The brief's key findings are: Although the introduction of defined contribution plans by some states has received considerable press attention, activity to date has been modest. Moreover, most recent shifts involve either hybrid plans or cash balance plans, rather than stand-alone defined contribution plans. The changes appear driven by a desire to avoid future unfunded liabilities, to reduce investment and mortality risk, and to help short-tenure workers. Such changes transfer risk to participants but, if the new plans enhance the likelihood of responsible funding, they could also offer some increased security.


Abstract The banking sector is facing constant change and fierce competition. In this scenario, banks need to align themselves with the ever-changing environment by enhancing employee knowledge base to create capabilities. The basic objective of the current study is to examine the effect of knowledge management activities and dynamic capabilities on employee performance in the banking sector of Pakistan. This research employed a quantitative method to analyse the data. The sample was taken from employees who are working in public and private banks in Pakistan. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed among employees of public and private banks adopting stratified random sampling technique. Ordinary Least Square (OLS) method is used to testify the hypothesis and factor analysis to examine the validity and reduction of the items. This research finds that both knowledge management activities and dynamic capabilities have significant effect on employee performance in the banking sector of Pakistan.


Neoclassical trade theory suggests that factor price convergence should follow increased commercial integration. Rising commercial integration and foreign direct investment followed the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Mexico. This paper evaluates the degree of wage convergence between Mexico and the United States between 1988 and 2011. We apply a synthetic panel approach to employment survey data and a more descriptive approach to Census data from Mexico and the US. First, we find no evidence of long-run wage convergence among cohorts characterized by low migration propensities although this was, in part, due to large macroeconomic shocks. On the other hand, we do find some evidence of convergence for workers with high migration propensities. Finally, we find evidence of convergence in the border of Mexico vis-a-vis its interior in the 1990s but this was reversed in the 2000s.


As smartphone ownership rises, usage patterns are expanding. Libraries face an increasing demand for online content delivered in a mobile compatible format while being constrained by financial and staffing limitations. Solutions are readily available through free and low-cost products to create mobile web pages and existing design models from which to draw inspiration. Platform-specific apps can easily support the kinds of content most commonly delivered on library mobile pages: basic contact information and outbound links to the catalog, databases, and other resources. Two software platforms for creating simple pages were tested, the free software from WordPress with mobile detection formatting enabled and LibGuides' mobile friendly platform in a basic version, free for those with LibGuides accounts, and the more feature-rich MobileBuilder version. Each was found to have advantages and weaknesses. Whichever platform is chosen, usability testing is critical. The authors offer a "Heuristic Checklist for Library Mobile Design," detailing aspects of interface design, user characteristics, and content delivery that should be assessed to determine how well the platform serves a library's requirements for mobile usability.


Engineering automated negotiation across the supply chain is a central research challenge for the important problem of supply chain formation. The difficult problem of designing negotiation strategies is greatly simplified if the negotiation mechanism is incentive compatible, in which case the agents' dominant strategy is to simply report their private information truthfully. Unfortunately, with two-sided negotiation it is impossible to simultaneously achieve perfect efficiency, budget balance, and individual rationality with incentive compatibility. This bears directly on the mechanism design problem for supply chain formation---the problem of designing auctions to coordinate the buying and selling of goods in multiple markets across a supply chain. We introduce incentive compatible, budget balanced, and individually rational auctions for supply chain formation inspired by previous work of Babaioff and Nisan, but extended to a broader class of supply chain topologies. The auctions explicitly discard profitable trades, thus giving up perfect efficiency to maintain budget balance and individual rationality. We use a novel payment rule analogous to Vickrey-Clarke-Groves payments, but adapted to our allocation rule. The first auction we present is incentive compatible when each agent desires only a single bundle of goods, the auction correctly knows all agents' bundles of interest, but the monetary valuations are private to the agents. We introduce extensions to maintain incentive compatibility when the auction does not know the agents' bundles of interest. We establish a good worst case bound on efficiency when the bundles of interest are known, which also applies in some cases when the bundles are not known. Our auctions produce higher efficiency for a broader class of supply chains than any other incentive compatible, individually rational , and budget-balanced auction we are aware of.


The Treaty of Waitangi, signed by Maori and by the British Crown in 1840, is the founding document of New Zealand. Yet it is not incorporated into domestic law. This book examines the place of the Treaty of Waitangi in New Zealand's law and constitution - where it is and where it should be. It undertakes an in depth analysis of the contemporary meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi, its legal status and its constitutional place. The book suggests that the meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi has been reinterpreted through a process of constitutional dialogue from 1973 to 1993. Today, its general meaning is best understood as representing an explicit commitment to the health of the relationships between the Crown, Maori, and other New Zealanders. Yet the specific meaning of the Treaty in relation to particular issues depends on context and therefore remains uncertain. This uncertainty is exacerbated by the incoherent legal status and inconsistent legal force of the Treaty of Waitangi. Underlying this is the continuing contested and tense uncertainty of the constitutional roles of New Zealand's public institutions in relation to the Treaty of Waitangi today. The key focus of the forward-looking part of the book is on how to achieve the objective of healthy relationships between the Crown, Maori and other New Zealanders. The conclusion is that, in order better to achieve this objective, change is desirable - change that stabilises the place of the Treaty of Waitangi in New Zealand's law and constitution. The Treaty should be given legal force, as judged independently by a new Treaty of Waitangi Court. This book was awarded the JF Northey Book Award by the Legal Research Foundation for the best book published by a New Zealand based author in 2008.A copy of the book may be ordered from Victoria University Press.


A woman diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder reveals her harrowing journey from abuse to recovery in this #1 New York Times bestselling autobiography written by her own multiple personalities. Successful, happily married Truddi Chase began therapy hoping to find the reasons behind her extreme anxiety, mood swings, and periodic blackouts. What emerged from her sessions was terrifying: Truddi's mind and body were inhabited by the Troops--ninety-two individual voices that emerged to shield her from her traumatizing childhood. For years the Troops created a world where she could hide from the pain of the ritualized sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of her own stepfather--abuse that began when she was only two years old. It was a past that Truddi didn't even know existed, until she and her therapist took a journey to where the nightmare began... Written by the Troops themselves, When Rabbit Howls is told by the very alter-egos who stayed with Truddi Chase, watched over her, and protected her. What they reveal is a spellbinding descent into a personal hell--and an ultimate, triumphant deliverance for the woman they became.


Multiculturalism in the United States is commonly lauded as a positive social ideal celebrating the diversity of our nation. But, in reality, immigrants often feel pressured to create a singular formulation of their identity that does not reflect the diversity of cultures that exist in their homeland. Hindu Americans have faced this challenge over the last fifteen years, as the number of Indians that have immigrated to this country has more than doubled. In ""A Place at the Multicultural Table"", Prema A. Kurien shows how various Hindu American organizations - religious, cultural, and political - are attempting to answer the puzzling questions of identity outside their homeland. Drawing on the experiences of both immigrant and American-born Hindu Americans, Kurien demonstrates how religious ideas and practices are being imported, exported, and reshaped in the process. The result of this transnational movement is an American Hinduism - an organized, politicized, and standardized version of that which is found in India. This first in-depth look at Hinduism in the United States and the Hindu Indian American community helps readers to understand the private devotions, practices, and beliefs of Hindu Indian Americans as well as their political mobilization and activism. It explains the differences between immigrant and American-born Hindu Americans, how both understand their religion and their identity, and it emphasizes the importance of the social and cultural context of the United States in influencing the development of an American Hinduism.


Background
Migration may impact the mental health of family members who remain in places of origin. We examined longitudinal associations between having an adult child migrant and mental health, for middle-aged and older Mexican adults accounting for complex time-varying confounding.

Methods
Mexican Health and Aging Study cohort (N = 11 806) respondents ≥50 years completed a 9-item past-week depressive symptoms scale; scores of ≥5 reflected elevated depressive symptoms. Expected risk differences (RD) for elevated depressive symptoms at each wave due to having at least one (versus no) adult child migrant in the US or in another Mexican city were estimated with longitudinal targeted maximum likelihood estimation.

Results
Women with at least one adult child in the US had a higher adjusted baseline prevalence of elevated depressive symptoms (RD: 0.063, 95% CI: 0.035, 0.091) compared to women with no adult children in the US. Men with at least one child in another Mexican city at all three study waves had a lower adjusted prevalence of elevated depressive symptoms at 11-year follow-up (RD: -0.042, 95% CI: -0.082, -0.003) compared to those with no internal migrant children over those waves. For men and women with ≤3 total children, adverse associations between having an adult child in the US and depressive symptoms persisted beyond baseline.

Conclusions
Associations between having an adult child migrant and depressive symptoms varied by respondent gender, family size, and the location of the child migrant. Trends in population aging and migration bring new urgency to examining associations with other outcomes and in other settings.


