There is growing interest in the potential and use of extracellular vesicles (EVs) for a range of diagnostic and therapeutic applications. EVs have been shown, in some instances, to mediate the regenerative effects elicited by stem cell therapies. As such, they are being studied to identify the extent to which these extracellular bodies can be employed as a therapeutic entity, and significant R&D activity is underway to further understand their clinical and commercial potential. However, successful translation will first require further characterization and standardization of EV production, as well as addressing some of the major challenges associated with their reproducible manufacture. This includes the capacity to produce EVs at a scale that is both clinically and commercially effective. This article will highlight some of the bioprocessing and manufacturing considerations and challenges associated with the standardized production of EVs.


The purpose of this assignment is to measure the extent that Rea Vaya Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system has delivered transport services to commuters on the phase 1A route connecting Soweto (Thokoza Park station) and Johannesburg Central Business District (CBD) (Ellispark station). Five service quality dimensions were used to measure the level of service provided by Rea Vaya namely tangibles, empathy, assurance, responsiveness and reliability. Positivism was used as the research philosophy, which is a scientific method that tests theories using structured and measurable methods such as a structured questionnaire and observations. Quantitative data was collected for this research, in a form of a structured questionnaire and observation. 100 questionnaires were issued to commuters to complete at Thokoza park station and all 100 were collected, added to this, a stopwatch was used to measure time frequencies between bus arrivals. Excel software was used to analyse the data collected into meaningful information. This research indicates that of the five service quality dimensions only two dimensions are totally satisfied namely empathy and tangibles. The other three dimensions namely assurance, reliability and responsiveness were partially satisfied. Therefore, Rea Vaya management should make attempts in improving the element of partially satisfied dimensions. More specifically, management needs to empower officials at the stations with authority to make decisions regarding commuter grievances, better scheduling methods to solve overcrowding during peak periods and information devices both busses and stations needs to be maintained and kept serviceable. Currently Rea Vaya ridership has decreased from 35 000 commuters daily in 2010 to 16 000 commuters daily showing a decline in ridership overtime. This paints a picture that indicates that the commuters are not satisfied with the service provided by Rea Vaya resulting in using alternative transport modes. When the Rea Vaya managers fix the abovementioned findings, it is expected that the ridership should gradually increase, perhaps to even above planned carrying capacity of 75 000 commuters daily.


Aims. We present laboratory studies of the micro-structural evolution of an amorphous ferro-magnesian silicate, of olivine composition, following thermal annealing under vacuum. Methods. The amorphous silicate was prepared as a thin film on a diamond substrate. Annealing under vacuum was performed at temperatures ranging from 870 to 1020 K. After annealing the thin films were extracted from the substrate and analysed by transmission electron microscopy to infer their microstructural and compositional evolution. Results. Spheroidal metallic nano-particles (2−50 nm) are found within the silicate films, which are still amorphous after annealing at 870 K and partially crystallized into forsterite for annealing up to 1020 K. We interpret this microstructure in terms of a reduction of the initial amorphous silicate FeO component, because of the carbon-rich partial pressure in the furnace due to pumping mechanism. Annealing in a controlled oxygen-rich atmosphere confirms this interpretation. Conclusions. The observed microstructures closely resemble those of the GEMS (Glass with Embedded Metal and Sulphides) found in chondritic IDPs (Interplanetary Dust Particles). Since IDPs contain abundant carbonaceous matter, a solid-state reduction reaction may have occurred during heating in the hot inner regions of the proto-solar disc. Related to this, the presence of forsterite grains grown from the amorphous precursor material clearly demonstrates that condensation from gaseous species is not required to explain the occurrence of forsterite around young protostars and in comets. Forsterite grains in these environments can be formed directly in the solid phase by thermal annealing of amorphous ferro-magnesian silicates precursor under reducing conditions. Finally, locking iron as metallic particles within the silicates explains why astronomical silicates always appear observationally Mg-rich.


A technique that employs two seed signals for the purpose of mitigating stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) effects in narrow-linewidth Yb-doped fiber amplifiers is investigated theoretically by constructing a self-consistent model that incorporates the laser gain, SBS, and four-wave mixing (FWM). The model reduces to solving a two-point boundary problem consisting of an 8x8 system of coupled nonlinear differential equations. Optimal operating conditions are determined by examining the interplay between the wavelength separation and power ratio of the two seeds. Two variants of this 'two-tone' amplification are considered. In one case the wavelength separation is precisely twice the Brillouin shift, while the other case considers a greater wavelength separation. For the former case, a two-fold increase in total output power over a broad range of seed power ratios centered about a ratio of approximately 2 is obtained, but with fairly large FWM. For the latter case, this model predicts an approximately 100% increase in output power (at SBS threshold with no signs of FWM) for a 'two-tone' amplifier with seed signals at 1064nm and 1068nm, compared to a conventional fiber amplifier with a single 1068nm seed. More significantly for this case, it is found that at a wavelength separation greater than 10nm, it is possible to appreciably enhance the power output of one of the laser frequencies.


Neural Machine Translation (NMT) is a new approach to machine translation that has shown promising results that are comparable to traditional approaches. A significant weakness in conventional NMT systems is their inability to correctly translate very rare words: end-to-end NMTs tend to have relatively small vocabularies with a single unk symbol that represents every possible out-of-vocabulary (OOV) word. In this paper, we propose and implement an effective technique to address this problem. We train an NMT system on data that is augmented by the output of a word alignment algorithm, allowing the NMT system to emit, for each OOV word in the target sentence, the position of its corresponding word in the source sentence. This information is later utilized in a post-processing step that translates every OOV word using a dictionary. Our experiments on the WMT'14 English to French translation task show that this method provides a substantial improvement of up to 2.8 BLEU points over an equivalent NMT system that does not use this technique. With 37.5 BLEU points, our NMT system is the first to surpass the best result achieved on a WMT'14 contest task.


Sorghum is one of the main cereal crops, its consumption is large, since it provides grain, fiber and biofuel. Likewise, its genome, with only 10 diploid chromosomes, makes it an attractive model for research and genetic improvement. Sorghum is the most studied C4 plant of its genus; several lines have been developed under three main characteristics: grain, forage and sugar biomass. Compared to other crops, sweet sorghum possesses high levels of highly fermentable sugars in the stem. Also, it has the ability of producing high production yields in marginal lands. These characteristics make it and attractive crop for the generation of biofuels. Molecular markers associated to several resistances and tolerances to biotic and abiotic factors have been described in literature. These allow the development of high-density linkage maps, which, along with the rising availability of sorghum genomes, will accelerate the identification of markers and the integration of the complete genome sequence. This will facilitate the selection of traits related to biofuels and the marker-assisted genetic improvement. Most of the information presented in this review is focused in Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench. However, from the bioenergetics perspective, it is limited to sweet sorghum, which represents a promising opportunity for further studies.


With the rapid adoption of web services, the need to protect against various threats has become imperative for organizations operating in cyberspace. Organizations are increasingly opting to get financial cover in the event of losses due to a security incident. This helps them safeguard against the threat posed to third-party services that the organization uses. It is in the organization's interest to understand the insurance requirements and procure all necessary direct and liability coverages. This helps transfer some risks to the insurance providers. However, cyber insurance policies often list details about coverages and exclusions using legalese that can be difficult to comprehend. Currently, it takes a significant manual effort to parse and extract knowledgeable rules from these lengthy and complicated policy documents. We have developed a semantically rich machine processable framework to automatically analyze cyber insurance policy and populate a knowledge graph that efficiently captures various inclusion and exclusion terms and rules embedded in the policy. In this paper, we describe this framework that has been built using technologies from AI, including Semantic Web, Modal/ Deontic Logic, and Natural Language Processing. We have validated our approach using industry standards proposed by the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and applying it against publicly available policies of 7 cyber insurance vendors. Our system will enable cyber insurance seekers to automatically analyze various policy documents and make a well-informed decision by identifying its inclusions and exclusions.


An accurate numerical simulation study of a polarization conversion phenomenon in deeply etched semiconductor electro-optic waveguide modulators is presented. Based on a powerful and versatile finite element package, the effect of various imperfect fabrication conditions on unwanted and unexpected polarization conversion in electro-optic semiconductor modulators is, for the first time to our knowledge reported and explained in terms of its origin.


In 802.11 managed wireless networks, the manager can address under-served links by rate-limiting the conflicting nodes. In order to determine to what extent each conflicting node is responsible for the poor performance, the manager needs to understand the coordination among conflicting nodes' transmissions. In this paper, we present a management framework called MIDAS (Management, Inference, and Diagnostics using Activity Share). We introduce the concept of Activity Share which characterizes the coordination among any set of network nodes in terms of the time they spend transmitting simultaneously. Unfortunately, the Activity Share cannot be locally measured by the nodes. Thus, MIDAS comprises an inference tool which, based on a combined physical, protocol, and statistical approach, infers the Activity Share by using a small set of passively collected, time-aggregate local channel measurements reported by the nodes. MIDAS uses the estimated Activity Share as the input of a simple model that predicts how limiting the transmission rate of any conflicting node would benefit the throughput of the under-served link. The model is based on the current network conditions, thus representing the first throughput model using online measurements. We implemented our tool on real hardware and deployed it on an indoor testbed. Our extensive validation combines testbed experiments and simulations. The results show that MIDAS infers the Activity Share with an average normalized relative error below 12% in all testbed experiments.


