On September 30, 2010, the UN Human Rights Council affirmed that the human right to water and sanitation is legally binding. The Council stated that the right to water and sanitation is derived from the right to an adequate standard of living, which is recognized in several international treaties, including the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. In June 2011 the Human Rights Council endorsed the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. These principles outline how states and businesses should implement the UN "Protect, Respect and Remedy" Framework on Business and Human Rights, which aims at preventing and redressing business-related human rights abuses. The Framework comprises three principles: the state duty to protect in the context of corporate human rights abuses; the corporate responsibility to respect all human rights; and access to remedies for victims of abuses. The corporate responsibility to respect all human rights is described as a "minimum standard" for business, but it is not a legal one. While providing valuable guidance to companies that are willing to take it on board, the Guiding Principles on the corporate responsibility to respect do not speak to those companies that are simply not interested in ensuring that their operations respect human rights, or those companies that have yet to engage with the issues at all. Unfortunately, these remain the majority. Therefore, when it comes to human rights, only an effective and faithful discharge by states of their legal duty to protect rights will have any significant impact. Turning specifically to the human right to water, I note that business can have a significant impact on the right to water. This impact occurs in three principle contexts: * where business is involved in the provision of water services * where business is a user of water--and particularly where water is a limited resource and business is competing with other users * where business activities that are unrelated to water per se have an impact on water sources (for example, where industry causes pollution of water systems). My remarks will focus on the third context, in particular, one case: the Niger Delta, where, since 2008, Amnesty International has researched violations of economic, social, and cultural rights as a consequence of oil extraction. The Niger Delta is one of the ten most important wetland and coastal marine ecosystems in the world and is home to some 31 million people. The Niger Delta is also the location of massive oil deposits, which have been extracted for decades by the government of Nigeria and by multinational oil companies. Oil has generated an estimated $600 billion since the 1960s. Despite this, the majority of the Niger Delta's population lives in poverty. They do not have adequate access to clean water. Some rely on boreholes, but many rely on the rivers and streams for water both for drinking and domestic use. In light of this, one of the most disturbing findings of Amnesty International's research was that the water system--the rivers, streams, and ponds--have for decades been the receiving bodies for oil spills and waste discharge, including waste water and dumped drilling waste. Rivers and creeks have also been subjected to dredging and canalization. The combined and cumulative impact of these practices by oil companies has significantly undermined the rights to water, food, and health. Despite the widespread pollution, Amnesty International could not find any study that considered the implications of oil pollution in water that is used for drinking, bathing, and other domestic purposes. The information that is available comes directly from the communities, such as the people affected by the Ogbodo spill of 2001, when thousands of people lost access to their main source of drinking water after an oil spill, and children reported skin and eye problems after diving in the oil-contaminated river. …


Examensarbete 16 hp Lactate Dehydrogenase and Citrate Synthase activity in cardiac and skeletal muscle of lowland and highland tinamous Naomi Aira Lactate Dehydrogenase and Citrate Synthase activity in cardiac and skeletal muscle of lowland and highland tinamous. Sammanfattning/Abstract: Tinamous (Tinamidae) have the smallest heart in relation to body mass compared to any other flying bird today (Bishop 1997). This means that heart size is likely to restrict aerobic metabolism. Tinamous inhabit areas from sea level to 4800 m a.s.l., which means that the high altitude living species, Nothoprocta ornata (NO), is exposed to hypoxia. In this study the activity of the two metabolic enzymes Lactate Dehydrogenase (LDH) and Citrate Synthase (CS) was measured and the ratio between the enzyme activities calculated to examine if the small heart of the tinamous affects their aerobic/anaerobic metabolism. The activity of the two enzymes was measured in the heart and the gastrocnemius muscle in the three species Nothoprocta ornata (NO), Nothoprocta perdicaria (NP) and Gallus gallus (GG). CS activity was significantly higher in the heart compared to the skeletal muscle and LDH activity was significant higher in the skeletal muscle than in the heart in all three species. The LDH/CS ratio was significantly higher in NO's skeletal muscle than in chickens but there was no significant difference between species in the heart. The higher ratio in NO´s muscle could be a sign of a higher anaerobic metabolism that is used in the muscles to compensate for the small heart NO have. In conclusion, the Tinamous' small heart can result in changed activities of LDH and CS in the heart and gastrocnemius muscle.


Water is susceptible to be used for numerous purposes, including edible, both for humans and animals.
In the food animal production, drinking water is frequently used as a way to carry out the most common pharmacological treatments. In these cases, there are many variables which could degrade drugs dissolved in this mean, even when properly arranged pharmaceutical formulations are used. In fact, although a product obtains a Marketing Authorization through appropriate laboratory studies both drug stability and solubility, on the other hand the solubility of the same drug in natural water used as a drinking water is not documented. In the present study has been evaluated the dissolution kinetics (at 0 hours and 24 hours) of products, having oxytetracycline and tylosin as active ingredient, used in drinking water samples in order to see how the different physical and chemical factors that characterize the drinking water may affect therapeutic efficacy. In fact, multiple factors, also of little relevance if individually considered, are able to adversely affect the pharmacological treatment carried out in drinking water.


The research described below forms part of a wider programme to develop a practical parser for naturally-occurring natural language input which is capable of returning the n-best syntacticallydeterminate analyses, containing that which is semantically and pragmatically most appropriate (preferably as the highest ranked) from the exponential (in sentence length) syntactically legitimate possibilities (Church & Patil 1983), which can frequently run into the thousands with realistic sentences and grammars. We have opted to develop a domain-independent solution to this problem based on integrating statistical Markov modelling techniques, which offer the potential for rapid tuning to different sublanguages / corpora on the basis of supervised training, with linguistically-adequate grammatical (language) models, capable of returning analyses detailed enough to support semantic interpretation


This article draws upon the work of two researchers who facilitated practitioner research with school professionals in Liverpool. The researchers themselves had not been involved in practitioner research before. In this account, the researchers reflect critically upon their own experience. The discussion presents the learning curve that the researchers underwent as well as what they discovered about the relationship between practitioners and researchers when engaged in school‐based research. Crucially the issue of practitioners' understandings of what constituted 'good' research emerged as a significant issue. In particular, positivist notions of research that drew from popular scientific understandings, as well as the culture of numerical targeting in the schools system, seemed to shape these practitioners' sense of what was expected of them as practitioner‐researchers. The article finishes by reflecting upon the possible lessons that this work presents for education managers considering practitioner research approaches for continuing professional development (CPD).


