Worldwide, breast cancer is the most common malignancy among females. The total breast area on a mammogram can be dived in a radiologicaly dense area (glandular and stromal tissue) and a non-dense area (mainly fat tissue). Women with a high proportion of dense breast tissue (percent breast density) have increased breast cancer risk. Exposure to high levels of growth factors and hormones with known mitogenic properties could increase breast cancer risk, through an increase in the amount of dense tissue of the breast. In this thesis we aimed to investigate the relationships between growth factors (insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I)) and hormones, both endogenous (insulin and sex steroids) and exogenous (phytoestrogens), on the one hand, and breast density and breast cancer on the other hand. In Chapter 2, we investigated the effects of premenopausal circulating levels of IGF-I (Chapter 2.1) and genetic variation in the IGF-1 gene (Chapter 2.2) on menopausal changes in breast density, using data of 656 women participating in the Prospect-EPIC cohort (European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition). Women with high premenopausal IGF-I levels showed a smaller decrease in percent breast density over menopause, which was, however, largely explained by the smaller increase of the non-dense area, whereas the dense area was hardly affected. Several of a total 16 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP), within the IGF-1 gene were significantly associated with higher IGF-I levels. These same SNPs were related, but to a lesser extent and statistically non-significantly, with a smaller decrease of percent density during the menopausal transition phase. In (Chapter 3) the association between circulating levels of sex steroids and breast density in 969 postmenopausal women participating in the Prospect-EPIC cohort was investigated. None of the sex steroids studied was clearly associated with percent breast density or the dense area. High circulating levels of estradiol, DHEAS and androstenedione were however associated with significantly smaller non-dense (fat) area. Within the large EPIC cohort, prediagnostic C-peptide serum levels were analyzed for 1141 women who were diagnosed with breast cancer, and for 2204 matched control subjects. Elevated levels of serum C-peptide -a marker for pancreatic insulin secretion- were not associated with overall breast cancer risk and we concluded that our results do not support the hypothesis that chronic hyperinsulinemia generally increases breast cancer risk (Chapter 4). In Chapter 5 we show that women with high circulating levels of five types of isoflavones had slightly decreased breast cancer risk. The association was strongest and statistically significant for genistein. Results originate from the largest prospective study (383 breast cancer case subjects and 383 control subjects participating in Prospect-EPIC) on circulating levels of phytoestrogens (plant compounds with hormone-like activity) and breast cancer risk. In Chapter 6, we discuss possible explanations for the findings that IGF-I and sex steroids that are known to have mitogenic properties and to increase breast cancer risk, hardly affect the absolute amount of dense breast tissue, which is supposed to be the target tissue for breast cancer, but are related to the non-dense area of the female breast.


[1] The southern rim of the Isidis basin contains one of the highest densities of valley networks, several restricted paleolake basins, and the stratigraphically lowest (oldest) terrain on Mars. Geologic mapping in Viking, MGS/MOC, and MOLA data, Odyssey/THEMIS data, and other multispectral data products supports the presence of extensive fans of debris and sediments deposited along the inner rim of the Isidis basin where large valleys enter the lowlands. Additional processes subsequent to the period of intense fluvial activity, including mass flow analogous to some glacial processes, have contributed to the materials accumulated on the margins of the Isidis basin. These have occurred along preexisting channels and valleys at the termini of major channels where they enter the plains along the highland-lowland boundary. If the abundant valley networks in highland terrains are the result of runoff accompanied by saturated groundwater flow, as has been suggested in previous studies of ancient fluvial highland terrains, then the extreme age and abundance of early valley networks in the Libya Montes highland rocks should have resulted in deposition of materials that record evidence for the long-term presence of water in the form of aqueous alteration of polycrystalline constituents. The material deposited along the basin margin is likely to consist of ancient altered highland rocks in several physical states (weathered, rounded, and angular) exposing both weathered and altered surfaces, and exposures of alteration profiles in fractured faces and unweathered material from rock interiors. Debris fans shed off the southern rim of Isidis Planitia should contain materials that have experienced possible saturated groundwater flow, residence within paleolake basins, and derivative materials deposited during the most fluvially intensive part of Martian geologic history. Many of these materials have also been reworked by ice-related processes. In situ measurements of the ancient crustal materials, in the form of rocks within the debris fans, and the weathered condition of the rocky material are potential sources for mineralogical evidence of climatic conditions in earliest Martian geologic history. The absence of alteration within rocks would, on the other hand, support the hypothesis that fluvial runoff during the earliest history of Mars was geologically brief rather than long-term and that long-term saturated groundwater flow was not present. Determination of the presence or absence of alteration would have corresponding implications for hypotheses requiring the long-term presence of aqueous solutions (i.e., complex organic compounds and life). A proposed MER site along the margin addresses realistic field science objectives of the Mars Exploration Rover mission and the current goals of the Mars Exploration Program. In situ measurements may be important in deriving estimates of the longevity and intensity of past wetter climates.


Data from the Epidemiologic Catchment Area study showed that a lifetime Diagnostic Interview Schedule/DSM-III diagnosis of panic disorder was associated with pervasive social and health consequences similar to or greater than those associated with major depression. These consequences included subjective feelings of poor physical and emotional health, alcohol and other drug abuse, increased likelihood of suicide attempts, impaired social and marital functioning, financial dependency, and increased use of psychoactive medications, health services, and the hospital emergency department for emotional problems. Comorbidity of panic disorder with major depression, agoraphobia, and alcohol or other drug abuse did not explain these findings. The social and health consequences of panic disorder (quality of life) should be considered, as risks and benefits of currently available acute and maintenance treatments are evaluated. Clinical trials of panic disorder, whether of drugs or behavioral treatment, should include quality of life assessments as outcome measures. Long-term prospective studies based on clinical samples of patients with panic disorder are indicated to relate the illness more precisely to social morbidity.


It is commonly perceived that firms do not want to be outsiders to a merger between competitor firms. We instead argue that it is beneficial to be a non-merging rival firm to a large horizontal merger. Using a sample of mergers with expert-identification of relevant rivals and the event-study methodology, we find rivals generally experience positive abnormal returns at the merger announcement date. Further, we find that the stock reaction of rivals to merger events is not sensitive to merger waves; hence, 'future acquisition probability' does not drive the positive abnormal returns of rivals. We then build a conceptual framework that encompasses the impact of merger events on both merging and rival firms in order to provide a schematic to elicit more information on merger type.


America's Red Rock Wilderness Act Designates specified lands in the following areas of Utah as components of the National Wilderness Preservation System: (1) Great Basin, (2) Grand Staircase-Escalante, (3) Moab-La Sal Canyons, (4) Henry Mountains, (5) Glen Canyon, (6) San Juan-Anasazi, (7) Canyonlands Basin, (8) San Rafael Swell, and (9) Book Cliffs and Uinta Basin. Sets forth administrative requirements for: (1) the exchange of state-owned lands within such areas, (2) federal reservation of water rights, (3) measurement of setbacks for roads with wilderness, (4) authorized livestock grazing, and (5) withdrawal of such lands from disposition under certain public land laws.


The paper argues that many erroneous conclusions derived from modelling are due to mistakes in logic rather than scientific methodology. The widely accepted models predicting the catastrophic consequences of carbon emissions, and suggesting how cuts by the developed world can prevent them, all ignore population growth and distribution, and such data are not used as independent variables in the global warming models. This casts doubt on the probability of the models, and even more on the suggested solutions, as an astonishingly high degree of accuracy in highly complex forecasts over a period of almost a century would be required, without which the extremely costly 'solutions' would be either unnecessary or insufficient. Over a 30-year period, forecasts of population are likely to be much more accurate than those for climate. Within such a period, population in the world's poorest countries will almost double, leading to virtually all the disasters that are predicted to arise from global warming some decades later. Since many measures taken to avoid putative global warming are likely to exacerbate the more rapidly approaching dangers of population growth, it would appear logical to give more consideration to assisting the poorer countries rather than impoverishing the rich.


Gelotophobia is defined as the fear of being laughed at. First empirical studies revealed that it is a valid and useful new concept. Furthermore, it was shown that it is of relevance among non-clinical groups and that it should be best conceptualized as a one-dimensional individual differences phenomenon. The present study presents first empirical data on the fear of being laughed at in the Czech Republic (N = 286) and in Slovakia (N = 440). It describes the adaptation of an instrument for the subjective assessment of gelotophobia to Czech and to Slovakian. The translations yielded good psychometric properties in terms of a high reliability (α ≥ .87). Especially, items referring to the avoidance of places where one has made an embarrassing impression (Czech Republic) and to controlling oneself strongly for not attracting negative attention for not making a ridiculous impression on others (Slovakia) yielded higher endorsements. Gelotophobia was not related to demographics, such as age, sex, and marital status (Czech Republic), but related to personality traits included in five-factor model. A stepwise multiple regression analysis showed that the five broad personality dimensions explained 41% (Czech sample) and 21% (Slovak sample) of fear of being laughed at. 6.29% (Czech Republic) and 6.14% (Slovakia) of the participants exceeded a cut-off score indicating at least a slight expression of gelotophobic symptoms. The GELOPH seems to be a useful instrument for further research on gelotophobia.