Richard Lynn's paper on the existence and the magnitude of sex differences in general intelligence proposes that among adults men have a higher average IQ than women and greater variability, and these contribute to the greater number of men among high achievers. The greater variability of males may be attributable to X-linked transmission of intelligence and/or to higher testosterone that could increase the expression of genes related to neurological development or cognition.
Key Words: Intelligence, Sex differences, X-linked inheritance


Abstract. Precipitation changes the physical and biological characteristics of an ecosystem. Using a precipitation-based conditional sampling technique and a 14 year data set from a 25 m micrometeorological tower in a high-elevation subalpine forest, we examined how warm-season precipitation affected the above-canopy diel cycle of wind and turbulence, net radiation Rnet, ecosystem eddy covariance fluxes (sensible heat H, latent heat LE, and CO2 net ecosystem exchange NEE) and vertical profiles of scalars (air temperature Ta, specific humidity q, and CO2 dry mole fraction χc). This analysis allowed us to examine how precipitation modified these variables from hourly (i.e., the diel cycle) to multi-day time-scales (i.e., typical of a weather-system frontal passage). During mid-day we found the following: (i) even though precipitation caused mean changes on the order of 50–70 % to Rnet, H, and LE, the surface energy balance (SEB) was relatively insensitive to precipitation with mid-day closure values ranging between 90 and 110 %, and (ii) compared to a typical dry day, a day following a rainy day was characterized by increased ecosystem uptake of CO2 (NEE increased by a 10 %), enhanced evaporative cooling (mid-day LE increased by a 30 W m−2), and a smaller amount of sensible heat transfer (mid-day H decreased by a 70 W m−2). Based on the mean diel cycle, the evaporative contribution to total evapotranspiration was, on average, around 6 % in dry conditions and between 15 and 25 % in partially wet conditions. Furthermore, increased LE lasted at least 18 h following a rain event. At night, even though precipitation (and accompanying clouds) reduced the magnitude of Rnet, LE increased from a 10 to over 20 W m−2 due to increased evaporation. Any effect of precipitation on the nocturnal SEB closure and NEE was overshadowed by atmospheric phenomena such as horizontal advection and decoupling that create measurement difficulties. Above-canopy mean χc during wet conditions was found to be about 2–3 μmol mol−1 larger than χc on dry days. This difference was fairly constant over the full diel cycle suggesting that it was due to synoptic weather patterns (different air masses and/or effects of barometric pressure). Finally, the effect of clouds on the timing and magnitude of daytime ecosystem fluxes is described.


Bacterial speck, caused by the pathogen Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato, is one of the most common diseases in tomato production. Together with Pto kinase, the NLR (nucleotide-binding domain leucine-rich repeat containing) protein Prf confers resistance against the bacterial speck pathogen by recognizing AvrPto and AvrPtoB, two Type III effector proteins secreted by P. syringae pv. tomato. This Prf/Pto pathway is part of a complex NLR network in solanaceous plants that mediates resistance to diverse pathogens through the helper NLR proteins NRCs (NLR required for cell death). We previously showed that, in Nicotiana benthamiana, the hypersensitive cell death elicited by expression of AvrPto and Pto, which activate immunity through the endogenous Prf ortholog NbPrf, requires functionally redundant NRC2 and NRC3. However, whether tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) Prf (SlPrf) confers resistance to the bacterial speck pathogen through NRC2 and NRC3 has not been determined. In this study, we show that SlPrf requires NRC2 and NRC3 to trigger hypersensitive cell death and disease resistance in both N. benthamiana and tomato. We found that the hypersensitive cell death induced by AvrPtoB/Pto/SlPrf in N. benthamiana is compromised when NRC2 and NRC3 are silenced, indicating that SlPrf is an NRC2/3-dependent NLR. We validated this finding by showing that silencing NRC2 and NRC3 in the bacterial speck resistant tomato 'Rio Grande 76R' compromised Prf-mediated resistance. These results indicate that the NRC network extends beyond N. benthamiana to solanaceous crops.


Recent warming has had enormous impacts on glaciers and high-mountain environments. Hazards have changed or new ones have emerged, including those from glacier lakes that form as glaciers retreat. The Andes of Peru have repeatedly been severely impacted by glacier lake outburst floods in the past. An important recent event occurred in the Cordillera Blanca in 2010 when an ice avalanche impacted a glacier lake and triggered an outburst flood that affected the downstream communities and city of Carhuaz. In this study we evaluate how such complex cascades of mass movement processes can be simulated coupling different physically-based numerical models. We furthermore develop an approach that allows us to elaborate corresponding hazard maps according to existing guidelines for debris flows and based on modelling results and field work.


This article examines wife abuse attitudes among a sample of 507 Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Cambodian adults living in the United States. The findings show that 24% to 36% of the sample agreed that violence is justified in certain situations such as a wife's sexual infidelity, her nagging, or her refusal to cook or clean. Southeast Asian respondents were more supportive of attitudes supporting male privilege and of the use of violence in specific situations in comparison with the East Asian respondents. Korean respondents were unique in their relatively weak endorsements of violence in contrast to the remaining three groups studied.


This document contains best current practice examples of Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) call flows showing interworking with the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). Elements in these call flows include SIP User Agents, SIP Proxy Servers, and PSTN Gateways. Scenarios include SIP to PSTN, PSTN to SIP, and PSTN to PSTN via SIP. PSTN telephony protocols are illustrated using ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network), ISUP (ISDN User Part), and FGB (Feature Group B) circuit associated signaling. PSTN calls are illustrated using global telephone numbers from the PSTN and private extensions served on by a PBX (Private Branch Exchange). Call flow diagrams and message details are shown.


Wireless Ad Hoc Networks are a particular paradigm where wireless devices communicate in a decentralized fashion, without any centralized infrastructure or decision. In order to avoid a situation where nodes chaotically try to communicate, distributed and localized structures (graphs, trees, etc.) need to be built. Mobility brings challenging issues to the maintenance and to the optimality of such structures. In conventional approaches, structures are adapted to the current topology by each node periodically sending beacon messages, which is a significant waste of network resources. If each node can obtain some a priori knowledge of future topology configurations, it could decide to send maintenance messages only when a change in the topology effectively requires updating the structure. In this Doctoral Thesis, we investigate this approach and define the Kinetic Graphs, a novel paradigm regrouping mobility predictions for a kinetic mobility management, and localized and distributed graph protocols to insure a high scalability. The Kinetic Graph framework is able to naturally capture the dynamics of mobile structures, and is composed of four steps: (i) a representation of the trajectories, (ii) a common message format for the posting of those trajectories, (iii) a time varying weight for building the kinetic structures, (iv) an aperiodic neighborhood maintenance. By following this framework, we show that any structure-based ad-hoc protocol may benefit from the kinetic approach. A significant challenge of Kinetic Graphs comes from prediction errors. In order to analyze them, we illustrate the relationship between the prediction model and the mobility model. We decompose the prediction errors into three metrics: the adequacy between the prediction and the mobility models, the predicability of the mobility model, and the mobility model's realism. Following the framework, we define a kinetic model for the modeling of the trajectories and then analyze the extents of the effects of each error metric and develop solutions in order to reduce them. We finally adapt the Multipoint Relaying (MPR) protocol, used by the Optimized Link State Routing protocol (OLSR), and show the significant improvements that may be obtained by using the Kinetic Graph Framework, even on the very challenging vehicular networks.


Justice Marshall's opinion in Furman v. Georgia memorably characterizes the abolition of capital punishment as "a major milestone in the long road up from barbarism." (1) For abolitionists today, it is surprising to recall that this phrase was not coined by Marshall, but borrowed from former Attorney General Ramsey Clark. (2) That the chief law enforcement official of the United States might publicly condemn capital punishment is, from a modern perspective, almost unimaginable. Since then, we have seen one liberal presidential candidacy founder at least in part on resisting the lure of vengeance: Michael Dukakis's rejection of capital punishment even for a hypothesized murderer of his wife hurt him badly. We have also watched two purportedly liberal candidates hustle to support capital punishment in particularly dubious circumstances; Bill Clinton left the campaign trail to sign the death warrant of a man so mentally impaired by a self-inflicted gunshot wound that he didn't understand dying, (3) and Barack Obama joined the clamor against a (conservative) Supreme Court's decision that imposition of the death penalty for child rape is unconstitutional. (4) But back in Furman's day, it was politically possible to condemn capital punishment. Indeed, by the time the Court decided Furman, it seemed that, like torture, capital punishment would eventually and inevitably be consigned to the dustbin of history. (5) In fact, Furman was the culmination of a long campaign by the Legal Defense Fund of the NAACP, one fought on multiple constitutional fronts in the attempt to achieve a moratorium. The LDF attack on the death penalty, which began because of manifest racial injustice in the imposition of the death penalty, continued to gather data on racial disparities in anticipation of a racial challenge. But it also pressed the issue of "death qualification," which resulted in the seating of juries particularly likely to convict and prone to favor capital punishment, the unreliability in the sentencing determination introduced by unitary proceedings, the broad use of capital punishment for crimes less than murder, and the lack of guidance given to juries in the determination of whether death was appropriate. When Furman struck down capital punishment statutes from Georgia and Texas, the LDF's jubilation is easily imagined, and has been somewhat ruefully chronicled. (6) Whether or not the euphoria was widely shared, the belief--or, at least, the fervent hope--that Furman signaled the end of capital punishment was not limited to the abolitionist camp. (7) That hope, however, was short-lived. The backlash to Furman was both swift and furious. Public outrage was fierce, and by 1976, thirty-five states had enacted new capital punishment statutes designed to remedy the flaws identified in the Furman opinions. Although almost 600 lives were spared by Furman--lives that, as Joan Cheever documented, were largely lived out nonviolently (8)--in the end, or at least in the middle, capital punishment was both reinstated and reinvigorated. Four years later, in Gregg v. Georgia, (9) the Supreme Court upheld Georgia's new "guided discretion" capital punishment statute, and by the end of the century, American executions approached a hundred a year. Why? There are many answers, including rising crime rates and changes in Supreme Court personnel. But certainly some of the explanation lies in the multiple Furman opinions, for just as Brown v. Board of Education (10) exemplifies strategic unanimity, Furman reflects a remarkable disregard for consensus. Every Justice wrote his own opinion, and none of the Justices in the majority even joined another Justice's opinion. The articles in this section reveal, in different but fundamental ways, both the folly of that fractured approach and an animating faith that Furman was nonetheless rightly decided. Professor Sullivan's article (11) explores the persistent problem of race. …


