To keep pace with recent advances in micro robotic structures demands actuator technologies which can deliver high power and precise motion. For electroactive material based actuators, high power typically implies either high field or high current drives which may lead to greater nonlinearities such as saturation, softening, and increased loss. Physical modeling of actuators is normally taken to be linear since the range of displacements, applied loads, and applied fields is typically small. If extrapolated to high drive conditions, these linear models significantly over predict the power which can be delivered. For actuators driving dynamic systems, a complete nonlinear model of the system will improve controllability and give more accurate estimations of power delivery capabilities. Here static nonlinearities and dynamic linear and nonlinear parameters are derived for high performance piezoelectric bending actuators.


In designing autonomous service systems such as assistive robots for the aged and the disabled, discovery and prediction of human actions are important and often crucial. Patterns of human behavior, however, involve ambiguity, uncertainty, complexity, and inconsistency caused by physical, logical, and emotional factors, and thus their modeling and recognition are known to be difficult. In this paper, a nonsupervised learning framework of human behavior patterns is suggested in consideration of human behavioral characteristics. Our approach consists of two steps. In the first step, a meaningful structure of data is discovered by using Agglomerative Iterative Bayesian Fuzzy Clustering (AIBFC) with a newly proposed cluster validity index. In the second step, the sequence of actions is learned on the basis of the structure discovered in the first step and by utilizing the proposed Fuzzy-state Q--learning (FSQL) process. These two learning steps are incorporated in an amalgamated framework, AIBFC-FSQL, which is capable of learning human behavior patterns in a nonsupervised manner and predicting subsequent human actions. Through a number of simulations with typical benchmark data sets, we show that the proposed learning method outperforms several well-known methods. We further conduct experiments with two challenging real-world databases to demonstrate its usefulness from a practical perspective.


In the middle of the 1990s many adolescents became vegetarians. There was concern among adults about whether these new young vegetarians got enough energy and nutrients from their dietary intake. The aim of this thesis was to investigate the prevalence of young vegetarians, the food and lifestyle habits, dietary intake and nutritional status of vegetarian and omnivorous adolescents. The prevalence of adolescents eating a vegetarian school lunch in 124 Swedish secondary schools was investigated by interviewing matrons. Information about prevalence of vegetarians, food and lifestyle habits, of 2041 15-year old students from Umea, Stockholm and Bergen, was obtained by a questionnaire. The dietary intake and nutritional status of thirty 16-20 year-old vegans were compared with thirty age, sex and height matched omnivores. Five percent of the adolescents (16-20 years) in Sweden were found to eat vegetarian food at school lunch. In Umea there was a significantly higher prevalence (15.6%) of 15-year-old vegetarians compared with Stockholm (4.8%) and Bergen (3.8%). It was also found that more females than males (15 years old) chose a vegetarian dietary regime. Even though the female vegetarians consumed vegetables significantly more often than the omnivores, the intake (32 times/month) was not as often as might be expected of a vegetarian population. The male vegetarians reported eating vegetables not even once a day (25 times/month). No difference in the consumption frequency of fruits/berries, alcoholic beverages, sweets/chocolates and fast foods was seen between vegetarians and omnivores. However, female vegetarians more often than female omnivores consumed dietary supplements. Furthermore, lifestyle characteristics of vegetarians were similar those of omnivores regarding exercise, use of alcohol and smoking habits. No significant difference in validity of reported energy expenditure or energy and protein intakes was found between vegans and omnivores. Young vegans (16-20 year-olds) were seen to have a higher calculated intake of vegetables, legumes, and dietary supplements and a lower intake of ice creams, cakes/cookies, and candies/chocolate than omnivores. The dietary intake was below the average requirements of riboflavin for 73% of the vegans, vitamin B12 for all vegans, vitamin D for 43% of the vegans, calcium for 77% of the vegans and selenium for all vegans and 43% of the omnivores. If intake of supplements was included the intake of e.g. calcium and selenium was still lower than the average requirements for 67% and 73% of the vegans respectively. Low iron stores were as prevalent among vegans as among omnivores (20% and 23% with low stores) and three vegans had low vitamin B12 concentrations in blood. The findings imply that food and lifestyle habits of young vegetarians are different than what previous studies of vegetarians have shown. There is a need for future research of the long-term health effects of being vegetarian.


Over the last few decades, the evidence on the adverse effects on the health of air pollution has been raised. Mortality is the most important health effect of ambient air pollution. We studied the relation between mortality and criteria pollutant air in Tehran, one of the highly industrialized, densely populated area and most polluted cities of the reign, during 2005-2014. For this purpose, we applied the approach proposed by the World Health Organization using the AirQ 2.2.3 model. Hourly concentrations of pollutants were taken from the Tehran environmental protection agency and Air Quality Control Company. In this model, the attributable proportion of health outcome, the annual number of excess cases of mortality for all causes were estimated. According to results, the number of total mortality caused by exposure to O3, NO2, SO2, PM10, PM2.5 in the past decade was 8042, 15141, 8136, 17776 and 20015 cases, respectively. The number of cumulative total mortality was 53110 cases in ten years. Furthermore, the number of cumulative cardiovascular and respiratory mortality 33887 and 8168 cases was estimated in last decade. A large number of residents of Tehran have died as a result of exposure to air pollutants; therefore for control and management of air pollution, appropriate actions on health and the environment should be performed.


Current approaches to semi-supervised incremental learning prefer to select unlabeled examples predicted with high confidence for model re-training. However, this strategy can degrade the classification performance rather than improve it. We present an analysis for the reasons of this phenomenon, showing that only relying on high confidence for data selection can lead to an erroneous estimate to the true distribution when the confidence annotator is highly correlated with the classifier in the information they use. We propose a new data selection approach to address this problem and apply it to a variety of applications, including machine learning and speech recognition. Encouraging improvements in recognition accuracy are observed in our experiments


This paper presents a methodology for obtaining a 3D reconstruction of a dynamic scene in multi-camera settings. Our target is to derive a compact representation of the 3D scene which is effective and accurate, whatever the number of cameras and even for very-wide baseline settings. Easing realtime 3D scene capture has outstanding applications in 2D and 3D content production, free viewpoint video of natural scenes and interactive video applications. The method proposed here has several original contributions on how to accelerate the process: it exploits spatial and temporal consistency for speeding up reconstruction, dividing the problem in two parts. First, 3D surfaces are efficiently sampled to obtain a silhouette-consistent set of colored surface points and normals, using a novel algorithm presented in this paper. Then, a fast, greedy meshing algorithm retrieves topologically correct continuous surfaces from the dense sets of oriented points, providing a suitable representation for multi-view video. Compared to other techniques in the literature, the presented approach is capable of retrieving 3D surfaces of foreground objects in real-time by exploiting the computing capabilities of GPUs. This is feasible due to the parallelized design of the surface sampling algorithm. The reconstructed surfaces can effectively be used for interactive representations. The presented methodology also offers good scalability to large multi-view video settings.


Water exchange between insects and their environment via the vapour phase includes influx and efflux components. The pressure cycle theory postulates that insects (and some other arthropods) can regulate the relative rates of influx and efflux of water vapour by modulating hydrostatic pressures at a vapour-liquid interface by compressing or expanding a sealed, gas-filled cavity. Some such cavities, like the tracheal system, could be compressed by elevated pressure in all or part of the haemocoele. Others, perhaps including the muscular rectum of flea prepupae, could be compressed by intrinsic muscles. Maddrell (Adv. Insect Physiol. 8, 199 (1971)) suggested a pressure cycle mechanism of this kind to account for rectal uptake of water vapour in Thermobia but did not find it compatible with quantitative information then available. Newer evidence conforms better with the proposed mechanism. Cyclical pressure changes are of widespread occurrence in insects and have sometimes been shown to depend on water status. Evidence is reviewed for the role of the tracheal system as an avenue for net exchange of water between the insect and its environment. Because water and respiratory gases share common pathways, most published findings fail to distinguish between the conventional view that the tracheal system has evolved as a site for distribution and exchange of respiratory gases and that any water exchange occurring in it is generally incidental and nonadaptive, and the theory proposed here. The pressure cycle theory offers a supplementary explanation not incompatible with evidence so far available. The relative importance of water economy and respiratory exchange in the functioning of compressible cavities such as the tracheal system remains to be explored. Some further implications of the pressure cycle theory are discussed. Consideration is given to the possible involvement of vapour-phase transport in the internal redistribution of water within the body. It is suggested that some insect wings may constitute internal vapour-liquid exchange sites, where water can move from the body fluids to the intratracheal gas. Ambient and body temperature must influence rates of vapour-liquid mass transfer. If elevated body temperature promotes evaporative discharge of the metabolic water burden that has been shown to accumulate during flight in some large insects, their minimum threshold thoracic temperature for sustained flight may relate to the maintenance of water balance. The role of water economy in the early evolution of insect wings is considered. Pressure cycles might help to maintain water balance in surface-breathing insects living in fresh and saline waters, but the turbulence of the surface of the open sea might prevent truly marine forms from using this mechanism.


We challenge three of the underlying principles of CART, a well know approach to the construction of classification and regression trees (CART). Our primary concern is with the penalization strategy employed to prune back an initial, overgrown tree. We reason, based on both intuitive and theoretical arguments, that the pruning rule for classification should be different from that used for regression (unlike CART). We also argue that growing a tree-structured partition that is specifically fitted to the data is unnecessary. Instead, our approach to tree modeling begins with a nonadapted (fixed) dyadic tree structure and partition, much like that underlying multiscale wavelet analysis. We show that dyadic trees provide sufficient flexibility, are easy to construct, and produce near-optimal results when properly pruned. Finally, we advocate the use of a negative log-likelihood measure of empirical risk. This is a more appropriate empirical risk for non-Gaussian regression problems, in contrast to the sum-of-squared errors criterion used in CART regression.