Addis Ababa, with an estimated human population of over 3 million, has a high demand for cereals, pulses, fresh vegetables, fruits, milk and milk products and meat and eggs. The Ada'a Woreda is one of the important areas that supply the well known 'maja' teff, chickpeas, fresh vegetables, eggs and chicken, meat and milk. The Woreda capital, Debre Zeit town, is only 45 km southeast of Addis Ababa and has a very good road and railway connection. The Ada'a Dairy Cooperative was established in 1998 in Debre Zeit based on its comparative market advantage, the conducive agro-ecological conditions for dairy production and the available support services. The cooperative was established with 34 members and an initial capital of 3,400 Birr. The main objectives are to minimize transaction costs, reduce price fluctuations over seasons, increase production efficiency, improve incomes and create job opportunities. Milk collection and marketing started in January 2000, with a daily total of 308 liters. The association has made significant progress so far and currently has over 850 members (about 50% female) who individually own over 3000 dairy cows. The current capital of the association has increased to USD 138,029. The number of milk collection sites has increased to 10 and job opportunity has been created for 62 staff. Daily milk collection has increased to over 8,000 liters and is mainly sold to the Dairy Development Enterprise (DDE) in Addis Ababa. The cooperative has established a small processing unit for the production of butter, yoghurt and cottage cheese during periods of excess supply. Members use mainly crossbred animals and the management level is relatively intensive with limited land area. Most animals are stall fed. The cooperative supplies inputs such as grass hay, concentrate feeds, veterinary drugs and services, and artificial insemination service to members at reasonable prices. Rural dairy farmers are joining the cooperative, taking advantage of market access for their milk. Inputs required in dairy production include feeds and water, labour, veterinary drugs and services, artificial insemination and equipment and utensils. The largest input in terms of volume and financial requirements is feed. These involve roughages and concentrate feeds. The main rural areas that provide roughage feeds (grass hay and crop residues) include Selale, Ada'a and adjacent Woredas, and Arsi. Concentrate feeds such as bran, middlings, oil seed cakes, molasses are supplied by ago-industries around Addis Ababa, Debre Zeit and Nazareth, but the row materials come from various parts of the country. Molasses is supplied from Wonji and Shoa Sugar Estates. Another major input is water which is used for animal consumption, washing and cleaning purposes. Most dairy farmers use expensive municipal water supply. Most of the milk collected is supplied to DDE. Pasteurized and processed products are mainly sold in Addis. Some fresh milk is also sold directly to hotels and restaurants in Addis Ababa, Debre Zeit, Dukem and Nazareth towns. In addition, milk collected from Ada'a by the Sebeta agro-industry is processed and supplied to urban centres as far as Bahir Dar. Manure produced from dairy farms is also supplied to a limited extent to rural areas, particularly to horticultural crops producing farms. A strong and organized rural-urban linkage is evolving informally at the moment and this should be recognized and strengthened to benefit both rural and urban dwellers in taking advantage of the value chain. Although urban and peri-urban dairy production system plays important role in the national economy, the system has been marginalized and there is limited research and institutional support addressing this issue. This paper presents the activities and achievements of the Ada'a dairy cooperative and also highlights the rural and urban linkages through the value chain of milk production, processing and marketing.


The main objective of this study was to investigate the refusal speech act among Omani EFL college students. It examined how they refused in various situations and whether their responses were appropriate in terms of culture and accurate in terms of language. Forty-one English as foreign language (EFL) learners completed a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) consisting of 12 scenarios by supplying written refusals to three requests, three suggestions, three invitations, and three offers. Students' responses were rated by two professors: one a native English speaker and the other not. A convenient sampling procedure was employed. The findings indicated that students' responses were largely inappropriate and inaccurate. Further examination showed that they were heavily influenced by the students' culture, many being mere translations of refusal responses in Omani Arabic. Others were inappropriate because they were too direct, due to students' lack of knowledge of the role of social status when issuing refusals to a person of high status. Language mistakes were mainly in the sentence structure, which affected the meaning clarity. Findings suggest that, to help students become better communicators in English, it is important to teach them directly the most common speech acts, especially those they might frequently use in their everyday conversations with professors and classmates.


A growing number of gene mutations, which are recognized as cancer drivers, can be successfully targeted with drugs. The redundant and dynamic nature of oncogenic signaling networks and complex interactions between cancer cells and the microenvironment, however, can cause drug resistance. While these challenges can be addressed by developing drug combinations or polypharmacology drugs, this benefits greatly from a detailed understanding of the proteome-wide target profiles. Using mass spectrometry-based chemical proteomics, we report the comprehensive characterization of the drug–protein interaction networks for the multikinase inhibitors dasatinib and sunitinib in primary lung cancer tissue specimens derived from patients. We observed in excess of 100 protein kinase targets plus various protein complexes involving, for instance, AMPK, TBK1 (sunitinib), and ILK (dasatinib). Importantly, comparison with lung cancer cell lines and mouse xenografts thereof showed that most targets were shared between cell lines and tissues. Several targets, however, were only present in tumor tissues. In xenografts, most of these proteins were of mouse origin suggesting that they originate from the tumor microenvironment. Furthermore, intersection with subsequent global phosphoproteomic analysis identified several activated signaling pathways. These included MAPK, immune, and integrin signaling, which were affected by these drugs in both cancer cells and the microenvironment. Thus, the combination of chemical and phosphoproteomics can generate a systems view of proteins, complexes, and signaling pathways that are simultaneously engaged by multitargeted drugs in cancer cells and the tumor microenvironment. This may allow for the design of novel anticancer therapies that concurrently target multiple tumor compartments. Mol Cancer Ther; 13(11); 2751–62. ©2014 AACR.


Disentangled representation learning has seen a surge in interest over recent times, generally focusing on new models which optimise one of many disparate disentanglement metrics. Symmetry Based Disentangled Representation learning introduced a robust mathematical framework that defined precisely what is meant by a "linear disentangled representation". This framework determined that such representations would depend on a particular decomposition of the symmetry group acting on the data, showing that actions would manifest through irreducible group representations acting on independent representational subspaces. Caselles-Dupre et al [2019] subsequently proposed the first model to induce and demonstrate a linear disentangled representation in a VAE model. In this work we empirically show that linear disentangled representations are not generally present in standard VAE models and that they instead require altering the loss landscape to induce them. We proceed to show that such representations are a desirable property with regard to classical disentanglement metrics. Finally we propose a method to induce irreducible representations which forgoes the need for labelled action sequences, as was required by prior work. We explore a number of properties of this method, including the ability to learn from action sequences without knowledge of intermediate states and robustness under visual noise. We also demonstrate that it can successfully learn 4 independent symmetries directly from pixels.


In his argument for the possibility of knowledge of spatial objects, in the Transcendental Deduction of the B-version of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant makes a crucial distinction between space as "form of intuition" and space as "formal intuition." The traditional interpretation regards the distinction between the two notions as reflecting a distinction between indeterminate space and determinations of space by the understanding, respectively. By contrast, a recent influential reading has argued that the two notions can be fused into one and that space as such is first generated by the understanding through an act of synthesis of the imagination.

Against this reading, this article argues that a key characteristic of space as a form of intuition is its nonconceptual unity, which defines the properties of space and is as such necessarily independent of determination by the understanding through the transcendental synthesis of the imagination. The conceptual unity that the understanding prescribes to the manifold in intuition, by means of the categories, defines the formal intuition. Furthermore, this article argues that it is the sui generis, nonconceptual unity of space, when taken as a unity for the understanding by means of conceptual determination, that first enables geometric knowledge and knowledge of spatially located particulars.


Evolving global markets in electronic commerce highlight the importance of developing a copyright regime capable of flowing with the changing landscape of international intellectual property law. Traditional boundaries based on time and distance erode as business, education, and the world at large become more digitized. In order to respond to the increasingly widespread digital age, copyright law must become less nationalistic and more global in scale. Both the United States and the European Union have acknowledged the dynamics of intellectual property in today's digital revolution. The United States has responded with, among others, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act, and the European Union has similarly answered with its Directives on Copyright and £-Commerce. Historically, the United States, in contrast with the European Union, has shown reluctance to recognize moral rights as an important aspect of copyright law. Going forward, it is in the interest of both trading entities to work together to create a more harmonized market that will be better suited to international business in the 21st century.


We investigate how different sanctioning regimes and the quality of local leaders affects public goods provision in Liberian villages. We conduct a public goods experiment where leaders act as third-party punishers under one of two exogenously imposed sanctioning regimes. Under the first "flat fee" regime leaders receive a flat fee as compensation but do not receive any monetary gains from punishment. Under the second, "incentivised" regime leaders receive the punishment (tokens taken from the game participants) as compensation. We use villagers' perceived measures of corruption of their leader as our preferred measure for leadership quality. To empirically distinguish between sanctioning itself and the identity of the person sanctioning we have a treatment variation where a random villager acts as the third party punisher. We find that real village leaders elicit higher contributions than random villagers or groups without sanctioning. We also report that the effectiveness of sanctioning is attenuated by chiefs that are perceived to be of low-quality, especially when the sanctioner has no material incentive to punish. This suggests that low-quality chiefs are less likely to exert effort for public goods if they do not also privately benefit from it. Finally we find that people's preferred regime choice seems to depend on their real-life experiences in the village rather than their individual characteristics. Current development programmes heavily rely on community self-management and local institutions. Our paper supports the idea that a programme's success is likely to depend on whether villagers deem their leader to be credible norm enforcers.


