18,000 cuttings of cassava cultivars, KME 990005, KME 990132, Ex-Mariakani and MM96_5280, were used to establish six multiplication and demonstration plots in the semi-arid Mutomo district in Kitui County. Cultivar MM96_5280 performed significantly better than the others, had a good stay-green ability, high tolerance to drought, cassava mosaic and brown streak virus diseases, and was vigorous.


This chapter considers alternative dispute resolutions (ADR), which are ways that a dispute can be settled outside of the court process. The chapters considers the growth of ADR and how the courts now require litigants to consider ADR before commencing legal action. The courts have wide powers to encourage ADR and this chapter considers these powers and why the courts try to encourage ADR. The key forms of ADR are then presented, together with an analysis of their strengths and weaknesses.


Regional frequency distributions are estimated using respective regional average coefficients of variance, skewness and kurtosis. The regional average coefficients may be significantly biased for a region with inadequate hydrometric data. The objective of this study is to select suitable regional frequency distributions in previously identified five hydrologic homogeneous regions of Nepalese territory with larger focus on data-scarce regions. Incorporation of synthetic flood data has been proposed in two hydrologic regions which have insufficient hydrometric data. A SimHyd rainfall runoff model was employed for the generation of synthetic flood data to augment hydrometric data inadequacy. Selection of best-fit regional frequency distribution was identified using L-moment ratio diagrams and goodness-of-fit measure. The selected distributions were tested by comparing observation and regional distribution factors at eight observation hydrometric sites. Incorporation of synthetic flood data enabled to reduce regional distribution factor error to 6% from that of 10%.


Under the approximation of small birefringence, the properties of radially and azimuthally polarized vortex beams tightly focused through a uniaxial birefringent crystal are investigated. The contour plots of intensity distribution near the focus and in the real focal plane are illustrated by performing numerical calculations. The dependence of the focal shift on numerical aperture and birefringence are analyzed. Moreover, the Strehl ratio in the real focal plane as a function of birefringence is also analyzed. It is revealed that the variation of birefringence has no influence on the focal shift and the Strehl ratio of azimuthally polarized vortex beams.


ADAMTS13 (A Disintegrin And Metalloprotease with ThromboSpondin type1 repeats-13) is an enzyme that is mainly synthesized in the liver and secreted into the blood stream. In plasma, ADAMTS13 cleaves ultra large (UL) von Willebrand factor (VWF) newly released from stimulated and/or injured endothelial cells. It also cleaves soluble UL-VWF and VWF in flowing blood or at the site of growing thrombi under high shear stress. The basic enzymology and structure-function of the ADAMTS13-VWF interaction have presented many interesting questions, particularly in the context of physiological cofactors and fluid shear stress. The relatively poor understanding of this system reflects the complex assessment of VWF proteolysis, as VWF in solution exhibits a conformation that does not actively engage with ADAMTS13. It has been unclear whether force-induced unfolding of VWF is the only mechanism to enhance proteolysis by ADAMTS13, or if interactions of ADAMTS13 and VWF with cofactors ideally position ADAMTS13 on VWF multimers for enhanced cleavage. We demonstrated that coagulation factor VIII (FVIII) and blood platelets cooperatively accelerate proteolytic cleavage of soluble VWF by ADAMTS13 through an alteration of VWF substrate conformation under physiologically relevant fluid shear stresses. In addition, we have established the critical role of the VWF propeptide and FVIIIand platelet-binding domains of VWF in regulating proteolysis of VWF by ADAMTS13 under physiologically relevant shear stress. Through site-directed mutagenesis, kinetic analyses, and peptide inhibition assays we have identified a substrate-binding exosite containing ADAMTS13 residues Arg659, Arg660 and Tyr661 that exhibits an important role in proteolytic cleavage of VWF under both non-physiological and physiological conditions. In addition, modification of this exosite region of ADAMTS13 yielded ADAMTS13 variants with reduced inhibition by autoantibodies and enhanced specific activity. Finally, we have demonstrated that infusion of ADAMTS13 and a truncated variant into ADAMTS13-/mice can restore the thrombus composition and kinetics of fibrin and platelet accumulation in an arterial thrombosis model. Together, these results suggest an important physiological role of cofactor binding to VWF and VWF interactions with ADAMTS13 exosites in regulating ADAMTS13 function in hemostasis. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics First Advisor Long Zheng


Low and variable farm income has been a main rationale for heavy government intervention in agricultural markets and income transfers to farmers whether in Europe in response to disruptive agricultural imports and low world prices at the end of the 19th century or in the US in response to the Great Depression. While the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is again discussed and new directions are examined, it is fundamental to know to what extent low and variable farm income is still a problem in contemporary European agriculture and a valid rationale for designing the new CAP. In this context, this paper first examines the income level and distribution of farm households compared to those of non-farm households for a selection of OECD countries. Second, the paper econometrically investigates whether explanations for low farm income given in the literature apply to the selected OECD countries for the 1980-2000 period. Third, the paper concludes with some policy implications. Both the descriptive and econometric analyses use the microeconomic dataset from the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS). This dataset contains socio-demographic, income and expenditure data that are collected at the household level through household-based budget surveys. These data are recorded in the LIS dataset in a harmonized way for the 30 countries that currently participate in the LIS. Average income levels as well as indicators of poverty and inequality are calculated for farm and non-farm households for the OECD countries that have at least three waves of data in the LIS dataset with a minimum of 30 identified farm households surveyed in each wave1. Three sets of explanations for low farm household income drawn from the literature review of Gardner (1992) are successively investigated: (i) the commodity market conditions, (ii) the earning disequilibrium between sectors, and (iii) the compensating differential for skill differences and non-pecuniary aspects2. Preliminary results confirm that in most of the 12 selected OECD countries the average farm household income is greater than the average non-farm household income. Lower average farm household income tends to occur sporadically for some years in only six of the 12 selected OECD countries. In five of the nine selected European countries, the average farm household incomes clearly tend to improve compared to the average non-farm household incomes during the 1985-95 period. They are well above the average household incomes. The incidence of poverty tends to be less severe among farm households than nonfarm households except for two European countries. In contrast, the intensity of poverty tends to be more severe among farm households than non-farm households in most countries. This implies that in general there are relatively fewer poor farm households compared to non-farm households but the severity of their poverty is stronger. In addition, the income distribution is more equal among farm households than non-farm households in all countries. In the final version of the paper, it is expected that each set of explanations for low farm household income would play a role in understanding the evolution of farm household incomes across countries. Depending on whether one set of explanations tends to dominate the others in one particular group of countries, public interventions can be designed and emphasized in a new CAP for improving and stabilising incomes of farm households.