A new method of root finding is formulated that uses a numerical iterative process involving three points. A given function Y= f(x) whose root(s) are desired is fitted and approximated by a polynomial function curve of the form y= a(x-b) N and passing through three equi-spaced points using the method of least squares. Successive iterations using the same procedure of curve fitting is used to locate the root within a given level of tolerance. The power N of the curve suitable for a given function form can be appropriately varied at each step of the iteration to give a faster rate of convergence and avoid cases where oscillation, divergence or off shooting to an invalid domain may be encountered. An estimate of the rate of convergence is provided. It is shown that the method has a quadratic convergence similar to that of Newton's method. Examples are provided showing the procedure as well as comparison of the rate of convergence with the secant and Newton's methods. The method does not require evaluation of function derivatives.


Demand fulfillment is a planning process which is concerned with the processing of customer orders. Its main objectives are providing a high customer service, especially in terms of providing real-time order confirmations and promising reliable delivery dates, as well as maximizing profits. In make-to-stock industries, such as the consumer goods industry, production quantities are usually determined mid-term, based on forecasts and not on actual customer requests. As a consequence, bottleneck situations can occur in the short-run. Furthermore, customers are usually heterogeneous regarding their profitability and their strategic importance. Consequently, the firm has to decide carefully on which orders to accept and whether to fulfill an accepted order from stock or from future production quantities, which entails either inventory holding or customer-specific backlogging costs. The setting in make-to-stock demand fulfillment is comparable to the situation in service industries: capacity is scarce in the short-run, customers are heterogeneous, and demand is uncertain. Therefore, quantity-based revenue management ideas have been transferred to the context of make-to-stock industries. However, typical revenue management assumptions like the perishability of products do not hold in the make-to-stock context. As a consequence, the allocation planning problem's complexity increases. Existing allocation planning models for make-to-stock industries show two main drawbacks: they either do not consider information about demand uncertainty appropriately or they are not scalable and, thus, not applicable to problems of practical sizes. Commercial advanced planning systems also provide the opportunity of determining allocations by means of simple rules. However, they also do not consider information about demand uncertainty (nor about customer heterogeneity) appropriately. The dissertation shows how allocation planning for demand fulfillment in make-to-stock industries can be improved by means of two-stage stochastic linear programming (SLP) with recourse. SLP formulations for both the single-period and the multi-period case are given. Moreover, the dissertation illustrates that allocation planning can be further improved if information about the consumption process, which follows the allocation planning process, is integrated into the allocation planning SLP model. In particular, information about the order arrival sequence as well as about consumption policies such as nesting or time-based policies is integrated by means of the second stage. The benefit of both performing allocation planning and considering information about demand uncertainty by using two-stage SLP depends on the input data like, e.g. the degree of customer heterogeneity, of capacity shortage as well as of demand uncertainty (or the forecast accuracy, respectively). Within a numerical study, we evaluate when allocation planning is likely to be beneficial and, in case it is, when SLP models are likely to outperform the allocation planning rules of commercial advanced planning systems or other existing allocation planning models.


This thesis describes the development of a gas scintillation drift counter as a high counting rate X-ray detector. The new device is a modified version of the gas scintillation counter which is capable of working in a digital mode at a quite high rate without producing space charge effects. A gas scintillation drift counter has been built to investigate its behaviour using a gas mixture of argon and nitrogen. Scintillation and transport properties of the gas mixture have been studied using an Am(^241) α-particle source and a (Fe(^55)) 5.9 keV radioactive X-ray source in order to obtain optimum relative compositions of argon and nitrogen. The effects of various operating parameters on the energy resolution of the counter and the characteristics of output pulses have been extensively studied. When deciding on the counter parameters and operating conditions, a special emphasis has been placed on conditions which produce a minimum of space charge around the anode, and small pulse-widths. Pulse response, gain variations with counting rate and stability of the RCA 8575 photomultiplier used to detect scintillation light have been investigated using a light emitting diode pulser, a constant light source and primary scintillation pulses from 6.9 keV X-rays. An increase in the amplitude of output pulses and a change in the dynode potentials with pulsing rate have been observed when operating the photo tube with a resistive potential distribution network attached to its dynodes. These variations have been successfully eliminated by stabilising the dynode potentials using emitter follower configurations. J An energy resolution of 30% has been obtained using 5.9 keVX-rays with a gas amplification factor of about 20. Tests which have been done using cobalt K(_α)X-rays reveal that the resolving time of the counter system increases with the anode voltage and for a fixed discrimination level of 25 mV it varies from 43 ns at the anode voltage of 2600 V to 67 ns at 3000 V. An energy resolution of 40% has been obtained with cobalt K (_α) x-rays at a counting rate of 6 MHz and with a gas amplification factor of 15. The characteristics of the scintillation pulses are found to be degraded with increasing intensity of the X-ray beam because of coincident events. However, a counting rate of 9.5 MHz has been achieved with this counter at the expense of its energy resolution.


In recent years, a new technique has been proposed to measure path-averaged rain rates by observing the rain-droplet-induced irradiance scintillation of a laser beam. The theoretical formulation was developed under the assumption that the detector is in the far-field region of the raindrop-induced scattering patterns. Preliminary experimental results for an optical link of 200 m supported this theory. For shorter path-lengths, the droplets in the near-field region effect the raindrop-induced scintillation. This paper discusses the modification to the theory to include the near-field effects. A 30-m laser link has been set up to measure path-averaged rain rates at COMSAT Laboratories, Clarksburg, Md., for more than 1 yr. The preliminary sample data indicate good agreement with the averaged rain rates measured by two tipping-bucket rain gauges that are 20 m apart and deployed along the path. The correlation of the optically measured rain rates with the average of the two individual bucket rain rates is better than the correlation of the rain rates measured by the two individual tipping-bucket rain gauges.


INTRODUCTION Founded in 1972 by Professor A. Oehling, Allergologia et Immunopathologia is a forum for those working in the field of pediatric asthma, allergy and immunology. Manuscripts related to clinical, epidemiological and experimental allergy and immunopathology related to childhood will been considered for publication.Allergologia et Immunopathologia is the official journal of the Spanish Society of Pediatric Allergy and Clinical Immunology (SEICAP) and also of the Latin American Society of Immunodeficiencies (LASID). It has and independent international Editorial Committee which submits received papers for peer-reviewing by international experts. The journal accepts original and review articles from all over the world, together with consensus statements from the aforementioned societies. Occasionally, the opinion of an expert on a burning topic is published in the "Point of View" section. Letters to the Editor on previously published papers are welcomed.Allergologia et Immunopathologia publishes 6 issues per year and is included in the major databases such as Pubmed, Scopus, Web of Knowledge, etc.


The Yunnan Great Rivers Project is a collaborative conservation and development project between the Yunnan provincial government and The Nature Conservancy. Transnational environmental projects of this kind must be brought more critically into view in order to understand the competing discourses and struggles over nature as the west is opened for investment. In this case the subject of ethnographic enquiry is a county-level workshop sponsored by The Nature Conservancy which drafted a petition eventually presented to the State Council requesting an end to mountaineering on a "sacred" Tibetan mountain. This case study raises a series of questions about the politics of ethnic minority empowerment and disempowerment and the transforming role of transnational environmental activity, including the production of biological and cultural knowledge.


ABSTRACT At a children's hospital in Riga, Latvia, isolates identified asSalmonella typhimurium were found to be resistant to expanded-spectrum cephalosporins. Two of the resistant strains were analyzed for the mechanism of cephalosporin resistance. Isoelectric focusing revealed a common β-lactamase with a pI of 8.8. In addition, one of the strains produced a pI 7.6 β-lactamase. A transconjugant producing only the pI 7.6 enzyme was susceptible to expanded-spectrum cephalosporins; therefore, this enzyme was most likely SHV-1. Transformants producing only the pI 8.8 β-lactamase were resistant to cefotaxime and aztreonam but were susceptible or intermediate to ceftazidime. A substrate profile determined spectrophotometrically with purified enzyme revealed potent activity against cefotaxime, with a relative kcat value of 95 (benzylpenicillin equal to 100). The enzyme showed lower relativekcat values for ceftazidime (3.3) and aztreonam (9.3). In addition, the enzyme was inhibited by clavulanate, sulbactam and tazobactam, with 50% inhibitory concentrations of 19, 100, and 3.4 nM, respectively. These results indicated the presence of an unusual extended-spectrum β-lactamase. The gene expressing the pI 8.8 β-lactamase was cloned. Nucleotide sequencing revealed a β-lactamase gene that differs from the gene encoding CTX-M-2, which also originated from S. typhimurium, by 11 nucleotides, 4 of which result in amino acid substitutions: Ala27Thr, Val230Gly, Glu254Ala, and Ile278Val. These results indicated the presence of a novel extended-spectrum β-lactamase, designated CTX-M-5, that specifically confers resistance to cefotaxime.


This Research is done/ conducted at Industrial Sentra of Tile of exist in Countryside of Gelangkulon of Subdistrict of sampung of Regency Ponorogo, with research title "Industrial Profile of Crafting/ diligence of Tile in Regency Ponorogo". Type of this Research is quantitative descriptive. As for method used in this research is random, takenly some of sample from entirety of population of exist in location of research of taken as obyek of research or
responder.
Intention of this research to know how social profile of economics of worker of tile and how big mount efficiency of is effort all worker of tile of at Industrial Sentra of Tile in Countryside Gelangkulon.
Technique analyse data used in this research use tabulation descriptive analysis constructively, that is depict an characteristic or profile of all worker of tile of exist in Industrial Sentra of Tile in Countryside of Gelangkulon of Subdistrict of Sampung of Regency Ponorogo.From result analyse data by using calculation mount effort efficiency, knowable that storey; level of efficiency of is effort from each worker of tile show number > 1 and < 3, with mean of
efficiency of equal to 1,71.
Inferential so that that effort in the field of industry of crafting/ diligence of tile in Contryside of this Gelangkulon is inclusive of efficient, because fulfilling standart of efficiency that is E > 1.