This paper examines the prevalence of any correlative relationship between intimate violence and substance abuse. At the outset the authors consider the abuser and the use of dependence-producing substances in relation to the abusive conduct. Based on a conspectus of the research, the conclusion is that whilst substance use may be one of the traits demonstrated by a large percentage of abusers, many prohibited substances used are, in fact, less of a root cause of violent interactions than a facilitator and a rationalisation for them. Establishing any general correlative link between intimate violence and drug use is made even more difficult by the fact that the different prohibited substances yield differing psychological effects.
Substance use by victims of violence often begins as a crutch to assist them out of their circumstances of shame and powerlessness. In many instances, the coping skills are characterised by the use of licit drugs like anti-depressants and tranquilisers. However, depending on the continuing environment, licit drugs can (and often are) abused with the patient resorting to more than the prescribed dosage.
In summary, one cannot deny the correlation between alcohol and drug use and the degeneration of the lives of the many women who are victims of abuse. To provide a palliative for the latter, means dealing with the former. In this regard there are various options, including leaving the abusive environment, divorce and damages, a protection order, and applying the provisions of Act 41 of 1971. Each of these possibilities is considered and dismissed.
Finally, the paper contrasts the prohibitionist model of drug rehabilitation with the proposal for a programme of harm reduction. In supporting the latter approach, the authors are persuaded by the argument that harm reduction legitimises treatment goals other than abstinence, which is both difficult to achieve and not in accordance with the immediate intention or want of the patient.


Abstract: Overleveraging of the banking sector has been considered one of the main causes of the 2007–09 financial crisis and the subsequent great recession. It was also of major concern for the subsequent BIS regulatory policies resulting in Basel III and its request for higher capital requirements. It has now become highly relevant for the planned European banking union. Overleveraging of the banking sector exposes the financial sector and the macroeconomy to vulnerabilities, but also, as critics state, seems to constrain credit flows to the private sector. We present here a measure of overleveraging, defined as the difference between actual and sustainable debt, conduct an empirical study on overleveraging for 40 banks in Europe, and study the vulnerabilities and credit contractions that can arise subsequently. Before the year 2004 overleveraging had not been a serious problem as leverage was on a sustainable level. However, in the run-up to the financial crisis, actual and optimal debt spread apart and the banking sector began to suffer from overleveraging. We use a non-linear Vector STAR model to evaluate the hypothesis that periods of increasing debt levels are accompanied by more severe credit constraints than periods of low leveraging. We demonstrate this for country groups across Europe.


Seven grape phylloxera, Daktulosphaira vitifoliae (Fitch), colonies collected from populations on root or leaf galls on the Vitis berlandieri x V. riparia rootstocks SO4, 5BB, and 5C, one colony from the rootstock V. rupestris St. George, and one colony collected from V. vinifera Cabernet Sauvignon were compared in bioassays with excised roots. The colonies were collected in Hungary, Germany, and the United States. The colonies had differing survival, developmental and reproductive capacities when tested on Cabernet Sauvignon, SO4 and 5C in laboratory bioassays. The colonies collected from rootstocks utilized SO4 and 5C roots better than the V. vinifera -collected colony. The performance of the colonies on 5C and SO4 roots was better on callus and nodosities than on tuberosities. This level of utilization of the rootstock roots is likely a result of selection for individuals possessing such traits from a variable population in viticultural situations. Colonies arising from roots or leaves were similarly adapted in the root bioassays. RAPD DNA analysis suggests that the rootstock-collected phylloxera are genetically remote from the V. vinifera collected colony.


The triglyceride-lowering effect of probiotics Lactobacillus plantarum KY1032 and Lactobacillus curvatus HY7601 were investigated. Male SD Wistar rats were randomly divided into three groups and fed high-fat diet (HFD), HFD and probiotics (5 X 10(9) CFU/day of L. plantarum KY1032 and 5 X 10(9) CFU/day of L. curvatus HY7601), or normal diet for 6 weeks. Probiotic treatment significantly lowered the elevated plasma triglyceride and increased plasma free fatty acid, glycerol, and plasma apolipoprotein A-V (ApoA-V) levels. The probiotic-treated group showed elevated hepatic mRNA expression of PPARα, bile acid receptor (FXR), and ApoA-V. These results demonstrate that L. plantarum KY1032 and L. curvatus HY7601 lower triglycerides in hypertriglyceridemic rats by upregulating ApoA-V, PPARα, and FXR.


A Fluid–Structure Interaction (FSI) problem can be reinterpreted as a heterogeneous problem with two subdomains. It is possible to describe the coupled problem at the interface between the fluid and the structure, yielding a nonlinear Steklov–Poincaré problem. The linear system can be linearized by Newton iterations on the interface and the resulting linear problem can be solved by the preconditioned GMRES method. In this work we investigate the behavior of preconditioners of Neumann–Neumann and Dirichlet–Neumann type. We find that, in the context of hemodynamics, the Dirichlet– Neumann, i.e., using Dirichlet boundary conditions on the fluid side and Neumann on the structure side, outperforms the Neumann–Neumann method, except when a weighting is used such that it basically reduces to the Dirichlet–Neumann method. (© 2015 Wiley‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)


Let $G$ be a simple balanced bipartite graph on $2n$ vertices, $\delta = \delta(G)/n$, and $\rho_0={\delta + \sqrt{2 \delta -1} \over 2}$. If $\delta \ge 1/2$ then $G$ has a $\lfloor \rho_0 n \rfloor$-regular spanning subgraph. The statement is nearly tight.