Much Canadian cultural policy has been predicated on the assumption that if market forces were to be allowed to prevail, then it would be very difficult for indigenous material to survive. So a range of measures has been implemented over the last seventy years or so with the basic aim of ensuring a Canadian presence in the more traditional arts such as literature and the theatre, and in the mass media.1 The impact of these has varied - there has been rather more success in imaginative fiction than in cinema for example - but the underlying assumption has changed little. However in the post-nafta world some of the protective measures have been contested. The area of magazines has proved to be particularly fraught, with the Americans mounting a challenge to the restrictions on split-runs - editions of us publications with minimal Canadian content which seek a share of the Canadian advertising market. As a result of a wto ruling in the late 1990s, the Canadian government has been obliged to dilute - though not abolish - its protective measures as far as magazines are concerned.2 A Canada Magazine Fund has been established and it now distributes aid to a large number of publications which previously drew support from these measures. Maclean's is Canada's national English language news magazine, and as such has been a major beneficiary of government policies. It was started as a monthly publication in 1911, becoming a weekly in 1978 in the wake of the full impact of protective legislation introduced by the Pearson government in 1965 being felt; as a consequence, its principal competitor, the Canadian edition of Time, lost the exemption it had initially been given in the period after 1965. The result was that no Canadian company placing advertising in that magazine could set the cost against tax. This means that for over twenty years Maclean's enjoyed a somewhat privileged status, and at the moment of writing it still has certain advantages over Time as far as advertising is concerned. What this article seeks to do is to consider how that privileged status has been used in recent years specifically in relation to the magazine's coverage of the world beyond Canada. The questions that are being asked are about the extent and nature of Maclean's' foreign coverage - what is covered and within which frameworks of interpretation the material is presented to the readers. Since the natural competitor of Maclean's is Time Canada, some comparative analysis of foreign coverage has also been undertaken with a view to ascertaining what differences might exist, particularly in relation to the scale of Time Canada's coverage, but also in relation to its orientation. The methodology involved both quantitative and qualitative analysis: coverage was measured (in column centimetres), and the journalistic approaches employed were examined. What was being sought ultimately was the rather elusive phenomenon of the Canadian perspective on the world, the nurturing and sustaining of which is one of the principal justifications of protective cultural measures. The analysis proceeded in two stages: firstly, there was a focus on two relatively short time periods, which enabled manageable comparative work to be carried out, and secondly, there was an examination of an entire year of Maclean's foreign coverage. Maclean's is published by Maclean Hunter, which since 1994 has been owned by Rogers Communications, a company with substantial interests in broadcasting and print. Maclean's employs over 60 editorial staff. In 1998 it had a circulation of 510,319, which compared with Time Canada's 318,378.3 In recent years, Time Canada has employed two journalists north of the forty-ninth parallel. Maclean's, it should be noted, competes not only with the Canadian edition of Time, but also with the us version, which is available in the Canadian market. The initial analysis The periods chosen for initial examination were October 1998 and April 1999, and the relevant editions of the two magazines were considered, as were the American version of Time, and, where relevant, the European one. …


This paper considers a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model for a small open economy and finds that an improvement in the terms of trade causes a housing boom-bust cycle if the duration of the improvement is uncertain. It is shown that as the economy has better access to the international financial market, the extent of the housing boom and bust gets larger. Also, an increase in the loan-to-value ratio in the domestic mortgage market tends to enhance the extent of the housing boom and bust when the economy has good access to the international financial market.


Critical discussion of Elizabeth Jolley's The Well (1986) has largely focused on issues of gender, but little has been said about the racial inscription of the novel. This lack is especially relevant when criticism, despite praising the author's experimentation with narrative technique and genre, tends to voice dissatisfaction with the novel's conclusion in medias res, which never solves the tension between a presumed return to the patriarchal norm and the voicing of liberating alternatives. This paper proposes a postcolonial perspective so as to come to terms with this dilemma, and argues that the text signals the impossibility of suppressing the Native from the contemporary Australian land and textscape, whose Gothic articulation in the uncanny shape of the male well-dweller haunts the novel's engagement with female empowerment. The female protagonist may only start overcoming a crippling gender discourse in the White postcolonial pastoralist setting by inscribing herself into 'Australianness'. Reconciling her body with the land is significantly staged in terms of an Aboriginal cosmogony, as it is a 'walkabout' that allows Hester to start controlling her body and story. Thus, The Well may be understood to be inconclusive because it struggles to map gender across race at a time of Aboriginal-exclusive multiculturalism. Written in the mid 1980s, it announces a point of inflection in thinking about nativenonnative relationships


It has been ten years since the United Nations imposed comprehensive sanctions on Iraq. The sanctions were adopted on August 6, 1990, forty-five years to the day after the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, killing an estimated one hundred thousand people and leaving a toxic legacy that still affects the population of the area. The bombing was soon followed by an attack on Nagasaki. The coincidence is a telling one. For all the US government's rhetoric about halting the use of weapons of mass destruction, the United States stands in a league of its own in using and proliferating them. As horrific as the use of nuclear weapons against Japan was, perhaps five to ten times as many people have died in Iraq as a consequence of the war led by the United States and Britain, under United Nations (UN) auspices, during the last decade. This article can also be found at the Monthly Review website , where most recent articles are published in full. Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.


Chronic use of opioid analgesics has been hindered by the development of opioid addiction and tolerance. We have reported that curcumin, a natural flavonoid from the rhizome of Curcuma longa, attenuated opioid tolerance, although the underlying mechanism remains unclear. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that curcumin may inhibit Ca 2+ /calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II α (CaMKII α ), a protein kinase that have been previously proposed to be critical for opioid tolerance and dependence. In this study, we have employed a state-of-art polymeric formulation technology to produce PLGA-curcumin nanoparticles (nanocurcumin), in order to overcome the drug's poor solubility and bioavailability that have made it extremely difficult for studying in vivo pharmacological actions of curcumin. We found that PLGA-curcumin nanoparticles reduced the dose requirement by 11-33 folds. Pretreatment with PLGA-curcumin (p.o.) prevented the development of opioid tolerance and dependence in a dose dependent manner with ED 50 of 3.9 mg/kg and 3.2 mg/kg, respectively. PLGA-curcumin dose-dependently attenuated already-established opioid tolerance (ED 50 = 12.6 mg/kg, p.o.) and dependence (ED 50 = 3.1 mg/kg, p.o.). Curcumin or PLGA-curcumin did not produce antinociception by itself or affect morphine (1-10 mg/kg) antinociception. Moreover, we found that the behavioral effects of curcumin on opioid tolerance and dependence correlated with its inhibition of morphine-induced CaMKII α activation in the brain. These results suggest that curcumin may attenuate opioid tolerance and dependence by suppressing CaMKII α activity.


A practical course in differential equations and mathematical modelling is a unique blend of the traditional methods with Lie group analysis enriched by author's own theoretical developments. The main objective of the book is to develop new mathematical curricula based on symmetry and invariance principles. This approach helps to make courses in differential equations, mathematical modelling, distributions and fundamental solution, etc. easy to follow and interesting for students. The book is based on author's long-term experience of teaching at Novosibirsk and Moscow Universities in Russia, College de France, Georgia Tech and Stanford University in USA, Universities in South Africa, Cyprus, Turkey, and Blekinge Institute of Technology (BTH) in Sweden. The new curriculum prepares the students for solving modern nonlinear problems and attracts essentially more students than the traditional way of teaching mathematics. The book can be used as a main textbook by undergraduate and graduate students and their teachers in applied mathematics, physics and engineering sciences.


Childhood obesity in the United States has increased alarmingly and much is becoming known about multiple factors that contribute to this epidemic. These include environmental (e.g., prevalent junk foods), behavioral (e.g., inactivity), intrapsychic (e.g., depression), interpersonal (e.g., parenting style), as well as biological, socioeconomic, and cultural factors, to name just a few. A comprehensive multi-factor model of childhood obesity is presented based on extant research and its implications for assessment, intervention, and prevention are explored. Emphasis is placed on the importance of developing sound assessment approaches, on the potential value of treatment matching using interventions focused on assessment results on each child's unique combination of causal factors, and more broadly on public health implications for prevention.