Second language (L2) learning in the 21st century, perhaps more than in the last, will see shifting perspectives, priorities and tendencies. Whereas the late 20th century saw the rise to pre-eminence of English as the international language of communication, the decades to come may chronicle a challenge to that dominance as other world languages, such as Chinese and Spanish, jostle for supremacy. New technologies may accelerate the injection of alternative ways of delivering a second language curriculum. The profile of the L2 learner, already a complex and diverse one, may undergo fundamental changes as new societal, cultural, political and professional demands are imposed on the individual. Within all these developments the concept of the autonomous language learner may also shift, indeed it is shifting already. Yet it would seem to me important to safeguard a number of constants, particularly those regarding the right of self-determination of the individual. With this in mind, this chapter elaborates on a model of autonomy first proposed in Macaro (1997). The model proposed 3 dimensions of L2 autonomy: autonomy of language competence; autonomy of language learning competence; autonomy of learner choice. In returning to this theme more than ten years later I find I still have in mind an L2 learner who is young and not that far advanced on his or her L2 learning path. This is not only because my professional experience lies with this group of learners but also because this group is still under-represented, perhaps even disenfranchised, in the second language acquisition and L2 pedagogy literature. I will examine each of these dimensions in turn and then try to pull them together in the concluding remarks.


Obvious surface manifestations of an anomalous concentration of geothermal energy at the Coso Geothermal Area, California, include fumarolic activity, active hot springs, and associated hydrothermally altered rocks. Abundant Pleistocene volcanic rocks, including a cluster of thirty-seven rhyolite domes, occupy a north-trending structural and topographic ridge near the center of an oval-shaped zone of late Cenozoic ring faulting. In an investigation of the thermal regime of the geothermal area, temperatures have been obtained to depths up to 133 m in 22 boreholes with measurements being made at least four times in each borehole. Geothermal gradients ranged from 24/sup 0/C/km to 450/sup 0/C/km. The high gradients arise from convecting hot water and magma which are cooled at shallow depth by conduction of heat to the surface. Thermal conductivity measurements ranging from 3.2 to 10.5 mcal/cm-sec-/sup 0/C were made on both cores and drill cuttings. The resultant heat flow values of 2.5 to 18 HFU are typical of geothermal areas. The actual process by which heat is transferred is rather complex; however, the heat flow determinations can be divided into two groups. The first group, less than 6.5 HFU, are indicative of regions with primarily conductive regimes although deep-seated mass transfer is implied.more » The second group, greater than 6.5 HFU, are characteristic of regions with considerable convective heat transfer in the shallow subsurface. The high heat flow values are essentially restricted to the central rhyolite dome field and the associated surface thermal manifestations. Heat transferred by convection of water would be rapidly exhausted if it were not intermittently supplied with energy from depth; therefore, the heat flow data substantiate the concept that the ring structure and associated volcanic rocks are products of a large magma chamber that has periodically erupted lava during the past one million years.« less


A method for removing impulse noise from audio signals by fusing multiple copies of the same recording is introduced in this paper. The proposed algorithm exploits the fact that while in general multiple copies of a given recording are available, all sharing the same master, most degradations in audio signals are record-dependent. Our method first seeks for the optimal non-rigid alignment of the signals that is robust to the presence of sparse outliers with arbitrary magnitude. Unlike previous approaches, we simultaneously find the optimal alignment of the signals and impulsive degradation. This is obtained via continuous dynamic time warping computed solving an Eikonal equation. We propose to use our approach in the derivative domain, reconstructing the signal by solving an inverse problem that resembles the Poisson image editing technique. The proposed framework is here illustrated and tested in the restoration of old gramophone recordings showing promising results; however, it can be used in other applications where different copies of the signal of interest are available and the degradations are copy-dependent.


Background: The aim of the study was to determine the effects of the topical administration of propolis and dexamethasone on oral surgical wounds. Method: Surgical wounds were made on the dorsum of the tongues of 90 hamsters, which were then divided into three experimental groups. The wounds were submitted to topical applications of a 30% ethanolic extract of propolis (EEP) (Group 1), 0.1% dexamethasone in orabase gel (Group 2), and orabase gel alone (Group 3). Six animals from each subgroup were sacrificed on days 1, 3, 7, 14, and 28 post surgery. Statistical analysis, involving nonparametric Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney tests and a chi-square test, were used to compare categorical variables. Results: The macroscopic exam of the surgical sites revealed statistically significant differences in the wound area between the propolis group and the remaining groups on day 7 postoperatively (p-value = 0.002). In the microscopic exam, the effects of EEP and dexamethasone were compared with regard to the presence of necrotic tissue, intensity of inflammation, formation of granulation tissue and epithelialisation. Conclusion: In conclusion, our results showed that EEP demonstrated a greater anti-inflammatory effect and shorter healing time in oral surgical wounds in hamsters, in comparison to dexamethasone in orabase gel.


The Endangered Orachrysops ariadne (Butler 1898) (Karkloof blue butterfly) is endemic to the Endangered Moist Midlands Grassland in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, and is extant at four sites. The results from the monitoring of the eggs laid by O. ariadne in a grassland area that is frequently burnt by poor rural people to ensure that palatable grass is available to their livestock, suggested the implementation of management interventions (fencing and firebreak burning) to prevent the local extinction of the butterfly. The number of eggs at the monitoring site declined dramatically between 2002 and 2003 and fluctuated after the management interventions were initiated properly in 2008, but had nearly reached the target number of 250 by 2013. An index count method for the monitoring of O. ariadne eggs at the other three known colonies, where plant invasion rather than uncontrolled burning is a major threat, was developed and shown to be efficient with regard to time relative to the number of eggs sampled. The host ant Camponotus natalensis (F. Smith 1858) (Natal sugar ant) was found to be present in all the host-plant patches at one colony site, indicating that all host-plant patches are likely to be breeding areas for the butterfly. Invasive plant control at and appropriate burning of the habitat of O. ariadne should assist in ensuring the survival of these colonies. Conservation implications: Adaptive monitoring and management of threatened endemic invertebrates and their habitats may be crucial for their continued survival. The development of efficient methods for the monitoring of such species is required where resources are limited, as threats to the species may cause sudden and irreversible declines in population size.


ORIGINAL ARTICLE Background: Health literacy in the 21 st century is an issue for global debate, which has also introduced a number of factors, including an increase in noncommunicable diseases. The use of mass communication, especially the Internet has resulted in increased attention on the importance of health literacy. Due to the importance of health literacy of women, the purpose of this study was to assess health literacy in women subscribing to health centers in the border of Yazd. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out on 250 women referred to health centers in the periphery of Yazd city, they were selected using simple random sampling method, and data were collected using a standard questionnaire of functional health literacy in adults. Collected information was analyzed by the SPSS18 software and appropriate non-parametric tests. Results: Most participants were of ages between 18 30 years. Questions were administered in the areas of health literacy, access area, information access, information understanding, judgment and assessment. Results indicated that 25.2, 56.6, and 19.6% were good, but the percentage of women in area judging from collated information in this category was not good. Regarding use of information, 84.4% of women were in the middle class, but none of them was classified in good category. Conclusion: Health literacy of women in general was unacceptable, and recommendations were made to establish continuous training for women to improve their views. Also, consideration should be given to centers to plan the transformation of health literacy, which has been launched to increase the health literacy of the population being studied as recipients of health services.


The nucleosome core particle is a highly conserved structure which can play diverse roles depending on the organism, cell, or part of chromatin in which it resides. The Protein Data Bank currently contains approximately 70 nucleosome core particle structures, over half of which were determined in the last three years. The recent emergence of the field of epigenetics, and the increase in data available from experiments, warrants a need to develop new approaches to quantitatively compare various features of interest across multiple structures. As a first step, we have developed a database and new computational tools to allow researchers to quantitatively analyze and compare the nucleosome core particle structures deposited in the Protein Data Bank. The features of the DNA-protein assembly can be examined in novel coordinate frames placed on the structure, allowing researchers to obtain a better understanding of the organization and subtleties of the macomolecular complexes. This comparison allows one to examine the 'motion' of any specific residue of interest, including sites of post-translational histone modification. The database also includes DNA-histone contact points, DNA conformational parameters, and information about protein features, such as the secondary structure in the globular histone core and the 'motion' of the histone tails. Along with these features, we also characterize the dynamics of the global structure of the nucleosome core particle, including the changes in superhelical path of the DNA and the rearrangements of the histone tetramers. In addition to data obtained from crystallographically solved structures, we are working to incorporate data from in silico experiments. The data and the results of the analysis are available to the public as an automatically updated, online-accessible web server. Cartoon diagrams of crystal structures are shown with their reference frames aligned. The frames were computed by PCA of the globular core of the histone octamer. The anionic atoms of aspartic acid and glutamic acid are marked in light red. The cationic atoms of the arginines and lysines are marked in dark blue. Note the channels that the charges may occupy.


High-temperature superconductivity remains arguably the greatest enigma of condensed matter physics. The discovery of iron-based high-temperature superconductors [, ] has renewed the importance of understanding superconductivity in materials susceptible to magnetic order and fluctuations. Intriguingly, they show magnetic fluctuations reminiscent of superconducting (SC) cuprates [], including a 'resonance' and an 'hourglass'-shaped dispersion [], which provides an opportunity to gain new insights into the coupling between spin fluctuations and superconductivity. In this paper, we report inelastic neutron scattering data on Fe1+yTe0.7Se0.3 using excess iron concentration to tune between an SC (y = 0.02) and a non-SC (y = 0.05) ground state. We find incommensurate spectra in both the samples but discover that in the one that becomes SC, a constriction toward a commensurate hourglass-shape develops well above Tc. Conversely, a spin gap and a concomitant spectral weight shift happen below Tc. Our results imply that the hourglass-shaped dispersion is most likely a prerequisite for superconductivity, whereas the spin gap and shift of spectral weight are the consequences of superconductivity. We explain this observation by pointing out that an inward dispersion toward the commensurate wave vector is needed for the opening of a spin gap to lower the magnetic exchange energy and hence provide the necessary condensation energy for the SC state to emerge.