Despite the substantial importance of the marketing concept and its implementation in the modern business arena extensive research has not been undertaken in developing countries. Market orientation models have only been developed and tested for developed countries. This need for a market orientation model that is applicable to developing countries underlies the principal purpose of this research to develop a synthesis model of market orientation and test it in a developing country. For this purpose, the researcher revisited the five leading market orientation perspectives including decision-making perspective (Shapiro, 1988), market intelligence perspective (Kohli and Jaworski, 1990), culturally based behavioural perspective (Narver and Slater, 1990), strategic perspective (Ruekert, 1992) and customer orientation perspective (Deshpande et al., 1993). Two synthesis issues, initial and vital, were identified from the five different perspectives that embodied the synthesis model of market orientation. The vital issues of the synthesis market orientation model were identified from the large body of literature, and a conceptual framework of market orientation was proposed. The conceptual framework considered internal and external factors as antecedents or determinants, and economic and non-economic performance as consequences, of market orientation and its four components (customer emphasis, intelligence/information generation, intelligence dissemination or interfunctional coordination and intelligence responsiveness or taking action). This framework was then tested in order to identify the linkage between market orientation and its antecedents and consequences. Such efforts have been observed in the previous market orientation literature but this study is different from those of the previous studies on several grounds. Firstly, this study was done on a new dimension of market orientation, the synthesis dimension. Secondly, this study considered external factors as antecedents of market orientation along with internal organisational antecedents. Thirdly, this study considered both the economic and non-economic performance measures as consequences of market orientation. Finally, this study was done on a developing country market (Bangladesh) where no market orientation study has yet been carried out. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods were used to arrive at a valid and convergent conclusion about the market orientation and its relationships with antecedents and consequences. For this purpose, quantitative survey data were obtained from high officials of both marketing and non-marketing departments of the consumer goods manufacturing companies in Bangladesh. A total number of 120 companies participated. Two interviews from each company were undertaken and 216 usable questionnaires were received. Ten companies were selected for a qualitative case study and in-depth interviews were conducted with the chief executive officer (CEO), or with a designated high official assigned by the CEO, for each company. Hypotheses of the study were tested using stepwise regression analysis and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA). Inductive reasoning technique was used for coding and categorising the qualitative data, and the case study method was used for presenting the research results. The findings of the study supported the hypotheses of the study and confirmed the applicability of the proposed market orientation framework. The findings of the study indicated that the market orientation of the consumer goods manufacturing companies in Bangladesh is determined by seven internal (top management emphasis, management training, centralisation, political behaviour, market based reward system, interdepartmental conflict, and interdepartmental connectedness) and three external antecedents/factors (competition, market turbulence, and general economy). The study also identified a significant effect of market orientation on both the economic and non-economic performance of business. The findings of this study are mostly consistent with the previous market orientation studies undertaken in developed countries. At the final stage, the first synthesis model of market orientation for a developing country, Bangladesh, was offered on the basis of the findings of this study. This first synthesis model of market orientation for a developing country, that confirms the extended form of the vital issues, is still to be established as a generic model. Therefore, in order to verify its generic application, it is hoped that this model will be used as a starting point for further studies and be tested in other countries in the world, both developed and developing.


Between 1999 and 2001 about 4,800 Iraqi refugees made their way to Australia. While the vast majority reached their destination, some never got that far, instead finding themselves stranded in Indonesia for up to 10 years. The author conducted interviews with Iraqi refugees in both Indonesia and Australia, from which a number of themes emerged. Central to these was the insecurity and uncertainty faced by participants over a protracted period with a marked difference when comparing the narratives of the participants settled in Australia with those living in a limbo situation in Indonesia. The former recalled the stresses of their journey and the associated feelings of fear, anxiety, and depression. In the case of the latter group, these feelings were ever present as their journey was not yet over.


Triclosan is an antibacterial agent used in household items and personal care products. Because wild animals and humans can harbor this compound in their systems, the toxic effects of triclosan are a possibility and are suspected. Therefore, we examined the effects of triclosan on intracellular Ca2+ concentration in rat thymocytes by cytometric techniques using fluorescent probes. Triclosan doses of 1-10 μM significantly increased the intensity of Ca2+-detecting Fluo-3 fluorescence, indicating an increase in intra-cellular Ca2+ concentrations. The augmentation of Fluo-3 fluorescence became more profound in a dose-dependent manner after the addition of an external source of Ca2+. Conversely, the removal of external Ca2+ greatly attenuated the triclosan-induced augmentation of Fluo-3 fluorescence. These results suggest that triclosan treatment allows external Ca2+ to pass through cell membranes. This phenomenon was not specific for Ca2+ because external Mn2+ quenched the triclosan-induced augmentation of Fluo-3 fluo-rescence, indicating that triclosan can also mediate Mn2+ permeation across membranes. Therefore, these results suggest that triclosan increases membrane permeability to divalent metal cations. Furthermore, triclosan induces Ca2+ release from intracellular stores because the Fluo-3 fluorescence intensitystill increased slightly after triclosan treatment, even under conditions free from external Ca2+. Additionally, triclosan did not increase the intensity of Fluo-3 fluorescence when Ca2+ was depleted from intracellular Ca2+ stores by A23187 under the external Ca2+-free condition. Taken together, these data suggest that micromolar concentrations of triclosan affect intracellular Ca2+ homeostasis in thymocytes, possibly resulting in cellular malfunction.