This paper proposes a new single-phase high-power-factor rectifier, which features regulation by conventional pulsewidth modulation (PWM), soft commutation, and instantaneous average line current control. A new zero-current-switching PWM (ZCS-PWM) auxiliary circuit is configured in the presented ZCS-PWM rectifier to perform ZCS in the active switches and zero-voltage switching in the passive switches. Furthermore, soft commutation of the main switch is achieved without additional current stress by the presented ZCS-PWM auxiliary circuit. A significant reduction in the conduction losses is achieved, since the circulating current for the soft switching flows only through the auxiliary circuit and a minimum number of switching devices are involved in the circulating current path and the proposed rectifier uses a single converter instead of the conventional configuration composed of a four-diode front-end rectifier followed by a boost converter. Nine transition states for describing the behavior of the ZCS-PWM rectifier in one switching period are described. The PWM switch model is used to predict the system performance. A prototype rated at 1 kW, operating 50 kHz, with an input ac voltage of 220 V/sub rms/ and an output voltage 400 V/sub dc/ has been implemented in laboratory. An efficiency of 97.3% and power factor over 0.99 has been measured. Analysis, design, and the control circuitry are also presented in this paper.


Abstract Although approaches to research other than experimentation and quasi-experimentation have recently become more prevalent in psychology, resistance to these approaches continues. Outright condemnation may have diminished, but equally powerful forms of resistance - illiteracy and indifference - remain. The nature and consequences of these forms of resistance are explored, particularly with respect to undergraduate education. I suggest we need to realize more fully how learning both traditional and alternative approaches informs our understanding of the other, and we need to encourage the growth of what Collini (1993) refers to as "the intellectual equivalent of bilingualism," a capacity to exercise the language of both kinds of approaches and to engage in a mutually intelligible exchange of views. In 1963, four years after delivering the Rede Lecture at Cambridge, C. P. Snow responded to the controversy sparked by his description of the gulf between what he termed the "two cultures" (i.e., the literary intellectuals and the natural scientists). In this response, he acknowledged that his views were shaped by his being an Englishman, and that in the United States the cultural divide between the humanists and the natural scientists was not nearly as sharp. As evidence, he cited a body of intellectual opinion from persons in a variety of fields, including social history, sociology, demography, political science, economics, and psychology - in others words, the social sciences. And of the budding existence of this "third culture," he said, "When it comes, some of the difficulties of communication will at last be softened: for such a culture has, just to do its job, to be on speaking terms with the scientific one" (p. 71, italics added). Although Snow is well known for his writings on the cultures of research and scholarly work, his view that the social sciences can (perhaps, must) speak the language of both the humanities and the natural sciences is not new, particularly with respect to psychology. As convincingly demonstrated by Danziger (1979), Wilhelm Wundt maintained that psychology consisted of two complementary halves, each of which was connected to a particular set of methods: physiological or individual psychology that was most often best investigated through experimental methods, and social or ethnopsychology that could only be investigated through nonexperimental methods. Wundt's views were, of course, not widely shared by many of his contemporaries, and certainly not by many of his successors. During much of the 20th century, psychology was based primarily on a positivist philosophy of science, defined almost exclusively as a natural science, and focused on the use of the experimental method. It is only within the latter years of this century that an accelerating questioning of the usefulness of this near-- exclusive definition has occurred, concomitant with a serious search for methods other than experimentation. Ironically, however, even in the present age of methodological pluralism, there is a deep gulf (perhaps somewhat akin to the divide that separated Snow's two cultures) between those in the field of psychology who can speak the languages of both the experimental (including quasi-experimental) methods and alternative methods, and those who speak only the languages of the former. In this article, I want to address the question of receptivity and resistance to incorporating alternative methods in psychology by focusing on what I believe are two powerful forms of resistance - illiteracy and indifference. Before describing these forms of resistance and their consequences, I consider briefly the question of naming. What Words are We to Use? Recent discussions of the expansion of methods available for psychological research are increasingly framed within the quantitative-qualitative binary. As Rogers (2001) persuasively argues, however, the use of the term qualitative is problematic on at least two grounds. …


We propose the linearized focal-plane technique (LIFT) and compare it to classical sensors, such as the quad-cell wavefront sensor (WFS), pyramid WFS, and Shack-Hartmann WFS. The number of modes sensed by LIFT can be tuned without any hardware modification nor degradation of low-order sensing performance. We derive an analytic model of the noise propagation law, which we validate on end-to-end simulations.