The central nucleus of the amygdala (CE) projects to target areas that elicit autonomic and behavioral symptoms of fear. It has been shown that in stressful or fearful paradigms, endogenous norepinephrine (NE) is released into the CE. Microinjections of NE into the CE could activate fear circuits in the brain and lead to fear-like behavior. The CE projects to an area of the brain called the dorsal raphe nucleus (DR), specifically the dorsal raphe nucleus, ventrolateral part (DRVL) and the adjacent ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (VLPAG). We hypothesize that NE binds to adrenergic receptors in the CE to stimulate corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) projections to the DR, where CRF binds to CRF type 2 receptors (CRFR2), which can elicit freezing behavior through serotonergic projections to a multisynaptic circuit controlling somatomotor neurons in the spinal cord. To test this hypothesis, we gave bilateral microinjections of NE (250 nmoles in 0.2 μL per side) into the CE and then immediately measured freezing behavior using the open-field test paradigm. Norepinephrine microinjections into the CE increased both the frequency and duration of freezing behavior. As the project is currently in the process of completion, we hope to also show that serotonergic neurons in the DR were activated in projection areas associated with previously established fear circuitry. This study was conducted to gain insight into control of serotonergic pathways that could lead to advancement of our understanding of stress-related mental illnesses.


Introduction: Marriage and family are one of the factors in mental health and individuals' life styles and its role in reducing personal and social disruptions is known. In order to plan properly and increase youth's awareness of right marital criteria, it is necessary to know their viewpoints. Therefore, this study was designed to determine the criteria of married couples about to get married referred to the Marriage Counseling Center of Tuyserkan City in 2015.
Methods: This study was a cross-sectional descriptive-analytic study that was conducted on 204 couples referred to the marriage counseling center, who were selected by the available sampling method, in 2015. The research instrument was a questionnaire including demographic characteristics and preference criteria of spouse selection inventory (PCSS). The data were analyzed by using the chi-square and Spearman correlation test, using SPSS version 17 at the level of error of less than 0.05.
Results: The results showed that among married criteria, 183 persons (89.5%), 179 persons (87.7%) and 177 persons (86.8%) chose love, chastity and mental health. Couples in urban areas married at higher ages. Also, there was a significant relationship between income and occupation and the gender of the couples (P<0.05).
Conclusion: It is essential to hold marriage preparation courses targeting and identifying desire educational needs of the target group in the appropriate time to create right attitude in mate selection criteria..


Serious questions are being asked concerning the manifestation of instability in society. The phenomena of maladministration, corruption, unrest, protests, failure in leadership, and the results of protest marches and poor service delivery, make one believe that the value, functioning and contribution of co-operative governance and intergovernmental relations is a myth. When public protests and instability are analysed, the main issue found at the heart of the problem concerns co-operation, implementation and co-ordination between the various spheres of government. Co-operation is needed to ensure satisfactory service delivery. The question can be asked if there is a direct relationship between poor service delivery, public protests and co-operative governance and good governance. Firstly the conceptual and constitutional framework of co-operative governance and intergovernmental relations will be discussed. In the following section the problems and challenges facing good governance will be analysed. Aspects pertaining to structural tension, policy choices, responsibility, accountability and implications of problems with good governance will be assessed. The manifestation of practical situations will be viewed against the background of co-operative governance.


The state of open science needs to be monitored to track changes over time and identify areas to create interventions to drive improvements. In order to monitor open science practices, they first need to be well defined and operationalized. To reach consensus on what open science practices to monitor at biomedical research institutions, we conducted a modified 3-round Delphi study. Participants were research administrators, researchers, specialists in dedicated open science roles, and librarians. In rounds 1 and 2, participants completed an online survey evaluating a set of potential open science practices, and for round 3, we hosted two half-day virtual meetings to discuss and vote on items that had not reached consensus. Ultimately, participants reached consensus on 19 open science practices. This core set of open science practices will form the foundation for institutional dashboards and may also be of value for the development of policy, education, and interventions.


This research brought together eight women survivors of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) to explore together, as co-researchers, the concept of self-compassion. CSA is recognised to provoke feelings of intense shame (Negrao, Bonanno, Noll, Putman, & Trickett, 2005) leading to feelings of worthlessness and self-condemnation which impacts on psychological well-being (Coffey, Leitenberg, Henning, Turner & Bennett, 1996).

Action research was chosen - an approach of researching with rather than on people - with a focus on human flourishing and with the participants being the beneficiaries of the research (MacDonald, 2012). This was also an opportunity for avoiding the 'doer done-to' (Benjamin, 2004) dynamic, instead empowering women whose will has been subjugated in the past.

Eight women from a Rape and Sexual Agency met weekly over a period of five months to discuss and explore different psychological approaches and theories to see what was helpful in engaging with self-compassion, what were their barriers and, importantly - when a relational trauma is the cause - what was the impact of doing this in a group format?

Exploring this in a group was felt by all the women to be the most important element, as they experienced empathy and compassion for each other's critical and condemning self which, they recognised, mirrored their own experiences. The flattened hierarchy of action research with peers also fostered a developing sense of trust in each other's expressions of empathy and compassion and multiple therapeutic alliances.

In addition, psycho-education around the impact of trauma and developing an 'observing self' (Deikman, 1982) were helpful in bringing acceptance to the self, a pre-requisite before self-compassion could be applied.

The results were related to Neff's three components of self-compassion (Neff, 2008) - selfkindness, common humanity and mindfulness - and can be conceptualised as a movement from a deficit position of self-condemnation, isolation and experiential avoidance towards at least a neutral position from which to develop these three components.

It is argued that the content of theories and models introduced during the research were less important than the process of action research within a therapeutic group, and that this process has potential to be applied to different client groups.


Biologically inspired robots that are used for research of the animal and the technological realm become more and more refined. Control schemes for sensor-less and sensorized robots were developed, are able to handle torque control and sometimes even adapt to a changing task set. Further mechanics and electronics have evolved and take part in more reliable and robust bio-inspired robots. Robots reproduce animal structures or use bio-mechanical principles to excel in a specific task. Never the less, during this evolution of robots the feet were often oversimplified compared to their animal counterparts. Our current work centers around the foot as a bio-mechanically complex but extremely important end-effector.


The companies listed in this notice have applied to the Board for approval, pursuant to the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956 (12 U.S.C. 1841 et seq.) (BHC Act), Regulation Y (12 CFR Part 225), and all other applicable statutes and regulations to become a bank holding company and/or to acquire the assets or the ownership of, control of, or the power to vote shares of a bank or bank holding company and all of the banks and nonbanking companies owned by the bank holding company, including the companies listed below. The applications listed below, as well as other related filings required by the Board, are available for immediate inspection at the Federal Reserve Bank indicated. The applications also will be available for inspection at the offices of the Board of Governors. Interested persons may express their views in writing on the standards enumerated in the BHC Act (12 U.S.C. 1842(c)). If the proposal also involves the acquisition of a nonbanking company, the review also includes whether the acquisition of the nonbanking company complies with the standards in section 4 of the BHC Act (12 U.S.C. 1843). Unless otherwise noted, nonbanking activities will be conducted throughout the United States. Additional information on all bank holding companies may be obtained from the National Information Center Web site at www.ffiec.gov/nic/. Unless otherwise noted, comments regarding each of these applications must be received at the Reserve Bank indicated or the offices of the Board of Governors not later than July 30, 2009. A. Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond (A. Linwood Gill, III, Vice President) 701 East Byrd Street, Richmond, Virginia 23261–4528: 1. Eastern Virginia Bankshares, Inc., Tappahannock, Virginia; to acquire 100 percent of the voting shares of First Capital Bancorp, Inc., and thereby indirectly acquire voting shares of First Capital Bank, both of Glen Allen, Virginia. B. Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas (E. Ann Worthy, Vice President) 2200 North Pearl Street, Dallas, Texas 75201– 2272: 1. A.N.B. Holding Company, Ltd., Terrell, Texas; to aquire additional voting shares, for a total of 35 percent, of The ANB Corporation, and thereby indirectly acquire additional voting shares of The American National Bank, both of Terrell, Texas; Lakeside Bancshares, Inc., and Lakeside National Bank, both of Rockwall, Texas.