Subsequent to the discovery of Aedes albopictus (Skuse) in Malta in September 2009, an attempt was made to investigate the mosquito's presence and behaviour during the winter following its discovery. The objective was to determine if the species had survived its first winter, and, if so, whether adults and/or immature stages were active during that period. Oviposition was last observed at the end of October. Larvae and pupae developed in the ovitraps throughout the winter and adult emergence of Ae. albopictus continued despite the apparent absence of adults in field surveys during this period. Control measures may therefore be applied continuously throughout the year. Adult biting activity in winter was not observed in this study. Should this be documented in future, however, then potential transmission of arboviruses like chikungunya and dengue must be considered possible throughout the whole year.


Introduction: There have been various systems for identifying risk of thyroid nodule malignancy using ultrasound (US), with the most recent being 2017 American College of Radiology proposed TI-RADS. However, this system does not take vascular patterns into account. The aim of this study is to determine the role of gray scale and color Doppler ultrasound in differentiating benign and malignant thyroid nodules Methods: A total of 180 ultrasound images of patients with thyroid nodules were analyzed. Nodule composition, shape, margin, echogenicity, echogenic foci and vascular patterns were evaluated. The results were compared with histology findings Results: 98 (54.4%) thyroid nodules were benign and 82 (45.5%) – malignant. Compared to malignant, more benign thyroid nodules (80.6%) were bigger than 1 cm, p < 0.001). Benign and malignant thyroid nodules did not significantly differ in frequency of composition or echogenicity (p > 0.05). Round and taller-than-wide shape, lobulated or irregular margin, microcalcifications were more common among malignant nodules (p < 0.05). Mean total TI-RADS score was significantly higher among malignant thyroid nodules compared to benign, p < 0.001. TI-RADS sensitivity in predicting the risk of malignancy was 82.9%, specificity – 69.4%, area under curve – 0.822, while vascularity had sensitivity of 40% and specificity of 36.7%. Mixed vascularity was more common among benign (p = 0.003) and weak perinodular vascularity was more common among malignant nodules (p = 0.048). Weak negative correlation was found between total amount of TI-RADS points and vascular patterns (rs = 0.238, p = 0.001) Conclusions: In our study irregular or lobulated margin, taller-than-wide shape and microcalcifications were more common among malignant thyroid nodules. While thyroid US using TI-RADS had good diagnostic value in predicting malignancy, vascular patterns had low sensitivity (40.2%) and specificity (36.7%). Thyroid nodules with intranodular vascularity had a lower TI-RADS score.


Commando Country assesses the nature of more than 30 special training centres that operated in the Scottish highlands between 1940 and 1945, in order to explore the origins, evolution and culture of British special service training during the Second World War. These locations were chosen by virtue of the utility of the physical environment of the highland estate, strongly influenced by associated ideas about the challenge of that environment, individual character and the nature of irregular warfare. By virtue of its Scottish geographical perspective, Commando Country diverges from the existing literature by looking across the training establishments used by different organisations, principally Military Intelligence, the Commandos, and Special Operations Executive (SOE), whose histories tend to be considered in isolation. The book investigates the development and function of each category of training centre, the relationships between them, and their place in the broader framework of British and Allied special operations. Based on research in official documentary sources, unpublished and published memoirs and on fieldwork and interviews with surviving participants conducted by the author, Commando Country also presents rare unpublished photographs from public and private sources and artefacts assembled for the exhibition of the same name held at the National War Museum, Edinburgh in 2007. The resulting thesis is that the philosophy and practice improvised at the original school of irregular warfare at Inverailort House in the summer of 1940 permeated the culture of the training centres that developed thereafter. Close attention is accordingly given to the circumstances, organisation and instructing personnel that created the Inverailort syllabus, and the backgrounds and skills brought to bear, some drawn from civilian professions. The application of similar methods to the newly formed Commando forces is then traced. In this context the original operational purposes of individual aspects of the training became standardised into a general test of fitness and character designed to control admission of volunteers into the Commandos, the raiding and assault units that regarded themselves as a new military elite. Simultaneously, the approach pioneered at Inverailort was adapted to form the paramilitary training element of SOE, the organisation that coordinated and supported Resistance organisations in enemy-occupied countries. Particular attention is paid to the dedicated training establishments for Polish and Norwegian SOE units based in Scotland. The book concludes by considering how techniques and philosophy were applied more widely as conventional military training itself evolved, extending influence even into postwar civilian outdoor recreation


The use of Floating Car Data (FCD) as a particular case of Probe Vehicle Data (PVD) has been the object of extensive research for estimating traffic conditions, travel times and Origin to Destination trip matrices. It is based on data collected from a GPS-equipped vehicle fleet or available cell phones. Cooperative Cars with vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) communication capabilities represent a step forward, as they also allow tracking vehicles surrounding the equipped car. This paper presents the results of a limited experiment with a small fleet of cooperative cars in Barcelona's Central Business District (CBD) known as L'Eixample. Data collected from the experiment were used to build and calibrate the emulation of cooperative functions in a microscopic simulation model that captured the behavior of vehicle sensors in Barcelona's CBD. Such a calibrated model allows emulating fleet data on a large scale that goes far beyond what a small fleet of cooperative vehicles could capture. To determine the traffic state, several approaches are developed for estimating traffic variables based on extensions of Edie's definition of the fundamental traffic variables with the emulated data, whose accuracy depends on the penetration level of the technology.