The epidemiology of
 gastrointestinal nematodes of sheep was investigated in farms of
 small farmers in Hyderabad district during the year of 2004-05.
 Faecal egg counts, packed cell volume, herbage larval counts, adult
 worm counts and inhibited/arrested development larvae from
 permanently grazing sheep were monitored. On the basis of the
 coproculture and necropsy, seven species of gastrointestinal
 nematodes were identified i.e. Haemonchus contortus,
 Trichostrongylus spp, Ostertagia circumcincta, Strongyloides
 papillosus, Trichuris ovis, Oesphagostomum columbianum and Chabertia
 ovina. The overall prevalence rate of infection was 42.1 and 44.75
 per cent on the basis of coprological examination and necropsy
 respectively. The results revealed that faecal egg counts (FEC),
 larval pasture counts, total worm counts (TWC) and packed cell
 volume (PCV) of sheep were significantly (P0.01) influenced by
 seasonal variation (months). The FEC and TWC of sheep reached to the
 highest level during the rainy summer season (September) i.e.1913.4
 and 920.8 respectively, while it declined to lower level during the
 dry season (February) i.e. 826.19 and 625.25. The arrested
 development larvae (L4) of H.contortus, O.circumcincta,
 Trichostrongylus spp. and Oe.columbianum were observed to occur from
 November to April and reached the peak in February i.e.511.4;
 whereas, L4 of S. papillosus, T. ovis and C. ovina did not show
 prone to arrest. The numbers of infective larvae (L3) on the pasture
 reached the peak of infectivity in August (1885) and declined to
 lower level in January (790). The PCV values of sheep were monitored
 during entire course of the study. There was highly decreased on PCV
 values of sheep during summer season (August) i.e. 24.88 percent and
 remained fluctuated during other seasons of the year. The drastic
 drop in PCV values were coincided with increased of FEC of sheep.
 During the year of 2005-06, the anthelmintic activity of Fumaria
 parviflora L. (Fumariaceae) whole plant, Adhatoda vasica (Acanthaceae)
 whole plant, Nigella sativa L. ( Ranunculaceae ) seeds, and
 Azadirachta indica L. ( Meliaceae) seeds were screened through the
 egg hatch and larval development assays in vitro. The results
 revealed that the aqueous and ethanolic extracts of F. parviflora A.
 vasica, N. sativa and A. indica at the concentrations of 3.12, 6.3,
 12.5, 25.0, and 50.0 mg/ml exhibited ovicidal and larvicidal
 (P0.05) against egg and larvae of gastrointestinal nematodes of
 sheep. All plant extracts showed dose-dependent (P0.05). The
 inhibition rate of plant extracts on eggs and larvae was ranged
 between 9.3 - 96.0 percent.
 In the year of 2006-07, the field trials were conducted to evaluate
 the anthelmintic activity of F. parviflora, A. vasica, N. sativa and
 A. indica extracts against gastrointestinal nematodes of sheep using
 the faecal egg counts reduction test (FECRT) in vivo. In each plant
 treatment trial, the experimental animals (n=50) were divided into
 five groups (n=10) at random using age, weight, sex and level of
 helminth infections as the blocking factors and subjected to
 different treatment with single dose of plant extracts and/or
 commercial anthelmintic as follow: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd groups received
 single doses of 50 mg/kg,100 mg/kg and 200mg/kg respectively of
 respective plant extracts, while 4th group acted as a positive
 control group which was given a single dose of levamisole 7.5mg/kg (ICI®
 Pakistan) and 5th group served as negative control group and
 received no treatment. The results revealed a gradual reduction in
 FEC of experimental animals treated with different doses of
 different plant extracts and commercial anthelmintic drugs, and the
 difference was significant (P0.05) on day 14 post treatment from
 day 0. The FEC decreased (P0.05) significantly from day 3 onward to
 day 14 post treatment. F. parviflora extract exhibited the highest
 effect (P0.05) in FEC reduction of experimental animals i.e. 77.6
 and 70.5 percent for ethanolic and aqueous extracts respectively at
 the dose of 200mg/kg on the day 14 post-treatment. The effect of
 plant extracts on the haematological values also was discussed. The
 results of the study suggest that combination of strategic use of
 anthelmintic drugs and medicinal plant extracts could be useful for
 the control of gastrointestinal nematode infections in sheep.


Soil fertility depletion is considered one of the main biophysical limiting factors for increasing per capita food production for smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa. The adoption and diffusion of sustainable agricultural practices (SAPs), as a way to tackle this challenge, has become an important issue in the development policy agenda in the region. This paper examines the adoption decisions for SAPs, using recent primary data of multiple plot-level observations collected in 4 districts and 60 villages of rural Tanzania. The paper employs a multivariate probit technique to model simultaneous interdependent adoption decisions by farm households. The analysis reveals that rainfall, insects and disease shocks, government effectiveness in provision of extension services, tenure status of plot, social capital, plot location and size, and household assets, all influence farmer investment in SAPs. Policies that target SAPs and are aimed at 1 Corresponding author: Menale Kassie: firstname.lastname@example.com. Tel: 254(20) 722 4628; Fax: 254(20) 7224600. 2 organizing farmers into associations, improving land tenure security, and enhancing skills of civil servants can increase uptake of SAPs in smallholder systems.


Over the past decade, academic research into the use of tourism as a contributor to poverty reduction has grown considerably; however, there are few insights on how the poor perceive the connections between poverty and tourism. Based upon interpretive and participatory fieldwork with the poor of Elmina in Ghana, this paper explores their understanding and constructions of poverty and how they comprehend tourism as a provider of alternative livelihood opportunities. It emerged that poverty is understood as a multi-dimensional construct, including low and irregular incomes, depletion of natural resources, a lack of access to social assets and educational opportunities, and denial of meaningful participation in society. At a time of structural readjustment in Elmina's economy, the potential of tourism to enhance livelihoods and reduce poverty is high, but remains hindered by major barriers to entrepreneurship development and employment within the sector, which is worsened by the lack of access to credit, exclusion from decision-making, poor skills and excessive bureaucracy. It became evident that a focus on the use of tourism for macroeconomic gains will not necessarily benefit the poor. They need to be included in tourism policy and practice, not only as a target group, but also in participatory mechanisms to ensure the appropriate use of tourism for poverty reduction. It is argued that it is only through a better understanding of poor people's experiences of poverty, that tourism can be used more meaningfully as a strategy for its alleviation.


Automatic generation of Chinese fonts that consist of large numbers of glyphs with complicated structures is now still a challenging and ongoing problem in areas of AI and Computer Graphics (CG). Traditional CG-based methods typically rely heavily on manual interventions, while recentlypopularized deep learning-based end-to-end approaches often obtain synthesis results with incorrect structures and/or serious artifacts. To address those problems, this paper proposes a structure-guided Chinese font generation system, SCFont, by using deep stacked networks. The key idea is to integrate the domain knowledge of Chinese characters with deep generative networks to ensure that high-quality glyphs with correct structures can be synthesized. More specifically, we first apply a CNN model to learn how to transfer the writing trajectories with separated strokes in the reference font style into those in the target style. Then, we train another CNN model learning how to recover shape details on the contour for synthesized writing trajectories. Experimental results validate the superiority of the proposed SCFont compared to the state of the art in both visual and quantitative assessments.


Photoemission and Auger electron spectroscopy are powerful tools in the study of the electronic and magnetic properties of d band metals. In certain instances experimental spectra can be directly interpreted as a measure of some one body density of states. In other cases one must consider the many body dynamics of the measurement process in detail. Striking examples of the latter are the resonant satellites in several filled d band materials which have been observed in photoemission near the photon energy threshold for core hole production. An elementary introduction to the physics of this satellite phenomenon will be presented. A model recently introduced by Davis and Feldkamp to explain resonant satellites in filled d band materials will be discussed in some detail and the predictions of this model will be used to illustrate some general properties of resonant photoemission satellites.