The increased energy demand and the importance to find renewable energy resources have been addressed by a scientific effort to improve the power conversion efficiency of organic solar cells. In particular, polymer-based solar cells have experienced a great increase in power conversion efficiency, which recently reached a value over 10%. The possibility to further improve the performance of polymer-based solar cells has encouraged the research to have a close look at the key parameters, which play an important role in the mechanism of charge generation. Specifically, the photo-physical processes and the time scales involved in converting excitons to charges are still poorly understood. Also, the microscopic origin and the nature of the driving force allowing interfacial electron-hole pairs to become free charges and the role played by the sample microstructure in a bulk heterojunction have to be clarified. We have used transient absorption spectroscopy, which provides information about the excited states dynamics with <100 fs time resolution, and THz time domain spectroscopy, which is additionally able to distinguish between bound and free charges and to bring insight to local mobility with a < 300 fs time resolution. We have excited our samples at different wavelengths in order to be able to selectively excite mainly the polymer or the fullerene. In Chapter 3, we present transient absorption measurements for a polymer known for good packing, long-range ordering and high mobility: pBTTT. We have investigated neat pBTTT and pBTTT blended with PCBM, either in 1:1 weight ratio (one-phase microstructure) presenting an intermixed co-crystal phase between polymer and PCBM, or in 1:4 weight ratio (two-phase microstructure) having the intermixed phase and neat fullerene regions. We found that charges are promptly generated in the 1:1 blends, but mostly recombine geminately, while the presence of neat fullerene domains (1:4 blends) is a driving force for free charge generation. In Chapter 4, we present the study of additional pBTTT:PCBM blends, obtained using additives of different lengths and in different quantity. In contrast to the previous 1:1 and 1:4 microstructures, there is now a neat polymer and fullerene phase, and an intermixed phase (three-phase microstructure), or the blend is predominately phase separated (two-phase microstructure). We show that prompt charge generation occurs mainly in the intermixed phase, while the presence of neat polymer domains leads to delayed exciton dissociation and reduces the yield of charge generation. Neat polymer and fullerene domains contribute nevertheless to the spatial separation of electron-hole pairs. Finally, in Chapter 5, we present the transient absorption and THz investigation of a donor-acceptor co-polymer (PBDTTPD) in the neat phase and blended with PCBM in 1:2 weight ratio. The blend has a three-phase microstructure, consisting of neat amorphous polymer aggregates, amorphous intermixed regions, and neat fullerene domains. Differently from the pBTTT:PCBM systems, the presence of large (8 nm) polymer domains in PBDTTPD:PCBM is not an obstacle to the generation of charges, since the delocalized excitons efficiently dissociate with a 1 ps time constant. The delayed charge separation was also observed by THz-time domain spectroscopy at very low fluence.


This article shows that anti-essentialism was a pivotal ideological feature of Russian Zionism – the idiom of Zionism that lay behind Russian Zionist periodicals such as Rassvet in Late Imperial Russia. For Russian Zionists, the Jewish nation was the social field that existed as a social fact. While Russian Zionists' concept of the Jewish nation was inevitably influenced by their political context, nonetheless, it was primarily a result of the convergence of the following two ideological movements. First, there emerged a sense that a socioeconomic foundation was crucial in forming a nation. The transformation of Jewish socioeconomic positions in Eastern Europe and Russia was the background of this consciousness. The second is the ideological claim that any collective entity or social field should be respected regardless of its merit and utility vis-à-vis others. More specifically, for Russian Zionists, the Jewish raison d'être was the simple existence of their own social field; they believed that no further definition was required. The emergence of this viewpoint can be understood as a reaction to the Zionists' perception of Jewish history where Jews pursued the recognition and validation of their place among non-Jews by virtue of their merit or utility vis-à-vis non-Jews.


Normal tissue toxicity reduces the therapeutic index of radiotherapy and decreases the quality of life for cancer survivors. Apoptosis is a key element of the radiation response in normal tissues like the hippocampus and small intestine, resulting in neurocognitive disorders and intestinal malabsorption. The Early Growth Response 1 (Egr1) transcription factor mediates radiation-induced apoptosis by activating the transcription of proapoptosis genes in response to ionizing radiation (IR). Therefore, we hypothesized that the genetic abrogation of Egr1 and the pharmacologic inhibition of its transcriptional activity could attenuate radiation-induced apoptosis in normal tissues. We demonstrated that Egr1-null mice had less apoptosis in the hippocampus and intestine following irradiation as compared with their wild-type littermates. A similar result was achieved using Mithramycin A (MMA) to prevent binding of Egr1 to target promoters in the mouse intestine. Abolishing Egr1 expression using shRNA dampened apoptosis and enhanced the clonogenic survival of irradiated HT22 hippocampal neuronal cells and IEC6 intestinal epithelial cells. Mechanistically, these events involved an abrogation of p53 induction by IR and an increase in the ratio of Bcl-2/Bax expression. In contrast, targeted silencing of Egr1 in two cancer cell lines (GL261 glioma cells and HCT116 colorectal cancer cells) was not radioprotective, since it reduced their growth while also sensitizing them to radiation-induced death. Further, Egr1 depletion delayed the growth of heterotopically implanted GL261 and HCT116 tumors. These results support the potential of silencing Egr1 in order to minimize the normal tissue complications associated with radiotherapy while enhancing tumor control. Mol Cancer Ther; 14(10); 2343–52. ©2015 AACR.


In the Romanian Carpathians, Silver fir covers about 5% of the forest area and is the second most important conifer species. Although there are a number of genetic studies concerning the distribution of genetic diversity of Abies alba in Europe, populations from the south-eastern limit of the distribution range have been studied less. The aim of the present study was to assess the genetic diversity and differentiation in 36 silver fir populations along the Carpathian Mountains in Romania, using seven microsatellites loci. High levels of genetic diversity (He = 0.779 to 0.834 and AR = 11.61 to 14.93) were found in all populations. Eastern Carpathians populations show higher levels of diversity, both in allelic richness and expected heterozygosity and higher degrees of genetic differentiation compared to southern populations. Bayesian clustering analysis revealed the existence of two genetically distinct groups for silver fir populations, one larger cluster which comprises the Inner Eastern Carpathians, Curvature Carpathians, South Carpathians and the Banat Mountains and the second cluster contained most of the North and Outer Eastern Carpathians population. Both AMOVA and Barrier analysis supported genetic differentiation among geographical provenance regions. The high genetic diversity of silver fir populations from the eastern limit of its distribution provide high potential to mitigate the negative effects of climate warming being valuable genetic resources in the context of global change. The distribution pattern of genetic variation at local, regional and country scale could and should be considered for the preservation of the forest genetic resources.


As customer-brand engagement progressively shifts to digital domains, understanding social media effects in branding has become a vital issue. Social media effectiveness is especially important for the US retail sector due to intense competition among retailers for consumer attention and engagement on digital channels. Yet, the research on the effectiveness of social media in the retail industry remains sparse. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how social media affects US retailers' customer-based brand equity (CBBE) which is an important indicator of brand success. Using a dataset of 15,717 retailer-day observations, the authors empirically test the dynamics between owned and earned social media and CBBE using panel vector autoregression (PVAR). The authors find strong impacts of owned and earned social media on CBBE across the board. However, they find that owned social media harms CBBE of retailers dealing in hedonic and high involvement products. Whereas owned social media helps general retailers in building CBBE, it reduces CBBE of specialty retailers.


Background The measurement of progress in maternal and newborn health often relies on data provided by women in surveys on the quality of care they received. The majority of these indicators, however, including the widely tracked "skilled attendance at birth" indicator, have not been validated. We assess the validity of a large set of maternal and newborn health indicators that are included or have the potential to be included in population–based surveys. Methods We compare women's reports of care received during labor and delivery in two Kenyan hospitals prior to discharge against a reference standard of direct observations by a trained third party (n = 662). We assessed individual–level reporting accuracy by quantifying the area under the receiver operating curve (AUC) and estimated population–level accuracy using the inflation factor (IF) for each indicator with sufficient numbers for analysis. Findings Four of 41 indicators performed well on both validation criteria (AUC>0.70 and 0.75<IF<1.25). These were: main provider during delivery was a nurse/midwife, a support companion was present at birth, cesarean operation, and low birthweight infant (<2500 g). Twenty–one indicators met acceptable levels for one criterion only (11 for AUC; 9 for IF). The skilled birth attendance indicator met the IF criterion only. Interpretation Few indicators met both validation criteria, partly because many routine care interventions almost always occurred, and there was insufficient variation for robust analysis. Validity is influenced by whether the woman had a cesarean section, and by question wording. Low validity is associated with indicators related to the timing or sequence of events. The validity of maternal and newborn quality of care indicators should be assessed in a range of settings to refine these findings.


Pipelines can be subjected to significant amounts of tensile forces due to geotechnical movements like slope instabilities and seismic activities as well as due to frost heave and thaw cycles in arctic regions. The tensile strain capacity Display Formulaetcrit of pipelines is crucial in the prediction of rupture and loss of containment capability in these load cases. Currently the Oil and Gas Pipeline Systems code CSA Z662-11 0 contains equations for the prediction of Display Formulaetcrit as a function of geometry and material properties of the pipeline. These equations resulted from extensive experimental and numerical studies carried out by Wang et al [2]–[6] using curved wide plate tests on pipes having grades X65 and higher. Verstraete et al 0 conducted curved wide plate tests at the University of Ghent which also resulted in tensile strain capacity prediction methods and girth weld flaw acceptability criteria. These criteria are included in the European Pipeline Research Group (EPRG) Tier 2 guidelines. Furthermore Verstrate et al 0 introduced a pressure correction factor of 0.5 in order to include the effect of internal pressure in the tensile strain capacity predictions in a conservative way. Further research by Wang et al with full scale pipes having an internal pressure factor of 0.72 also showed that Display Formulaetcrit decreases in the presence of internal pressure [10]–[15]. In their work, Wang et al presented a clear methodology for the design of full scale experiments and numerical simulations to study the effect of internal pressure on the tensile strain capacity of pipes with girth weld flaws [10]–[15]. However, there has been limited testing to enable a precise understanding of the tensile strain capacity of pipes with grades less than X65 as a function of girth weld flaw sizes and the internal pressure.In this paper the experimental setup for the testing of grade X52 full scale specimens with 12″ diameter and ¼″ wall thickness is demonstrated. In the scope of this research 8 full scale specimens will be tested and the results will be used to formulate the tensile strain capacity of X52 pipes under internal pressure. The specimens are designed for the simultaneous application of displacement controlled tensile loading and the internal pressure. Finite element analysis is applied in the optimization process for the sizes of end plates and connection elements. Also the lengths of the full scale specimens are determined based on the results from finite element analysis. The appropriate lengths are chosen in such a way that between the location of the girth weld flaw and the end plates uniform strain zones could be obtained. The internal pressure in these experiments is ranging between pressure values causing 80% SMYS and 30% SMYS hoop stress. The end plates and connection elements of the specimens are designed in such a way that the tensile displacement load is applied with an eccentricity of 10% of the pipe diameter with the purpose of increasing the magnitude of tensile strains at the girth weld flaw location.The results of two full scale experiments of this research program are presented. The structural response from the experiments is compared to the finite element simulation. The remote strain values of the experiment are found to be higher than the Display Formulaetcrit values predicted by the equations in 0.© 2014 ASME