SOMMARIO: 1. Introduzione – 2. Le mutilazioni genitali femminili come atto di violenza nelle norme e nei documenti europei degli anni 2000 – 3. Escissione e abuso/brutalita/violenza: binomi appropriati e inevitabili? – 4. L'escissione, il dolore e la sua reinterpretazione – 5. Il rapporto dell'escissione con la comunita, la famiglia e il matrimonio – 6. La Convenzione di Istanbul, le norme francesi e i rischi per la liberta religiosa – 7. Considerazioni conclusive.Female Genital Mutilation as a Gender-Based Crime? (An Analysis of the European Norms in Light of the Concepts of Violence and Religious Freedom)ABSTRACT: Female genital mutilations (FGM) are ancient practices, which are widespread in several geographical areas, and particularly in Africa. The conflict between customary norms and state legal systems, which arises because FGM violate fundamental rights like the right to physical integrity, health, and non-discrimination based on gender/ethnicity/culture, discloses the dialectic between two normative universes; these universes are conceptually distant with regard to the priority given to the individual and the group. Focusing on the reasons related to female genital cutting (FGC), which consists of the ablation, to differing degrees, of female genital organs, this article, argues that the link that European norms establish between FGM and violence, abuse or brutality comes into conflict with the reasons why migrants perpetuate FGC. Therefore, the way gender is mainstreamed into European norms on FGM can have negative effects, which concern courts' implementation of these norms and migrants' social inclusion. Furthermore, this article claims that focusing on health instead of gender equality may prove more effective for the eradication of FGM. Through an analysis of French law, it also suggests that the way the national law is adapted to conform to the Istanbul Convention, may represent a danger to religious freedom.


During recent years mathematical modeling has been extensively deployed within the IIASA energy research activities. The shift in the Energy Project's activities from predominantly global energy demand and supply considerations toward more regional and local ones called for greater detail in the representation of the energy system compared to the models used within the scope of "Energy in a Finite World" (W. Haefele et al., Ballinger Publishing Company, 1981). Furthermore, the statistical data base has improved considerably over recent years which allowed for a comprehensive representation of the entire energy chain from resource extraction to end-use conversion.

The change in the scope of the Energy Group's activities and the improved statistical data availability motivated the development of the MESSAGE-II energy model. The point of departure was the original MESSAGE model of IIASA's global energy study. Like its predecessor, MESSAGE-II was conceptualized for the transformation of dynamic linear programming problems into matrix structures. But apart from primary to secondary energy conversion, the main feature of the original model, this new code also depicts energy extraction, transport, distribution and end-use conversion. In addition, MESSAGE-II hosts features such as integer programming, non-linear objectives and the possibility of multi-objective optimization. The optimization of a MESSGAE-II coded problem requires a linear program solving package, e.g. MINOS, APEX, MPSX, etc.

Part I of this report provides the descriptions of both, the mathematical formulation and a guide for the code implementation and specification of input files necessary for the potential user to understand and apply this code. Part II contains a complete example of a MESSAGE-II code application including input files, etc. The actual use of MESSAGE-II may benefit from another publication that is closely related to this report. The "User's Guide for the Post-Processor of MESSAGE-II" (WP-84-72) entails convenient pre- and post-calculating procedures, report writing and plotting routines, etc. tailored particularly to interact with MESSAGE-II. The examples used in the post-processor guide correspond to the examples given in the user's guide for the matrix generator.


Impaired empathic response has been described in patients following brain injury, suggesting that empathy may be a fundamental aspect of the social behavior disturbed by brain damage. However, the neuroanatomical basis of impaired empathy has not been studied in detail. The empathic response of patients with localized lesions in the prefrontal cortex (n = 25) was compared to responses of patients with posterior (n = 17) and healthy control subjects (n = 19). To examine the cognitive processes that underlie the empathic ability, the relationships between empathy scores and the performance on tasks that assess processes of cognitive flexibility, affect recognition, and theory of mind (TOM) were also examined. Patients with prefrontal lesions, particularly when their damage included the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, were significantly impaired in empathy as compared to patients with posterior lesions and healthy controls. However, among patients with posterior lesions, those with damage to the right hemisphere were impaired, whereas those with left posterior lesions displayed empathy levels similar to healthy controls. Seven of nine patients with the most profound empathy deficit had a right ventromedial lesion. A differential pattern regarding the relationships between empathy and cognitive performance was also found: Whereas among patients with dorsolateral prefrontal damage empathy was related to cognitive flexibility but not to TOM and affect recognition, empathy scores in patients with ventromedial lesions were related to TOM but not to cognitive flexibility. Our findings suggest that prefrontal structures play an important part in a network mediating the empathic response and specifically that the right ventromedial cortex has a unique role in integrating cognition and affect to produce the empathic response.


There is an argument to be made for letting corporations hold off on contributing to their employees' defined benefit pension plans, as long as there is a guarantee the cash will come eventually. That is the reason that provincial governments began allowing creditworthy companies to instead provide a letter of credit, backed by a Canadian bank, guaranteeing the cash deposit, and secured by the company's line of credit or some similar facility. Sometimes circumstances are such that a company needs all the cash it can get to grow, or perhaps to manage through tough economic times. Given the sluggish recovery from last decade's financial crisis and the difficulty for pension funds to grow amid persistent low interest rates, it perhaps is understandable that more companies are using standby letters of credit as IOUs for their employee pensions. The letters provide the companies more flexibility with their capital, and diminish the risk that, should returns to pension funds rise again to more normal rates, there could be "trapped surplus." It is, however, harder to make a case for why public sector companies and Crown corporations have begun using letters of credit in place of cash deposits to pensions. They certainly do not face the same pressure for capital flexibility, given their revenue is frequently assured, and they face no competition that would pressure them to redirect capital for strategic purposes. And yet, research shows that this is happening, at least to some degree. That should give policymakers pause. Unfortunately, there is a troubling lack of data available as to which organizations have been using letters of credit in place of cash contributions to pension funds. Clearly they are proving useful for some companies, and that the exact reasons vary widely. We observe some companies using the letter of credit option that would appear to have plenty of capital flexibility, so the rationale for their use might not be what the policy anticipated. Meanwhile, it is unclear why so many other companies have chosen not to avail themselves of this temporary pension-funding relief, despite the advantages it offers for avoiding the risk of trapped surpluses. There also remain restrictions on who can underwrite these credit guarantees — regulations do not consider foreign banks and insurance companies acceptable, for example — raising the cost for companies that arrange letters of credit. Taken together, it would seem that there are signs that the policy changes allowing pension-funding relief might be serving their purpose and might be helping companies that could use it, but there is a worrying lack of information to be sure how well they are working and what problems may loom. It certainly seems like a close review is in order. When a Crown corporation is writing IOUs to its defined-benefit pension fund, that is surely a sign that policy-makers are not keeping a close enough eye on the outcomes this policy has led to.