Introduction: At subdissociative doses of 0.1 - 0.5 mg/kg, ketamine provides effective analgesia when used alone or as an adjunct to opioid analgesics without causing cardiovascular or respiratory compromise. Ketamine is a beneficial analgesic agent in the emergency department (ED), particularly in patients with opioid-resistant pain or polytrauma patients who are hemodynamically unstable. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate current practice and describe clinical outcomes associated with the use of low-dose ketamine for acute pain in the ED. Methods: Adult patients receiving ketamine were retrospectively evaluated between March 1, 2012 and March 31, 2013. Patients were included if they were ordered for ketamine in the ED to treat acute pain. Outcomes included dose administered, cumulative doses, concurrent opioid administration, and any efficacy or adverse events documented after the administration of ketamine. Continuous variables are reported as mean (standard deviation [SD]) or median (interquartile range [IQR]). Results: A total of 46 patients were evaluated for inclusion. Of the 25 patients included, 38 doses of ketamine were documented. The mean age was 41 years old with 64% of the patients being female. The average initial ketamine dose was 0.12 ± 0.06 mg/kg and 8 (32%) patients received multiple doses of ketamine (1.5 ± 0.8 doses per patient). Ketamine was added to opioid therapy in 23 (92%) patients. Pain scores decreased post administration of ketamine from 10 (9 - 10) to 5 (4 - 7). Adequate pain relief was documented in 11 (44%) patients (felt comfortable going home); partial pain relief was noted in 5 (20%) patients; 3 (12%) patients reported no pain relief; 3 (12%) patients were able to have a procedure done, and efficacy was not documented in 3 (12%) patients. Anxiety and agitation were documented in 2 (8%) patients. No adverse outcomes were documented in 84% of patients. Conclusion: Administration of low-dose ketamine for acute pain in the ED demonstrated improvement in patients' pain scores with minimal documented adverse outcomes.


It has been recognized that alternative fuels such as liquid petroleum gas (LPG) has less polluting combustion characteristics than diesel fuel. Direct-injection stratified-charge combustion LPG engines with spark-ignition can potentially replace conventional diesel engines by achieving a more efficient combustion with less pollution. However, there are many unknowns regarding LPG spray mixture formation and combustion in the engine cylinder thus making the development of high-efficiency LPG engines difficult. In this study, LPG was injected into a high pressure and temperature atmosphere inside a constant volume chamber to reproduce the stratification processes in the engine cylinder. The spray was made to hit an impingement wall with a similar profile as a piston bowl. Spray images were taken using the Schlieren and laser induced fluorescence (LIF) method to analyze spray penetration and evaporation characteristics. Combustion characteristics were examined visually by taking simultaneous images of the flame and OH radical formed during combustion. Numerical calculations using the KIVA-3 code was performed to predict mixture formation and combustion of LPG. The results showed that the LPG mixture moved along the impingement wall eventually reaching the spark plug location. The OH radical rose sharply and decreased gradually when combustion occurred vigorously. The predicted results from numerical calculations showed favorable agreement with measurements.


The task of search for interesting relationships among data has been always an research focus in data mining. The overall performance of mining association rules is determined by the discover the large itemsets, i.e., the sets of itemsets that have their support above a pre-determined minimum support . The algorithms proposed for association rules show different approaches to generate all large itemsets (Apriori, AprioriTid, AprioriHibrido, DHP (Standing for Direct Hashing and Pruning), DIC( Dynamic Itemset Counting), Partition, y FP-tree). However, none of these algorithms is based on operators of the relational algebra and all they have been implemented on outside of databases engines. In this paper, an algorithm called EquipAsso is proposed. EquipAsso is an algorithm for the discovery the large itemsets based on two new operators of relational algebra: Associator and EquiKeep. These two operators facilitate the search of large itemsets and they allow the tightlycoupled integration of the algorithm with a relational database system. Associator y EquiKeep are implemented in the SQL SELECT clause as two new primitives Associator Range and EquiKeep On .


American mink Mustela vison, originally bred in fur farms, have become established in areas occupied by native endangered Southern river otter Lontra provocax, in Patagonia. In accordance with European experience, this biological invasion in South America raises questions about the interaction between invasive mink and native otter, from the viewpoints of both community assembly and conservation. We set out (1) to find which aspects of habitat structure were related to the distribution of signs of both this invasive species and Southern river otter Lontra provocax, in Argentinean Patagonia and their most common prey and (2) to test general predictions of niche partitioning between these two species. Based on surveys of 447 of 600 m transects for otter and mink scats/footprints along the waterside of lakes and rivers in the Andean Patagonian region, we compared diet composition (from scat analysis) and micro-habitat preferences (from field signs) of the two species. Otters were more specialist than mink in habitat use and diet. Mink used different habitats in other river basins where otters were absent. Where they occurred together in the basin of the Limay River, the distributions of their signs were similar, and mink diet was more similar to that of otters. There was no detectable difference in otter diet before and after mink arrival in the Limay basin. Contrary to the prediction of niche partitioning, and to the findings of European studies, resource use by mink was more similar to that of otters where the species occurred sympatrically than where they were allopatric.


Body centric communication has been extensively studied in the past for a range of frequencies, however the need to reduce the size of the devices makes nano-scale technologies attractive for future applications. This opens up opportunities of applying nano-devices made of the novel materials, like carbon nano tubes (CNT), graphene and etc., which operate at THz frequencies and probably inside human bodies. With a brief introduction of nano-communications and review of the state of the art, three main contributions have been demonstrated in this thesis to characterise nano-scale body-centric communication at THz band: • A novel channel model has been studied. The path loss values obtained from the simulation have been compared with an analytical model in order to verify the feasibility of the numerical analysis. On the basis of the path loss model and noise model, the channel capacity is also investigated. • A 3-D stratified skin model is built to investigate the wave propagation from the under-skin to skin surface and the influence of the rough interface between different skin layers is investigated by introducing two detailed skin models with different interfaces (i.e.,3-D sine function and 3-D sinc function). In addition, the effects of the inclusion of the sweat duct is also analysed and the results show great potential of the THz waves on sensing and communicating. • Since the data of dielectric properties for biological materials at THz band are quite scarce, in collaboration with the Blizard Institute, London, UK, different human tissues such as skin, blood, muscle and etc. are planned to be measured with the THz Time Domain Spectroscopy (THz-TDS) system at Queen Mary University of London to enrich the database of electromagnetic parameters at the band of interest. In this chapter, collagen, the main constitution of skin was