Objective—Sepsis is a major cause of death for intensive care patients. High concentrations of inflammatory cytokines are characteristic of severe systemic inflammation and activated monocytes are their predominant cellular source. To identify targets for antiinflammatory intervention, we investigated the response of human macrophages to inflammatory and antiinflammatory mediators. Methods and Results—We profiled gene expression in human macrophages exposed to lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and interferon (IFN)-γ in the presence or absence of recombinant activated protein C (APC) or IL-10 and identified Wnt5A as one of the transcripts most highly induced by LPS/IFN-γ and suppressed by APC and IL-10. We confirmed regulation of Wnt5A protein in macrophages and detected it in sera and bone marrow macrophages of patients with severe sepsis. We established that a functional Wnt5A/frizzled-5/CaMKII signaling pathway was essential for macrophage inflammatory activation. To prove the essential contribution of Wnt5A we measured inflammatory cytokines after stimulation with Wnt5A, silenced Wnt5A by siRNA, and blocked receptor binding with soluble Frizzled–related peptide-1 (sFRP1). Conclusion—Wnt5A is critically involved in inflammatory macrophage signaling in sepsis and is a target for antiinflammatory mediators like APC or antagonists like sFRP1.


The new Criminal Code came into force on 26 September, 2000. This Code has brought a lot of novelty in to the criminal law and over variety of law. It is important to understand how the new criminal rules could change the recidivism rates in Lithuania, to make a forecast of changing of recidivist criminality. The article contains: the definition of recidivism criminality, the system of punishments, separation of punishment. Under the new Criminal Code the recognition of a person to be a recidivist cannot be determined by the previous commitment of a criminal offence, and this will probably reduce the rates of recidivism. Nevertheless, this reduction would be formal reaction to the new legislation. It should be said that for the real crime prevention it is much more important the all facts of commitment of criminal deeds, regardless whether they accord the formal notions of crime or criminal offence. It is commonly recognized that the motivation for the criminal carrier is probably identified not only by the crime, but all kinds of criminal deeds. It is also possible to forecast the formal reduction of recidivism rates due to the new explanation of the property of minor value in the chapter, which foresees the liability for property crime. For example, according to the new Criminal code of Republic of Lithuania theft is considered to be a crime only in cases where the value of stolen property exceeds the size of 3 MLL (minimum living level). Having in mind that the structure of recidivist criminality mostly contains property violations such an explanation can strongly affect the formal rates of repeated crime. It is well known that recidivism is of the penitential nature. This means that repeated crimes are usually committed by the ex-prisoners. From this point of view the most significant novelty, which serves the purpose of recidivist crime prevention, relates to the new system of criminal punishments, as well as rules of imposition of punishments and release from punishment and liability. These norms of the new Criminal Code of Republic of Lithuania give to the judge large discretion to administer justice, especially in choosing various alternative punishments.


Abstract The prevention of food loss throughout the supply chain, including manufacturers, has become a major challenge for a number of organisations. In addition, consumers are also increasingly interested in the authenticity of food and want to ensure that they receive the right quality of food. To address this issue, there is a need for reliable and robust tools to be available in the Industry 4.0 era that can trace the food throughout the supply chain from the farm through processing until it reaches the customer and, thus, ensure transparency. Using the people, process, and technology (PPT) model, this paper develops a blockchain-enabled food supply chain framework including the future opportunities and the present impediments based on the systematic literature review and semi-structured case interviews from the context of emerging economies. The study investigates the suitability of blockchain technology in resolving major challenges, such as traceability, trust, and accountability in the food industry. The study further paves the way for future researchers to address the technological and people-related challenges in the Industry 4.0 era to mitigate the emerging problems in the food sector. Interestingly, we did not find many issues in process- and performance-related aspects. The study offers empirical evidence of blockchain technology implementation in the Industry 4.0 era that opens up the discussion for future researchers and lists the potential threats.


This article studies the implications of consumption taxation on capital accumulation in a one-sector endogenous growth model with finite horizons. A tax on consumption, when tax revenues are lump-sum rebated to consumers, redistributes income between living generations and future, still unborn, generations, and therefore depresses aggregate consumption and raises saving, stimulating capital accumulation and economic growth. If however the resources from taxation are used for financing unproductive public spending, the effect of the consumption tax on the endogenous growth rate disappears as no intergenerational redistribution of income occurs. Finally, a consumption tax hike accompanied by a compensatory reduction of public debt increases long-run economic growth and reduces the consumption-output ratio. Our results on consumption taxation differ substantially from those obtained within the endogenous growth literature.


The disciplinary rules of every state prohibit attorneys from charging unreasonable fees. However, these provisions are virtually never enforced based on the size of the fee alone; almost all cases involve independent forms of misconduct, such as falsifying billing records, or demanding fees in excess of an agreed upon amount. The only two cases the authors could find in which attorneys have been disciplined solely based on the size of the fee involved blue-chip civil attorneys - former Harvard and Yale law school faculty members - who represented working-class defendants in criminal matters. In both cases, the conclusion that the fee was excessive was questionable; the clients were completely exonerated of criminal charges and the amounts involved would have been unexceptional in elite civil practice. These disciplinary prosecutions were particularly doubtful, the authors argue, because the Sixth Amendment right to retain counsel of choice prohibits the government from limiting the amount of money criminal defendants can pay their lawyers. The reasonable fee rules are either unenforced or perversely enforced because they are not designed to limit lawyer's fees or incomes per se, but to ensure that lawyers do not take advantage of clients, and that clients understand the nature of the legal services they are buying. The mismatch between the purpose of the rules and their language should be remedied by making clear that lawyers are obligated to talk with their clients about their legal options and offer some estimate of what they might cost. But fees negotiated after appropriate disclosure should not subject an attorney to discipline.


We use data from the 1999-2000 Chinese Health and Family Life Survey merged with community-level data from the 1982, 1990, and 2000 Chinese censuses to examine the relationship between the local sex ratio (number of men per 100 women) and sexual outcomes among women. Consistent with hypotheses derived from demographic-opportunity theory, logistic regression analyses show that women are more likely to have had recent and nonmarital sexual intercourse, to have been forced to have sex, and to test positive for a sexually-transmitted infection when there is a relative abundance of age-matched men in their local community. Education, birth cohort, and geographic location also emerge as significant predictors of women's sexual experiences.


Heat-stressed crops suffer dehydration, depressed growth, and a consequent decline in water productivity, which is the yield of harvestable product as a function of lifetime water consumption and is a trait associated with plant growth and development. Heat shock transcription factor (HSF) genes have been implicated not only in thermotolerance but also in plant growth and development, and therefore could influence water productivity. Here it is demonstrated that Arabidopsis thaliana plants with increased HSFA1b expression showed increased water productivity and harvest index under water-replete and water-limiting conditions. In non-stressed HSFA1b-overexpressing (HSFA1bOx) plants, 509 genes showed altered expression, and these genes were not over-represented for development-associated genes but were for response to biotic stress. This confirmed an additional role for HSFA1b in maintaining basal disease resistance, which was stress hormone independent but involved H2O2 signalling. Fifty-five of the 509 genes harbour a variant of the heat shock element (HSE) in their promoters, here named HSE1b. Chromatin immunoprecipitation-PCR confirmed binding of HSFA1b to HSE1b in vivo, including in seven transcription factor genes. One of these is MULTIPROTEIN BRIDGING FACTOR1c (MBF1c). Plants overexpressing MBF1c showed enhanced basal resistance but not water productivity, thus partially phenocopying HSFA1bOx plants. A comparison of genes responsive to HSFA1b and MBF1c overexpression revealed a common group, none of which harbours a HSE1b motif. From this example, it is suggested that HSFA1b directly regulates 55 HSE1b-containing genes, which control the remaining 454 genes, collectively accounting for the stress defence and developmental phenotypes of HSFA1bOx.


Opinion polls may inadvertently affect public opinion, as people may change their attitudes after learning what others think. A disconcerting possibility is that opinion polls have the ability to create information cascades, wherein the majority opinion becomes increasingly larger over time. Testing poll influence on attitudes toward Syrian refugees and mandatory measles vaccination, we field survey experiments on a probability-based online survey panel. Through a novel automated procedure labeled the dynamic response feedback, we measure whether the answers from early poll respondents can influence the opinions of subsequent respondents who learn the answers of the previous respondents. Using this procedure, no feedback loops are identified.


Poonch valley an area of about 8500 hectares at an elevation ranging from 1750 meters to 2500 meters above sea level. Biodiversity and ethnobotanical study was conducted during a period of three years (April, 1999 to April, 2002).The result of initial site analysis showed that the soils were mostly acidic with low content of exchangeable cations. No significant difference in soil organic matters and phosphorus were observed between categories use in the analysis. The genera studied were classified into 3 categories according to 'the number of species. 25 plant communities were recorded in the study area on the basis of phytosociological parameters. Scleroderma cepa was recorded as endemic mushroom in the study area. This study concludes that this region has a total of 430 vascular plant species and 5 non-vascular plant species. The ethnobotanical studies indicated that inhabitants of Poonch Valley utilized 169 plant species for more than 30 domestic needs. The major usage included 68 medicinal plants, 35 fuel wood species, 35 fodder species, 24 vegetable and pot herbs, 10 veterinary medicinal plants, 24 fruit yielding plants, 14 spices and condiment species, 12 for construction and timber requirements, 13 ornamental species, 9 used as field fencing species, 13 furniture making species, and 6 used as mouth wash (maswak). Most of the plants are used for multiple purposes.