This study examined the association between labour intensification due to work intensification and work extensification and ill health in women in certain manufacturing work in the Philippines. Work intensification is defined as more workload for each worker, and work extensification as less deadtime or work rest and more overtime. The sample was 23 establishments and 630 respondents. Workplace environment monitoring showed exposure to hazards such as noise, chemicals, poor ventilation, and poor illumination. The most prevalent illnesses and health problems were headache and coughs and colds. Results of focus group discussions showed adverse work conditions, hazard exposures among women workers, fast pace of work, close supervision, prevalent occupational illnesses, and management style that do not comply with the national work standards. The results indicate that the health issues of women workers depend on many factors, such as management and supervisory style, job autonomy, nature of task, and hazard exposures. This study resulted in three major analytic observations on the engagement of women workers in the new global labour market, the role of information technologies (IT) in women's work, and occupational illnesses caused by work intensification and work extensification.


This thesis aims to address the paucity of research on contemporary middlebrow fiction and the ongoing tensions in the American literary hierarchy by focussing on the published novels of author Donna Tartt. By examining Tartt's fiction both through a close reading analysis and an examination of paratextual elements of her work, this thesis argues that Tartt's novels fall somewhere in the liminal space between highbrow and lowbrow culture. Each chapter looks at one of her novels in detail, drawing on Pierre Bourdieu's theories on cultural capital and taste as a prism through which Tartt's books might be examined. The introduction explores the history of literary tensions in America. The first chapter examines the role of protagonist Richard Papen in The Secret History and his position as an unreliable narrator. Chapter two looks at the merging of literary genres in The Little Friend, with a particular focus on the fusing of Southern Gothic and Sentimental fiction. Lastly, chapter three analyses the importance of art in The Goldfinch, concentrating on the Carel Fabritius painting for which Tartt's novel is named. It is the intention of this thesis to show through each chapter that Tartt balances the cerebral with the emotional, and offers highbrow critics who dismiss her work as 'popular' a riposte by opening discussions about what constitutes taste in literature.


Modern software development without reactive programming is hard to imagine. Reactive programming favors a wide class of contemporary software systems that respond to user input, network messages, and other events. While reactive programming is an active field of research, the implementation of reactive concepts remains challenging. In particular, change detection represents a hard but inevitable necessity when implementing reactive concepts. Typically, change detection mechanisms are not intended for reuse but are tightly coupled to the particular change resolution mechanism. As a result, developers often have to re-implement similar abstractions. A reusable primitive for change detection is still missing. To find a suitable primitive, we identify commonalities in existing reactive concepts. We discover a class of reactive concepts, state-based reactive concepts. All state-based reactive concepts share a common change detection mechanism: they detect changes in the evaluation result of an expression. On the basis of the identified common change detection mechanism, we propose active expressions as a reusable primitive. By abstracting the tedious implementation details of change detection, active expressions can ease the implementation of reactive programming concepts. We evaluate the design of active expressions by re-implementing a number of existing state-based reactive concepts using them. The resulting implementations highlight the expressiveness of active expressions. Active expressions enable the separation of essential from non-essential parts when reasoning about reactive programming concepts. By using active expressions as a primitive for change detection, developers of reactive language constructs and runtime support can now focus on the design of how application programmers should be able to react to change. Ultimately, we would like active expressions to encourage experiments with novel reactive programming concepts and with that to yield a wider variety of them to explore.


This study investigated the morphology, electrochemical modification with respect to the wood fiber direction, and mechanical properties of wood modified by in situ polymerization with polyaniline (PANI). This polymerization formed a composite material with applications as an anti-static, electromagnetic, anti-corrosion, and heavy metal purifying materials. The polymer was found throughout the entire structure of the wood and was quantified within the wood cell wall and middle lamella by SEM-EDX. The presence of PANI affected the conductivity of the composite specimens, which was found to be higher in the fiber direction, indicating a more intact percolation pathway of connected PANI particles in this direction. The PANI modification resulted in a small reduction of the storage modulus, the maximum strength, and the ductility of the wood, with decreases in the properties of specimens conditioned in an environment above 66% relative humidity. The in situ-polymerized PANI strongly interacted with the lignin component of the veneers, according to the decrease in the lignin glass transition temperature (Tg) noted in DMA studies.


+ Ph.D. Researcher, P.G. Teaching Department of Law, RTMNU, Nagpur * Research Guide, RTMNU, Nagpur. Abstract It is the need of hour that laws be more gender neutral. To bring equality and to protect the rights of the people of third sex gender and homosexuals neutral laws are imperative. These days a regular conflict can be easily seen in the mode of the men's rights movement in India. It is the outcome of high rate of manipulation and exploitation of female oriented laws. These incidents are clear evident for the conflict theory of sociology and of Karl Marx. Due to absence of proper legislation on male rape laws and less risk factor in comparison to the involvement of girls into it the demand is high. As social stigma and fear of pregnancy is less it is easily carried out. . Sexual assault and can be done of a female as well as male. Studies conducted mostly in developed countries indicate that 5-10% of men report a history of childhood sexual abuse, 3.6% in Namibia and 13.4% in the United Republic of Tanzania to 20% in Peru. The evidence available suggests that males may be even less likely than female victims to report an assault to the authorities.


Today computer games are being developed more than for entertainment of the players. In the field of health and education, serious games aim to improve the level of the cognitive abilities, in a more attractive manner.
Among the mental process, the concentration and the relaxation are the basic cognitive abilities in tennis. The timely monitoring and the levels of these abilities are important when the performance enhancement is concerned.
Mental preparation of tennis players represents an essential aspect of the modern training process. In order to increase its efficiency, the mental preparation uses more often than before biofeedback systems, able to provide an objective and augumented feedback concerning the capacity to control and to maintain the mental abilities at a certain level, during a task. One of the biofeedback systems is represented by Neuroharmony, an electroencephalographic system, that uses also an educational software able to improve the cognitive abilities of the users, through different serious games.
In this paper we present one case study concerning the use of Neuroharmony serious games in the mental training of a 16 years old tennis player, who participated in 12 computer assisted lessons. Each lesson was 30 minutes and was held twice per week, before the practical training lessons. We were focused on the following experimental variables: the games results, the variation of the brain waves in the computer tasks and the constancy of the forehand, in a court test. The results reflect some characteristics of the mental training in tennis and the effect of this approach on the practical training efficiency.