Several methods have been used to measure the particle size and distribution of colloidal silica. It is an important parameter governing the proper function of many industrial products, for example, organic-inorganic hybrid coatings, ceramic coatings, paints, and inks, etc. Particle size distribution of commercial colloidal silica of eight was measured by TEM (transmission electron microscopy) or DLS (dynamic light scattering). The accuracy of the particle distribution is decreased when the colloidal silica is a mixture of approximately 50 nm particles and 100 nm particles. The particles less than ~50 nm may not be detected by DLS analyzer in the case of mixture sample. In order to investigate the difference in particle size distribution among measurement methods, we have compared and discussed particle size results measured from DLS, TEM, and BET (Brunauer-Emmett-Teller) analysis. In the TEM observation, 16 TEM images from one grid were compared and found out that the particle size distribution may vary based on the positions from which the particles are observed either scattered or agglomerated. We suggest combination of DLS, TEM and BET method to obtain the particle size distribution reflecting the dispersion, which represents the surface properties and aggregation state.


. The development research aims to produce draft teaching materials of otomotive electrical and elektronic practice in the form of an integrated jobsheet that can improve the achievement of competency standars in mechanical engineering majors. Development held for two years. The first year perform a requirement of analysis of the competency standards contained in the SKKNI otomotive field based Kep.116 /Men/ VII/2004 , KKNI and SNPT based curriculum in mechanical engineering majors in 2017[4]. Automotive electrical and electronic practice grouped into 2 (two) types of jobsheet that is conventional ignition system and the elctronic ignition jobsheet system , where both types of jobsheet are arranged in one standard of competence. The model refers to the material development of the model of Dick and Carey (2004). The results of the questionnaire responses of experts, students, and faculty were analyzed descriptively, the result is the average age of students is 20-22 years. Outstanding characteristics are more students tend to like work that is experimental. (Sunarto, 2004). Means of laboratory learning approaches and strategies of training is one of the most appropriate learning system applied in practice otomotive electrical and electronic in mechanical engineering majors.Characteristics of students majoring in mechanical engineering force in 2016/2017 to practice learning otomotive electrical and electronic views of: 1) the attitude of the average student score of 114 (positive), 2) the interest of students the average score of 75 (high), 3) student motivation average score of 75 (high), and 4) the level of students' understanding of the concept of otomotive electrical and electronic practices an average score of 3.6 (medium), and 5) most of the suggestions students 79,41% suggest the practice of teaching materials need to be developed , enhanced with more series of system drawings and short explanations to make it more easily understood and to understand.


Extensively modifiable arrays of clustered arginines in a large set of human proteins function as regulatory protein interaction platforms. Quantitative immunoprecipitation assays defined two distinct cumulative binding mechanisms operating across an array of 18 methyl-arginine motifs in SYNCRIP. Systematic analysis of human arginine methylation identifies two distinct signaling modes; either isolated modifications akin to canonical post-translational modification regulation, or clustered arrays within disordered protein sequence. Hundreds of proteins contain these methyl-arginine arrays and are more prone to accumulate mutations and more tightly expression-regulated than dispersed methylation targets. Arginines within an array in the highly methylated RNA-binding protein synaptotagmin binding cytoplasmic RNA interacting protein (SYNCRIP) were experimentally shown to function in concert, providing a tunable protein interaction interface. Quantitative immunoprecipitation assays defined two distinct cumulative binding mechanisms operating across 18 proximal arginine–glycine (RG) motifs in SYNCRIP. Functional binding to the methyltransferase PRMT1 was promoted by continual arginine stretches, whereas interaction with the methyl-binding protein SMN1 was arginine content–dependent irrespective of linear position within the unstructured region. This study highlights how highly repetitive modifiable amino acid arrays in low structural complexity regions can provide regulatory platforms, with SYNCRIP as an extreme example how arginine methylation leverages these disordered sequences to mediate cellular interactions.


Abstract This paper analyses the importance of tourism employment for in-migration to Malung/Sälen and Älvdalen, two rural municipalities hosting two major tourist destinations in the southern Swedish mountains. It uses micro-data from a database that includes, among many other variables, residence and employment information. This work is explorative and uses longitudinal data that permit examining individuals and go beyond simple net employment figures to show that many in-migrants to these municipalities are employed in tourism and constitute part of what is defined as the "creative workforce" in the local labour market. In this sense, tourism employment is found to be a pull factor for in-migration of highly skilled and well-paid people.


This paper presents an analysis of cross-cultural and linguistic issues in the generation of referring expressions (REs) for English and Japanese dialogues. The analysis is based on a translation activity carried out for a study on the perception of automatically generated REs in a virtual world involving participants in Tokyo and Dublin and complemented by two data elicitation studies. In order to preserve the output of the RE generation algorithm the translation sought to produce a Japanese dialogue in which the REs were as close to the English originals as possible, but within a scenario adapted to the Japanese culture. The two data elicitation experiments assessed Japanese speakers' preferences of REs in the same dialogue context. Insights from this work are relevant to the design of RE generation algorithms for use in real-life situations and raise questions as to what extent the current algorithms are transferable between languages and cultures. Results suggest that current approaches to generating REs are biased towards the English language, which becomes apparent when considering, for instance, the realisation of Japanese locative expressions and the absence of a distinction between singular and plural in the Japanese language. 1 LiLT Volume 5, Issue 1, June 2011. Issues in Translating and Producing Japanese Referring Expressions for Dialogues. Copyright c © 2011, CSLI Publications. 2 / LiLT volume 5, issue 1 June 2011