The upper Couch Formation is part of the lower of two formations composing the Ogallala Group in Blanco and Yellowhouse canyons in northwestern Texas. An eolian origin for the upper Couch Formation is indicated by its mean grain size, pedogenic carbonate nodules, massive bedding, and blanketlike morphology. The unit conforms poorly to the usual eolian depositional models; it resulted from a combination of the processes involved in loess and sand-sheet formation. Grassland or savanna vegetation probably existed over the area and aided in sediment trapping. Vertebrates are unusual in eolian units, but the adaptations and mode of preservation of those in the upper Couch Formation also support an eolian interpretation. This and other widespread silty sand sheets in the Ogallala indicate major fluctuations in depositional style, possibly climatically controlled. Lateral continuity and preservation of vertebrates give silty sand sheets great potential as correlation tools.


Shale gas reservoir is characterized by complex lithology with ultra-low porosity and permeability, which brings many challenges in the formation evaluation. Elemental Capture Spectroscopy Sonde (ECS) can be used to measure the elements and get the formation of the mineralogy. LithoScanner is a newly-generated spectroscopy tool, which can be used to measure both inelastic and capture spectra, providing estimation of more elements, including silicon, calcium, iron, sulfur, titanium, gadolinium, aluminum, potassium, sodium, magnesium, manganese, carbon, etc. LithoScanner can be directly used to measure the total organic carbon content (TOC) in the formation, and provide solutions to the lithology classification and heterogeneous rock analysis (HRA). The changing lithology and borehole rugosity have little influence on the direct measurement of TOC by LithoScanner. LithoScanner shows great advantage in accuracy when comparing with other methods using triple-combo. The systematic lithology classification method in shale gas reservoir using LithoScanner is correlatable in multi-wells. The brittleness index from mineralogy can be applied to hydraulic stimulation. HRA results offered guides in both the coring sample selection and the experiment. The advantages of LithoScanner in shale gas formation evaluation were presented in this paper, and the workflow can also be applied to other reservoirs.


We show that information extracted from crowd-based testing can enhance automated mobile testing. We introduce Polariz, which generates replicable test scripts from crowd-based testing, extracting cross-app 'motif' events: automatically-inferred reusable higher-level event sequences composed of lower-level observed event actions. Our empirical study used 434 crowd workers from Mechanical Turk to perform 1,350 testing tasks on 9 popular Google Play apps, each with at least 1 million user installs. The findings reveal that the crowd was able to achieve 60.5% unique activity coverage and proved to be complementary to automated search-based testing in 5 out of the 9 subjects studied. Our leave-one-out evaluation demonstrates that coverage attainment can be improved (6 out of 9 cases, with no disimprovement on the remaining 3) by combining crowd-based and search-based testing.


We develop a computational framework to study the impact of burst assembly algorithms on the byte loss rate (ByLR) of an OBS network under bursty (ON-OFF) IP traffic input. First we propose a computational method to analyze the characteristics of assembled bursts in terms of burst length and/or burst assembly time distribution under timer-based, burst-threshold-based, and dual-threshold-based burst assemblers. The unique feature of our analytical model is that it can capture the effect of source burst duration (average ON time) on the statistical characteristics of the assembled bursts for all the aforesaid burst assemblers. We then derive the expressions for ByLR for these assembly schemes using the characteristics of assembled bursts as obtained above. This enables us to compare the performance of the burst assemblers under identical traffic scenarios and the impact of source burst duration on loss for each of the above assembly schemes. To our knowledge, such an analytical scheme is not yet available. Using the framework, we also illustrate the loss surfaces for each of the above assembly schemes against load-correlation axes. We also demonstrate how to obtain constant loss contours on the load-correlation plane of a parameterized burst assembler so that the result can be used to dynamically adapt the assembly parameters. The results show that the ByLR increases with an increase in the source burst duration for all the above-mentioned assemblers, but the rate of increase is the least in the case of the burst-threshold-based assembler. It is also observed that the ByLR for the timer-based assembler is the highest and that for the burst-threshold-based assembler is the lowest under identical traffic and latency scenarios.


We have previously isolated a cDNA clone for a gene whose expression is reduced by retinoic acid (RA) treatment of F9 embryonal carcinoma cells. The nucleotide sequence indicated that this gene, Rex-1, encodes a zinc-finger protein and thus may be a transcriptional regulator. The Rex-1 message level is high in two lines of embryonic stem cells (CCE and D3) and is reduced when D3 cells are induced to differentiate using four different growth conditions. As expected for a stem-cell-specific message, Rex-1 mRNA is present in the inner cell mass (ICM) of the day 4.5 mouse blastocyst. It is also present in the polar trophoblast of the blastocyst. One and two days later, Rex-1 message is found in the ectoplacental cone and extraembryonic ectoderm of the egg cylinder (trophoblast-derived tissues), but its abundance is much reduced in the embryonic ectoderm which is directly descended from the ICM. Rex-1 is expressed in the day 18 placenta (murine gestation is 18 days), a tissue which is largely derived from trophoblast. The only tested adult tissue that contains detectable amounts of Rex-1 mRNA is the testis. In situ hybridization and northern analyses of RNA from germ-cell-deficient mouse testis and stage-specific germ cell preparations suggest that Rex-1 expression is limited to spermatocytes (germ cells undergoing meiosis). These results suggest that Rex-1 is involved in trophoblast development and spermatogenesis, and is a useful marker for studies of early cell fate determination in the ICM.


We describe a simple and fast algorithm for optimizing Markov random fields over images. The algorithm performs block coordinate descent by optimally updating a horizontal or vertical line in each step. While the algorithm is not as accurate as state-of-the-art MRF solvers on traditional benchmark problems, it is trivially parallelizable and produces competitive results in a fraction of a second. As an application, we develop an approach to increasing the accuracy of consumer depth cameras. The presented algorithm enables high-resolution MRF optimization at multiple frames per second and substantially increases the accuracy of the produced range images.


Semiotics and the concept of signs can be used to analyse the signs that can be found in a Swedish primary school in order to understand and expand our understanding of the role of signifiers, including cultural ones, in child education. The study identifies what signs can be found, what purpose they have and what category of sign they belong to, whether they are signs as defined by Saussure, how they might be categorized within Peirce's triadic typology and, applying Barthes' notion of cultural signification, the extent to which they contribute to maintaining and promoting a school's identity and values. In order to analyse the signs, a Swedish public primary school located in Halmstad was visited and the visible signs were photographed and catalogued. In order to confirm the intentions behind the design and meaning of signs, an interview with a senior teacher was arranged. The result, and signs, that were documented and described; these included drawings, emergency escape signs, posters, diplomas and other instructions with picture or sign language representations. The signs were categorized and analysed using semiotic theories of signs suggested by Saussure, Peirce and Barthes. The study facilitates a clearer understanding of the range of functions of signs in schools, both for practical purposes and as signifiers of culture and identity, and also highlights the possible applications and limitations of using semiotic theories in investigating generated meanings in physical locations.


Automated Case Management Systems are still at an early stage of adoption in many developing countries. These are frequently standalone systems implemented with donor financing, and they often fail due to capacity constraints or as a consequence of short-term, project-based funding. But there are examples of developing countries overcoming these pitfalls and producing innovative solutions that surpass government practices in more developed countries. The Integrated Electronic Case Management System (IECMS), developed and implemented by the Ministry of Justice of Rwanda from 2015-2016, is one such innovation. This system has progressed rapidly in its level of adoption and integration between law enforcement, the prosecutor's office, courts, and corrections. This paper will discuss the key system functionalities and the implementation methodology, including both the benefits and shortcomings of this approach, with the goal of applying lessons learned in future installations. Foremost among the successes of this project were the integrated Sector Wide Approach, the thorough business process re-engineering, and strong ownership by the Rwandan Justice Sector staff. Particularly instructive will be the analysis of the integrated approach, covering five institutions with a single system in less than two years. However, the particular success in this case may not be replicable for governments with a more decentralized approach.


Stephen Jay Gould (1941–2002) was a Harvard-based American palaeontologist ('paleobiologist') and popular science writer who was known for his theory of 'punctuated equilibrium', evolution by jumps, as well as his fights against creationism and human sociobiology. He saw evolutionary theory as hierarchical and believed that at the top levels there was a process he called 'species selection', something that palaeontologists uniquely are able to discern and understand. Although his work was much appreciated by the general public, he could irritate his fellow scientists. No one, however, denied the deep moral passions that drove his thinking and writing.