A global climatology and database of mixed layer properties are computed from nearly 1,250,000 Argo profiles. The climatology is calculated with both a hybrid algorithm for detecting the mixed layer depth (MLD) and a standard threshold method. The climatology provides accurate information about the depth, properties, extent, and seasonal patterns of global mixed layers. The individual profile results in the database can be used to construct time series of mixed layer properties in specific regions of interest. The climatology and database are available online at http://mixedlayer.ucsd.edu. The MLDs calculated by the hybrid algorithm are shallower and generally more accurate than those of the threshold method, particularly in regions of deep winter mixed layers; the new climatology differs the most from existing mixed layer climatologies in these regions. Examples are presented from the Labrador and Irminger Seas, the Southern Ocean, and the North Atlantic Ocean near the Gulf Stream. In these regions the threshold method tends to overestimate winter MLDs by approximately 10% compared to the algorithm.


An ideal bioherbicide should be easy and cheap to produce, viable and efficacious in controlling
target weed with definite time. Drechslela cynodontis has been reported as the potential
bioherbicide for goosegrass; however, its control efficacy has several shortcomings. A study
was conducted to determine the suitability of D.cynodontis as bioherbicide for controlling
gooserass both in the glasshouse and in the field. In the pathogenicity test, mycelium and
conidia base concentration have significant effect on disease development as indicated by the
high AUDPC values and faster rate of disease development. Significantly higher disease
developed (DS=100%) in treatment with 0.05g/ml mycelium and 2.5 x 106conidia/ml
respectively on the four leaf-stage goosegrass 6 days after inoculation. Besides, it also caused
100% disease severity on Dactylotenium agegypyium. The fungus infected other closely related
grassy weeds (disease index=3 and 4) and produced small necrotic lesions on crop plants such as
rice and corn and are resistant (disease index=2) which recovered after several days. Even though D.cynodontis was suitable in various cropping situations, but a crucial understanding of
the conditions under which high level of disease development is important. Drechslera sp.
requires over of 12 hours of dew period for maximum disease development (DS=100%), dew
period less than 12 hour resulted on less disease developed. Therefore oil emulsion (10 % palm
oil) has been used to circumvent the dew period requirement, as this emulsion has helped in
creating higher disease severity. Temperature between 25-300C are suitable for spore
germination and appressorium formation on leave surface. When the incubation temperature
was increased to 350C, conidial germination and appressorium formation were reduced. At this
temperature, most infection process was stopped at the stage of germ tubes elongation. Spore
germination and formation of appressorium were significantly higher in the dark (91%)
compared to light (75%) at 300C. Understanding the course of the infection and development of
D.cynodontis could aid in elucidating the mechanism of host death and in determine the
suitability of D.cynodontis as the biocontrol agent for goosegrass. Conidia started to germinate 3
hr (40.75%) after inoculation on goosegrass in dark condition. Germ tubes were produced
abundantly 6 hr (53.75%) after inoculation and penetration occurred after appressorium
formation and started to colonize the epidemal cells. For the chemical herbicide interaction
study, spore germination was high in treatment containing 0.25X Glyphosate (95%) compare to
other herbicides at similar concentration. At this concentration, conidial germination was
reduced by 80% with Metolachlor, 72% with Clethodim, 60% with Glufosinate ammonium, and
20% with Paraquat. The interaction between these chemicals and conidia germination indicated
a negative linear relationship, where spore germinations are constantly decreased with the
increase in herbicide concentration. Sublethal rate of herbicide combined with pathogen may
incite synergistic effect, potentially increasing weed control and reducing management costs.


The presented work unites several distinct lines of research, asserting that the broader construct of complexity (with its various connotations) may be uniquely relevant and informative to our understanding and management of psychotic disorders.

Part 1 outlines the candidate's contributions to the development of EEG methodology in clinical populations in an effort to most directly capture neural noise and complexity. The advent of oscillatory analysis facilitated the study of ongoing background activity of the EEG. Further exploration of this background activity demonstrated that increased neural noise (as quantified by Lempel-Ziv complexity) is highly correlated with, and conceptually very relevant to, positive symptoms of psychosis. Part 2 describes how considering the complexity of clinical psychosis states justifies the use of human laboratory studies using psychotomimetic drugs such as tetrahydrocannabinol and ketamine. Part 3 explains how the ideas and inferences from the work in Parts 1 and 2 can inform the environment of psychotic disorders, specifically the candidate's work in prescribing practices and first episode psychosis service design.

The thesis concludes that EEG studies of clinical populations face particular methodological challenges, however the resultant technical advancements have expanded our view of neural function to the particular benefit of our understanding of psychosis. EEG measures of complexity may be amongst the most sensitive biomarkers associated with positive symptoms, however more empirical research is called for to confirm this observation. Human laboratory studies of psychotomimetic drugs in healthy humans may continue to prove useful, in circumventing the phenomenological and patho-etiological complexity of clinically occurring psychosis. As a next step, multi-modal studies (combining biophysical signals, individual phenomenology and even population level outcomes) in combination with data mining techniques might further characterize the complexity within psychosis. Psychotic disorders, as complex problems, warrant framing and intervention informed by complexity.


Objective: To explore risk factors of cytologic positive rate of ascites in early endometrial cancer patients and its influences on prognosis.
Methods: 3415 endometrial cancer patients in I and II stage in endometrial cancer prevention and treatment of Ankang project in Guangdong Women and Children hospital from 2000 to 2010 were given ascites cytologic examination. Then this study analyzed the relations between ascites cytologic positive examination and clinical pathological conditions, the relations between ascites cytologic positive and patients' prognosis.
Results: First, scites cytologic positive rate of early endometrial cancer patients was 3.7%. Second, single analysis show that the onset age more than 60 years old (P=0.008), deep muscle infiltration (P=0.001), cervical interstitial invasion (P=0.007), which were the influencing factors of ascites cytologic positive of early endometrial cancer patients. Multiple factors analysis show that onset age (OR=1.797, 95% CI 1.064~3.036, P=0.028), deep muscle infiltration (R=1.724, 95% CI 1.025~2.900, P=0.040), cervical interstitial invasion (OR=2.051, 95% CI 1.083~3.886, P=0.027) were independent risk factors of ascites cytologic positive of early endometrial cancer patients. Third, recurrence rate of positive and negative patients with ascites cytologic examination (14.2% vs. 7.2%, P=0.005), remote recurrence rate (11.0% vs. 4.5%, P=0.001), there were statistical differences, local recurrence rate (3.1% vs. 2.9%, P>0.05), there were no statistical differences. Fourth, survival time of ascites cytologic positive and negative patients compared with progress-free survival time, there were statistical differences (P<0.001, P=0.001). Multiple factors analysis showed that ascites cytologic positive had no obvious influences on survival time (OR=0.620, 95% CI 0.194~1.986, P=0.421) and progress-free survival time (OR=0.496, 95% CI 0.182~1.348, P=0.169).
Conclusion: Ascites cytologic positive has close relations with independent factors of old age, deep muscle infiltration, cervical interstitial invasion. The prognosis of scites cytologic positive patients poorer than negative patients, but scites cytologic positive isn't independent prognostic influencing factors of early endometrial cancer.


This thesis consists of 4 components:

Part One is a comprehensive log of the first 500 cases seen as an oncology resident at Perth Veterinary Oncology and an assessment of the proportion of different tumour cases presented during this time. Lymphoma was the most common disease seen, comprising 122/500 (24.4%) of cases. There were 88.4% canine cases and 11.6% feline cases. The majority of dogs were crossbreeds; however, the three most common pure breeds seen were the Labrador, golden retriever and Staffordshire bull terrier.

Part Two provides a description of the cases classified as 'Tumours of the Skeletal System'. Dogs with a confirmed diagnosis of osteosarcoma are then described. The patient signalment and disease presentation are compared and contrasted to previous studies to determine whether osteosarcoma in our cohort of dogs is a similar entity.

Part Three is a description of reported risk factors for the development of osteosarcoma. It includes a literature review demonstrating the evidence supporting or refuting these risks.

Part Four is a retrospective analysis of 33 canine patients diagnosed with appendicular osteosarcoma treated with amputation and an adjuvant chemotherapy protocol consisting of two doses of doxorubicin given two weeks apart, followed by four doses of carboplatin given at three weekly intervals. This chemotherapy protocol has not been previously described. The most effective adjuvant chemotherapy protocol for the treatment of canine appendicular osteosarcoma post limb amputation has not yet been determined, and this study of a novel protocol may help to further define this.