Research Question: the paper investigates the influence of the size of the squad and the club's expenditures on football in the final classification in seasons 2008 to 2016 of the first division of the Brazilian Football League (Serie A). Motivation: Considering soccer as the most important sport in Brazil, representing a cultural symbol of the country, it is better to make it necessary. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the influence of the size of the squad on the performance of the teams and, in addition, how much the clubs invest in the formation of these squads. Idea: In this perspective, the central hypothesis of this study is that clubs with the highest number of players will also present the best classifications, and the second central hypothesis is that clubs with more investments in football have the biggest squad. Data: (The study was conducted with data collected over the internet, using data provided by clubs. Only the clubs belonging to the first division were used, being a total of 34 clubs, divided into 2 groups, according to the investment value in Football. Tools: This study presents descriptive and inferential analyses, since the qualitative-quantitative approach was assumed as a way of understanding the data. Assuming the number of clubs participating in the study, we chose non-parametric inferential analyses in the intra- and inter-group evaluations, using the alpha value of 0,05 as criterion. Findings: The results show that the size of the squad is not a determining factor in the ranking of clubs in the National League, but the clubs' spending on football is crucial, since the clubs with the highest spent on football were the clubs with the best safety ratings in 4 of 6 Championships. In addition, the results showed that the size of the squad and spending on Football  are not related, that is, it's not the size of the squad what determines the cost of football and other factors, such as wages of athletes. Contribution: One can conclude that to the first division of the Brazilian championship of professional football, the number of athletes in the squad is not a determining factor for the position taken by the clubs in the competition, but the value invested in wages, corroborating only one of the hypotheses of study. However, this study has some limitations, such as sample size (only 34 teams), the use of clubs from a single country, and the lack of information from other clubs (not all clubs provide their financial statements through the club or federation website). Therefore, we emphasize the need for new studies.


Objectives: The current standard of care for an amputee is a socket-based prostheses. An osseointegrated implant (OI) is an alternative for prosthetic attachment. Osseointegration addresses reported problems related to wearing a socket interface, such as skin issues, discomfort, diminished function, quality of life, prosthetic use, and abandonment. The purpose of this report is to systematically review current literature regarding OI to identify and categorize the reported clinically relevant outcome measures, rate the quality of available evidence, and synthesize the findings. Data sources: A multidisciplinary team used PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) methods. Search methodology was based on identifying clinically relevant articles. Three databases were searched: PubMed, CINAHL, and Web of Science. Study Selection: Clinical studies with aggregated data reporting at least 1 clinically relevant outcome measure were included. Data Extraction: The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) criterion was used for critical appraisal and recommendations. Conclusions: This review identified 21 clinically relevant observational studies. Outcome measures were categorized into the following 9 categories: vibratory stimulation, complications, biomechanics, economics, patient-reported outcome measures, electromyography, x-ray, physical functional performance, and energy consumption. This systematic review consisted of Level III and IV observational studies. Homogeneous outcome measures with strong psychometric properties across prospective studies do not exist to date. Higher-level, prospective, randomized, long-term, clinically relevant trials are needed to prove efficacy of OI compared with socket prosthetic attachment. Osseointegration was at least equivalent to sockets in most studies. In some cases, it was superior. Osseointegration represents a promising alternative to socket prosthetic attachments for extremity amputees. Level of Evidence: Therapeutic Level III. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.


The occurrence of extreme weather conditions appears on the rise under current climate change conditions, resulting in more frequent and severe floods. The devastating floods in southern China in 2010 and eastern Australia 2010–2011, serve as a solemn testimony to that notion. Accompanying the excess runoffs, elevated amount of terrigenous materials, including nutrients for microalgae, are discharged to the coastal ocean. However, how these floods and the materials they carry affect the coastal ocean ecosystem is still poorly understood. Yangtze River (aka Changjiang), which is the largest river in the Eurasian continent, flows eastward and empties into the East China Sea. Since the early twentieth century, serious overflows of the Changjiang have occurred four times. During the two most recent ones in July 1998 and 2010, we found total primary production in the East China Sea reaching 147 × 103 tons carbon per day, which may support fisheries catch as high as 410 × 103 tons per month, about triple the amount during non‐flooding periods based on direct field oceanographic observations. As the frequencies of floods increase world wide as a result of climate change, the flood‐induced biological production could be a silver lining to the hydrological hazards and human and property losses inflicted by excessive precipitations.


With changes to the Australian sheep industry, breeds that have a meat emphasis are becoming increasingly adopted by farmers. One such breed is the Dorper sheep, which was used in this study to investigate the relationship between worm egg count and production attributes. Gastrointestinal worm burden was measured by worm egg counts (WECs) and production attributes that were examined included liveweight, body condition score (BCS), c-site fat depth and eye muscle depth. Two flocks of Dorper lambs (two-hundred and eighty nine Dorper ewe lambs, and two-hundred and thirty four entire Dorper ram lambs), were weaned onto two separate paddocks for grazing and natural worm challenge on a Kojonup property. At post weaning (approximately 10 months of age), each flock had their production attributes measured, along with individual WECs. Each flock was drenched at weaning and not drenched again until after individual WECs were measured. The measured flock WEC frequency distribution reinforced the concept that high flock WECs are influenced by a small percentage of the sheep within the flock and that Dorper sheep are similar to other breeds with respect to parasite population dynamics.

The relationships found between WEC and production attributes of both liveweight and eye muscle depth were positive, contradicting the hypothesis of that a negative relationship exists between WEC and production in the Dorper. Although this relationship between WEC and liveweight was weak and unexpected, the relationship was still significant (P<0.05). With an increasing WEC, BCS fell by 56.6% and 37.7% of average ram BCSs in twin and single born rams respectively (P<0.05), while an 18.6% decrease of average ewe BCS was observed in twin born ewes (P<0.05). The drop in body condition score and c-site fat depth may have contributed to overall leaner and lighter carcases (particularly in the ram flock). Given that the liveweights were actually higher in these same animals, this suggests a reduced dressing percentage due to increased non-carcase components, possibly gastrointestinal tissue mass.

With increasing WEC the association of liveweight increase and BCS decline indicated that sheep with a higher worm burden may have heavier intestines, when compared to sheep with a low worm challenge. By using liveweight change to assess GIN impact on productivity, production losses linked to gastrointestinal parasite infection may be underestimated. Instead of using liveweight change in assessing the effect of a worm challenge, measurements of the carcass yield may be a more reliable measure in revealing the real economic impact of gastrointestinal worms on sheep meat production systems.