Keywords:

Darwinism;
evolution;
paleobiology;
popular science;
punctuated equilibrium;
spandrel;
adaptationism;
progress;
sociobiology;
Burgess Shale;
Magisterium;
baseball;
hierarchy;
species selection


Background: Bacterial biofilms play an important role in urinary tract infections and is responsible for persistence infections and also the higher antimicrobial resistance is seen in biofilm forming uropathogen as compared to free floating bacteria. So the present study was undertaken with the aim to know the prevalence of biofilm formation and antimicrobial resistant pattern of biofilm producer and non-biofilm producing uropathogens. Materials & Methods: A total of 146 Gram negative bacilli and 62 S. aureus isolated from patients suspected UTIs were tested for biofilm formation and antimicrobial susceptibility testing by Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion method on Mueller Hinton agar as per CLSI guidelines. Result: Out of 208 isolates from urine, Biofilm formation was noted in 122(58.66%) and no biofilm formation in 86(41.35%).[Strong Biofilm formation in 76(36.54%) and weak biofilm formation in 46(22.12%)iA'A'.In our study, we noted biofilm and non-biofilm forming microorganism showed mark difference in antimicrobial resistance pattern. In Staphylococcus aureus striking difference was noted to ciprofloxacin (100% versus 33.33%) and azithromycin (96%versus 41.67%). Isolates showed no resistance to linezolid. Whereas isolates of Pseudomonas aeruginosa to netilin (100% versus 42.86%).And in other Gram negative bacilli difference was noted to gentamicin (87.93% versus 13.43%) and norfloxacin (84.48% versus 37.31%) Conclusion: Biofilm forming isolates showed higher antimicrobial resistance as compared to non-biofilm producer. Thus, Uropathogen should be routinely screened for biofilm formation.


The short coherence lengths characteristic of low-dimensional superconductors are associated with usefully high critical fields or temperatures. Unfortunately, such materials are often sensitive to disorder and suffer from phase fluctuations in the superconducting order parameter which diverge with temperature T, magnetic field H, or current I. We propose an approach to overcome synthesis and fluctuation problems: building superconductors from inhomogeneous composites of nanofilaments. Macroscopic crystals of quasi-one-dimensional Na2-δMo6Se6 featuring Na vacancy disorder (δ ≈ 0.2) are shown to behave as percolative networks of superconducting nanowires. Long-range order is established via transverse coupling between individual one-dimensional filaments, yet phase coherence remains unstable to fluctuations and localization in the zero (T,H,I) limit. However, a region of reentrant phase coherence develops upon raising (T,H,I). We attribute this phenomenon to an enhancement of the transverse coupling due to electron delocalization. Our observations of reentrant phase coherence coincide with a peak in the Josephson energy EJ at nonzero (T,H,I), which we estimate using a simple analytical model for a disordered anisotropic superconductor. Na2-δMo6Se6 is therefore a blueprint for a future generation of nanofilamentary superconductors with inbuilt resilience to phase fluctuations at elevated (T,H,I).


type="main"> Although previous literature has found substantial differences between female and male workers in almost all labor market outcomes, the question of whether training participation differs between female and male part-time workers has been neglected. This article provides a novel examination of whether the part-time training gap is gender-dependent. Using a Swiss dataset, we find that men engaged in part-time employment suffer from a serious training disadvantage in comparison to men working full-time and that this effect is not found for women. Thus, in countries where part-time participation levels differ significantly between men and women, part-time employment is a "bane" to men but not to women. Women, however, "pay the price" merely by virtue of being female.


Our project is a stabilization effort on the GNU libc thread library NPTL—Native POSIX Threading Library. To achieve this, we focused our work on extending the pool of open-source tests and on providing a tool for tracing the internal mechanisms of the library. This paper introduces our work with a short status on test coverage of NPTL at the beginning of the project (February 2004). It explains how we built the prioritized list of NPTL routines to be tested. It then describes our methodology for designing tests in the following areas: conformance to POSIX standard, scalability, and stress. It also explains how we have simplified the use of the tests and the analysis of the results. Finally, it provides figures about our results, and it shows how NPTL has evolved during year 2004. The paper goes on to explain how this NPTL Trace Tool can help NPTL users, and hackers, to understand and fix problems. It describes the features of the tool and presents our chosen architecture. Finally, it shows the current status of the project and the possible future extensions.


Most Ukrainian believers (about two-thirds) are Orthodox. Another Ukrainian church of Byzantine tradition adheres to Orthodox rite but recognizes the supremacy of the Pope: the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, which operated underground until perestroika and is concentrated in Western Ukraine (about one-tenth of believers). There is also a fastgrowing number of Protestant and non-traditional religious communities throughout the country. Although Ukrainian Orthodoxy faces strong competition, its main challenge is its own internal divide. Part of Ukrainian Orthodoxy supports the creation of a united Ukrainian autocephalous (fully self-governing) church. At the same time, the major part of Ukrainian Orthodoxy is an autonomous part of the Russian Orthodox Church. Both the Russian government and Orthodox Church are trying to limit Ukrainian Orthodoxy's autonomy and use it as an instrument to involve Ukraine in the so-called Russkii mir (Russian World), a concept that both the Kremlin and the Moscow Patriarchate support.


The use of Pyroelectric array detectors in Infrared cameras in the 8 to 14 µm region necessitates a means for area-modulation, or chopping of the infrared scene, thus generating an element of change for measurement by the detector. Currently this is achieved by mechanically chopping the image using a rotating blade, with drawbacks of high electric motor power, blurring as camera motion changes the rotational speed, and the chopper blade largely determining the camera diameter. Adequate modulation using a novel method has been achieved in the 8 to 14 µm region by introducing moderate levels of excess carriers to suitably prepared Germanium. These were introduced via excitation from a diode laser source. The process described uses inter valence band trasitions from the light-hole to heavy-hole band, requiring power densitities in the order of Watts cm-2. Modulation of from 44% to 6% transmission at 10 µm using a power density of 28.6 W cm2 from an AlGaAs 809nm laser is easily achievable. The on state transmission will then be then increased to essentially 100% by using anti-reflection coatings. We will describe the relative importance of the bulk and surface properties; high bulk purity and low surface recombination velocities being required to make an effective device, although operation is possible with lower quality material. The most suitable material for the device is low carrier density n-Germanium. The modulator does not operate in the much-publicised intra-band transition region which involves generating a free carrier density greater than the critical density, typically requiring laser powers in the order of MW cm-2.


Against the methodological background of historical discourse analysis, this paper traces some of the relevant factors that influenced the development of news discourse from the seventeenth to the twenty first century. Inthe seventeenth century the occasional news publications that were published in response to important events were replaced by more regular news publications. The structure of articles was generally narrative and chronological. The familiar inverted pyramid structure emerged from the beginning of the twentieth century. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, mass media news discourse consists of an ever-increasing flood of information that is broken down into increasingly smaller snippets of information in the form ofhypertextual and multi-modal information units.


Our society is heavily and intrinsically dependent on energy transformation and usage. In a world scenario where resources are being depleted while their demand is increasing, it is crucial to optimize every process. During the last decade the concept of energy efficiency has become a leitmotif in several fields and has directly influenced our everyday life: from light bulbs to airplane turbines, there has been a general shift from pure performance to better efficiency. In this vein, we focus on the mobility and tractive efficiency of off-road vehicles. These vehicles are adopted in military, agriculture, construction, exploration, recreation, and mining applications and are intended to operate on soft, deformable terrain. The performance of off-road vehicles is deeply influenced by the tire-soil interaction mechanism. Soft soil can drastically reduce the traction performance of tires up to the point of making motion impossible. In this study, a tire model able to predict the performance of rigid wheels and flexible tires is developed. The model follows a semi-empirical approach for steady-state conditions and predicts basic features, such as the drawbar pull, the driving torque and the lateral force, as well as complex behaviors, such as the slip-sinkage phenomenon and the multi-pass effect. The tractive efficiency of different tire-soil configurations is simulated and discussed. To investigate the handling and the traction efficiency, the tire model is implemented into a four-wheel vehicle model. Several tire geometries, vehicle configurations (FWD, RWD, AWD), soil types, and terrain profiles are considered to evaluate the performance under different simulation scenarios. The simulation environment represents an effective tool to realistically analyze the impact of tire parameters (size, inflation pressure) and torque distribution on the energy efficiency. It is verified that larger tires and decreased inflation pressure generally provide better traction and energy efficiency (under steady-state working conditions). The torque distribution strategy between the axles deeply affects the traction and the efficiency: the two variables can't clearly be maximized at the same time and a trade-off has to be found.


Investigations into the role of strontium (Sr) in caries prevention have attracted great interest in the research community in the past, with their peak in the 1970–80s. To this date, no clear indication of the relative importance of Sr in caries prevention has been provided. A vast number of animal caries, epidemiological and mechanistic studies have been conducted. Although there is much discrepancy, the majority of studies suggest that Sr exhibits some cariostatic properties, predominantly in the presence of fluoride. An optimum Sr concentration of 5–10 ppm in drinking water has been proposed as a direct result of several epidemiological caries studies. Despite these results, no direct link can be established between Sr and caries prevention as, to date, no relevant, randomized controlled trials have been reported. The extrapolation of potential cariostatic properties of Sr from epidemiological studies is difficult due to the co-presence of several other trace elements in the water of the study areas, with many of these elements being attributed cariostatic properties in their own right. Furthermore, the role of caries risk factors was not taken into consideration. There is a clear need for further research, especially on the mineral phases in the dental hard tissues, plaque and plaque fluid associated with Sr as these may give rise to a better understanding of this subject matter. Based on the current data, the cariostatic properties of Sr, or at least those proposed by some authors, cannot be supported.