The multiple purpose plants included Melia azedrach, (7 uses), Ficus palmata, Morus alba, and Ulmus vilosa (6 uses), Dulbergia sissoo, Pinus roxburghii, Juglans regia, and Celtis australis (5 uses), Acacia modesta, Abies pindrow, Pinus wallichiana, Zanthoxylum alatum, Populus ciliata, Ailanthus excelsa and Buxus papilosa (4 uses each), while Quercus dilatata, Quercus incana, Cedrella toona, Mentha sylvestricum, Salix alba and Dodonaea viscose.

Other studies suggest that the indigenous knowledge related to medicinal plants uses comes from women age between 29-50 years, where as in this study the folk medicinal use comes from men. Result of this survey were conducted to see the source of indigenous knowledge , related to the medicinal uses of the plants revealed that 72 % of folk medicinal knowledge comes from people above the age of 50 years, while 28 % of it comes from people between age of 30 and 50. The survey also indicated that men especially old ones are more informative of traditional knowledge of medicinal plants than women in the area.

Moreover, it was also observed that about 45 % of the local population is dependent on medicinal plants for curing different ailments. It was also indicated that about 60 % of the home made drugs were used by peoples above the age of 50 years, 30 % by children below age of 15 years especially infants while remaining 10 % of the traditional medicines of plant origin are utilized by people between ages of I5-50 years.

The conservation of biological diversity requires all possible efforts and there is a need for holistic approach involving wild and cultivated plants, forest trees and their habitats. An immediate action is required at national level for developing a system for protected areas, so that the biological study continues to remain available for the benefit and welfare of the inhabitants of the area for all times to come. All the above parameters are discussed.


As North Carolina's economy has grown, the need to mitigate negative effects of land disturbance on aquatic ecosystems has also grown. The regulatory authority to require stream mitigation in North Carolina has now been in place for 10 years. When land disturbance adversely impacts streams, the responsible party, typically a developer or North Carolina's Department of Transportation, can satisfy mitigation requirements through payment of fees to the state's Ecosystem Enhancement Program (EEP). The EEP then manages a stream mitigation project on behalf of the responsible party. As almost a decade has passed, the needs for the EEP to precisely know the total and per-project expenses of its in-lieu-fee program for stream mitigation and identify ways to reduce costs of the program have grown. The goal of this study was to provide EEP officials with objective information that they could use to improve management of projects for stream mitigation. The first objective was to precisely and thoroughly account for all of the expenses of previous design-bid and design-bid-build projects. The second objective was to rigorously analyze the effects of stream length, location, and other project characteristics on the contractual expense of these projects. EEP has spent or committed to spend $46.34 million for 45 design-build or design-bid-build projects to restore or enhance 191,374 ft. of streams. Expenses per foot are $242.12. As the length of a restored or enhanced stream increases, the expenses per foot decrease. The decrease is more pronounced in undeveloped, rural areas. EEP could reduce contractual costs of mitigation by approving fewer projects with longer reaches of streams. To further reduce costs, EEP could approve projects in undeveloped, rural areas if the stream mitigation units produced would be at least as great as those in urban areas.


ABSTRACT The wars in Syria and Iraq attracted about 45,000 individuals from outside the arenas. Most joined the Islamic State, but interestingly, other prominent armed groups showed less interest in foreign volunteers. This paper introduces the Demand for Foreign Volunteers Theory (DFVT) to explain the diverging choices Jabhat al-Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham, and the People's Protection Units made. The theory links four variables that shape groups' positions: political considerations, operational needs, organizational capacity, and ideational fit. Both operational and political considerations emphasize the motivation for using foreign volunteers, though the two are not equally important; when they conflict, political considerations take priority. Organizational capacity, on the other hand, determines a group's ability to translate need into action, serving as a necessary—but insufficient—condition for foreign mobilization. Finally, ideational factors, specifically a group's identity and ideology, determine the pool of potential recruits. The case studies show that political considerations made all three actors cautious about recruiting foreign fighters, though these considerations differed between groups. Ultimately, despite the availability of sufficient organizational capacity, all groups found it risky and even undesirable.


Invasive vertebrates have had significant effects on native species, ecosystem processes, human health and economies around the world for more than 200 years. However, in the last 30 years, the breadth and impact of invasive specie s has accelerated with the growth and integration of high speed transportation networks. The effects of many non -native species are often difficult to predict prior to establishment. Current efforts to manage invasive species can be broken into the areas of preventio n of introduction and detection of incipient populations, documentation of impacts, and development and implementation of management tools. We address various aspects of these areas under the broad headings of 1) invasiveness and pathways, and 2) impacts, managements, and challenges. One of the biggest challenges of invasive species management is the lack of interest and resources to manage species before they are established. Hence, few tools exist to manage populations once a population is established. As such, much of the focus of current research is dedicated to identifying the impact of species and the development of management tools. Further, these new tools must not only be effective but also adaptable to the ever changing dynamics of the economic, social, and ecological aspects of the locality invaded. The symposia at this conference on various invasive vertebrates highlight both successful and unsuccessful management efforts, investigations to determine the full impact of invasive specie s, and the development of novel control techniques.


Before a nation can produce, it must achieve social peace. That social peace has been reached in different nations by differing means, some of which have then been embedded in business firms, in corporate ownership patterns, and in corporate governance structures. The large publicly held, diffusely owned firm dominates business in the United States despite its infirmities, namely the frequently fragile relations between stockholders and managers. But in other economically advanced nations, ownership is not diffuse but concentrated. It is concentrated in no small measure because the delicate threads that tie managers to shareholders in the public firm fray easily in common political environments, such as those in the continental European social democracies. Social democracies press managers to stabilize employment, to forego some profit-maximizing risks with the firm, and to use up capital in place rather than to downsize when markets no longer are aligned with the firm's production capabilities. Since managers must have discretion in the public firm, how they use that discretion is crucial to stockholders, and social democratic pressures induce managers to stray farther than otherwise from their shareholders' profit-maximizing goals. Moreover, the means that align managers with diffuse stockholders in the United States-incentive compensation, hostile takeovers, and strong shareholder-wealth maximization norms-are weaker and sometimes denigrated in continental social democracies. Hence, public firms there have higher managerial agency costs, and large-block shareholding has persisted as shareholders' best remaining way to control those costs. Social democracies may enhance total social welfare, but if they do, they do so with fewer public firms than less socially responsive nations. The author therefore uncovers not only a political explanation for ownership concentration in Europe, but also a crucial political prerequisite to the rise of the public firm in the United States, namely the weakness of social democratic pressures on the American business firm.


Using contemporary data from the U.S. and other nations, we address 3 questions: Do gender differences in mathematics performance exist in the general population? Do gender differences exist among the mathematically talented? Do females exist who possess profound mathematical talent? In regard to the first question, contemporary data indicate that girls in the U.S. have reached parity with boys in mathematics performance, a pattern that is found in some other nations as well. Focusing on the second question, studies find more males than females scoring above the 95th or 99th percentile, but this gender gap has significantly narrowed over time in the U.S. and is not found among some ethnic groups and in some nations. Furthermore, data from several studies indicate that greater male variability with respect to mathematics is not ubiquitous. Rather, its presence correlates with several measures of gender inequality. Thus, it is largely an artifact of changeable sociocultural factors, not immutable, innate biological differences between the sexes. Responding to the third question, we document the existence of females who possess profound mathematical talent. Finally, we review mounting evidence that both the magnitude of mean math gender differences and the frequency of identification of gifted and profoundly gifted females significantly correlate with sociocultural factors, including measures of gender equality across nations.


Anew relational taxonomic database for planktonic foraminifera ("pforams@mikrotax") has been constructed and is now freely available online at http://www.mikrotax.org. It represents a major advance from its predecessor, the CHRONOS online taxonomic database, which has served the research community since 2005. The benefits of the new database to the research and industrial biostratigraphic communities are many, as it will serve as an immediately accessible taxonomic guide and reference for specialists and non-specialists alike by providing access to a wealth of information and images from original authors and from experts who have inserted recent authoritative updates to planktonic foraminiferal taxonomy, phylogeny and biostratigraphy. The database will be continually updated and used as a guide for training current and future generations of students and professionals who will be able to self-educate on planktonic foraminiferal taxonomy and biostratigraphy. Further investigation of species traditionally included in the Cretaceous genera Heterohelix, Globigerinelloides, Marginotruncana, and Globotruncana is required to exclude the use of polyphyletic morphotaxa. The taxonomy for Paleogene planktonic foraminifera is quite stable following publication of the Paleocene, Eocene, and Oligocene taxonomic atlases, but revisions to the taxonomy and phylogeny of Neogene taxa are needed to incorporate results from genetic sequencing studies and recent biostratigraphic observations.