When the School of Tropical Medicine was established at the Naval Hospital, Treasure Island, in July, 1944, it became necessary to have a source of parasitic material for instructional purposes. Accordingly, the school undertook the examinations for intestinal and blood parasites previously done by the hospital's clinical laboratory. This not only provided material for class use, but also gave the authors a chance to secure data on the incidence of parasitic infections in a rather representative group of naval personnel, drawn from the various activities of the Twelfth Naval District.
The total number of military personnel examined from the inception of the program to October 1, 1945, was 1153. On these persons a total of 2747 examinations, or an average of 2.4 per individual, was made. In addition 103 civilian navy employees and their families, interned in the Philippines during the Japanese occupation, were examined by us upon their return to the United States, an average of 2.8 examinations apiece being performed upon this group.


The article reveals the main results of the ascertaining phase of the experiment of the research project "Methodical principles of developing the project technologies for the professional training of future qualified workers of agrarian, construction and motor transport industries", which consist in the diagnostic analysis of educational project activities in the institutions of vocational (vocational-technical) education. The analysis of the responses of teaching staff of vocational (vocational-technical) education institutions conducted by the authors showed the need to facilitate their readiness to develop project technologies in the training of future qualified workers, the creation of educational and methodological support for project activities in the professional training of students, namely: developing the corresponding methodological recommendations, textbooks etc. The obtained results showed that the teachers are aware of the essence of the project activity in the training of future qualified workers, but not all of them have mastered effective methods and techniques for the application of project technology. Some contradictions were found when teachers noticed the positive influence of such technologies on students' motivation and performance, and at the same time, they argued that these technologies are limited in use. It is determined that the rational application of educational project technologies in vocational (vocational-technical) education institutions promotes the development of the professional competence of the future qualified workers.


E-Government increases transparency and im- proves communication between the government and the users. Providing e-Government services to business sector is a fun- damental mission of governmental agencies in Saudi Arabia. However, the adoption of e-Government systems is less than satisfactory in many countries, particularly in developing coun- tries. This is a significant factor that can lead to e-Government failure and, therefore, to the waste of budget and effort. One pertinent, unanswered question is what are the key factors that influence the adoption and utilisation level of users from business sector. Unlike much research in the literature that has utilised common technology acceptance models and theories to analyse the adoption of e-Government, which may not be sufficient for such analysis, this study proposes a conceptual framework following a holistic approach to analyse key factors that influence the adoption and utilisation of e-Government in Saudi Arabia. The developed framework, E-Government Adoption and Utilisation Model (EGAUM), was developed based on critical evaluation of several common models and theories related to technology acceptance and use including Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), in conjunction with analysis of e-Government adoption literature. The study involved 48 participating business entities from two major cities in Saudi Arabia, Riyadh and Jeddah. The descriptive and statistical analyses are presented in this paper and the results indicated that all the proposed factors have degree of influence on the adoption and utilisation level. Perceived Benefits, Awareness, Previous Experience, and Regulations & Policies were found to be the significant factors that are most likely to influence the adoption and usage level of users from business sector.
Keywords: E-Government; E-Services; Saudi Arabia; Technology Adoption; Influential Factors; Users' Intention; Business Sector Perspective


A field study was conducted in 2006 at Sari Agricultural and Natural Resources University, in order to determine the best time for weed control in soybean promising line, 033. Experiment was arranged in randomized complete block design with 4 replications and two series of treatments. In the first series, weeds were kept in place until crop reached V2 (second trifoliolate), V4 (fourth trifoliolate), V6 (sixth trifoliolate), R1 (beginning bloom, first flower), R3 (beginning pod), R5 (beginning seed) and were then removed and the crop kept weed-free for the rest of the season. In the second series, crops were kept weed-free until the above growth stages after which weeds were allowed to grow in the plots for the rest of the season. Whole season weedy and weed-free plots were included in the experiment for yield comparison. The results showed that among studied traits, grain yield, pod numbers per plant and weed biomass were affected significantly by control and interference treatments. The highest number of pods per plant was obtained from plots which kept weed-free for whole season control. Results showed that weed control should be carried out between V2 (26 day after planting) to R1 (63 day after planting) stages of soybean to provide maximum grain yield. Thus, it is possible to optimize the timing of weed control, which can serve to reduce the costs and side effects of intensive chemical weed control.


Studies involving mutants of the gene SPATULA indicate that it promotes the growth of carpel margins and of pollen tract tissues derived from them. We show that it encodes a new member of the basic-helix-loop-helix family of transcription factors. SPATULA is expressed in marginal and pollen tract tissues throughout their development confirming its role in regulating their growth. It is also expressed in many other tissues where it may act redundantly to control growth, including the peripheral zone of the shoot apical meristem, and specific tissues within leaves, petals, stamens and roots. Expression in the stomium, funiculus and valve dehiscence zone indicates an additional role in abscission. SPATULA expression does not require the function of the other carpel development genes CRABS CLAW and AGAMOUS, although its expression is repressed in first whorl organs by the A function gene APETALA2. Further, we have shown that disruptions to gynoecial pattern formation seen in ettin mutants can largely be attributed to ectopic SPATULA action. ETTIN's role seems to be to negatively regulate SPATULA expression in abaxial regions of the developing gynoecium. SPATULA is the first basic-helix-loop-helix gene in plants known to play a role in floral organogenesis.


Purpose - logistics service quality is becoming a vital tool for delivering superior logistics service performance and creating customer satisfaction. This paper examined the influence of logistics service quality dimensions (LSQ) on supplier's retailer satisfaction. While highlighting the importance of relationship quality with retailers satisfaction on improving the performance on suppliers – retailers relationship. Design/methodology - literature review was highlighted from many different approaches and perspectives for logistics service quality, customer satisfaction and Relationship quality, these approaches were used to derive the hypotheses that was used in the research , A quantitative analysis that had been done through using self administrative questionnaire collected 143 retailers – distributed in Alexandria - discovered the differences and particularities linked to the importance and perceived characteristics of logistical services . Findings - The results identified two dimensions of logistics service quality (Personnel Contact quality and timeliness) have a great effect on retailers' satisfaction, it was clear that a higher level of retailer satisfaction leads to high relationship quality. The validity and reliability tests were tested. Research limitations/implications - In this study the sample was only collected from Alexandria city which limit the generalisability of the research results Originality/value – This paper presented a framework of logistics service quality dimensions on supplier's retailer satisfaction while highlighting the importance of relationship quality with retailers satisfaction on improving the performance on suppliers – retailers relationship in the supply chain from business to business perspective.


This thesis sets out to describe and discuss male street prostitution as it occurs in Durban. The aim is to examine to what degree male street prostitutes are at risk of HIV infection, and make appropriate recommendations for HIV intervention. The field data, gathered through participant observation, revealed significant differences between the two research sites, refiecting broader race and class divisions in the South African society. At the same time, the in-depth case studies of the individual participants suggest that they share similar socio-economic life histories characterised by poverty and dysfunctional families, and hold similar world-views. The research was conducted within a social constructionist framework, guided by theories of human sexuality. Yet, sexuality was not the framework within which the male street prostitutes in Durban attached meaning to their profession. Professing to be largely heterosexual, the respondents engaged in homosexual sexual acts without considering themselves to be homosexual, reflecting and amplifying the fluid nature of human sexuality. It was, however, within an economic framework that the male street prostitutes who participated in this study understood and interpreted their profession. The sexual aspect of their activities was far less important than the economic gain to them, and prostitution was interpreted as a survival strategy, A significant finding of this research is that male street prostitutes in Durban face a considerably higher risk of exposure to HIV from their non-paying sexual partners (lovers) than from their paying sex partners (clients). The research participants all had a good knowledge of HIV and the potential danger of transmission whilst engaging in unsafe commercial sex. In their private love lives, the participants were less cautious about exposing themselves and their partners to HIV infection, hence the conclusion that the respondents face a greater threat of HIV infection from their lovers than from their clients. Finally, male street prostitutes, like female street prostitutes, do however face some risk of HIV infection as a result of their involvement with commercial sex. The illegal nature of their activities is considered to contribute to an environment conducive to the transmission of HIV, and this thesis argues for a change in the legal status of commercial sex work as a primary component of HIV intervention in this vulnerable group of men and women.


Purpose: This article studies the public sector's reaction faced with the COVID-19 pandemic and proposes tools and recommendations based on relationship marketing communication principles Design/Approach/Methodology: To carry out this study, interviews were conducted based on a conversation guide through which data were collected from officials of public institutions and private individuals who work closely with the public environment, inquiring about crisis responsiveness and the efficiency and effectiveness of communication channels used A literature review was used along with the semi-structured free discussion;the technique employed is that of the in-depth interview based on the conversation guide tool Findings: Crises change lives and perceptions Once regarded as a barrier to freedoms and free markets, governments and the public sector are now called upon to intervene in the crisis and ensure continuity amidst the worst economic crisis in a century and the worst crisis in the world of work since the Second World War The public system's strengths and weaknesses become apparent, and a generalized need for building up resilience and responsiveness and improving adapted communication is identified Practical Implication: This article contains clear references to how public institutions can improve crisis responsiveness and communication, based on a relationship marketing approach Originality/Value: To carry out this study, 42 interviews were conducted with officials from public institutions and private individuals in Europe and the United States, creating an overview of institutional communication in crisis times and comparing the results with previous literature findings Good responsiveness and communication are now more important than ever, as work and exchange of information are done remotely in most sectors


A lot of scholars have alluded to the existence of indigenous knowledge among community elders. The purpose of this study was to explore existence of indigenous science understandings among Zulu elders and determine the impact of these understandings on the indigenous secondary school learners. A group of elders and a group of learners from a selected rural community were interviewed on three phenomena pertaining to biology and physical science. Each phenomenon was chosen according to its relevance to the traditional African practices of the rural community studied. The data from both groups was analysed to determine understandings held by each group. Findings of this study revealed that elders held indigenous science understandings that had an impact on the indigenous secondary school learners. Elders transmit these understandings as views that I chose to call indigenous conceptions and duality explanation conceptions. As a result of the impact of elders' views and school science, learners on the other hand held three types of conceptions, namely, unchanged indigenous conceptions, hybridised conceptions and duality explanation conceptions. The recommendations I made are based on the findings that elders' indigenous knowledge has an impact on learners' science understandings. This then has implications to classroom practices and science education.