We investigate the feasibility of trans-rectal optical tomography of the prostate using an endo-rectal near-infrared (NIR) applicator that is to be integrated with a trans-rectal ultrasound (TRUS) probe. Integration with TRUS ensures accurate endo-rectal positioning of the NIR applicator and the utility of using TRUS spatial prior information to guide NIR image reconstruction. The prostate NIR image reconstruction is challenging even with the use of spatial prior owing to the anatomic complexity of the imaging domain. A hierarchical reconstruction algorithm is developed that implements cascaded initial-guesses for nested domains. This hierarchical image reconstruction method is then applied to evaluating a number of NIR applicator designs for integration with a sagittal TRUS transducer. A NIR applicator configuration feasible for instrumentation development is proposed that contains one linear array of optodes on each lateral side of the sagittal TRUS transducer. The performance of this NIR applicator is characterized for the recovery of single tumor mimicking lesion as well as dual targets in the prostate. The results suggest a strong feasibility of transrectal prostate imaging by use of the endo-rectal NIR/US probe.


1. Stimulation of single giant nerve fibres in the stellar nerves of the squid ( Loligo pealii ) shows them to be motor axons which produce contraction of the circular fibres of the mantle muscles. 2. When a stellar nerve is stimulated with condenser discharges a maximal response is obtained at threshold voltage. No increase of response is obtained by further increase in the strength of stimulation except for an occasional slight increase at about ten times threshold voltage probably due to repetitive firing. It therefore appears that the stimulus produces a single impulse in the giant fibre, and that this is capable of exciting contraction in all the muscle fibres which it reaches. This confirms the conclusion reached on histological grounds that in spite of their syncytial nature each of the giant nerve fibres is a single functional unit. 3. Since there are about ten giant fibres on each side the mantle is divided into 20 neuromotor units, each nerve fibre innervating an enormous number of muscle fibres. The existence of these units can also very readily be demonstrated by the fact that threshold electrical stimulation at any point within the territory innervated by each single giant fibre sets up a contraction of the muscle fibres of all parts of the territory with which the stimulated area is in connexion through the nerve. 4. Stimulation of the smaller fibres in a stellar nerve after destruction of the giant fibre also causes contraction of the circular muscles of the mantle. The amount of this contraction increases progressively with increased voltage, presumably on account of the stimulation of more and more nerve fibres. The maximum tension developed in this way is always very much less than that produced by stimulation of the giant fibres. 5. The mantle is therefore provided with a double mechanism of expiratory contraction, maximal contractions being produced by single impulses in the giant fibres and graded contractions by those in the smaller fibres of the nerve. Presumably the former contractions are those involved in rapid movement, the latter in respiration. 6. There are also radial muscles, running through the thickness of the mantle, whose contractions effect the inspiration by making the cavity larger.


DEVELOPING AN INTERCESSORY PRAYER MINISTRY TO SUPPORT PERSONAL EVANGELISM AT FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, ROANOKE, TEXAS Bruce Allen Barber, D.Min. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary Faculty Supervisor: Dr. Timothy K. Beougher This project developed an intercessory prayer ministry to begin and support an evangelism ministry in a local church. Chapter 1 introduces this project by identifying its goals, context, rationale, and definitions and limitations. First Baptist Church Roanoke, Texas, is in a critical position that is far beyond the church's current conscious understanding. The neighborhood surrounding the church is radically changing, and the church must get on its knees and ask God for guidance and power to reach the Affluent Suburbia households that are unlike it educationally and financially. Chapter 2 provides the biblical foundations for this project. The first half of this chapter reveals there is an Old Testament basis for God's worldwide plan of evangelism. The prophet Isaiah declares God gave Israel a divine call and an evangelistic mission to be a light to the Gentiles. King David discloses that God is sovereign and he hears and answers the prayers of his people as they seek to obey His revealed will. The Prophet Zechariah declares humanity finds God through His people—for God is with his people. The second half of this chapter reveals the New Testament basis for developing an evangelistic intercessory prayer ministry. The apostle Paul and Jesus taught and modeled the interrelatedness of intercessory prayer and evangelism. Through earnest, consistent, and compassionate prayer, Christians, in the power of the Holy Spirit, will fulfill the Great Commission. Chapter 3 addresses the potentially confusing nature of prayer. Deciding upon the absolute sovereignty of God is the first step to clarification and power in prayer. Alpha-Omega Prayer operates with the understanding that the Father calls and prepares hearts to pray while the Holy Spirit initiates prayer within the believer. The benefits of Alpha-Omega Prayer in the local church are its prophetic and priestly roles for intercessors. Alpha-Omega Prayer returns prayer to its rightful foundation, God, and it is a refreshing correction to the current anthropocentric nature of prayer. Chapter 4 presents a detailed account of preparing the church to develop an intercessory prayer ministry to support the ministry of evangelism. A ten-week in the Discipleship Training class using Ogilvie's Conversation with God, a pre-test, a five-part sermon series, eight training seminars, and a post-test were used to equip volunteers and discover the project's affect on those volunteers. Chapter 5 is an evaluation of the project's effectiveness in reaching its four goals. The project attempted to measure, inform, and positively enhance the volunteers' behavior, feelings, and beliefs about evangelism's dependence upon prayer. Finally, it also shares the paradigm shift this project caused within this writers personal life and ministry. Prayer will never be approached the same!


Understanding meat demand and its characteristics are important in giving a more accurate evaluation of the factors that govern consumers' willingness to pay for meat products, and in understanding the relationship and responsiveness between variables. Demand for meat, including beef and beef offal is continuously increasing in Indonesia, and studies in meat demand have been conducted extensively. However, most of those studies did not
consider offal products. This study focuses only on the consumption of offal and beef, considering that domestic production has not met the domestic demand. In addition, some problems still appear as the beef self-sufficiency program has not yielded the maximum desired results.

This study has five main purposes. Firstly, it provides up to date information about the determinants of social-demographic factors for offal and beef expenditures with probit model analysis. Secondly, it estimates the demand elasticities for offal and beef (local and imported) by using the linear approximate of almost ideal demand system (LA/AIDS) model with the inclusion of Inverse Mill Ratio (IMR). Thirdly, this study estimates the potential impact of socioeconomic and demographic factors, product attributes (quality and affordability) and market factor (availability) on the willingness to pay (WTP) for
imported offal with the hedonic price model approach. Fourthly, this study examines the actual WTP for imported offal and calculates the marginal implicit price (marginal
willingness to pay) by using the hedonic price model approach. Finally, this study explores Australia's trade prospects for imported offal in Indonesia based on the LA/AIDS, WTP and descriptive analyses.

Research findings show that several important factors such as age, income, ethnicity, occupation, family size and level of education significantly affect the expenditure for local and imported offal, and local and imported beef. Offal and beef are classified as necessity goods in Makassar, and consumers rely heavily on offal and beef products. This result is supported by the positive expenditure elasticity of the study, where consumer income
increases the demand for local and imported offal and beef. The WTP analysis reveals that if the price of imported offal on the market increases, the willingness to pay for the product will decrease. Therefore, the availability of the products in the market should be a large focus of the Indonesian Government, including local and international firms. Maintaining the sustainability of meat products in the country, including with efficient trade policies of imported offal and beef is crucial. Australia as a major exporter of live cattle and beef products in Indonesia could gain more insight from this perspective.

The research contributes to the literature of the demand and practice studies, especially in assisting producers, marketers and policy makers in developing effective supply,
including the market share of offal and beef in Makassar City. The results of this study will have important implications and better understanding of beef and offal industries in Indonesia.


The Tensleep oil reservoir at Teapot Dome, Wyoming, USA, is a naturally fractured tight sandstone reservoir that has been considered for carbon dioxide enhanced oil recovery (![Formula][1] -EOR) and sequestration. Interpretation of open fractures identified in wireline image logs from the field suggests that the reservoir fracture network is dominated by early formed structural hinge-oblique fractures with interconnectivity enhanced by hinge-parallel and hinge-perpendicular fracture sets. Previous studies show that 3D seismic scale discontinuity attributes are dominated by more recent hinge-parallel and strike slip trends. The most negative curvature attribute that we used highlights concave features attributed to subtle traveltime delay through fracture zones and small faults or flexures associated with the fracture swarms. The poststack discontinuity extraction workflow incorporated seismic spectral blueing (SSB) to enhance the resolution of the seismic data. The SSB process is followed by computation of the short-wavelength most negative curvature. Subsequently, the minimum similarity attribute is applied to accentuate regions with minimum similarity of curvature. An edge-illumination process is then applied to the minimum similarity of the most negative curvature output. Discontinuities extracted through edge illumination locate regions of minimal similarity in curvature along fracture zones or small fault boundaries. This workflow enhances hinge-oblique discontinuities without azimuthal filtering and provides a fracture intensity attribute, which is used as an input to distribute the fracture intensity through the model discrete fracture network. Qualitative correlation of production data to extracted discontinuities suggests that wells located on hinge-oblique discontinuities are more productive than other wells in the field.