The effects that speakers' disfluencies have on the listener are rather complex. Speech perception is an incredibly fast process, given that while the mechanism interprets the incoming waveform as a series of linguistic segments and suprasegmentals, it is also continuously ready to receive and correct the incoming erroneous messages. The goal of the present experiment was to describe the correction process and determine its efficiency. Various types of disfluency were tested with nine-year-old children, young adults, and elders. The results show that the time span of the corrective process depends upon the type of disfluency, the context, and the listener's age. The higher operational level the production error involves, the more time is required for correcting it and the corrections are poorer than at lower operational levels.


Polymorphisms in the gene for the α5 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) subunit are associated with vulnerability to nicotine addiction. However, the underlying normal functions of α5-containing nAChRs in the brain are poorly understood. Striatal dopamine (DA) transmission is critical to the acquisition and maintenance of drug addiction and is modulated strongly by nicotine acting at heteromeric β2-containing (β2*) nAChRs. We explored whether α5 subunits, as well as α4, α6, and β3 subunits, participate in the powerful regulation of DA release probability by β2* nAChRs in nucleus accumbens (NAc) core and in dorsal striatum [caudatoputamen (CPu)]. We detected evoked dopamine release using fast-scan cyclic voltammetry at carbon-fiber microelectrodes in striatal slices from mice with deletions of α4, α5, α6, or β3 subunits. We show that the nAChR subtypes that dominantly regulate dopamine transmission depend critically upon α5 subunits in the dorsal CPu in α4α5(non-α6)β2-nAChRs but not in NAc core, where α4α6β2β3-nAChRs are required. These data reveal the distinct populations of nAChRs that govern DA transmission in NAc core versus dorsal CPu. Furthermore, they indicate that α5 subunits are critical to the regulation of DA transmission by α4β2* nAChRs in regions of striatum associated with habitual and instrumental responses (dorsal CPu) rather than pavlovian associations (NAc).


Informal footpaths known as desire lines crisscross the city of Detroit and are visible from space. Despite their prevalence, especially in postindustrial cities, no comprehensive study of desire lines exists for any urban area. How extensive are these lines, how do people use them, and how are they changing over time? What is their potential to reinvigorate the fabric of neighborhoods and communities? We conducted a spatiotemporal analysis of desire lines in Detroit by combining remote sensing and spatial analysis with physical audits and interviews. Our results show that Detroit has more than 5680 of these footpaths, totaling more than 150 miles (> 240 km). Transportation planners may value desire lines for their efficiency, reducing travel time and distance. Urban theorists and community activists, however, view desire lines as a form of resistance and reclamation of space for a public poorly served by urban institutions. The results of our mixed-methods approach demonstrate how these two perspectives can co-exist. Desire lines are creative attempts to expand urban possibilities, enhance efficiency, and reaffirm agency in increasingly regulated cities. Desire lines in Detroit, however, are rapidly disappearing. From 2010 to 2016, the Lower Eastside region of the city witnessed a 70 percent reduction in the total length of these lines. Our analysis shows that this correlates with changes in land ownership, management practices, and population dynamics. The loss of desire lines exposes the limits of informal practices and indicates the need for connections to broader relationships of power and governance. Creative engagements with the state can formalize lines and help residents realize their rights to the city.


Blended learning refers to the use of conventional face-to-face learning experiences in combination with online education resources and practices. An increase in enrolments and a more diverse student body has intensified the demand to develop first-year teaching and learning pedagogies. Food science and technology lecturers must facilitate constructive learning in order to develop student skills, including critical thinking, teamwork, and self-directed learning. The aim of this investigation was to evaluate student perceptions of collaborative and blended learning. Students were exposed to various technology-enhanced pedagogical tools and face-to-face teaching strategies such as online academic journal reflections, video screencasts, group assignments, food processing practicals, and group crossword puzzles. A mixed-method survey consisting of multiple-choice, a 5-point Likert scale, and open-ended qualitative questions was administered via Blackboard. A total of 133 students were registered for the module, and 72.1% (n = 96) completed the survey. In this study, respondents felt they were prepared to complete the online group assignments (82%), which illustrates that they could learn the course material through collaboration. Moreover, 87% of the students agreed that they could keep up with the coursework in the blended format. Students recommended that there should be more lecture designed video screencasts, and they should be offered more opportunities to do oral presentations in this module. The respondents positively received collaborative and blended learning. The findings of this study, in general, affirm the merits of incorporating blended and collaborative learning in food science and technology curricula.


Extracted from text ... 42
CASE REPORT
EMERGENCY CONTRACEPTION
A recent edition of the New England Journal of Medicine1
carries an interesting approach to a case report on the alltoo-
common problem of emergency contraception.
The case: 'A healthy 19-year-old woman comes in for a routine
appointment. She is sexually active in a monogamous
relationship. Pregnancy is not currently desired. Her partner
uses condoms most of the time. She is uncertain of the date
of her last menstrual period but has had sexual intercourse
several times since her last menses, including unprotected
intercourse 4 days earlier. A high-sensitivity urine test for
pregnancy is ..


Hydrology has been suggested as the mechanism controlling vegetation and related surficial pore-water chemistry in large peatlands. Peatland hydrology influences the carbon dynamics within these large carbon reservoirs and will influence their response to global warming. A geophysical survey was completed in Caribou Bog, a large peatland in Maine, to evaluate peatland stratigraphy and hydrology. Geophysical measurements were integrated with direct measurements of peat stratigraphy from probing, fluid chemistry, and vegetation patterns in the peatland. Consistent with previous field studies, ground-penetrating radar (GPR) was an excellent method for delineating peatland stratigraphy. Prominent reflectors from the peat-lake sediment and lake sediment-mineral soil contacts were precisely recorded up to 8 m deep. Two-dimensional resistivity and induced polarization imaging were used to investigate stratigraphy beneath the mineral soil, beyond the range of GPR. We observe that the peat is chargeable, and that IP imaging is an alternative method for defining peat thickness. The chargeability of peat is attributed to the high surface-charge density on partially decomposed organic matter. The electrical conductivity imaging resolved glaciomarine sediment thickness (a confining layer) and its variability across the basin. Comparison of the bulk conductivity images with peatland vegetation revealed a correlation between confining layer thickness and dominant vegetation type, suggesting that stratigraphy exerts a control on hydrogeology and vegetation distribution within this peatland. Terrain conductivity measured with a Geonics EM31 meter correlated with confining glaciomarine sediment thickness and was an effective method for estimating variability in glaciomarine sediment thickness over approximately 18 km 2 . Our understanding of the hydrogeology, stratigraphy, and controls on vegetation growth in this peatland was much enhanced from the geophysical study.


In this paper we consider the problem of online stochastic optimization of a locally smooth function under bandit feedback. We introduce the high-confidence tree (HCT) algorithm, a novel anytime χ-armed bandit algorithm, and derive regret bounds matching the performance of state-of-the-art algorithms in terms of the dependency on number of steps and the near-optimality dimension. The main advantage of HCT is that it handles the challenging case of correlated bandit feedback (reward), whereas existing methods require rewards to be conditionally independent. HCT also improves on the state-of-the-art in terms of the memory requirement, as well as requiring a weaker smoothness assumption on the mean-reward function in comparison with the existing anytime algorithms. Finally, we discuss how HCT can be applied to the problem of policy search in reinforcement learning and we report preliminary empirical results.


Although photosynthesis has been intensively studied, many open questions remain, which still need to be answered. The aim of this thesis was to further investigate the PSI complex, which in the course of the light reaction of photosynthesis catalyzes the light-induced transfer of electrons from plastocyanin on the lumenal side to ferredoxin on the stromal side. In this thesis emphasis was put on the reducing side of PSI, so-called stromal ridge of PSI, which is composed of the subunits D, E and C. Functional analyses of Arabidopsis plants carrying disrupted genes for PSI-E and PSI-D subunits were performed. Analyzing PSI-D, it was shown that of the two genes coding for this subunit only a mutation in PSI-D1 led to a general alteration in the polypeptide composition of PSI and thus also in the photosynthetic electron flow. The characterization of psad1-1 psad2-1 double mutant indicated that PSI-D is necessary for the stability of PSI in Arabidopsis. A complete lack of the D subunit led to seedling lethality under photoautotrophic conditions. The instability of Arabidopsis PSI without PSI-D can be explained either by an increase in degradation of the incomplete PSI complex or by downregulation of the synthesis of PSI subunits. In contrast, Arabidopsis plants lacking the PSI-E subunit were able to grow under photoautotrophic conditions. However, they showed severe phenotype including a significant reduction in size and pale green pigmentation, which was turning more yellowish during development. The psae1-3 psae2-1 double mutant exhibited a high-chlorophyll fluorescence phenotype, which had already been observed in the psad1-1 psad2-1 double mutant. This indicates that photosynthetic electron flow is severely altered also in Arabidopsis plants lacking PSI-E subunit. Further spectroscopic, biochemical and physiological studies are in progress in order to understand the biological consequences of a complete lack of PSI-E subunit and its importance for photosynthesis in plants. An unexpected feature observed in both psad1-1 and psae1-3 single mutants, was a significantly increased level of thylakoid protein phosphorylation and therefore the presence of some new phosphopeptides that could not be detected in WT. A striking feature was that even the level of PSI phosphorylation was affected by these mutations. The only PSI phosphopeptide detected so far had been the PSI-D1 protein. Regarding the complementation analysis performed in this thesis it seems that phosphorylation of PSI-D1 does not play a key function in the PSI. Anyhow, it can not be excluded that this phosphorylation might play a role, if plants are grown under particular environmental conditions, not tested in this work. Mass spectrometry techniques and methods of proteomics allowed the successful identification and analysis of one previously unknown phosphoprotein Lhca4. This was the first light-harvesting protein outside of LHCII to be phosphorylated. However, a distinct role for Lhca4 phosphorylation remains unknown. Further studies are needed in order to elucidate the cause and consequences of Lhca4 phosphorylation and to get further insight into the implication of a high level of thylakoid protein phosphorylation as observed in psad1-1 and psae1-3 mutants.