Offers Agamben's genealogy of power in terms of political, philosophical and legal thought. This book investigates the genealogy of the strife between the Polis and its population with particular regard to the Greek concept of stasis and the strife with the commonwealth of Hobbes' Leviathan. It re opens the questioning of the answers offered from the pre history of the power of the State all the way to the time after the end of its power and towards the renewed questioning of the state of power today. This is an interdisciplinary exploration of the relations that form historically and theoretically between law and philosophy. It is a unique simultaneous investigation into the laws of philosophy and the philosophies of law. It focusses on the creativity of the legal and philosophical imagination in the face of the present social situation. It explores legal and philosophical concepts and modalities in relation to the formation and intersection of institutional traditions, histories and ideas.


For multiple-relay cooperative networks with multiple antennas deployed at source and destination nodes, we investigate the outage performance of selection based semi-blind amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying, where transmit beamforming (TB) is conducted at source transmission and maximum ratio combining (MRC) at destination reception. Based on the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, we analyze the impact of the configuration of destination antennas on the outage performance under arbitrary Nakagami-m fading channels. Results reveal that increasing the number of destination antennas is not necessary for an improvement of outage performance with any Nakagami-m parameter. Inspired by this fact, an approximation is proposed for the optimal selection. Simulation results show that the approximation is an efficient selection method.


A method was developed for in-orbit measurement of the relative pointing of spectrometer channels, and the relationship between the spectrometer channels and the spacecraft coordinate system. In this innovation, individual scans of the Moon, from the three channels, were used to determine the position of the center of the Moon, with respect to channel-specific coordinates. Comparing the coordinates of the center of the Moon, obtained from individual channels, yields the relative pointing between the channels. Comparing the coordinates of the center of the Moon in one of the channels with the Moon ephemerides and with the spacecraft coordinate measurement, using the onboard star tracker, yields the relative orientation of the channel optical axes with respect to the spacecraft coordinates.


Abstract. Theory and numerical implementation describing groundwater flow and the transport of heat and solute mass in fully saturated fractured rocks with elasto-plastic mechanical feedbacks are developed. In our formulation, fractures are considered as being of lower dimension than the hosting deformable porous rock and we consider their hydraulic and mechanical apertures as scaling parameters to ensure continuous exchange of fluid mass and energy within the fracture–solid matrix system. The coupled system of equations is implemented in a new simulator code that makes use of a Galerkin finite-element technique. The code builds on a flexible, object-oriented numerical framework (MOOSE, Multiphysics Object Oriented Simulation Environment) which provides an extensive scalable parallel and implicit coupling to solve for the multiphysics problem. The governing equations of groundwater flow, heat and mass transport, and rock deformation are solved in a weak sense (either by classical Newton–Raphson or by free Jacobian inexact Newton–Krylow schemes) on an underlying unstructured mesh. Nonlinear feedbacks among the active processes are enforced by considering evolving fluid and rock properties depending on the thermo-hydro-mechanical state of the system and the local structure, i.e. degree of connectivity, of the fracture system. A suite of applications is presented to illustrate the flexibility and capability of the new simulator to address problems of increasing complexity and occurring at different spatial (from centimetres to tens of kilometres) and temporal scales (from minutes to hundreds of years).


This is a draft of the introduction to a forthcoming monograph on moral psychology in a Nietzschean vein. "Moral psychology" here encompasses issues in metaethics, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of action, including questions concerning the objectivity of morality, the relationship between moral judgment and emotion, the nature of the emotions, free will and moral responsibility, and the structure of the mind as that is relevant to the possibility of moral action and judgment.
While the book has exegetical aims, it is not an exercise in the "history of ideas." I argue that Nietzsche is often right. Among Nietzsche's views that seem to me plausible and are defended in this volume are: his anti-realism about value, his sentimentalism, his skepticism about consciousness and rational agency, his fatalism, and his skepticism about the post-hoc rationalizations of moral philosophers. For reasons that will become clear, I do not take a position on whether Nietzsche is right that morality is dangerous to the most valuable kinds of human flourishing—though I do believe we should be worried by his challenge, as I am.
The aim of this volume, in short, is to articulate and defend Nietzschean moral psychology. Because of this double aim I often move from exposition to philosophical argument independent of the exposition. I thus hope the volume will be of interest to philosophers interested in the philosophical issues, even if not especially interested in Nietzsche.


The extrusive section on the northern flank of the Troodos ophiolite is 1,000 to 1,500 m thick and consists of about 12 lithologic units of pillowed and massive lava and breccia. Some pillowed units, which average 100 to 200 m in thickness, vary systematically from lava tubes up to 6 m in diameter at the base, through common pillows less than 1 m in diameter, to small pillows and extrusive breccias at the top. These assemblages appear to be individual volcanoes, suggesting episodic volcanic accretion. The upper 100 to 200 m of the section is pervasively altered and oxidized, but fresh volcanic glass is preserved throughout most of the extrusive section. The lavas are subdivided on geochemical evidence into a lower, differentiated andesite to dacitic andesite series resembling evolved island-arc tholeiites and an upper series of picrite, mafic basalt, and basaltic andesite very low in TiO2, K2O, P2O5, Nb, Rb, and Ba. The highly depleted basalt and basaltic andesite resemble lavas from ocean crust near island arcs. Lateral continuity of lithologic units interpreted as individual volcanoes and the relatively constant dips of the extrusive rocks suggest that tilting and rotation have not played major roles in the accretion process. The occurrence of fractionated lavas at the base and primitive lavas at the top suggests a broad zone of accretion, located above a subduction zone.


This study was conducted for the evaluation of hypertonic saline solution in haemorrhagic septicaemia (HS) in buffaloes, calf scour in buffalo calves and other clinical conditions of livestock characterized by hypovolaemia and/or endotoxaemia including spontaneous cases of calf scour, dehydrated diarrhoeic goats and buffaloes. For this purpose, 50buffaloes were selected from the field suffering from HS. The disease was diagnosed on the basis of clinical signs. Then theses animals were randomly divided into two equal groups (A and B).Buffaloes of group A were treated with the conventional treatment already in vogue i.e. ceftiofur HCl and flunixin meglumine @ 6 mg/kg and 2 mg/kg BW, IM and IV, respectively. Group B was treated with intravenous infusion of hypertonic saline solution (HSS) @ 4 mL/kg BW followed by isotonic saline solution @ 10 mL/kg BW along with ceftiofur HCl and flunixin meglumine. For evaluation of HSS in calf scour, neonatal diarrhoea in buffalo calves (n=24) was induced through oral administration of 2 mL broth culture of having eneteropathogenic E. coli count of 1010 CFU. To evaluate the efficacy of HSS in clinical conditions of livestock,spontaneous cases of calf scour (n=24), dehydrated diarrhoeic goats (n=24) and buffaloes (n=24) were studied. In all these conditions, the animals were randomly divided into two equal groups viz. A and B (n=12 each). Group A was treated with isotonic (90 mL/kg BW) and group B with hypertonic (4 mL/kg BW) saline solutions along with ceftiofur HCl and flunixin meglumine (6 and 2 mg/kg BW, respectively). The efficacy of treatment was evaluated on the basis of clinical parameters, haematological analysis, haemodynamic parameters, blood gas analysis, serum electrolytes and serum biochemical profiles. These all evaluation parameters were recorded at baseline (during disease), t=1, t=3, t=6, t=12, t=24 and t=36 hours after treatment. However, for induced calf scour, the additional recording time point was before induction of diarrhoea which acted as baseline; other recording time points being the same as for other conditions studied.Hypertonic saline infusion to the buffaloes of group B suffering from HS showed significantly higher survival rate of 80% and differed significantly (P < 0.05) from group A in which survival rate was 52%. Group B significantly (P < 0.05) improved heart rate,mean arterial pressure,central venous pressure,haematocrit and haemoglobin concentration,partial pressure of arterial oxygen, blood pH and total serum protein. Hypertonic infusion increased serum sodium and chloride ions concentration but the changes were not of sufficient magnitude to be of risk to the buffaloes. Hypertonic saline solution (group B) resuscitated buffalo calves from neonatal diarrhoea (either induced or spontaneous) more rapidly and effectively than isotonic saline solution (group A) and showed significant (P < 0.05) improvement in all the parameters studied. The resuscitation of diarrhoeic dehydrated goats (n=24) and buffaloes (n=24) through administering hypertonic saline solution was evaluated. Both treatment protocols helped in recovering the normal values of all the parameters studied within experimental period. But hypertonic saline solution showed significant differences (P < 0.05) over group A in heart rate,mean arterial pressure, central venous pressure, partial pressure of arterial oxygen, blood pH and bicarbonates in diarrhoeic goats. In diarrhoeic buffaloes, HSS infusion only showed significant difference (P < 0.05) over group A in partial pressure of venous oxygen, while other parameters were recovered to normal without any statistical difference. On the basis of findings of this study, it was concluded that hypertonic saline solution can be safely administered to the buffaloes suffering from haemorrhagic septicaemia and buffalo calves with neonatal diarrhoea.It offset deleterious haemodynamic effects of endotoxins, thus ameliorates the septic shock more effectively than does antibiotic therapy alone in HS. In addition to rapid and effective, intravenous administration of a small volume of HSS provides a practical and economical method to resuscitate dehydrated calves with neonatal diarrhoea, diarrhoeic goats and buffaloes,thus make it suitable for field use.