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Efficient regulation of internal homeostasis and defending it against perturbations requires complex behavioral strategies. However, the computational principles mediating brain's homeostatic regulation of reward and associative learning remain undefined. Here we use a definition of primary rewards, as outcomes fulfilling physiological needs, to build a normative theory showing how learning motivated behavior is modulated by the internal state of the animal. The theory proves that seeking rewards is equivalent to the fundamental objective of physiological stability, defining the notion of physiological rationality of behavior. We further give a formal basis for temporal discounting of reward. It also explains how animals learn to act predictively to preclude prospective homeostatic challenges, and attributes a normative computational role to the modulation of midbrain dopaminergic activity by hypothalamic signals.


In recent years, a considerable effort has been devoted towards the application of advanced techniques for turbomachinery efficient fluid dynamic control during operations. A novel strategy to dynamically modify and optimize the performance during operations takes advantage of shape memory alloys properties. Experimental and numerical analyses on a morphing polymeric blade for an automotive axial fan are presented. The blade shape change was achieved by shape memory alloys strips, thermomechanically treated, embedded in the blade and thermally activated by hot air stream flow. Measurement of fluid temperature, blade surface temperature pattern and three-dimensional shape change of the blade during activation was performed by means of an innovative image analysis technique in a purpose-built wind tunnel. Computational fluid dynamics numerical simulations were performed to study performance variations and three-dimensional fluid dynamic behavior of the fan originated from the shape memory effect.


We consider the problem of distribution-free testing of the class of monotone monomials and the class of monomials over n variables. While there are very efficient testers for a variety of classes of functions when the underlying distribution is uniform, designing distribution-free testers (which must work under an arbitrary and unknown distribution) tends to be more challenging. When the underlying distribution is uniform, Parnas et al. (SIAM J. Discr. Math., 2002) give a tester for (monotone) monomials whose query complexity does not depend on n, and whose dependence on the distance parameter is (inverse) linear. In contrast, Glasner and Servedio (Theory of Computing, 2009) prove that every distribution-free tester for monotone monomials as well as for general monomials must have query complexity e W(n 1=5 ) (for a constant distance parameter e). In this paper we present distribution-free testers for these classes with query complexity e O(n 1=2 =e). We note that in contrast to previous results for distribution-free testing, our testers do not build on the testers that work under the uniform distribution. Rather, we define and exploit certain structural properties of monomials (and functions that differ from them on a non-negligible part of the input space), which were not used in previous work on property testing.


This document describes the results of the Ninth General Capital Increase Survey (IDB-9 Survey). This was an electronic survey sent by the Office of Evaluation and Oversight (OVE) to all operational staff of the Bank between September 20 and October 4, 2012. The goal of the survey was to measure the extent of implementation of the reforms mandated in the IDB-9 Agreement. All survey responses were anonymous, and the results were aggregated at the unit level. The IDB-9 survey included up to 31 closed questions organized in the following eight modules: sector strategies (4 to 6 questions); Bank programming (4 questions), lending instruments and knowledge products (2 questions); private sector development and coordination (4 questions); Development Effectiveness Matrix (4 questions); Progress Monitoring Report (4 questions); the Independent Consultation and Investigation Mechanism (3 questions); the new Access to Information Policy (4 questions), and an open-ended question. Each staff member reported their unit and department affiliation and was asked the corresponding set of questions.


We report experimental and theoretical investigations of nitrogen doped graphene. A low-pressure Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) system was used to grow large-area graphene on copper foil, using ethylene as the carbon source. Nitrogen-doped graphene (N-graphene) was prepared by exposing the graphene transferred to different substrates to atomic nitrogen plasma. The effect of varying nitrogen flow rates on doping of graphene was investigated while keeping the power and time constant during the process. The N-graphene was characterized via Raman Spectroscopy, X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), Scanning Tunneling Microscopy and Spectroscopy (STM and STS), and Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). Raman mapping of N-graphene was also performed to show homogeneity of nitrogen on the graphitic lattice. XPS results have revealed the presence of different nitrogen configurations in the graphitic lattice with similar doping concentrations. Density functional theory (DFT) based calculations showed that the periodic adsorption of N atoms predominantly occurs on top of the C atoms rather than through substitution of C in our N-graphene samples. Our results indicate a feasible procedure for producing N-graphene with homogenous and effective doping which would be valuable in electronic and optical applications.


Companies are always trying to enhance their functioning to achieve a competitive advantage in a given market. Some of the tools that are used to improve organizational functioning include ERP systems. In fact, ERP systems are becoming very popular among firms, to the point where they are considered by some as an ailing business savior. Nevertheless, despite the attractive functions that an ERP system may display to an interested company, implementing such a system successfully is a task that is far from being easy. Several problems may arise in the implementation phase, and a failure to address them correctly can have terrible consequences on the general functioning of a firm. Two of the main factors that contribute to a failed ERP system implementation are training and resistance to change. A tool that may actually help with the ERP system implementation failure is ERP simulation. The main purpose of this thesis is to study the potential effect that ERP simulations can have on a potential ERP system user skills and knowledge, and thereafter find the potential impact that they may have while being used during an ERP implementation to facilitate training and reduce resistance to change. The tools that were used to successfully accomplish this research were a personal interview with an ERP simulation expert, a detailed survey with ERP simulation participants, and various information that were collected from books, articles, reports and websites. This thesis main results show that ERP simulations can enable ERP users to improve their knowledge of ERP systems effectively, and also have potential to contribute during the implementation phase by reducing the possible problems that may arise from the training and the resistance to change perspectives.


Businesses integrate in different food supply arrangements (FSAs) to create economic value. Ways to increase that value are traditionally associated with sharing expectations and aligning outcomes from different participants. However, in the case of micro-producers, increasing economic value is not the only motivation to engage with such arrangements. In their case other drivers have been identified which suggest the need for a complementary approach in order to realise their individual development.
In this paper, we analyse four different arrangements for food supply design: direct distribution channels, supply chains, supply networks and supply communities. Elements such as challenge addressed, main driver, organisational principle, transactional direction and power structure are considered to provide a new description for the preference to a particular supply arrangement. Our contribution extends the notion of multi-actor supply arrangements beyond chains and networks, by considering supply communities that involve producers and consumers. We introduce the notion of 'community' and use it to propose micro-producers as members of internally self-organised communities that may engage in the development of individual and collective supportive actions. To contextualise the discussion, we use the case of a typical UK regional, county-based food marketing group which provides umbrella marketing support for specialist SME and micro food businesses.


Based on waveguide coupling technology, we set a kaleidoscope homogenizer to get an intensity redistributed uniform multimode laser beam and then shape the uniform beam into a large area square beam with an imaging system. The simulation results of overall light intensity uniformity are both greater than 89% under the irradiation areas of 3.5  cm × 3  cm and 10  cm × 10  cm. In the practical application, it is also greater than 85%. After that, we apply this technology to the photoluminescence imaging detection of semiconductor devices, proving that this technology can be widely used in a variety of research requiring large areas of uniform laser illuminating spots.


Taxation has been identified as a major threat to the growth of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) not only in highly industrialized countries such USA but also in less industrialized countries, Kenya included. Taxation in general increases the costs of operation of running small and medium enterprises. To compensate for the increased costs of operation, prices on goods are raised thus causing the amounts of sales to go down. The question that appears to generate surprisingly little debate in Kenya is the scope for legally mitigating taxes by individuals and SMEs. Entrepreneurship is about change and since entrepreneurs are innovators, they should devise ways and means of coping with the adverse and threatening effects of taxation in order to survive, grow and sustain their businesses. How then can Kenyan individuals and business enterprises arrange their affairs within the current legal environment so as to minimize their tax burden? The general objective of this paper is to examine the innovative tax coping mechanisms by SMEs in Nairobi County. This paper is significant as it highlights important ways in which entrepreneurs in Nairobi can cope with taxation within the legal framework to enhance their business performance. Moreover, the paper analyses significant literature that could be used as a point of reference by other scholars conducting research in the same field.


Soccer has a great social representation in many cultures. But the passion developed in the fans can born aggressive and violent behaviors in a moment that should be for fun, characterizing the deviant leisure, theme that needs more investigation. This qualitative research has a main goal to investigate, in the academics studies, the aggressive behavior of the organized fans and their consequences in the leisure time. By a bibliographical research, information were found in reference material, composed by books and thesis, besides the use of databases, with the key-words: leisure, cheerleaders, aggressiveness and violence. The results show that, independently of the genesis of an aggressive behavior, other factors could interfere. When inside a group, or depending on the social-historical context, the profile of the fans, the violence of each society, the media, the poor organization of sport and impunity, these factors can affect individual behavior, contributing to aggressive and violent manifestations in soccer context, inside the field and inside the organizations of the fans. This kind of manifestation leads to a smaller audience at the stadiums, and even creating limitations in activities of leisure context. These violent conducts can bring serious physics and/or psychological consequences. After all, is pointed the necessity of specific public policies involving leisure and the international events.


CONTEXT
The diagnosis of acute thoracic aortic dissection is difficult to make and often missed.

OBJECTIVE
To review the accuracy of clinical history taking, physical examination, and plain chest radiograph in the diagnosis of acute thoracic aortic dissection.

DATA SOURCES
A comprehensive review of the English-language literature was conducted using MEDLINE for the years 1966 through 2000. Additional sources were identified from the references of retrieved articles.