ABSTRACT  Coastal ecosystems face numerous well-documented threats that pose significant risk of reduction in the ability of these ecosystems to persevere. Although coastal disturbance processes related to maritime exposure are relatively well known, the past and potential impacts of fire in these ecosystems have not been well studied. Because fire plays such an important role in so many other southeastern ecosystems, and because the areal extent of coastal strand ecosystems has been much reduced, it is important to resolve the role of fire for management of these threatened communities. In 2014, prescribed fire management was undertaken in a protected and relatively intact, 55-ha remnant section of coastal strand in the Guana Tolomato National Estuarine Research Reserve (GTMNERR) adjacent to the Atlantic Ocean in northeast Florida, USA. The fire history for this area was unknown. We compared burned samples to unburned samples to test whether there were differences in patterns of vegetative response to this fire management action. In backdune sites, we found significant dissimilarities in plant community biodiversity indicators between burned and unburned samples, whereas vegetative cover changed significantly in both foredune and backdune sites. We include a review of successional patterns and fire effects for similar sites in the region for comparison, which provisionally suggests a 4–20-yr fire return interval. We conclude that fire management for the backdune component of the coastal strand is an important strategy for this ecosystem to avert succession to maritime hammock.


Purpose: We aimed to evaluate the effect of vitreomacular adhesion (VMA) in visual and anatomic outcomes in patients with diabetic macular edema (DME) after intravitreal injection of ranibizumab (Lucentis®). Patients and Methods: This was a prospective cohort study that included thirty eyes of DME patients, divided into two groups according to their spectral-domain-optical coherence tomography image analysis at the baseline visit to identify the presence (VMA+) or absence (VMA−) of VMA. Patients with any degree of vitreomacular traction were not included in this study. VMA was classified by the size of adhesion into either focal (<1500 mm) or broad (>1500 mm). All patients received monthly 0.5 mg of intravitreal ranibizumab injection for 6 months. Patients were observed monthly for a 6-month period and their best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) and central macular thickness (CMT) were recorded. The incidence of posterior vitreous detachment (PVD) was observed. Results: Compared with baseline, there was a significant decrease in CMT after 6 months by 151.46 ± 121.47 and 139.33 ± 144.23 μm in VMA+ and VMA− groups, respectively (P = 0.681). The mean average improvement in BCVA was 10.21 ± 6.33 and 6.68 ± 6.35 letters in the VMA+ and VMA− groups, respectively. The difference between the two groups was statistically significant (P = 0.007). At 6 months, among the 15 eyes of VMA+ at baseline, 4 eyes demonstrated PVD and 11 eyes showed no change in VMA status. Conclusion: Patients having DME with VMA may achieve higher visual gain with anti-vascular endothelial growth factor therapy. Presence of VMA should not preclude patients with DME from receiving anti-vascular endothelial growth factor therapy.


To overcome a trade-off issue between stability and flexibility in the generation of ring-shaped optical lattices, we proposed and demonstrated a novel generation method by using axially symmetric polarization elements. While two optical vortices were coaxially generated, electrically controlled phase difference between them by an electro-optic modulator enabled a precise rotation of the lattice. Our method has the capability to fulfill the high stability and rapid rotation.


Derek Moore was born in South Shields and studied at the local grammar school, from which he gained an Exhibition to Jesus College, Cambridge. However, before going to Cambridge he did his National Service in the Royal Air Force and was stationed in Yorkshire, where one of his fellow personnel was the poet Ted Hughes. He entered Jesus College in 1951, studying for the Mathematical Tripos, which he gained in 1954, and for Part III, which he gained in 1955. He then became a research student in applied mathematics and theoretical fluid mechanics under the supervision of Dr Ian Proudman and was awarded a PhD degree of the University of Cambridge in 1958. Thereafter he held positions at the University of Bristol, the Goddard Space Flight Center, New York, California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and Imperial College, London, where he spent the major part of his career. He became distinguished for the Moore-Spiegel oscillator and the Moore singularity. Moreover he had a strong interest in jazz, which is the subject of an appreciation by Peter Batten.


Although many studies consider the spatial pattern of manufacturing plants in developing countries, the role of services as a driver of urbanization and structural transformation is still not well understood. Using establishment level data from India, this paper helps narrow this gap by comparing and contrasting the spatial development of services with that in manufacturing. The study during the 2001-2010 period suggests that (i) services are more urbanized than manufacturing and are moving toward the urban and, by contrast, the organized manufacturing sector is moving away from urban cores to the rural periphery; (ii) manufacturing and services activities are highly correlated in spatial terms and exhibit a high degree of concentration in just a few states and industries; (iii) manufacturing in urban districts has a stronger tendency to locate closer to larger cities relative to services activity; (iv) infrastructure has a significant effect on manufacturing output, while human capital matters more for services activity; and lastly, (v) technology penetration, measured by the penetration of the Internet, is more strongly associated with services than manufacturing. Similar results hold when growth in activity is measured over the study period rather than levels. Manufacturing and services do not appear to crowd each other out of local areas.


The conference, "Humankind at the Intersection of Nature and Culture", presented in the Kruger National Park in South Africa, forms part of the project "Humanism in the era of globalisation: An intercultural dialogue on culture, humanity and values". This project works on the premise that there is a "need for a new kind of humanism, the aim is to create an understanding of humankind in an era of globalisation that encompasses all civilisations while at the same time emphasising their particularity and diversity". Among the problems of an intercultural hermeneutics that have been in discussion, and that we should regard as essential to the understanding of humanism demanded here, there belongs the basic intuition that there needs to be universally valid norms and values that are based upon mutual recognition of cultural diversity. In order to establish such basic norms, humanism has to appeal to basic anthropological principles that can make a claim to cross-cultural legitimacy. On the one hand, the justificatory ground discerned in these principles must be unconditional and universalisable. On the other hand, these basic anthropological principles have to be evident and intelligible within each culture's horizon of understanding. The determining ground of the will, through which each human being can endorse this set of norms, has to be compatible with his, or her, free consent.


The non-covalent interactions of different upper-rim-substituted C(2)-resorcinarenes with tetramethylammonium salts were analyzed in the gas phase in an Electrospray Ionization Fourier-transform ion-cyclotron-resonance (ESI-FTICR) mass spectrometer and by (1)H NMR titrations. The order of binding strengths of the hosts towards the tetramethylammonium cation in the gas phase reflects the electronic nature of the substituents on the upper rim of the resorcinarene. In solution, however, a different trend with particularly high binding constants for halogenated resorcinarenes has been observed. This trend can be explained by a synergetic effect originating from the interaction of the halogenated resorcinarenes with the counter anions through hydrogen bonding. This study highlights the importance of weak interactions in recognition processes and points out the benefits of comparing the gas-phase data with results obtained from solution experiments.


Background: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder and heterogeneous mental illness, which is characterized by an age dependent loss of memory and an impairment of multiple cognitive functions. One of the factors that play an effective role in pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease and memory impairment is oxidative stress. Oxidative stress occurs because of an imbalance in the oxidant and antioxidant levels. In AD brain, the levels of the antioxidants were found to be decreased, Preventive antioxidants such as catalase; MDA and SOD enzymes have also been shown to be essential for neural survival and neuronal protection against oxidative damages. Injected intracerebroventricularly (i.c.v), STZ can produce oxidative stress in the brain and cognitive impairment that probably cause sporadic Alzheimer's disease. Progesterone has potential from neurogenesis to memory improvement by reduce oxidative stress. Beside the observation that PROG and its metabolites exert functions relevant for the physiology of the CNS; they are also protective agents in the CNS. The present study was undertaken to assess the potential Progesterone as Alzheimer's disease via the mechanisms of reduction of free radical. Material and method: 48 male rats after cannulating, randomly divided into 8 groups (n=8) including: 1. Control group 2. Shame group (sesame oil). 3. Groups of Alzheimer's disease (recipient of streptozotocin (3mg / kg)) 4-6. STZ plus progestrone (2, 1.5, 0.5μg / kg). All groups except the control were cannulated bilaterally ventricular area by stereotaxic device. Alzheimer's model was induced by intracerebroventricularly injection of streptozotocin (3mg/kg). After Indus Alzheimer Progesterone injected through the cannula and control groups received sesame oil. Characteristic of learning and spatial memory was assessed using Morris Water Maze for 5 consecutive days. At the end, the level of FRAP were measured in rat's blood. Results: Administration progesterone significantly improved spatial memory in experimental models of Alzheimer's rats (P<0.001). FRAP amount in All dose of progesterone showed a significant reduction compared to the AD animals (P<0.001). Conclusion: It seems that pretreatment with progesterone by reduces oxidative stress and reduce the production of free radicals and therefore reduce the damage induced Alzheimer's disease and has the ability to prevent the impairment in the experimental models of Alzheimer's rats


A method for intermediate ballistics modelling is presented. The method is used to study the effect of muzzle brakes with a passing projectile. Pressures, velocities and impulses are computed using a thermodynamic interior ballistics code (lumped parameter code) for projectile travel within the barrel. Then Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations are used for gas and projectile travel outside the barrel. CFD simulations are performed both with and without a projectile and the results compared. Three generic muzzle brake geometries are used for simulations. Impulses computed from thermodynamic model and CFD model are combined to evaluate the gun recoil. The CFD model, with initial conditions transferred from the thermodynamic model, can further be used to analyse the influence from the muzzle break on the flow.