ABSTRACT Labeling a person by their past behavior or a criminal conviction is commonplace throughout forensic and correctional psychology. Labels including 'offender' and 'sex offender' infiltrate academic writing and conference presentations, names of professional organizations and treatment programmes and, at times, traverse therapeutic work. That such labels are frequently used and rarely advocated against suggests that helping professionals either (i) don't recognize labeling as an ethical issue, or (ii) don't consider it their role to challenge. The current paper aims to encourage critical reflection on the use of labels in forensic and correctional psychology. Key concerns are illustrated through a focus on labels commonly assigned to individuals who have sexually abused, where labeling is especially prolific. The scope of labeling is reviewed, and implications for rehabilitation and reintegration discussed. Next, an analysis of the ethics of labeling individuals on the basis of criminal convictions, past behavior or psychological phenomena is presented. It is argued that the use of such labels contradict core ethical principles including beneficence and nonmaleficence, respect for the dignity of all persons, and responsibilities to society. A de-labelling movement for forensic/correctional psychology and related fields is proposed.


The study attempted to understand the condition of the insulation system and to classify the data according to its condition. Data mining processes were used to gain insight into the data and the condition of the insulation system. The different stages of data mining are explained. An analysis was done using self-organizing maps, which is an unsupervised neural network technique. Hierarchical and K-mean clustering techniques were used to classify the data. The results of the different techniques were compared to an expert's assessment. A comparison was done between the different techniques used. The patterns in the different features of the data due to ageing were observed. The data was qualitatively assessed and classified into groups according to the deterioration of the insulation system using the classification techniques. Finally the results correlated well with the expert's assessment.


Can African countries learn from the development experiences of other regions? Or are the continent's development challenges unique? This paper looks at the development experience of the Nordic countries, especially Sweden, from the nineteenth century and discusses the extent to which the observed patterns of development could have relevance for Africa. The paper argues that poverty is not immutable. Nordic countries were for centuries a poor agrarian outpost at the European periphery and yet via the development of institutions, establishment of a culture of political inclusion and social compassion have managed to raise the welfare of their population to among the highest in the world. The paper also argues that the ability to develop internal capacities for administration as well as institutional flexibility have been crucial for Nordic prosperity.


We have studied a sample of 296 faint (>0.5 mJy) radio sources selected from an area of the Tenth Cambridge (10C) survey at 15.7 GHz in the Lockman Hole. By matching this catalogue to several lower frequency surveys (e. g. including a deep GMRT survey at 610 MHz, a WSRT survey at 1.4 GHz, NVSS, FIRST and WENSS) we have investigated the radio spectral properties of the sources in this sample; all but 30 of the 10C sources are matched to one or more of these surveys. We have found a significant increase in the proportion of flat-spectrum sources at flux densities below approximate to 1 mJy - the median spectral index between 15.7 GHz and 610 MHz changes from 0.75 for flux densities greater than 1.5 mJy to 0.08 for flux densities less than 0.8 mJy. This suggests that a population of faint, flat-spectrum sources are emerging at flux densities less than or similar to 1 mJy. The spectral index distribution of this sample of sources selected at 15.7 GHz is compared to those of two samples selected at 1.4 GHz from FIRST and NVSS. We find that there is a significant flat-spectrum population present in the 10C sample which is missing from the samples selected at 1.4 GHz. The 10C sample is compared to a sample of sources selected from the SKADS Simulated Sky by Wilman et al. and we find that this simulation fails to reproduce the observed spectral index distribution and significantly underpredicts the number of sources in the faintest flux density bin. It is likely that the observed faint, flat-spectrum sources are a result of the cores of Fanaroff-Riley type I sources becoming dominant at high frequencies. These results highlight the importance of studying this faint, high-frequency population.


The plantar area of the foot is known as very complicated in terms of muscle layers. The first layer's muscle, abductor digiti minimi and the third layer's muscle, flexor digiti minimi brevis are so familiar and located closer to eachother. According to anatomical aspect; abductor digiti minimi muscle lies on the flexor digitimi minimi brevis but in the case that we work on, flexor digiti minimi brevis muscle lies on the abductor digiti minimi. The reasons may followed as; the function of the lateral plantar side, genetic and environmental conditions as well.


This article introduces two theoretical concepts for the emerging field Knowledge Visualization and discusses a new visualization application that was used to communicate a long-term project to various stakeholders in an organization. First, we introduce a theoretical framework and a model for Knowledge Visualization. The framework and the model identify and relate the key-aspects for successful Knowledge Visualization applications. Next, we present an evaluation of an implemented Knowledge Visualization application: The Tube Map Visualization. A quality development process had to be established in an education centre for health care professions. Traditional project plans, flyers, and mails did not manage to get the attention, did present overview and detail insufficiently, and did not motivate the employees for actions. Because Visual Metaphors are effective for Knowledge Communication we developed a customized Knowledge Map based on the tube system metaphor. The Tube Map Visualization illustrates the whole project, where each tube line represents a target group and each station a milestone. The visualization was printed as a poster and displayed at prominent locations in the organization. The findings of an evaluation indicate that the Tube Map Visualization is a powerful metaphor to communicate a complex project to different target groups and to build up a mutual story. The employees considered it useful because it provides overview and detailed information in one image and because it initiates discussion. The Tube Map Visualization is therefore helpful to complement traditional project plans of (1) long-term projects where (2) different stakeholders are involved. The theoretical framework, the model, and the findings have implications for researchers in the fields of Knowledge Management, Knowledge Visualization, Information Visualization, and Communication Sciences.


Campylobacter jejuni is the most common foodborne pathogen in industrialized countries. Most human infections come from contaminated poultry, but wild birds are also known to harbor C. jejuni. Wild birds are often described as asymptomatic carriers, but this assumption is based on domestic poultry research. We studied the effects of C. jejuni infection on body condition and survival of adult and nestling American crows Corvus brachyrhynchos in Davis, California. Previous work demonstrated that more than half of the crows in this population are infected with C. jejuni and that at least some of the isolates carried by crows are similar to those found in domestic animals and humans. In this study, we compared the body condition of infected and uninfected individuals at the time of capture among adults (n = 44; 52% infected) and nestlings (n = 97; 77% infected). We subsequently monitored these banded individuals for up to 3 yr and used mark–recapture survival analysis to estimate relationships between infection status and later survival. We found that adult crows infected with C. jejuni were in poor condition relative to uninfected adults: average body mass of infected birds was 12% lower, whereas average body size did not differ between the two groups. Likewise, apparent survival probability was lower for infected adults. In contrast, nestling body condition, fledging success, and survival did not differ by infection status. This is the first study to document adverse effects of C. jejuni infection in a free-living, wild bird. If these effects are widespread, C. jejuni exposure may be a cause of conservation concern for some species, especially when human activities increase exposure to infections or introduce novel strains to wild bird populations. Our results add to the growing body of work demonstrating hidden long-term costs of seemingly mild infections in wild populations.


This dissertation is about health-related sense of humor measurement and associations between a sense of humor and health. Two sense of humor measures were developed, the QOHC and the HCL. The QOHC measures four humorous coping styles, aimed at acquiring positive affective states: antecedent-focused (AFHC), response-focused (RFHC), affiliative and aggressive-manipulative. AFHC is defined as the preventive use of humor to decrease negative affect, whereas RFHC is aimed at the reduction of negative affect already present. AFHC is expected to be more favorable to health than RFHC. Although the QOHC showed good validity and adequate divergent validity, the differences between positive and negative forms of humorous coping was not clear-cut. In an additional study, the QOHC and six other currently available humorous coping questionnaires were compared with regard to their fit with a stress-coping model. A mapping sentence was formed, which included external demands, humorous coping responses and coping aims. Five raters judged 81 humorous coping items from the questionnaires, using this "mapping sentence" as a template. External demands and humorous responses were sometimes underrepresented, whereas the coping aims facet was covered by only a few of them. Raters had difficulty to distinguish between antecedent-focused and response-focused humorous coping aims. Also, the 24-item HCL was developed and validated. Its intention is to measure six types of humorous behaviors validly and consistently: humor appreciation, positive humorous coping, mirth, positive humor climate at work, negative humor production and humor reproduction. Internal consistency and validity varied depending on the time window of the HCL used. Two studies were then conducted to test the associations of the new instruments with health. In the first study an occupational health model predicting the frequency of upper respiratory tract infections (URTI) by job demands, job resources (including humorous coping styles) and job-related affect was tested. Most humorous coping styles were unrelated to URTI frequency, except for response-focused humorous coping, which was positively related to it. Response-focused humorous coping was also positively related to negative job-related affect, which was positively associated with URTI frequency. The model including antecedent-focused humorous coping showed that this style was positively associated with positive job-related affect and negatively related to negative job-related affect. However, job control and negative job-related affect were more powerful predictors of URTI frequency than humorous coping styles. In the second study burnout was considered to influence humorous behaviors in a negative way, compared to healthy subjects. Also, burnout subjects were supposed to differ with regard to their humor styles. Burnout and healthy subjects were compared with regard to humorous traits (generic humorous coping and humor styles) and humorous behaviors during the past two weeks. The burnout group had lower generic humorous coping and lower positive humor styles than the control group, whereas no differences with respect to negative humor styles were found. The burnout group reported lower mirth, humor appreciation and humor reproduction than the control group, but the groups showed no differences with regard to more active humor use like negative humor production and positive humorous coping.