STUDY SELECTION
The search revealed 274 potential sources, which were reviewed for pertinence and quality. Articles included were original investigations describing the clinical findings for 18 or more consecutive patients with confirmed thoracic aortic dissection. Twenty-one studies were identified that met selection criteria.

DATA EXTRACTION
Critical appraisal and data extraction were performed by the author.

DATA SYNTHESIS
Most patients with thoracic aortic dissection have severe pain (pooled sensitivity, 90%) of sudden onset (sensitivity, 84%). The absence of sudden pain onset lowers the likelihood of dissection (negative likelihood ratio [LR], 0.3; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.2-0.5). On examination, 49% of patients have an elevated blood pressure, 28% have a diastolic murmur, 31% have pulse deficits or blood pressure differentials, and 17% have focal neurological deficits. Presence of a diastolic murmur does little to change the pretest probability of dissection (positive LR, 1.4; 95% CI, 1.0-2.0), whereas pulse or blood pressure differentials and neurological deficits increase the likelihood of disease (positive LRs, 5.7 and 6.6-33.0, respectively). The plain chest radiograph results are usually abnormal (sensitivity, 90%); hence, the presence of a normal aorta and mediastinum decreases the probability of dissection (negative LR, 0.3; 95% CI, 0.2-0.4). Combinations of findings increase the likelihood of disease.

CONCLUSIONS
The presence of pulse deficits or focal neurological deficits increases the likelihood of an acute thoracic aortic dissection in the appropriate clinical setting. Conversely, a completely normal chest radiograph result or the absence of pain of sudden onset lowers the likelihood. Overall, however, the clinical examination is insufficiently sensitive to rule out aortic dissection given the high morbidity of missed diagnosis.


Philosopher and theologian, Bernard Lonergan, S.J., regarded as one of the most influential Jesuit thinkers of the twentieth century, focused primarily on cognitional theory, epistemology and metaphysics. His system of thought known as "intentionality analysis" has been applied widely to many fields of study, including education. While Lonergan directly addressed certain issues in education and educational philosophy, his thought has greater promise for educational philosophy through broader application, specifically in ordering and expanding educational themes related to the four key differentiations of consciousness he expounds. The differentiations are explained as distinct but interrelated levels of consciousness and consist of experiencing, understanding, judging and deciding.  For educational philosophy, "experiencing" draws attention to the vast array of sensory input, affectivity and the experience of ideas. "Understanding" brings to light the questioning process that seeks intelligibility for human experience, direct and indirect, where the processes and achievements of intelligence become the focus. "Judging" concerns questions of the good, the right and the true, and provides an expanded context of critical thinking and reasonableness encompassing knowledge of not only the world but also of oneself.  "Deciding" wrestles with the existential questions of life and promotes responsible living expressed in moral agency, social justice, service to one's communities, and engaged citizenship.  More than adding new educational theory or pedagogical innovation (though these may result with further practical application of intentionality analysis), the promise of Lonergan's thought for education philosophy appears as a larger framework for deep thinking about education that distinguishes important themes and concerns and interrelates them to a comprehensive and open-ended horizon that champions human potentials for attentiveness, intelligence, reasonableness and responsibility.


A focus of recent debate in Buddhist Studies has been the extent to whichthe early Buddhists were involved in maritime activity. This paper takes this discussion as a starting point to explore the use of boats in early Pāli texts.It notes the rarity of nautical imagery in extant Indian literature of the period, and contrasts this with the frequent use of the boat as a simile and metaphor in the nikāyas. These early texts, however, exhibit little interest in maritime travel or its imagery. The Jātakas, however, select an underlying maritime metaphor for their articulation of the Bodhisatta vow, and include a number of maritime stories that involve the achievements of the Bodhisatta as mariner and hero, as well as other, often unsuccessful, outcomes of voyages undertaken by those who do not follow basic Buddhist principles. This paper examines the few Jātaka stories in which the image of the sea voyage is used to demonstrate the nature of the Bodhisatta path and the search for the perfections. These stories, rich in their depiction of sea travel, anticipate the peculiarly Southern Buddhist interest in the imageof the boat.This image subsequently features in many forms in the thought, art, practice and narrative of these often coastal and river-based regions.


Endotracheal intubation (ETI) is a crucial medical procedure performed on critically ill patients. It involves insertion of a breathing tube into the trachea i.e. the windpipe connecting the larynx and the lungs. Often, this procedure is performed by the paramedics (aka providers) under challenging prehospital settings e.g. roadside, ambulances or helicopters. Successful intubations could be lifesaving, whereas, failed intubation could potentially be fatal. Under prehospital environments, ETI success rates among the paramedics are surprisingly low and this necessitates better training and performance evaluation of ETI skills. Currently, few objective metrics exist to quantify the differences in ETI techniques between providers. In this pilot study, we develop a quantitative framework for discriminating the kinematic characteristics of providers with different experience levels. The system utilizes statistical analysis on spatio-temporal multimodal features extracted from optical motion capture, accelerometers and electromyography (EMG) sensors. Our experiments involved three individuals performing intubations on a dummy, each with different levels of training. Quantitative performance analysis on multimodal features revealed distinctive differences among different skill levels. In future work, the feedback from these analysis could potentially be harnessed for enhanced ETI training.


This essay examines the way Alistair MacLeod's short fiction formally and thematically invokes the presence of Walter Benjamin's oral ―Storyteller‖ figure/and culture, elaborated in his 1936 essay, in order to ask broader questions about the role of storytelling—oral and written—in contemporary culture. The essay analyzes the cultural implications for resuscitating this storyteller figure. I develop a paradigm to explore the ―use‖ of stories by synthesizing ―found‖ ideas drawn from various cultural sources: Benjamin's affirmation of the use of story, the rhetorical criticism of Terry Eagleton, Raymond Williams' searching analyses of the individual, culture and education, and finally cultural philosophies of narrative by Richard Kearney and Richard Rorty. This paradigm is then tested in five MacLeod stories. I show how MacLeod's stories, in foregrounding the links between writing and orality, invite us to revaluate the role of orality and literature. MacLeod's texts demonstrate how narrative and storytelling encompassing a newly visioned and embodied subject, re-grounded in the matrix of family/culture/history, can narrate us through fragmentation and loss towards a new cultural vision. Contemporary manifestations of Benjamin's ―Storyteller‖ figure discovered in MacLeod's texts are seen to reflect the many existential sources of story and the culture-shaping energy that story is. Rehearsing the active shaping and historicizing of self and culture through narrative, the stories work to renew our sense of the fundamental nature and cultural use of story. These conclusions have significant implications for how we inherit and carry forward from generation to generation our location or dislocation within personhood, family and culture. SUPERVISORS: Dr. Judith Miller & Dr. Susan Wismer


Federated Learning (FL) is a novel paradigm for the shared training of models based on decentralized and private data. With respect to ethical guidelines, FL is promising regarding privacy, but needs to excel vis-\`a-vis transparency and trustworthiness. In particular, FL has to address the accountability of the parties involved and their adherence to rules, law and principles. We introduce AF^2 Framework, where we instrument FL with accountability by fusing verifiable claims with tamper-evident facts, into reproducible arguments. We build on AI FactSheets for instilling transparency and trustworthiness into the AI lifecycle and expand it to incorporate dynamic and nested facts, as well as complex model compositions in FL. Based on our approach, an auditor can validate, reproduce and certify a FL process. This can be directly applied in practice to address the challenges of AI engineering and ethics.


Restoration activities inherently depend on understanding the spatial and temporal variation in basic demographic rates of the species of interest. For species that modify and maintain their own habitat such as the eastern oyster Crassostrea virginica, understanding demographic rates and their impacts on population and habitat success are crucial to ensuring restoration success. We measured oyster recruitment, density, size distribution, biomass, mortality and Perkinsus marinus infection intensity quarterly for 3 yr on shallow intertidal reefs created with shell cultch in March 2009. All reefs were located within Sister Lake, LA. Reefs were placed in pairs at 3 different locations within the lake; pairs were placed in low and medium energy sites within each location. Restored reefs placed within close proximity (<8 km) experienced very different development trajectories; there was high inter-site and inter-annual variation in recruitment and mortality of oysters, with only slight variation in growth curves. Despite this high variation in population dynamics, all reefs supported dense oyster populations (728 ± 102 ind. m−2) and high live oyster biomass (>14.6 kg m−2) at the end of 3 yr. Shell accretion, on average, exceeded estimated rates required to keep pace with local subsidence and shell loss. Variation in recruitment, growth and survival drives local site-specific population success, which highlights the need to understand local water quality, hydrodynamics, and metapopulation dynamics when planning restoration.