This working paper provides a survey of the theoretical underpinnings for the various employment guarantee schemes, and discusses full employment policy experiences in the United States, Sweden, India, Argentina, and France. The theoretical and policy developments are delineated in a historical context. The paper concludes by identifying some questions that still need to be addressed in the context of the global political economy.


There has been a long debate on whether the expected utility model can explain lottery purchase decision under uncertainty. The traditional strand of research, named the effective price approach, following the expected utility approach takes the expected loss of each ticket as the lottery price and uses this effective price to understand lottery demand. Another branch of literature, more from the prospect theory perspective, argues that lottery demand depends more on jackpot size, or small odds events, than expected values. It is hard to separately evaluate these two different approaches as they share common factors which are hard to cleanly differentiate. In this paper, we examine these two approaches by exploiting a unique lottery game setup in China. This lottery game is similar to the lotteries in other countries except that there is a cap policy on the grand prize, which limits the reward of each jackpot winner. We show that this seemingly complex cap-policy actually causes the whole lottery price to be almost fixed all of the time although the rollover money from the last draw significantly varies. This suggests that the effective price approach cannot explain the observed variation in lottery sales. We further conduct Monte Carlo simulations and provide evidence showing that the popular 2SLS method using rollover and its square as instruments in the effective price literature may give spurious estimation result. We also find that lottery sales are highly correlated to the rollover size.


STUDY OBJECTIVE: To determine whether ethnic differences in cardiovascular disease mortality persist in people with non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. DESIGN: This was an ecological study in which routine mortality data from 1985-86, which coded all mentioned causes of death, provided the numerator. The UK population derived from 1981 census formed the denominator. SETTING: United Kingdom. PARTICIPANTS: Records of all deaths in people aged 45 years and above were extracted if diabetes was mentioned anywhere on the death certificate. The denominator was aged five years to approximate to the 1986 population. Mortality rates where a cardiovascular underlying cause was given were compared between South Asians, African-Caribbeans, and those born in England and Wales. The latter group formed the standard for directly standardised rate ratios. MAIN RESULTS: Mortality from heart disease was approximately three times higher in diabetic South Asian born men and women than in those with diabetes born in England and Wales. This ethnic difference was greatest in the younger age group. Conversely, stroke mortality rates in African-Caribbeans were 3.5-4 times higher than those in the England and Wales population. Despite this high mortality from stroke, ischaemic heart disease death rates were not high in African-Caribbean men. CONCLUSIONS: Ethnic differences in cardiovascular mortality persisted and were greater in those with diabetes. Thus the high risk of heart disease should be targeted for intervention in South Asians, and the high rates of stroke targeted in African-Caribbeans.


Cassava (Manihot esculenta L.) is one of the most important food crops in the tropics, but yields are far below their potential. The gene pool of cas- sava contains natural genetic diversity relevant to many important breeding goals, but breeding progress has been slow, partly because of insuf- ficient genomic resources. As a first step toward implementing genomewide genetic studies that will facilitate rapid genetic gain through breed- ing, we genotyped-by-sequencing a set of 182 full-sibs population of cassava that segregated in several traits: resistance to the cassava mosaic disease (CMD) and yield under CMD pressure; increased carotenoid content in storage roots; color of stem exterior and anthocyanin pigmen- tation in the petioles, inner root skin, and api- cal leaves. Employing a rare-cutting restriction enzyme, PstI, in a genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) library preparation, we obtained 2478 segregating single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), of which 1257 passed standard filter - ing for missing genotypes and deviation from expected genotypic frequencies. We mapped 772 SNPs across 19 linkage groups and anchored 313 unique scaffolds from the version 4.1 of the cassava genome assembly. Most of the stud- ied morphological traits as well as resistance to CMD and root carotenoid content showed quali- tative inheritance. As expected, quantitative trait loci analysis for these traits revealed single loci surrounded by small confidence intervals. Yield under CMD was associated with the CMD resis- tance locus. We show that GBS is a powerful genotyping tool that provides a sufficient number of markers for unraveling the genetic architecture of Mendelian traits in cassava in addition to the development of a robust genetic map that can help anchor unassembled genomic scaffolds.