Long‐term monitoring data from eastern North America and Europe indicate a link between increased dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations in surface waters over the last two decades and decreased atmospheric pollutant and marine sulphur (S) deposition. The hypothesis is that decreased acidity and ionic strength associated with declining S deposition has increased the solubility of DOC. However, the sign and magnitude of DOC trends have varied between sites, and in some cases at sites where S deposition has declined, no significant increase in DOC has been observed, creating uncertainty about the causal mechanisms driving the observed trends. In this paper, we demonstrate chemical regulation of DOC release from organic soils in batch experiments caused by changes in acidity and conductivity (measured as a proxy for ionic strength) associated with controlled SO42− additions. DOC release from the top 10 cm of the O‐horizon of organo‐mineral soils and peats decreased by 21–60% in response to additions of 0–437 µeq SO42− l−1 sulphuric acid (H2SO4) and neutral sea‐salt solutions (containing Na+, Mg2+, Cl−, SO42−) over a 20‐hour extraction period. A significant decrease in the proportion of the acid‐sensitive coloured aromatic humic acids (measured by specific ultra‐violet absorbance (SUVA) at 254 nm) was also found with increasing acidity (P < 0.05) in most, but not all, soils, confirming that DOC quality, as well as quantity, changed with SO42− additions. DOC release appeared to be more sensitive to increased acidity than to increased conductivity. By comparing the change in DOC release with bulk soil properties, we found that DOC release from the O‐horizon of organo‐mineral soils and semi‐confined peats, which contained greater exchangeable aluminium (Al) and had lower base saturation (BS), were more sensitive to SO42− additions than DOC release from blanket peats with low concentrations of exchangeable Al and greater BS. Therefore, variation in soil type and acid/base status between sites may partly explain the difference in the magnitude of DOC changes seen at different sites where declines in S deposition have been similar.


Several series of polyol ester (POE) refrigeration lubricants have been investigated for low GWP refrigerant R32 (R-410A replacement) and HFO-1234ze (R-134a replacement). The main problems of R32/HFO refrigeration lubricant development can be summarized as balancing between miscibility, solubility and lubricity. Generally speaking, refrigerant-lubricant mixture with highly miscible property in low temperature evaporator will lead to more soluble phenomenon in high temperature compressor. Therefore, when refrigerant is well miscible with refrigeration lubricant, dissolved refrigerant will reduce working viscosity of refrigerant-oil mixture in compressor, and thus results in lower lubricity, wear of sliding parts, and compressor durability shortage. In our studies, the key factor which result in aforementioned phenomenon was found, and can be controlled independently by using optimized chemical structure. For R32 compressor system, we have successfully developed a series of POE refrigeration lubricant, with viscosities ranging from 32cSt to 90cSt at 40°C, and with a wide range of miscibility (20% oil) from -40°C to 2°C. From results of PVT experiments and lubricity tests (Falex P/V and four ball), it demonstrated to be possible to develop a POE oil with high miscibility, low solubility and high working viscosity. All results in R32 system were better than traditional refrigeration lubricant in R410A system. Meanwhile, we also were able to identify the relationship between surface tension of chemical structure and lubricity. For HFO-1234ze compressor system, incumbent refrigeration lubricants suitable for R134a are almost fully miscible in HFO-1234ze, which could lead to severe refrigerant dilution of lubricant viscosity and poor lubricity due to high solubility. Through studies of chemical structure of refrigeration lubricants, reliable experimental tests and rigorous thermodynamic calculation, we created a range of POE lubricants (ISO68 to ISO220) with miscibility (20% oil) from -33°C to -13°C, all the while, maintaining solubility and working viscosity on par with the common POE refrigeration lubricants currently used in R-134a system.


An account of the post-imperial disintegration of East Central Europe. In its aftermath, the disintegrated parts passionately cleave to their dispossession by generating political and literary sacrificial narratives. The monograph investigates their interaction.


Perth is a rapidly growing city and the demand for urban land has been steadily increasing over recent years (D.P.I., 2011) and the meeting of environmental legislations for storm-water management and floodplain strategic management is the kernel around which a variety of skills and deep speculation revolves.

Technological advancement and multi-variable calculus have made possible the ability to predict how a given artefact will behave according to a defined series of variables in the environment within which the apparatus is expected to perform its duty. This is to introduce the key role that modelling resembles within the design process.

 In geological terms, it is known with deposition that Perth is accommodated over a rather variegated spectrum of soil types that ranges from sand, silt, clayey sand and clay. Due to this multi-faceted nature there are no standard design guidelines for subsoil drainage systems at date. A calibrated mathematical model can readily facilitate the design process and decision making thanks to its ability to provide groundwater mounding height values for environments with different physical and hydrogeological characteristics.

Subsoil drainage is used throughout the world to control shallow groundwater levels to facilitate land use in both agricultural and urban development. The term subsoil implies that a buried pipe is used as opposed to an open drain, usually where land values are high.

 The primary mechanism by which subsoil drainage functions is the provision of an outlet from a slotted pipe system such that groundwater can flow by gravity, according to Darcy's law, towards the pipe thus lowering groundwater levels.

Subsoil drainage is usually constructed in parallel or sub-parallel lines, so that the water table mounds between the parallel drainage lines.

 Critical parameters determining whether a subsoil drainage system operates as intended are: the soil permeability, the volume of water to be drained in unit time and drain spacing.

On the Swan Coastal Plain subsoil drainage has been used in urban developments where the water table has been shallow for decades, generally with success owing to the characteristically sandy soils and the relatively low rainfall in the South West of Western Australia.

This paper describes a subsoil drainage experimental site in the City of Armadale, instrumented to monitor water table mounding between a set of parallel subsoil drains in imported sand fill in 2009 and 2010. The paper describes the data collected together with application of a suitable model to represent the relevant components of water flux, and an application of that model to design the subsoil drainage systems on the Swan Coastal Plain.

It is the contention of this paper that a properly designed and calibrated model is to foresee the rise and decline of the perched water table under a given set of environmental conditions. Doing so, it will be possible to implement the Best Practice Technique (BPT) while addressing the need to avoid the oversizing of sand-fill requirements and consequent levitation of capital budget, maximise the security of assets and obviate the violation of buildings' structural integrity.

 In terms of literature review, it has been deliberately decided to report references that are relevant to the Western Australia scenario solely: this is justified by the unique morpho-geological arrangement of the Swan Coastal Plain; in fact, overseas regulators for urban development may enforce building codes, approval schemes and land sub-divisional requirements that are not parallel to the Australian decisional criteria for such practices.


This is the second article in a two-part introduction to Chinese historical syntax. The previous article introduces aspects of pre-medieval grammar which differ markedly from modern Chinese varieties, specifically fronting of object NPs to preverbal position, the asymmetry between subject and object relative clause formation, and the encoding of argument structure alternations like active and passive. Each of these characteristics is related to morphological distinctions on nouns, verbs, or pronouns which are either overtly represented in the logographic writing system in Archaic Chinese or have been reconstructed for (Pre-)Archaic Chinese. In this second article, I discuss changes which took place in Middle Chinese and correlate these innovations with the loss of the (Pre-)Archaic Chinese morphology. The main goal of these articles is to highlight a common denominator, i.e. the morphology, which enables a systemic view of pre-medieval Chinese and the changes which have resulted in the striking differences observed in Middle Chinese and beyond.


Synopsis This paper presents the results of research on the development and application of a custom-made truck cycle and delay automated data collection system (TCD-ADCS) in a surface coal mining. Truck cycle and delay field data are locally stored in trucks and then synchronized and replicated through a wireless network into a centralized server containing an already-developed integrated production management system (IPMS). The system relies on motion sensing and distance travelled in order to automatically define the cycle starting/ending points, cycle time, position, and delay time. Connectivity and communication between loading equipment and trucks are also established. Communication between the equipment operators and TCD-ADCS system is via a user-friendly graphic interface. The hardware used for the development of this system consists of a rugged touch-screen personal computer, 2.4 GHz radio transmitter antenna, and a commercial GPS receiver. The system was developed, tested, and deployed at a surface coal mine in the USA.


Formal treatment of collaborative multi-agent systems has been lagging behind the rapid progress in sequential decision making by individual agents. Recent work in the area of decentralized Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) has contributed to closing this gap, but the computational complexity of these models remains a serious obstacle. To overcome this complexity barrier, we identify a specific class of decentralized MDPs in which the agents' transitions are independent. The class consists of independent collaborating agents that are tied together through a structured global reward function that depends on all of their histories of states and actions. We present a novel algorithm for solving this class of problems and examine its properties, both as an optimal algorithm and as an anytime algorithm. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first algorithm to optimally solve a non-trivial subclass of decentralized MDPs. It lays the foundation for further work in this area on both exact and approximate algorithms.