Forty years ago, the questions most discussed among those who cared about leadership were "is leadership possible among those who don't have titles and positions?"; "what are the characteristics possessed by effective leaders?"; and "how do we find the people who are the best leaders and help them prepare for positions that will allow them to have an impact?" After many conversations, conferences, research studies, and books, the terrain has shifted among scholars. Now the conversations focus on questions such as "If leadership is a shared responsibility among members of groups, how can the full leadership potential of all be cultivated?"; "What role do collaborators play in empowering positive leadership and defending against those who misuse it?"; and "How can organizations cultivate cultures that support and encourage visionary leadership dedicated to benefitting all?"

The shift in the questions that leadership educators now explore, coupled with the breadth and variety of the initiatives dedicated to nurturing it, demonstrate that leadership can be taught. More importantly, the practice of leadership demonstrates that many can pursue leadership and that they must if the opportunities of the 21st century are to be fulfilled. The conversations and the needs for leadership have both shifted and it is now incumbent on those who value leadership most to agree to unifying perspectives that can draw us together in common purpose. From your vantage point, what are the crucial conversations, next steps, and/or thoughts for consideration as we enter the second decade of the 21st century?


Generative adversarial imitation learning (GAIL) is a popular inverse reinforcement learning approach for jointly optimizing policy and reward from expert trajectories. A primary question about GAIL is whether applying a certain policy gradient algorithm to GAIL attains a global minimizer (i.e., yields the expert policy), for which existing understanding is very limited. Such global convergence has been shown only for the linear (or linear-type) MDP and linear (or linearizable) reward. In this paper, we study GAIL under general MDP and for nonlinear reward function classes (as long as the objective function is strongly concave with respect to the reward parameter). We characterize the global convergence with a sublinear rate for a broad range of commonly used policy gradient algorithms, all of which are implemented in an alternating manner with stochastic gradient ascent for reward update, including projected policy gradient (PPG)-GAIL, Frank-Wolfe policy gradient (FWPG)-GAIL, trust region policy optimization (TRPO)-GAIL and natural policy gradient (NPG)-GAIL. This is the first systematic theoretical study of GAIL for global convergence.


This text discusses all three formalisms used in the study of finite temperature field theory, namely the imaginary time formalism, the closed time formalism and thermofield dynamics. Applications of the formalisms are worked out in detail. Gauge field theories and symmetry restoration at finite temperature are among the practical examples discussed in depth. The question of gauge dependence of the effective potential and the Nielsen identities are explained. The nonrestoration of some symmetries at high temperature (such as supersymmetry) and theories on nonsimply connected space-times are also described thoroughly. Other topics include (1+1)- and (2+1)-dimensional field theories at finite temperature and phase transitions, derivative expansion, linear response theory and the question of infrared divergences at finite temperature. In addition, examples of nonequilibrium phenomena are discussed with the disoriented chiral condensates as an illustration. This book should be a useful tool for graduate students, teachers, and researchers in theoretical physics.


Across the globe, higher education institutions are working in environments of increasing accountability with little sign of this trend abating. This heightened focus on accountability has placed greater demands on institutions to provide evidence of quality and the achievement of standards that assure that quality. Moderation is one quality assurance process that plays a central role in the teaching, learning and assessment cycle in higher education institutions. While there is a growing body of research globally on teaching, learning and , to a lesser degree, assessment in higher education, the process of moderation has received even less attention (Watty, Freeman, Howieson, Hancock, O'Connell, et al. 2013). Until recently, moderation processes in Australian universities have been typically located within individual institutions, with universities given the responsibility for developing their own specific policies and practices. However, in 2009 the Australian Government announced that an independent national quality and regulatory body for higher education institutions would be established. With the introduction of the Tertiary Education Quality Standards Authority (TEQSA), more formalised requirements for moderation of assessment are being mandated. In light of these reforms, the purpose of this qualitative study was to identify and investigate current moderation practices operating within one faculty, the Faculty of Education, in a large urban university in eastern Australia. The findings of this study revealed four discourses of moderation: equity, justification, community building and accountability. These discourses provide a starting point for academics to engage in substantive conversations around assessment and to further critique the processes of moderation.


When a society becomes more affluent, does it lose other values? Are the skills that education and literacy gave millions wasted on consuming pop culture? Do the media coerce us into a world of the superficial and the material - or can they be a force for good? When Richard Hoggart asked these questions in his 1957 book "The Uses of Literacy", Britain was undergoing huge social change, yet his landmark work has lost none of its pertinence and power today. Hoggart gives a fascinating insight into the close-knit values of Northern England's vanishing working-class communities, and weaves this together with his views on the arrival of a new, homogenous 'mass' US-influenced culture. His headline-grabbing bestseller opened up a whole new area of cultural study and remains essential reading, both as a historical document, and as a commentary on class, poverty and the media.


This stimulating one-volume history traces the social and economic evolution of France as a nation from the founding of the monarchy in 987, to the present day. Against a background of structural change, Goubert etches a vivid account of key events and personalities. His perspective is a popular one, and his main interest is in how political events and famous people affect the nation as a whole. The book incorporates the findings and perspectives of recent monographic studies with clarity and precision, but it is Goubert's own judgements, direct, forceful and iconoclastic, which make this an invaluable text.


Most models for online advertising assume that an advertiser's value from winning an ad auction, which depends on the clickthrough rate or conversion rate of the advertisement, is independent of other advertisements served alongside it in the same session. This ignores an important 'externality effect': as the advertising audience has a limited attention span, a high-quality ad on a page can detract attention from other ads on the same page. That is, the utility to a winner in such an auction also depends on the set of other winners.
 In this paper, we introduce the problem of modeling externalities in online advertising, and study the winner determination problem in these models. Our models are based on choice models on the audience side. We show that in the most general case, the winner determination problem is hard even to approximate. However, we give an approximation algorithm for this problem with an approximation factor that is logarithmic in the ratio of the maximum to the minimum bid. Furthermore, we show that there are some interesting special cases, such as the case where the audience preferences are single peaked, where the problem can be solved exactly in polynomial time. For all these algorithms, we prove that the winner determination algorithm can be combined with VCG-style payments to yield truthful mechanisms.


Presented at: Confronting the ethics of pandemic influenza planning. The 2008 Summit of the States; 2008 Jul 14; Indianapolis, IN.


Statistical fault localization is one of the essential tasks of program debugging, and it has shown that the evaluation history of predicates may disclose important clues about the root cause of failures. However, especially for safety-critical software, there exists evaluation bias using same granularity to measure simple predicates and complex compound predicates. Intuitively, we should use fine-grain predicates to evaluate the suspiciousness of complex compound predicates and reduce the evaluation bias. In this paper, we propose a novel predicate fault localization technique from predicate testing to identify fault location. Based on the predicate fault model, we first generate constraint sets for each predicate and then calculate the suspiciousness of predicates by evaluating their constraint sets. Finally, we sort the suspicious predicates by their suspiciousness. Our preliminary results show that our approach can significantly improve fault predicate absolute ranking.


Abstract. In this paper we present the results of the comparison between two terrestrial laser scanners (TLS), a discrete return system (Riegl LMS-Z620) and an echo-digitizing system (Riegl VZ-400), employed for the survey of a dense forested area, in the italian Alps. The site is actually undergoing a strong debate among the inhabitants and local government authorities about the exploitation of the area as a huge quarry to produce building material. The dispute originates from the uncertainty about the instability of the underlying mountain slope, which was interested in 1966 by a landslide. The whole area was surveyed with the two laser scanners on February 2011 during the vegetation dormant period. A slight different processing workflow was applied to the collected datasets: the VZ-400 scans were pre-filtered by exploiting the "calibrated relative reflectance" readings and the multi-target capability provided by this laser scanning system. Next, two different spatial filters were applied to both the resulting georeferenced 3D models, in order to eliminate as much vegetation as possible: iterative filter and a custom morphological filter, developed by the authors. Achieved results show that for both datasets, the iterative and the morphological filters perform quite well for eliminating the vegetation, though some manual editing is still required since vegetation does not feature a prevalent growing direction. Furthermore, the comparison between the number of points left in the final DTMs shows that the VZ-400 provided a one order of magnitude denser point cloud wrt. the LMS-Z620. This demonstrates that a TLS with multi-target capability can potentially provide a more detailed DTM even in presence of dense vegetation.


The legalisation of the customary land rights of rural communities is currently actively promoted as a strategy for conserving biodiversity. There is, however, little empirical information on the conservation outcomes of these tenure reforms. In this paper, we describe four conservation projects that specifically aimed to formalise land rights in the Philippines, a country widely seen as a model for the devolution of control over natural resources to rural communities. We demonstrate that these legalistic interventions are based on flawed assumptions, on: 1) the capacity of the state to enforce tenure; 2) the characteristics of customary land rights; and 3) the causal links between legal entitlements and sustainable natural resource management. As a result, these state-led tenure reforms actually aggravate tenure insecurity on the ground, and ultimately fail to improve natural resource management.