Among the many mysteries of our Universe, one still unanswered question is how globular clusters form. Globular clusters are very dense agglomerates of hundreds of thousands of stars and they host some of the oldest known stars in our Universe. Since they are luminous, old and found in all massive galaxies, they are a fundamental piece of the puzzle to understand galaxy formation and evolution processes. Traditionally, globular clusters were thought to be simple stellar systems, in which all stars were born at the same time and have the same chemical composition. %Therefore, globular clusters have been considered the perfect laboratory to study how stars evolve. However, in the last few decades, it has been shown that stars within a given globular cluster display inhomogeneities in their chemistry. Every massive old globular cluster located in the Milky Way, for which high precision and deep observations were obtained, was found to host several different stellar populations, i.e. multiple populations. Each stellar population is characterized by specific chemical patterns observed in the atmospheres of individual stars. Only certain elements are found to vary, and they do not do so randomly, but rather the variations are observed to correlate between the elements. The stellar population that has enhanced nitrogen (N) content, also has enhanced sodium and helium abundances but has a depletion in carbon and oxygen, to cite a few examples. At the same time, the iron content is found to be constant among the different populations. Such chemical patterns are often called anomalies. More interestingly, it seems like such chemical anomalies are unique to globular cluster systems, i.e. dense stellar systems, since they are basically not found in other stars located in the field. Knowing how such multiple populations form and how they impact the evolution of globular clusters is crucial to understand the formation of stars and clusters themselves and, more broadly, the formation and evolution of galaxies. Many theoretical scenarios have been proposed to explain the origin of the chemical anomalies in globular clusters. Most models treat the origin of this phenomenon as multiple events of star formation. In such models, a first generation of stars forms from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud which is homogeneous in its chemical composition. The winds of the massive stars from this first generation sink in the centre of the cluster to collapse and provide material for a second generation of stars, which then forms with a different chemical composition. While theoretically straightforward, such scenarios (which involve many types of massive stars) fail in reproducing many of the observed properties of multiple populations in globular clusters. Hence, the formation mechanism for the origin of multiple populations remains an open question. Most studies of multiple populations focused only on ancient globular clusters, aged up to $\sim$13 Gyr. However, many dense and massive younger star clusters are observed in nearby galaxies. Is the multiple populations phenomenon limited to the ancient globular clusters, i.e. could this be a cosmological effect? The goal of this thesis has been expanding the search for multiple populations to star clusters that are significantly younger than the old globular clusters, i.e. up to 10 times younger. Indeed, a compelling line of investigation is to look for multiple populations depending on certain global properties of the clusters, such as age, mass, metallicity. The first major result presented in this work is that multiple populations are found also in the young clusters, down to $\sim$2 Gyr old objects, showing that the phenomenon of multiple populations is not only restricted to the early Universe. Another interesting result I report is that the extent of the multiple populations (in chemical abundance spread) is a strong function of age, with older clusters having larger chemical variations. Additionally, I show that there is no difference in age between the populations in a young star cluster. Such results represent fundamental constraints for the origin of multiple populations and might point towards a new and fresh direction into the onset of this complex phenomenon. An important and related question is whether the young massive star clusters are the same type of stellar systems as the ancient globular clusters, just observed at a different stage of their lifetimes. If confirmed, this could provide important constraints on star cluster formation studies. Therefore, in this thesis I explored clusters at younger ages in order to address the fundamental question whether the star (and cluster) formation conditions were different in the early Universe. The results presented here represent an important hint that ancient and young clusters share the same origin and are only separated in age. I show that star clusters do not require special conditions in which to form, so that they can be used as tracers for the formation and evolution of galaxies.


The purpose of the research is to determine college Instructor's skill rate in designing exam questions in chemistry subject. The statistical population was all of chemistry exam scripts for two semesters in one academic year from which a sample of 364 exam scripts was drawn using multistage cluster sampling. Two experts assessed the scripts and by using appropriate indices and z-test and chi-squared test the analysis of the data was done. We found that the designed exams have suitable coefficients of validity and reliability. The level of difficulty of exams was high. No significant relationship was found between male and female instructors in terms of the coefficient of validity and reliability but a significant difference between the difficulty level in male and female instructors was found(P<.001). It means that female instructors had designed more difficult questions. We did not find any significant relationship between the instructors' gender and the coefficient of discrimination of the exams.


Amy Steadman was destined to become one of the great women's soccer players of her generation. "The best of the best," "Parade" magazine called her as she left high school and headed off to the University of North Carolina. Instead, by age twenty, Amy had undergone five surgeries on her right knee. She had to give up the sport she loved. She walked with a stiff gait, like an elderly woman, and found it painful to get out of bed in the morning. "Warrior Girls" exposes the downside of the women's sports revolution that has evolved since Title IX: an injury epidemic that is easily ignored because we worry that it will threaten our daughters' hard-won opportunities on the field. From teenage girls playing local soccer, basketball, lacrosse, volleyball, and other sports to women competing at the elite level, female athletes are suffering serious injuries at alarming rates. The numbers are frightening and irrefutable. Young female athletes tear their ACLs, the stabilizing ligament in the knee, at rates as high as eight times greater than their male counterparts. Women's collegiate soccer players suffer concussions at the same rate as college football players. From head to toe, female athletes suffer higher rates of injury, and many of them play through constant pain. Michael Sokolove gives us the most up-to-date research on girls and sports injuries. He takes us into the homes and hearts of female athletes, into operating theaters where orthopedic surgeons reconstruct shredded knees, and onto the practice field of famed University of North Carolina soccer coach Anson Dorrance. Exhaustively researched and strongly argued, "Warrior Girls" is an urgent wake-up call for parents and coaches. Sokolove connects the culture of youth sports -- the demands for girls to specialize in a single sport by age ten or younger, and to play it year-round -- directly to the injury epidemic. Devoted to the ideal of team, and deeply bonded with teammates, these tough girls don't want to leave the field even when confronted with serious injury and chronic pain. "Warrior Girls" shows how girls can train better and smarter to decrease their risks. It makes clear that parents must come together and demand changes to a sports culture that manufactures injuries. Well-documented, opinionated, and controversial, "Warrior Girls" shows that all girls can safeguard themselves on the field without sacrificing their hard-won right to be there.


The United States is the leading country in the application of biotechnology to agricultural methods. One of the principal reasons for this is the flexibility of its legislation on Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO). A significant part of its production of soya or corn is already genetically modified, so that its companies need to avoid technical barriers to their exports in the world markets. In the EU, negative public opinion has contributed to the adoption by the authorities of exigent legislation in order to avoid the possible risks to human health and the environment posed by GMO. The EU's authorisation procedure for these organisms is long and meticulous. Furthermore, a compulsory labelling system has been adopted for products, which contain GMO or genetically modified materials (GM materials). In 1998, American interests started to be adversely affected by European legislation. The USA Administration threatened to sue the EU before the World Trade Organisation (WTO). These threats have yet to be followed up with any action. The rules of international trade are regulated by agreements signed up to by the members of the WTO. The EU can argue that its authorisation procedure is designed to reduce the risks to health and the environment. This line of argument is compatible with the Agreements on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) and Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT). The compulsory labelling system is also compatible with the Agreement on TBT if the WTO accepts that a product in which GM material is detected is not similar to a conventional one. The Protocol of Biosafety further supports the EU position since it advocates a cautious approach exemplified by the fact that the Protocol permits consideration of non-scientific risks during risk assessment. However, the Protocol is not yet in force, it is pending ratification by at least 50 countries and, now more than ever, it is uncertain whether the United States will be willing to ratify the Protocol. However, we cannot be sure that there will be future commercial controversy, which will show the contradictions between the commercial agreement and the environmental one.