The game of Yahtzee is a semi-strategic luck based game, which means it should be possible to maximize the score with an optimal strategy. The main purpose of the study is to compare the results of the optimal algorithm with other useable strategies when playing Yahtzee. To receive interesting results, the strategies and decisions made by the algorithms will be compared and analyzed in performance as well as by creating an environment where they have to choose from the same set of dices. To further see how well the different algorithms performed, Human Trials were conducted where 6 humans contributed by playing the game of Yahtzee 300 times. These test subjects were familiar with the game of Yahtzee and in this study it is concluded that these subjects had through reinforcement learning created an almost optimal play style. Our conclusion is that the Optimal Algorithm performs better than other algorithms that because it does not take any risks while playing while it tries to maximize the score but doing this uses a great amount of computation power, approximately 13.8GB of RAM and around 22 hours to complete.


Complex robotics systems are often built as a system of modules, where each module solves a separate data processing task to produce the complex overall behavior that is required of the robot. For instance, the perception system for autonomous off-road navigation discussed in this thesis uses a terrain classification module, a ground-plane estimation module, and a path-planning module among others. Splitting a complex task into a series of sub-problems allows human designers to engineer solutions for each sub-problem independently, and devise efficient specialized algorithms to solve them. However, modular design can also create problems for applying learning algorithms. Ideally, learning should find parameters for each module that optimize the performance of the overall system. This requires obtaining "local" information for each module about how changing the parameters of that module will impact the output of the system.
Previous work in modular learning [1, 2] showed that if the modules of system were differentiable, gradient descent could be used to provide this local information in "shallow" systems containing with two or three modules between input and output. However, except for convolutional neural networks, this procedure was rarely successful in "deep" systems of more than three modules. Many robotics applications added an additional complication by employing a planning algorithm to produce their output. This makes it hard to define a "loss" function to judge how well the system is performing, or compute a gradient with respect to previous modules in the system.
Recent advances in learning deep neural networks [3, 4] suggest that learning in deep systems can be successful if data-dependent regularization is first used to provide relevant local information to the modules of the system, and the modules are then jointly optimized by gradient descent. Concurrently, research in imitation learning [5, 6] has offered effective new ways of defining loss functions for the output of planning modules.
This thesis combines these lines of research to develop new tools for learning in modular systems. As data-dependent regularization has been shown to be critical to success in deep modular systems, several significant contributions are provided in this area. A novel, differentiable formulation of sparse coding is presented and shown to be a powerful semi-supervised learning algorithm. Sparse coding has traditionally used non-convex optimization methods, and an alternative, convex formulation is developed with a deterministic optimization procedure. Theoretical contributions developed for this convex formulation also enable an efficient, online multi-task learning algorithm. Results in domain adaptation provide further regularization options. To allow joint optimization of systems that employ planning modules, this thesis leverages loss functions developed in recent imitation learning research, and develops techniques for improving all modules of the system with subgradient descent. Finally, this thesis has also made significant contributions to mobile robot perception for navigation, providing terrain classification techniques that been incorporated into fielded industrial and government systems [7].


Currently, the most common strategy of forest biodiversity managers in the Pacific and Inland Northwest (PINW) is to maintain structural complexity within forest stands and create the full range of seral stages across the landscape. Recent advances in ecological theory reveal that biodiversity at regional to continental scales is strongly influenced by available energy (i.e. factors influencing vegetative growth such as precipitation, temperature, radiation, soil fertility). We hypothesized bird species richness (BSR) exhibits a positive or unimodal relationship with energy across landscapes and the relationship between energy and BSR within a landscape is positive in energy limited landscapes and flat or decreasing in energy rich landscapes. Additionally, we hypothesized that structural complexity explains a lower percentage of the variation in BSR in energy limited environments and higher percentage in energy rich environments and that the slope of the relationship between structural complexity and BSR is greatest in energy rich environments. Ours is the first study to test the relative influence of energy and vegetation structure on BSR at local scales, and to offer predictive theory on how these influences differ across energy gradients. We sampled bird communities and vegetation across a matrix of seral stages and biophysical settings at each of 5 landscapes. We analyzed the response of BSR to structural complexity and energy covariates at each landscape. We found that (1) BSR had a unimodal relationship with available energy across the PINW region, (2) the landscape-scale relationships between energy and BSR were positive or unimodal in energy limited locations and were flat or negative in energy rich locations, (3) forest structural complexity explained more of the variation in bird species richness in energy rich landscapes, and (4) the slope of the relationship between forest structural complexity and BSR was steepest in energy limited locations and negative in energy rich locations. In energy rich locations, forest managers will likely increase landscape-scale diversity by providing all seral-stages and a range of forest structural complexity. In low-energy environments, biodiversity will likely be maximized by managing local high-energy hotspots judiciously and adjusting harvest intensities in other locations to compensate for slower regeneration rates.


: Objective: To evaluate the effects of diet control and Metformin on placental morphology in gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Methods: After written informed consent 62 GDMs were enrolled. According to WHO criteria, 30 cases of GDMs with blood sugar level <130 mg/dl, were assigned Group B (2000-2500Kcal/day and 30 minute walk thrice weekly were kept on diet control and 32 cases of GDM with blood sugar level >130 mg/dl, assigned Group C were kept on diet with tablet Metformin,(500mg TDS) Finally 25 normal pregnant females were kept in Group A as control. After delivery placentae were preserved and evaluated for morphology. Results: Heavy placentae with abundant villous immaturity, chorangiosis and syncytial knots in group B and fibrinoid necrosis and calcification in group C were seen. In group B versus A placental and cord width while in Group C versus A only cord width in gross morphology showed significant results. In group B versus A villous immaturity, chorangiosis, infarction and syncytial knots in light microscopy were present; similarly in B versus C placental width, chorangiosis and syncytial knots showed significant results, while in C versus A results were non-significant. Conclusion: Metformin produced beneficial effects on placental morphology being comparable to normal control in contrast to diet group.


800x600 In this article, two lenses are used to engage the task of African Biblical Hermeneutics. The one lens is derived from African wisdom, i shavha i sia muinga i ya fhi?, in which there is a need for people to affirm their own roots. Drawing from the wisdom of the preceding proverb, we argue that, in their scholarship, African biblical scholars have to take seriously their own African heritage and thus do justice to their contexts rather than rely heavily on Western paradigms if their scholarship is to impact communities and also contribute towards shaping the face of biblical hermeneutics as a whole. The other lens is an analogy derived from the following events in Jesus' life: incarnation, death and resurrection. The task of African Biblical Hermeneutics has to be a three-fold process for the Bible to be 'gospel' in Africa: Firstly, the incarnation of the Word – the Bible as the Other has to incarnate into African contexts for it to become an African Word. Secondly, the death of the Word – this entails a critical engagement with the Word from multiple perspectives for it to be relevant to the struggles of African people. Thirdly, the resurrection of the Word – the biblical text has to be allowed to address and transform an African person in new creative ways. Normal 0 false false false EN-ZA X-NONE HE Normal 0 false false false EN-ZA X-NONE HE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4


The aim of the article is to introduce a project-management efficiency model in order to rank the dimensions of efficient project management in the public sector. There is a need to develop and introduce measurement instruments that would enable decision-makers to prioritise the important dimensions of efficient project management. The results of the model will also demonstrate how project management acts as the primary function to enhance organisational performance, codified through improved logical endstate programmes, work ethics and process contributions. The efficiency model/instrument that was developed can act as a tool to enable project managers to determine the important dimensions of efficient project management in their specific organisations. A greater level of efficiency can be achieved if the organisation can work more efficiently and provide more effective services. The introduction of efficient project-management practices for an organisation is of the utmost importance in helping the organisation to fundamentally adapt to external threats to its existence and focus its endeavours in a coordinated manner.


PurposeThis paper investigates the impact of adopting quality management standards like ISO9001 on a firm's performance and the mediator role of human capabilities within firms in this relationship. The article analyses this mediator effect in the context of an emerging economy that set a policy reform aimed at increase ISO adoption and with a large share of informal labour markets.Design/methodology/approachThis study implements a quantitative approach, applying a Difference in Differences-DiD model with a Propensity Score Matching on fixed effect panel data analysis of a sample of certified and non-certified firms using firm-level data obtained from the national statistics office of Colombia. This methodology allows having comparable groups before the policy implementation. It reduces differences in observable characteristics and controls for parallel trends in primary outcomes before the policy reform.FindingsThe research findings suggest that after Colombian policy reform of the quality system (2006), firms that adopted ISO 9001 certification increased innovation (5.2%), labour productivity (4.6%), sales (5.7%) and wages (4.9%). Furthermore, it shows that the share of permanent workers is an essential mediator in adopting quality programs. Adopters firms with a large percentage of temporary workers weaken their initial investment in quality infrastructure.Research limitations/implicationsThis research does not consider one key aspect. This is the lack of information about the organizational culture inside Colombian organizations that is related to a successful implementation of Quality Management standards like ISO 9001. However, it does not affect the conclusion about the mediation effect of human capital in the relationship between ISO 9001 and firm performance.Practical implicationsThe study covered all the Colombian manufacturing firms with ten or more employees. It provides critical insight for managers to value implementing ISO 9001 certification and appropriately put attention to enhancing their firms' human capital in emerging economies. Also, a policy implication of the paper is that governmental efforts to strengthen quality infrastructure in emerging economies should also include steps to increase a firm's investment in human capital.Originality/valueThis study provides further support for government policies to strengthen firms' incentives to adopt modern management practices. The strong effects of implementing these management practices on sales, productivity and innovation have been identified. Furthermore, the investments in quality infrastructure must be accompanied by investment in human capital and workforce stability.