Literature retrieval education can improve agricultural college students' ability of science and technology innovation and is an important means to cultivate students' innovation ability. This paper surveyed and analyzed the present situation of literature retrieval education to find out the defects of cultivating the innovation ability of the students. Compared with some foreign schools' advanced practice, put forward five measures to improve the innovation ability of the agricultural students.


The need for accurate conditional-branch prediction is well known: mispred ictions waste large numbers of cycles and also waste power on mis-speculated computation. A number o f studies have explored ways to improve the prediction accuracy of two-level predictors, but ha ve considered exclusively global or local history. Because most programs benefit from having both global and local history available, other work has proposed hybrid predictors that combine a global-history w ith a local-history component. Building on prior work that categorizes the types of branch mispredicti ons, this paper presents a taxonomy of mispredictions. Using the taxonomy, the paper shows wh y a two-level predictor that alloys local and global history in the same predictor index provides superior performance. By making both types of history available all the time, an alloyed scheme obtains accuracies com petitive with hybrid schemes, even though organized like conventional two-level predictors. A lloying has the advantage that it eliminates the need to make a choice between components, since the history types are merged. For large predictors used in high-performance processors, an alloyed organizat io provides competitive performance that suffers less variation from program to program than alternat ives. For the smaller predictors needed in spaceand power-constrained environments, alloying outperforms alternative organizations.


INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES: Penile inversion vaginoplasty (PIV) is the most common technique utilized for feminizing genital reconstruction in transgender women. After surgery, patients must perform regular vaginal dilation to maintain vaginal canal depth and width. Vaginal stenosis is a common complication after initial surgery and can be challenging to manage. Revision vaginoplasty for increased depth is difficult due to lack of available tissue and scar formation from previous dissection, as well as limited visualization using a perineal approach. This video presents a novel technique for revision vaginal reconstruction using robotic assisted peritoneal flap mobilization. METHODS: We identified 8 transgender women who underwent peritoneal flap revision vaginoplasty for vaginal stenosis after prior PIV between September 2017 and September 2018. The revision vaginoplasty is performed by developing two peritoneal flaps measuring approximately 8 cm wide by 10 cm long. The retrovesical pouch is opened, and dissection proceeds between the prostate and rectum to the stenotic vaginal canal. The canal is opened laterally. The flaps are raised from the anterior aspect of the rectum and sigmoid colon, and the posterior aspect of the bladder. The flaps are sutured to the inverted penile skin to create the apex of the neovagina. Outcomes were reported using descriptive statistics on intra-operative details and peri-operative complications/results. RESULTS: Robotic peritoneal flap revision vaginoplasty was successfully performed in all 8 patients. Patients had a mean age of 37 and underwent revision vaginoplasty at a median of 13.5 months (range 6-240) after initial PIV. Some (7/8) 88% of patients underwent initial PIV at an outside institution. Surgical indication for revision surgery was short or stenotic vagina (n=7) or absent vaginal canal (n=1). There were no intraoperative complications. Mean estimated blood loss was 162.5 mL, operative time 295 minutes, and length of stay 5.1 days. At mean follow up of 120 days, the mean vaginal depth and width were 14.5cm and 3.7cm. CONCLUSIONS: We present a novel technique for revision vaginoplasty using a robotic approach with peritoneal flaps. This procedure can be safely performed with low morbidity for transgender female patients with vaginal stenosis to improve vaginal canal depth and width. Figure. No caption available. Source of Funding: None


The lack of women in leadership across higher education has been problemitised in the literature. Often contemporary discourses promote 'fixing the women' as a solution. Consequently, interventions aimed at helping women break through 'the glass ceiling' abound. This article argues that the gendered power relations at play in universities stubbornly maintain entrenched inequalities whereby, regardless of measures implemented for and by women, the problem remains. The precariousness for women of leadership careers is explored through two separate but complementary case studies (from different continents and different generations) each one illuminating gender power relations at work. The article concludes by arguing that it is universities themselves that need fixing, not the women, and that women's growing resistance, particularly of the younger generation, reflects their dissatisfaction with higher education leadership communities of practice of masculinities.


This paper describes song structure and repertoire variation in ortolan buntings (Emberiza hortulana) from an isolated and declining Norwegian population, analysed by using the minimal unit of production approach. Males from the studied population sang strophes similar to both dialects found in geographically closest populations in Sweden. We did not observe any simplification of song structure, which is typical for isolated populations of birds. On the contrary, the studied population was characterised by a greater song variation. Song type repertoires were larger both at the individual level and if we considered numbers of different syllables and song types found within the population. This variation seems to reflect the influence of habitat fragmentation and female deficiency at the boundary of the species range on song learning processes and males' dispersion. We also found a remarkable within-song-type variation, which seems to be independent of song type variation level of song production, but its function is unexplained.


Women, we are told, should not own guns. Women, we are told, are more likely to be injured by their own guns than to fend off an attack themselves. This "fact" is rooted in a fundamental assumption of female weakness and vulnerability. Why should a woman not be every bit as capable as a man of using a firearm in self-defense? And yet the reality is that millions of American women--somewhere between 11,000,000 and 17,000,000--use guns confidently and competently every day. Women are hunting, using firearms in their work as policewomen and in the military, shooting for sport, and arming themselves for personal security in ever-increasing numbers. What motivates women to possess firearms? What is their relationship to their guns? And who exactly are these women? Crucially, can a woman be a gun-owner and a feminist too? Women's growing tendency to arm themselves has in recent years been political fodder for both the right and the left. Female gun owners are frequently painted as "trying to be like men" (the conservative perspective) or "capitulating to patriarchal ideas about power" (the liberal critique). Eschewing the polar extremes in the heated debate over gun ownership and gun control, and linking firearms and feminism in novel fashion, Mary Zeiss Stange and Carol K. Oyster here cut through the rhetoric to paint a precise and unflinching account of America's gun women.


Radar scattering is typically represented as the RCS of the test object. The term RCS evolved from the basic metric for radar scattering: the ratio of the power scattered from an object in units of power per solid angle (steradians) normalized to the plane-wave illumination in units of power per unit area. The RCS is thus given in units of area (or effective cross-sectional area of the target, hence the name). Note that the RCS of the test object is a property of the test object alone; it is neither a function of the radar system nor the distance between the radar and the test object, if the object is in the far field. Because the RCS of a target can have large amplitude variation in frequency and angle, it is expressed in units of decibels with respect to a square meter and is abbreviated as dBsm (sometimes DBSM or dBm2). In terms of this definition, the RCS of a radar target is a scalar ratio of powers. If the effects of polarization and phase are included, the scattering can be expressed as a complex polarimetric scattering (CPS) matrix. The measurement of the RCS of a test object requires the test object to be illuminated by an electromagnetic plane wave and the resultant scattered signal to be observed in the far field. After calibration, this process yields the RCS of the test object in units of area, or the full scattering matrix as a set of complex scattering coefficients.This paper describes the planned upgrades to the old IEEE Std 1502™-2007 IEEE Recommended Practice for Radar Cross-Section Test Procedures [1]. The new standard will reflect the recent improvements in numerical tools, measurement technology and uncertainty estimates in the past decade.


This study conducted at Dambwa Forest Reserve in Livingstone, Zambia, evaluated the perception of local people about joint management of the forest reserve in the area and if there had been improvements to the livelihoods of the community and the ecological condition of the forest following joint forest management (JFM). Generally, more people (68%) participated in joint forestry management meetings than in forestry activities, such as forest patrol and prescribed early burning, and the size of the household significantly influenced the involvement of community members in JFM activities. The results also showed that the social status of the local community members played a significant role in their participation in JFM activities, with the forest committee member group being the most involved (57–61%). The perception of most members of the community was that there were neither monetary benefits derived from JFM nor any significant improvement in their livelihood following JFM. Although there were high regeneration levels (10 000 saplings ha−1) for all of the species, among the selected commercial trees Pterocarpus angolensis, Baikiaea plurijuga and Colophospermum mopane had natural regeneration consisting of 118, 72 and 67 saplings ha−1, respectively. Overall, 89% of the stems for the selected commercial species were less than 30 cm DBH, rendering them unsuitable for harvesting. It can be concluded that although the promotion of community involvement in forest protection and management contributes to regeneration of forest tree species, the communities did not perceive JFM as having improved their livelihood.


The microfinance revolution has allowed more than 150 million poor people around the world to receive small loans without collateral, build up assets, and buy insurance. The idea that providing access to reliable and affordable financial services can have powerful economic and social effects has captured the imagination of policymakers, activists, bankers, and researchers around the world; the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize went to microfinance pioneer Muhammed Yunis and Grameen Bank of Bangladesh. This book offers an accessible and engaging analysis of the global expansion of financial markets in poor communities. It introduces readers to the key ideas driving microfinance, integrating theory with empirical data and addressing a range of issues, including savings and insurance, the role of women, impact measurement, and management incentives. This second edition has been updated throughout to reflect the latest data. A new chapter on commercialization describes the rapid growth in investment in microfinance institutions and the tensions inherent in the efforts to meet both social and financial objectives. The chapters on credit contracts, savings and insurance, and gender have been expanded substantially; a new section in the chapter on impact measurement describes the growing importance of randomized controlled trials; and the chapter on managing microfinance offers a new perspective on governance issues in transforming institutions. Appendixes and problem sets cover technical material.