The absorption spectra of small silver and gold clusters are presented. The experimental technique consists in depositing clusters in an argon matrix which is illuminated with white light. By collecting the outcoming light from the matrix and by analysing it spectrally, the absorption spectrum of the supported clusters can be obtained. To achieve these studies, a new experimental setup has been designed. This setup offers an enhanced sensibility and allows for the measurement of absorption spectra of systems that haven't yet been studied, like silver clusters made of 4, 6, 10, 12 and 14 atoms, as well as gold clusters. The two theoretical approaches used to describe the optical response of a cluster are briefly presented. The first one is the classical Mie theory applied to the Clemenger-Nilsson model, the second one being the quantum chemistry approach. The most relevant known results on silver and gold clusters are reviewed. The experimental setup is then precisely presented. The clusters provided by a sputtering source are mass selected and guided by sets of einzel lenses to the sample-holder, which is cooled down with a liquid helium cycle to approximately 28 K. The clusters are then co-deposited with argon atoms to form a matrix supporting clusters. The design of the sample-holder is presented along with its requirements and constraints. By using two different light sources, the absorption measurements are obtained over a large spectra, ranging from 2 eV to 6 eV. The method used to process the signal and yield an absorption spectrum is presented and discussed. The choice of a rare gas matrix is motivated by its weak interaction with the clusters. However, its effects on the optical response of the clusters are still important. These effects are reviewed and discussed in order to allow for a good understanding of the results that were obtained. Results found for clusters of Agn (n = 4, 6, 10, 11, 12, 14) as well as for clusters of Aun (n = 1 - 7) are presented and compared to existing measurements ans calculations. A good general agreement is found between our measurements and known results. In particular, the question of the coexsitence in the matrix of several geometries that are quasi-degenerate is asked. Finally, the validity of the Mie classical model to describe the shift of the spectrum due to the matrix environnement is discussed. The important relativistic effects in gold clusters are discussed through a review of theoretical calculations of the geometrical structures of these systems as well as through a comparison with results found for silver clusters.


Ubuntu Unleashed is filled with unique and advanced information for everyone who wants to make the most of the Ubuntu Linux operating system. This new edition has been thoroughly revised and updated by a long-time Ubuntu community leader to reflect the exciting new Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) and the forthcoming Ubuntu 12.04. Former Ubuntu Forum administrator Matthew Helmke covers all you need to know about Ubuntu 11.10/12.04 installation, configuration, productivity, multimedia, development, system administration, server operations, networking, virtualization, security, DevOps, and moreincluding intermediate-to-advanced techniques you wont find in any other book. Helmke presents up-to-the-minute introductions to Ubuntus key productivity and Web development tools, programming languages, hardware support, and more. Youll find brand-new coverage of the new Unity desktop, new NoSQL database support and Android mobile development tools, and many other Ubuntu 11.10/12.04 innovations. Whether youre new to Ubuntu or already a power user, youll turn to this book constantly: for new techniques, new solutions, and new ways to do even more with Ubuntu! Matthew Helmke served from 2006 to 2011 on the Ubuntu Forum Council, providing leadership and oversight of the Ubuntu Forums, and spent two years on the Ubuntu regional membership approval board for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. He has written about Ubuntu for several magazines and websites, is a lead author of The Official Ubuntu Book. He works for The iPlant Collaborative, which is funded by the National Science Foundation and is building cyberinfrastructure for the biological sciences to support the growing use of massive amounts of data and computationally intensive forms of research. Quickly install Ubuntu, configure it, and get your hardware running right Configure and customize the new Unity desktop (or alternatives such as GNOME) Get started with multimedia and productivity applications, including LibreOffice Manage Linux services, users, and software packages Administer and use Ubuntu from the command line Automate tasks and use shell scripting Provide secure remote access Manage kernels and modules Administer file, print, email, proxy, LDAP, and database services (both SQL and NoSQL) Use both Apache and alternative HTTP servers Support and use virtualization Use Ubuntu in cloud environments Learn the basics about popular programming languages including Python, PHP, and Perl, and how to use Ubuntu to develop in them Learn how to get started developing Android mobile devices Ubuntu 11.10 on DVD DVD includes the full Ubuntu 11.10 distribution for Intel x86 computers as well as the complete LibreOffice office suite and hundreds of additional programs and utilities. Free Upgrade! Purchase this book anytime in 2012 and receive a free Ubuntu 12.04 Upgrade Kit by mail (U.S. or Canada only) after Ubuntu 12.04 is released. See inside back cover for details.


The recplonization pattern of two cold-sensitive species was studied in the intertidal Wadden Sea near Sylt after their populations had been almost eliminated by the winter of 1995/96. Because of low predation pressure juvenile cockles Cerastoderma edule quickly recolonized the area in high numbers during the first summer. In contrast, the polychaete Lanice conchilega needed three years until the population reached similar densities as before the severe winter. In the first two years, coastal Lanice population was too small to release sufficient amounts of larvae to recolonize the intertidal fringe of its distributional range. These results stress that populations in the Wadden Sea, in some cases, crucially depend on exchange processes with the North Sea.


A field experiment in growing garden thyme was carried out in Jaroszewice (the central Lublin region) in 2008–2010. Three growth biostimulators (Asahi SL, Bio-algeen S 90, and Tytanit) were used in the study. Plots with no foliar application of these growth stimulators established the control group. Carrot, faba bean, and spring wheat forecrops were the other experimental factors. The present study showed that the best quantitative parameters of thyme raw material were observed after the application of the growth simulators. The root forecrop (carrot) also had a beneficial effect on thyme yield. Thyme crop protection without the application of the growth simulators resulted in the deterioration of the biometric traits and yields of this crop. The treatment with no application of the growth simulators was the most beneficial for the chemical composition of thyme raw material.