The purpose of this qualitative study was to understand and describe the misconceptions that may exist among students with visual impairments and instructional techniques that may help them learn scientific concepts of seasonal change. Teachers' perceptions of student learning were also examined. Data were obtained from students 1 week prior to and 2 weeks after instruction. Students in a comparison group received traditional instruction concerning seasonal change that included textbooks, 3-D models, and lectures. Students in an inquiry-based group received instruction that included student generated models, graphs of temperature data, and 3-D models. Students who participated in the traditional instruction all exhibited alternative conceptions before instruction. Reasons for seasons included the Earth's rotation on its axis, a change in distance between the Earth and the Sun, and the Earth's tilt moving back and forth as it orbited the Sun. After instruction, students in this group all continued to exhibit alternative understandings of seasons. Only one student in this group held a scientific fragment (e.g., Earth orbiting the Sun) within his alternative explanation. The comparison group teacher believed that his students had a scientific understanding of the cause of seasons after completion of the curriculum which did not reflect students' actual documented learning. Students who were members of the inquiry-based group also had alternative conceptions before instruction. Reasons for seasons included the Earth's tilt moving back and forth as it orbited the Sun, a change in the amount of moisture levels in the atmosphere, and the rotation of the Earth on its axis. One student was able to explain that the Earth orbited the Sun, but could not explain how this motion caused seasons. After instruction, students in this group all had scientific understandings of seasons or scientific fragments, and none held alternative understandings. The inquiry-based group teacher believed that her students had a scientific understanding of the causes of seasons upon completion of the curriculum which was reflective of students' documented learning.


Open Design has become an umbrella term for a wide range of approaches to design and creativity where professional design is challenged. These range from seeing designers as simply irrelevant (in democratized innovation) to an active and creative collaboration between designers and non-designers (co-design) to the dissolution of the distinction between designer and nondesigner altogether. While supporting open design in general, we argue that there are important instances where open design approaches may not be appropriate and that there will be a polarization between casual design activity (for cups, t-shirts and so on) and critical designs (medical equipment, very complex systems like mobile phones).


Teaching practices within educational institutions have evolved through the increased adoption of technology to deliver the curriculum and the use of computers for assessment purposes. For educational technologists, there is a vast array of commercial computer applications available for the delivery of objective tests, and in some instances, organisations have opted to develop bespoke systems to meet their individual pedagogical requirements. However, there is very little research published on the usability of these systems and on the possible usability problems that could ultimately affect users' learning or users' marks in summative tests. This paper focuses on the effectiveness of the heuristic evaluation method for the evaluation of computer-assisted assessment (CAA) systems and proposes a set of CAA heuristics for evaluating assessment tools. The results of these tests show that, with little training, novice evaluators can effectively perform an evaluation and could, using this heuristic set, identify genuine usability problems within the assessment tool. Therefore, educational technologists or software developers could use the new CAA heuristic set to aid their procurement or inform their design decisions.


An e-commerce scalability case study is presented in which both traditional performance testing and performance modeling were used to help tune the application for high performance. This involved the creation of a system simulation model as well as the development of an approach for test case generation and execution. We describe our experience using a simulation model to help diagnose production system problems, and discuss ways that the effectiveness of performance testing efforts was improved by its use.


Interest in the use of tactile information displays has grown rapidly in recent years. However, relatively little research has been conducted to explore any cognitive and/or attentional limitations that may be inherent when using the body as a receptor surface for the transmission of information. In the present study, participants attempted to detect changes to tactile patterns presented sequentially on the body surface. The patterns consisted of 1-3 vibrotactile stimuli presented for 200 ms with a blank interstimulus interval of 800 ms. The pattern of tactile stimulation was repeatedly changed (alternating between two different patterns) on 50% of the trials, while no change occurred on the remaining trials. The results showed that participants often failed to detect the changes to the consecutively-presented tactile patterns. This finding may reflect a tactile equivalent of the phenomenon of change blindness reported in previous visual studies. The implications of these finding for human tactile interface design are discussed.


We report on the artificial fabrication of stacked monolayers of Fe/Cu on Cu(100) by pulsed laser deposition at 300 K employing reflection high energy electron diffraction (RHEED). In contrast to the thermally deposited films, an improved two dimensional growth of the Fe and Cu layers has been achieved by virtue of the dynamics of the pulsed laser deposition technique. The observed RHEED oscillations for each Fe and Cu layer and their growth mode as studied by scanning tunnelling microscopy indicate layer-by-layer growth. The magnetic properties studied by magneto-optical Kerr effect measurements show that the easy axis of magnetization is in plane with no specific anisotropy observed in the plane. Ferromagnetic response was absent for thicknesses less than 2 ML in total within the measured temperature range down to 100 K. The Curie temperature increases from 225 K for a trilayer Fe/Cu/Fe to 400 K for a total layer thickness of 10 ML.


Objective: The aim of the current study was to prepare an amorphous solid dispersion of ketoprofen in polymer PVP K-30 by solvent co-evaporation technique and to characterize the physicochemical properties. Methods : An amorphous solid dispersion of ketoprofen, a water insoluble non-steroidal anti- inflammatory drug with polyvinyl pyrrolidone K-30, were prepared by solvent co-evaporation method at drug to polymer ratios 1:1, 1:3, 1:5 and 1:9 (w/w). Physicochemical properties of the solid drug were evaluated by X-ray powder diffractometry (XRPD), differential thermal analysis (DTA) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Dissolution studies were conducted according to the USP paddle method. Results : The X-ray powder diffraction and differential thermal analysis showed that ketoprofen was transformed from a crystalline phase to an amorphous state, as showed by disappearance of its characteristic of diffraction peaks and an endothermic peak. SEM Microphoto of amorphous solid dispersion showed homogeneous size and morphology. In addition, ketoprofen in amorphous solid dispersion showed better dissolution rate compared to crystalline drugs. The dissolution efficiency (DE) of ketoprofen from its amorphous solid dispersion increased with an increasing ratio of polymer. Conclusion: The study has shown that dispersions of ketoprofen into water-soluble polymer PVP K-30 formed an amorphous ketoprofen in solid dispersion system. All amorphous solid dispersion of ketoprofen in PVP K-30 prepared by solvent co-evaporation demonstrated a significant improvement in dissolution rate of ketoprofen compared to pure ketoprofen.


Risk governance is arguably the most vital arena for post-crisis bank reform because it addresses the fundamental issues that drive the mismanagement of financial institutions. We assess the progress of reforms in bank risk governance in seven advanced economies and the EU five years after the Lehman Brothers failure and three years after the release of a 'best practice' benchmark in this field (BCBS, 2010). We find that the countries that have made the greatest progress in risk governance reform are not crisis countries and usually not those that host the largest global financial centres. Thus, reform tends to occur in the jurisdictions where it is least needed. We propose the 'relative power hypothesis' as the best explanation for this pattern of regulatory diffusion with some evidence to support the 'consensus hypothesis'. Those countries where shareholder and manager power is strongest (Japan, Switzerland, UK, US,) are least able to implement fundamental reforms. The jurisdictions where depositor and taxpayer power is strongest (Australia, Canada, Singapore and EU ex-UK) have the most comprehensive risk governance regulation. The implications of the relative power hypothesis are not encouraging for achieving fundamental reform in banking or for the management of systemic risk.


Distributed denial of service attacks are becoming a serious threat that no business involved in providing services over the Internet can ignore. The rapidly growing frequency and magnitude in which these attacks are occurring is an alarming indicator. As cloud services are being adopted by many enterprises, the cloud infrastructure resilience to such attacks becomes a growing concern. In this paper, we discuss the types and possible impacts of DDoS attacks on cloud computing and the suggested mitigation techniques. These attacks were categorized into three categories; external, internal, and cloud-to-outside attacks.


In this paper we have developed a system that can automatically discriminate between machine-printed and handwritten words in structured bi-lingual (Arabic and French) form document layout. Our system has been applied in the context of Tunisian National Health Insurance Fund for medical care costs refund with encouraging results. In the used forms, handwritten data usually touch or cross the preprinted form frames and texts, creating complex problems for the recognition routines. Each text type should also be processed using different methods in order to optimize the recognition accuracy. This work aims to address these issues and to especially solve the problem of machine-printed/handwritten and Arabic/French word discrimination. To this end, we computed co-occurrence matrix of oriented gradients from word's image and used it as input to a k-Nearest Neighbor classifier. Experiments are carried on 20 forms. An average script identification rate of 98.31% is achieved.


The purpose of this thesis is to explore the search for authentic self in Zadie Smith's White Teeth. Using Judith Butler's theory of performance and performativity, a close reading of White Teeth provides concrete literary examples of the theory and how it works in a contemporary novel.  Jane Austen's Mansfield Park is also examined through Butler's performance and performativity model, providing proof of an established women writers' interest in gender and class norms. An exploration of Austen's use of satire supports the notion that Smith's novel operates in a long-standing tradition of feminist literature.


Introduction Radon is the second most important cause of lung cancer after smoking. Thus, the determination of indoor radon concentrations in dwellings and workplaces is an important public health concern. The purpose of this research was to measure the concentration of radon gas in residential homes and public places in the city of Shiraz and its relationship with the type and age of the buildings as well as the type of materials used to construct the building (brick, block). We also determined the radon dosages that occupants of the building would receive. Methods The present study is a descriptive-analytical and cross-sectional research that was conducted on the building's indoor air in the city of Shiraz in 2015. Using geographic information system (GIS) software and a spatial sampling cell with an area of 25 square kilometers, 200 points were selected. In this study, we used passive diffusive samplers as Solid State Nuclear Track Detector (SSNTD) CR-39 polycarbonate films for three months in the winter. Sampling was conducted in accordance with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's protocol. We determined the concentrations of radon gas at the time of sampling, and calibration factors were determined. The data were analyzed by IBM-SPSS, version 20, descriptive statistics, Kruskal-Wallis, and Mann–Whitney tests. Results This study showed that the average radon concentration was 57.6 ± 33.06 Bq/m3 in residential dwellings. The average effective dose was 1.45 mSv/y. The concentration of radon in 5.4% of the houses was found to be greater than 100 Bq/m3, which is above the level allowed by the World Health Organization (WHO). Conclusion Since radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer, it seems necessary to increase the public's awareness of this issue and to take action to reduce radon in homes when the concentrations are above the WHO's guideline.