Pierre Parlebas is a French professor in sport sociology, mathematician, psychologist, but above everything, a physical education (PE) teacher. He pursues the study of society from the structures of the games. He proposes the Motor Praxiology in order to study the motor action, which is oriented by a logic of a specific situation. As a good scientist he started looking for objective measurable variables, elements that could lead to the understanding of the e↵ects of the internal logic of the situations. Parlebas understands the PE as the education of the motor conduct which is created by a motor action and its meaning. According to him, the situations of the sporting games orient the motor conduct of the players, and consequently, their motor action. The curiosity as a PE teacher to understand sporting games, due to their power to orientate the motor conducts, pushed him to build mathematical models of ludomotor games, that is, models of the objective structures of the internal logic of games which took the name of universals. A model is a simplified representation of a given reality which is generally designed to study, explain or predict phenomena. Universals were models proposed by Pierre Parlebas, maybe, the specific knowledge that PE teachers need in order to carry out their job: educate the motor conduct. As a future PE teacher,I also feel the same curiosity as Parlebas did. If I want to be a good PE teacher, should not I understand the logic of the situations of the games?. Knowing that the motor action represents the common denominator of all the physical practises and confers its own identity to the PE, I consider necessary to know all the possibilities, e↵ects and functioning of the sporting games. In this project we are going to continue with the modelling activity suggested by Parlebas but using modern computational resources, in other words, we are going to make advanced modelling of the ludomotor games. For that, we are going to analyse a game called 4 corners, a game easy to model and already modelled by Parlebas in 1973. Our proposal covers two main elements: 1) the study of the mathematical analysis of the 4 corners game and its integration. 2) a new approach for the observation and utilization of computational tools to do that analysis.


Devastated by the civil wars of the 17th century or by the neglect of their owners, the majority of Scottish baronial castles built between 1250 and 1450 survive as little more than skeletal ruins. These reminders of Scotland's past have captured the imaginations of romantics, artists, writers and tourists since the late 18th century. Often set in spectacular surroundings, on cliff-tops, islands, and gorges, their ruined grandeur evokes a medieval world of sieges, banquets and murders, and provides a rare physical link with the Anglo-Scottish wars of Robert the Bruce and William Wallace.


Parameter Identification (PI) algorithm is an optimization procedure that systematically searches the parameters embedded in a mathematical model. These parameters are not measurable from a physical point of view. The optimization is based on the minimization of a selected norm of the differences between the solution of the mathematical model and scattered observations collected from the system. Parameter identification (or inverse problem) has been studied in groundwater systems extensively for the past decade (15), and it has also drawn many researchers in the fields of open-channel flow and estuarine modeling since 1972 (1,2,9,17). All the past estuarine PI works in the literature are confined to the one-dimensional case, and hydrodynamics and transport equations are treated separately. This study deals with PI in a two-dimensional vertically-averaged estuarine salinity model. The salinity transport equation is coupled with the hydrodynamics equations. The coupled relationship introduces extra density terms in the hydrodynamics equations, which must be solved simultaneously with the transport equation. One of the most difficult problems in PI is the collection of needed observations from the system which is being modeled. With limited exception, the currently available data from the prototype estuaries are not adequate for the purposes of developing a PI algorithm. This is usually critical in quantity (the number of stations and/or the period of time) and in quality (noise of data). However, if an operational hydraulic model is available, the data could then be obtained economically and accurately under an ideally controlled environment. The large amount of data that can be collected from a hydraulic model of an estuary will provide a sufficient number of observations and the required initial and boundary conditions for the development of a PI algorithm. The use of the estuary hydraulic model could provide a better source of prototype data than would be available from the real estuary. It will be much easier to distinguish between the inadequacy of the mathematics and the inadequacy of our understanding of the prototype. Thus, it will give us an idea of how well we could expect to mathematically model the real estuary if we had an unlimited amount of prototype data. Additionally, when these types of data are used in PI, parameters can be optimally identified and the mathematical model can then be used conjunctively with the hydraulic model for prototype applications, provided that the mathematical model is consistently formulated. How well a hydraulic model simulates the prototype estuary is not considered in this study.


The Semliki Forest virus (SFV) expression system utilises the efficient replication of SFV to transiently express foreign proteins in eukaryotic cells. In the basic version, cells are infected with a recombinant SFV where the part of the viral ribonucleic acid (RNA) genome that encodes the virus structural proteins is replaced by a gene of interest (transgene). On infection the viral genome is amplified and efficiently translated in the host cell cytoplasm, resulting in high-level expression of the transgene. Recombinant virus is produced by co-transfection of recombinant viral genomes and a helper genome that provides the virus structural proteins. Alternatively, infection is initiated by transfection with viral RNA genomes produced in vitro. Further developments, aiming for vaccine and therapeutic applications, include a deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) vector where the recombinant SFV genome is placed under a cytomegalovirus promoter. This allows transgene expression without involving the structural virus proteins, and avoids RNA work in vitro.

Key Concepts:

A polylinker is a short DNA sequence containing multiple unique restriction sites.

A packaging signal is a motif in the viral genome that specifically interacts with the capsid forming protein of the virus. This will ensure efficient genome incorporation.

Replicon RNA is self-replicating RNA that directs efficient production of protein.

Recombinant SFV is a suicide virus that infect cells and delivers replicon RNA but cannot produce new virions.

An autoprotease is a single use enzyme that is synthesised as part of a polyprotein and will release itself from the growing polypeptide chain.

Keywords:

alphavirus;
protein production;
mammalian cells;
virus-like particle;
vector RNA;
replicon


At the heart of modern Japan there remains an intractable and divisive social problem with its roots in pre-history, namely the ongoing social discrimination against the D?wa communities, otherwise known as Buraku. Their marginalization and isolation within society as a whole remains a veiled yet contested issue. Buraku studies, once largely ignored within Japan's academia and by scholarly publishers, have developed considerably in the first decades of the twenty-first century, as the extensive bibliographies of both Japanese and English sources provided here clearly demonstrates. The authors of the present study published in Japanese in 2016 and translated here by the Oxford scholar Ian Neary, have been able to incorporate this most recent data. Because of its importance as the first Buraku history based on this new research, a wider readership was always the authors' principal focus. Yet, it also provides a valuable source book for further study by those wishing to develop their knowledge about the subject from an informed base. This history of the Buraku communities and their antecedents is the first such study to be published in English.


We provide the most detailed sedimentological log to date through the Phyllopod Bed of the mid-Cambrian Burgess Shale Formation of British Columbia, based on millimetre-scale logging of a suite of thin sections. The sedimentary facies is dominated by alternations of homogeneous mudstone and a coarser-grained, laminated, variably sandy and shelly mudstone that is locally micronodular. Most boundaries between these two lithologies are gradational, and discrete fining-upwards turbidite units were rarely recognized. Such a pattern is interpreted to indicate rapid sedimentation of up to decimetre-thick units at this location from pulsatory, quasi-continuous density currents consistent with earlier proposals of exceptional preservation through rapid burial; the density currents responsible were probably largely akin to mud-rich slurries, helping explain the transport and entombment of the fossils. The homogeneous mudstone units are characterized by numerous distinctive lenses of pyrite framboids or subeuhedral crystals, previously interpreted as small ripples. Their 3D shape, however, suggests an origin as subspherical early diagenetic aggregates; their present morphology is consistent with the high levels of compaction inferred from the preservation of fossils.


We consider theoretically the use of a room-temperature silicon quantum dot based device for electrometer applications. The low power device includes two split gates that quantize the electronic energy levels in the emitter and collector regions. The base consists of a silicon quantum dot buried in silicon dioxide. The small size of the dot and quantization of the states in the leads combined to allow the device to operate at room temperature. The nonlinear current-voltage characteristics can be significantly altered by small changes to the potential of the split gates. Power dissipation in the device therefore changes with the split gate voltage, and this can be exploited in electrometer applications. A simple model of the power dissipated when the device is part of a microwave resonant inductor-resistor-capacitor tank circuit suggests that large changes in device power can be achieved by changing the gate voltage, thereby forming a measurable signal. We also demonstrate that the power dissipation in the device changes as the base width is varied, and that the current through the device increases exponentially with a decrease in base width.


Although egg color is generally consistent within individual birds and robust to environmental variation, recent evidence suggests a degree of susceptibility to environmental perturbation or modulation of egg color. Most of this variation manifests via the physiology of the laying female, but some direct impacts of the environment on laid eggs have also been discovered. Here we test whether light changes bird egg color and we quantify its effect, by subjecting variable blue-green eggs of Rüppell's weaver (Ploceus galbula) to a broad-spectrum light source under laboratory conditions, and measuring egg reflectance every few hours. Eggshells gradually decreased in reflectance across the entire measured wavelength spectrum of 250–800 nm. Reflectance peaks were disproportionately affected, such that the height decreased of both the blue-green peak and the smaller UV peak typical of blue-green eggs. The reflectance of lighter eggs was affected slightly more than that of darker eggs. These changes are similar to previous results for changes over long periods of time in darkness, suggesting that light might hasten the same process of pigment degradation that proceeds even without light. Comparison between the experimental light source and both sunlight and typical artificial lighting situations raises the possibility that significant color change might occur during incubation in some birds, but indicates that eggshell illumination in museums for short periods of study is unlikely to affect their color to a detectable extent. Additional research should be performed on eggs of other species and in other light environments, with an eye to an eventual generalized model of the effect of light on eggshell color.