In 1850 a cotton planter named Robert Stafford fathered a daughter (later named Cornelia) by a woman named "Juda." Three years later Juda bore him a second daughter (later named Nancy). On an inventory made for Stafford's tax records they were simply young females, listed only by age, not by name or family. One was six years old, the other was nine years old. They were the only female mulattos in their age group. All the others in their age group were black. "Mulatto" indicated to the county tax assessor that, in this case, their father was a white man. Their first appearance in the historical record was in an 1860 inventory in Camden County, Georgia. It was a slave inventory. They were slaves because Juda was a slave. These events were not so unusual on the southern plantations of the United States, but ensuing developments were remarkable. This paper focuses upon Nancy's life, for she grew up to follow a career. It was an unusual one for an African-American girl born before the Civil War. Considering that she was born of a slave mother, her choice of career was downright incredible. The child grew up to became a physician, to practice in Europe. She died in 1933. The location of her grave is unknown. Although her descendants told us she was buried in London, no confirming evidence has appeared.


Replicated state machines are linearizable, fault-tolerant groups of replicas that are coordinated using a consensus algorithm. Copilot replication is the first 1-slowdown-tolerant consensus protocol: it delivers normal latency despite the slowdown of any 1 replica. Copilot uses two distinguished replicas—the pilot and copilot—to proactively add redundancy to all stages of processing a client's command. Copilot uses dependencies and deduplication to resolve potentially differing orderings proposed by the pilots. To avoid dependencies leading to either pilot being able to slow down the group, Copilot uses fast takeovers that allow a fast pilot to complete the ongoing work of a slow pilot. Copilot includes two optimizations—ping-pong batching and null dependency elimination—that improve its performance when there are 0 and 1 slow pilots respectively. Our evaluation of Copilot shows its performance is lower but competitive with MultiPaxos and EPaxos when no replicas are slow. When a replica is slow, Copilot is the only protocol that avoids high latencies.


This thesis provides an empirical analysis on how Foreign Direct Investment could affect economic growth. The analysis focuses on China and two East Asian countries, South Korea and Taiwan, for the period from 1980 to 2006. A VAR system is applied to China and the other two countries, while innovation analysis, including variance decomposition and impulse response, is then undertaken to evaluate the influence of shocks on each variable. Cointegration analysis is introduced to capture the long-run equilibrium relationships. The results suggest a small negative effect of FDI on economic growth in China and Taiwan, and no significant influence on economic growth in South Korea. But we find that FDI could be attracted by rapid economic growth of all these countries. The traditional elements for growth, such as capital and labour are demonstrated to play important roles in stimulating economic growth, while the sustainable elements suggested by new endogenous theory, such as technology development and human capital, are found playing different roles across countries with respect to their strategies of development. In addition, a simultaneous equation model is estimated to capture the effects of policy instruments on output, FDI and other endogenous variables in China. Both direct coefficient effects and multiplier effects are calculated. The results indicate that the changes in capital formation, employment and human capital could decelerate the economic growth, while the changes in technology transfer and saving could have III accelerating effects on the change in output directly. FDI could affect the change in economic growth indirectly through an accelerating effect on capital formation and human capital. For the impacts of policy instruments, It draws a conclusion that the monetary policies, fiscal policies and commercial policies committed by the government are indeed appreciative for accelerating economic development in China. Together with the specific empirical results for China and other two East Asian countries, this thesis provides a more comprehensive framework to study the relationships between economic growth and FDI, with the VAR system focusing on the general overview and the simultaneous equation model targeting on the intermediates.


The Risk Connected to Sea Voyages as the Particular Kind of Non-monetary Contribution to Partnership in Roman Law Summary The seaborne commerce in ancient Rome due to the amount of capital required and the risk involved in navigation was often practiced as a common enterprise. The best known form of a common investment in maritime trading was a contract of maritime loan but analogical purposes could be realized through making the consensual contract of societas . This contract could be used to achieve its traditional scope which is collecting a capital necessary for conducting some kind of economic activity and sharing the risk involved in such business. In this kind of partnership each partner made a contribution of capital for financing the partnership' activity (in the form of money or property) and also each partner was involved in conducting the common business matters. The alternative form was a partnership in which only one partner made a contribution of capital and the other socius contributed his future services that consisted of travelling and trading and as the consequence was exposed to the risk of navigation. Undoubtedly such a partnership operating in the sector of maritime commerce was a very hazardous enterprise because the risk that a ship may perish was very high. Thus the risk of navigation, and more precisely the willingness to undertake such a risk, was treated as a very precious component of a partner's services and in case of a partnership in which only one partner made such a contribution, his contribution was deemed to be of extreme value and importance and thus justify granting him a special position in a partnership. The problem regarding the willingness to undertake the risk of navigation as a kind of a non-monetary contribution in a partnership was treated by Ulpianus in his commentary ad Sabinum (D. 17,2,29,1). This jurist accepted the possibility of making a partnership in which one partner had a share in the profits but did not bear the loss. Such an agreement was permissible if his services constituted an economical equivalent of the loss. To justify this opinion Ulpianus said that often the services performed by a partner ( industria ) were of such importance that their value was even higher than the value of the capital contributed by other partners. To illustrate such a situation Ulpianus referred to an example of a partner who alone underwent the danger of navigation ( solus navigat solus peregrineretur, pericula subeat solus ). The question of an exclusion of one of the partners from bearing the loss constituted one of the issues of the controversy reported in legal sources as magna quaestio . This controversy is deemed to be related with the transformation of a partnership from the community of properties to an instrument of conducting economic activities and gaining profits. On the basis of the sources it is not possible to find out about the role that the latter example played in this controversy. But it's worth noting that this example constitutes the one and the only example of the situation in which the partner's non- monetary contribution was deemed to be so precious that justified the settlement on the basis of which this partner was excluded from bearing the loss resulted from the partnership's business. Thus one can not exclude that this example was also used by Servius and his supporters to popularize more universal idea of excluding the partners that contributed only their services from the loss in the partnership. It is also worth noting also that such a partnership in which one partner made a contribution of capital and the other conducted a partnership business that involved sea-travelling was a contract very close to a maritime loan. For the maritime loan it was essential that the creditor undertook the risk of the perishing of the ship ( periculum maris ) in which case he was not entitled to claim his money back, but as a reward he could stipulate the interests exceeding the legal rate in case of a successful journey. Thus his situation was analogous to the situation of a partner who contributed his capital in a partnership – both of them were involved in sponsoring a common business but they did not participate in its conducting. If the ship arrived safely both of them participated in the profits: the partner according to his share in partnership, the lender could claim the high interests, but in case of the perishing of the ship both of them lost the money they had invested in a commercial voyage. Respectively a partner who contributed to the partnership with his services and thus undertook the risk of navigation just as a borrower in case of the maritime loan, in case of successful return of the ship had his share in the profit but in case of the perishing of the ship did not bear the loss of an invested capital. Thus the contract of partnership in the moment of the passage from the idea of a partnership based on the ownership to the idea of a partnership as the instrument of conducting economic activities and gaining profits became an alternative to the contract of a maritime loan legal form in which the seaborne commerce could be financed. The risk involved in navigation was thus treated as a value that could constitute a kind of a non-monetary contribution of a partner in partnership's profits and losses. At the same time the particular character of this contribution was used as an argument in the discussion regarding the general issue of the exclusion of a partner who contributed only with his services from bearing the loss resulted from the partnership's activities. The acknowledgement of a willingness to undertake the risk of navigation as a possible contribution to the partnership constitutes the proof that the Roman iurisprudentes affirmed that in many cases there wasn't the capital but services offered by a partner crucial for making profit. These services might consist of special abilities and skills of a partner ( ars , peritia ), his social position and connections ( gratia ) or undertaking some hazardous activity for a partnership ( industria ). The acceptance of these values as crucial for fixing the partners' shares in a partnership means also the acceptance in the law sector of the elements that were essential in the area of making business. Thanks to that a partnership became a contract that could be attractive for the entrepreneurs who wanted to make profits. Showing the advantages offered by this contract to Roman businessmen, due to the acceptance of such a flexible concept of possible kinds of the contribution, supports the view that the role of this contract in the Roman economy was not as marginal as it was maintained by the authors convinced that the key-figure for conducting common economic activities was a servus communis .


It is shown that the dispersion-managed nonlinear pulse solutions can be viewed as nonlinear Bloch waves with a periodic scattering potential that is set up self-consistently by the wave itself. The pulses are shown to be chirp-free at the center of each dispersion segment. The essential physical mechanism is explained by the interaction of the m=0 and the m=2 Hermite–Gaussian components of the pulse.


While the 1999 drought has had severe financial impacts on agricultural producers in the drought regions, its impact on U.S. agricultural production has been limited. The drought will reduce commodity receipts relative to 1998 by an estimated $1.29 billion. Estimated farm net income losses, including expected yield losses, increases in expenses, and insurance indemnities, will total $1.35 billion, about 3 percent of expected 1999 U.S. net farm income. Drought impacts in areas of the Northeast designated as extreme and severe drought are expected to reduce farmers' net income by nearly $840 million. The regions affected, the crops grown in those regions, the increased use of irrigation, and crop insurance coverage limited the drought's impacts on agriculture nationally. Drought also affects the rural population by reducing water supplies available for human and livestock consumption.