A shared mobility service (SMS) under ring shape would combine the principle of service cycle along a fixed route (as in a transit line) and a fairly important territorial coverage, assuming that every user would accept to walk on some length to and from the service. Thus, service availability can be optimised, detours are avoided, vehicles achieve higher productivity. The synergy between the ring-shaped infrastructure and the vehicle fleet enables to optimise the quality of service in terms of access time and ride time, and also to reduce production costs - and therefore the tariff fares, under suitable regulation. The chapter aims to reveal these 'systemic qualities' of ring-shaped SMSs by providing a mathematical model called 'Orbicity'. It has a four-fold architecture: (i) traffic operations, (ii) supply-demand equilibrium under elastic demand, (iii) service management with endogenous fleet size and fare rate, (iv) service policy in terms of technology (vehicle type, number of places, energy vector, driving technology) and also the regulation regime. After outlining the model for ring-shaped shuttle services, we explore a set of scenarios along two axes of technological generation and regulation regime. It appears that ring-shaped shuttle services could be supplied at very affordable prices, while achieving profitability and requiring no public subsidies.


The objective of this research was to evaluate the effect of ad rank on the performance of sponsored search advertising campaigns. In this study, we analyzed a large log file comprised of almost 7,000,000 records spanning 33 consecutive months of a search engine marketing campaign of a major US retailer. The theoretical foundation of this research is serial position effect, including both primacy and recency effects. One way ANOVA and Tamhane's T2 tests are used in this study as our analytical methods. We examined the effect of ad rank on the critical keyword advertising metrics of clicks and conversions, which translate well to the aspect of relevance in information processing theory. Findings from our research indicate that ad rank does have significant effect on both of these online advertising metrics, although it has less direct effect on conversion rates. Primacy effect was found on clicks, indicating a general compelling performance of ads listed on top positions of the first search engine results page. Meanwhile, conversion rates across all sixteen ad positions we investigated follow a relatively stable distribution, with the exception of the first two ads. Ads in these two positions generated extremely high conversion values. However, examining both clicks and conversion rates combined into a single metric of conversion potential, it is apparent that ad rank has a significant effect on the performance of keyword advertising campaigns. Ad appears at the top of the results listing have a much greater conversion potential. The research results reported in this paper are beneficial to companies using search engine marketing as they strive to design more effective advertising campaigns. Implications from this study could lead to more targeted bidding strategies and thus reduce ineffective bidding in keyword auctions.


Abstract. The record-breaking major stratospheric warming of northern winter 2009 (January–February) is studied using BASCOE (Belgian Assimilation System for Chemical ObsErvation) stratospheric water vapour analyses and MLS (Microwave Limb Sounder) water vapour observations, together with meteorological data from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and potential vorticity (PV) derived from ECMWF meteorological data. We focus on the interaction between the cyclonic wintertime stratospheric polar vortex and subsidiary anticyclonic stratospheric circulations during the build-up, peak and aftermath of the major warming. We show dynamical consistency between the water vapour analysed fields and the meteorological and PV fields. Using various approaches, we use the analysed water vapour fields to estimate descent in the polar vortex during this period of between ~0.5 km day −1 and ~0.7 km day −1 . New results include the analysis of water vapour during the major warming and demonstration of the benefit of assimilating MLS satellite data into the BASCOE model.


The reproductive and larval ecology of the introduced species Bufo marinus was studied at two breeding sites in tropical northern Australia. Reproductive activity, recruitment patterns, larval growth and survival, and predation by conspecifics and by insect, crustacean and fish species were looked at in detail.

Reproduction at both sites occurred from December to June. Recruitment from reproductive events was sporadic. It was not concentrated during any particular period of the breeding season. During breeding periods, individuals at oviposition sites were predominantly males, with a population sex ratio of 10:1. Less than 30 percent of the estimated male population and 5 percent of the estimated female population were active (found in transect searches) on any one night during the breeding period. The proportion of active individuals in amplexus at any time was low. Total numbers of active individuals declined by the end of the dry season and sex ratios approached 1:1. No breeding was observed during the late dry season although histological examination of gonads indicated that reproductively active males and females (with mature sperm and ova) were present all year round.

Sampling of larval populations indicated that densities recorded at both sites varied temporally and spatially. High variance-mean ratios for sample densities indicated that larval distributions within transects were aggregated. Peak densities were typically between 600 to 800 per m². Larval density was used to determine population size but estimates showed no consistent association with recruitment of eggs from observed breeding.

Experimental studies indicated that during the embryonic stages (Gosner stages 1 to 24) predator-free survival was approximately 70 percent (90 percent survival/day) over a mean developmental period of 72 hours. Highest mortality occurred between three days (hatching) and twelve days (stage 25) after laying. Mean larval periods of 22 to 54 days were recorded. Shorter larval periods were associated with lower larval density. Survival to metamorphosis ranged from 0.1 to 10 percent (97 percent mean survival/day). Survival and growth rates in most experiments were density dependent. Growth of pre-hatching stages was linear but growth was exponential or decreasing exponential during the tadpole stages, controlled either by temperature or density. Growth of larvae is food limited, with advantages to older larvae demonstrated in an artificial pond experiment with two overlapping cohorts of different age. Growth was reduced for both cohorts but the effect was greater for younger cohorts. Individuals that survived egg predation by older cohorts grew larger because of reduced competition.

Egg predation by older cohorts of Bufo larvae appeared to be a major source of mortality. Intraspecific predation was restricted to pre-swimming embryo stages and greatly reduced pre-hatching survival in field and experimental populations (1.67 percent mean survival/day). No other predators of eggs were recorded.

Few species were active predators of hatched tadpoles. Only two of eleven potential predators examined in feeding rate experiments consumed tadpoles. These were an adult dytiscid beetle, Homeodytes scutellaris (0.28 tadpoles/hour), and a freshwater crayfish, Cherax quadricarinatus (0.48 tadpoles/hour). None of the native fish species examined successfully consumed eggs or larvae.

A predation experiment was conducted in experimental ponds with aeschnid dragonfly larvae, Hemianax papuensis, and high and low densities of Bufo larvae. Predation significantly reduced survival of larvae at both densities and growth was significantly lower for larvae in predator treatments at high density. Slower growth for larvae in predator treatments probably resulted from larvae altering their foraging behaviour in response to the presence of predators. Tadpoles appeared to be less conspicuous in predator treatments. In predator treatments with a low initial density of Bufo, initial predation decreased densities to a level where encounter rates with predators were low and tadpole food resources were probably not limiting. Final mass and larval period for tadpoles at low density in predator treatments were similar to controls.

Larval population size is most likely to be influenced by differences in cohort overlap resulting from adult breeding phenology. A small overlap will result in generations with narrow size differences and will produce increased competition between cohorts. A large overlap may result in large size differences in cohorts and may lead to heavy predation of eggs by older cohorts. Invertebrate predators are likely to affect the survival of larval Bufo marinus populations during colonisation and periods of habitat deterioration.


A document proposes the development of radio-frequency-(RF)-driven dielectric heaters for non-nuclear thermal testing of the cores of nuclear-fission reactors for spacecraft. Like the electrical-resistance heaters used heretofore for such testing, the dielectric heaters would be inserted in the reactors in place of nuclear fuel rods. A typical heater according to the proposal would consist of a rod of lossy dielectric material sized and shaped like a fuel rod and containing an electrically conductive rod along its center line. Exploiting the dielectric loss mechanism that is usually considered a nuisance in other applications, an RF signal, typically at a frequency .50 MHz and an amplitude between 2 and 5 kV, would be applied to the central conductor to heat the dielectric material. The main advantage of the proposal is that the wiring needed for the RF dielectric heating would be simpler and easier to fabricate than is the wiring needed for resistance heating. In some applications, it might be possible to eliminate all heater wiring and, instead, beam the RF heating power into the dielectric rods from external antennas.


The burgeoning field of positive psychology, which is the scientific study of how individuals and organizations flourish and what makes life worth living, is primarily descriptive and nomothetic. However, it has spawned several prescriptive exercises (i.e., positive interventions) for improving well-being. A common theoretically based definition for a positive intervention does not exist in the current literature. More importantly, although the interventions have shown some success, they have been developed with little thought to theory, such that the mechanisms that make such interventions successful are unknown. The aims of this paper are several-fold: First, I review the importance of theory in general, especially as it pertains to the development and application of positive interventions. Second, to provide a basis for developing good theory, I review criteria that have been proposed for evaluating existing theories and characteristics that differentiate among theories of human behavior and behavior change. Third, I provide an overview of existing behavior and behavior change theories that may be relevant to the development and application of positive interventions. Finally, I propose a new definition of a positive intervention and recommend a theoretical framework for the synthesis and application of positive interventions. Based on this review, I propose a theoretically-based hybrid model, which combines elements of self-determination theory and the health action process approach as a framework for positive interventions moving forward. Altogether, this work sounds a clarion call for the adoption of a rigorous, theory-based, and scientific approach to the design, development, and application of positive interventions.