The present study aimed at assesssing – by clinical, histological and radiological investigations – the influence of some external factors on the pulp-dentin complex, and at providing a causal interpretation of the structural changes observed. Materials and methods. Clinical and radiological exams were performed on 65 old patients with ages between 60-75, and also on 40 young patients with ages between 20-35, presenting different dental-periodontal pathologies. The pulp-dentin complex was submitted to a morphopathological examination, to highlight the structural changes observed at microscopic level. Fragments of dental pulp were imersed in a 4% formaldehyde solution with phosphate buffer 0.1 M., pH 7.2, for 12 -14 hours, at a temperature of 4oC, and 3-5 μm thick slices were prepared. The slices were coloured with hematoxylin-eosine (HE), by the trichromic technique – Masson. Photographies were taken with a Zeiss microscope, with Kodak 200 ASA. Results. Significant differences were observed, between the two groups of patients, as to the external factors that produce structural changes on pulp-dentin organ. In the group of young patients dental caries and coronal fillings prevailed, while the group of old patients was mostly associated with atrition and chronic marginal periodontitis. Out of the 40 young patients, 30 presented chronic dental caries (75%), while, among the 65 old patients, only 24 presented dental caries (36.9%). The percentages of coronary fillings between the two study groups were close, which could be considered as one of the causes producing changes in the pulp-dentin organ, following aggresive preparation of cavities, the action of materials used for the protection of pulp-dentin complex or of the materials used for coronry fillings. Conclusions. Dental pulp has a remarkable ability to counteract the action of harmful factors, producing a mineral barrier and stimulating the reparatory processes. Changes in the endodontic space can be produced in both experimental groups, but more intensely and more frequently in the old patients. The endodontic space is modified, both physiologically and pathologically, including deposition of secondary or tertiary dentin (reactionary or reparative dentin), as well as pulp reactions, such as: inflammation, fibrosis, calcium degeneration or vacuolisis. At cell level, microsocopic images showed a decrease of the odontoblasts number and sizes, as well as a reduced fibroblasts/fibrocytes ratios. These changes are associated with progressive vascular and nervous changes, that can be considered both theis cause and effect. These pathological transformations are related with a more difficult preparation of the endodontic space and can be considered as having a major role in the failure of endodontic therapy.


Most time processes within the atmosphere and oceans, and along the water cycle are periodic-stochastic processes, with the physical basis of the periodicity derived from astronomic cycles and the stochasticity produced by various sources of randomness within the environments of the earth. The atmosphere is the major source of stochasticity in all those geophysical time processes which are connected to the incoming solar radiation, though the oceans, the earth's surface, and the earth's crust also produce the stochasticity. The main influence of the oceans and the continental surfaces as well as the underground water is, however, to attenuate the high stochasticity produced by the atmosphere. It is concluded that without stochastic meteorology a good understanding of many geophysical stochastic processes will be difficult.


Cost, time, and expertise constraints limit traditional observation-based comprehensive biodiversity assessment. Therefore, surrogate focal taxa representative of wider biodiversity are commonly used as an imperfect 'proxy'. Contemporary biodiversity assessments are also increasingly benefiting from the combination of high-throughput sequencing and metagenomic methodologies that enable identification of environmental DNA samples. However, there is a need for empirical studies combining the use of surrogate taxa with metagenomic approaches, that promise rapid and efficient biodiversity assessment. We here tested for the first time the possibility of using the intestinal contents of wild-collected dung beetles (Scarabaeidae) as a source of mammalian DNA, in a metagenomics proof-of-concept approach to directly detect and identify mammals from an area of savanna-scrub in southern Africa. Dung beetles have been purveyed as an indirect proxy measure of mammalian diversity, owing to their dependence upon vertebrate dung as a food source, and the ease with which they can be comprehensively sampled using simple and repeatable trapping protocols, achievable much faster than vertebrate surveys. Following shotgun sequencing of gut content DNA extractions from ten dung beetle species, we used in silico filters to identify mammals by searching the resulting reads against known mammalian mitochondrial DNA from online sequence repositories, matching 546 paired reads to known mitogenomes held in GenBank, and 634 reads to known mammal barcode sequences held in BOLD. Identified mammalian sequences were consistent with wild and domesticated ungulates known from the sampling site, and included blue wildebeest, plains zebra, and domestic cattle and goat. Four dung beetle samples yielded sufficient sequence data to successfully assemble the near-complete mitogenome of blue wildebeest at up to 21 X mean coverage, despite low initial DNA concentrations, unambiguously corroborating identification. It is conceptually and practically possible to rapidly and economically apply metagenomic techniques in dung beetle gut sequencing to detect the presence of mammals upon whose dung the beetles have fed. Since the approach can be readily scaled up, it may prove to be of practical use as a complement to traditional biodiversity assessment methods, and should be tested in usefulness for detecting rare, endangered or cryptic mammal species.


Where does Homer come from? And why does Homer matter? His epic poems of war and suffering can still speak to us of the role of destiny in life, of cruelty, of humanity and its frailty, but why they do is a mystery. How can we be so intimate with something so distant? In this passionate and deeply personal book, Adam Nicolson sets out to explain why these great ancient poems still have so much to say about what it is to be human, to love, lose, grow old and die. 'The Mighty Dead' is a journey of history and discovery, sewn together by the oldest stories we have - the Iliad and the Odyssey, which emerged from a time before the Greeks became Greek. As nomadic tribes of the northern steppe, they clashed with the sophisticated cities of the eastern Mediterranean. These poems tell us how we became who we are. We witness a disputatious dinner in 19th-century Paris and Keats finding in Chapman's Homer the inspiration to travel in the 'realms of gold'. We go to Bosnia in the 1930s, with the god of Homer studies Milman Parry where oral poetry still thrived; to Spain to visit the possible site of Hades; to Troy, Ukraine, Syria and the islands of the Mediterranean; and to that most ancient of modern experiences, the open sea, in calm and storm. Reflecting on fathers and sons, men and women, on the necessity for love and the violence of warriors, on peace and war, youth and old-age, Homer is the deep voice of Europe, as dark as Mavrodaphne and as glowingly alive as anything that has ever been.


Abstract First collections are reported for Elaphomyces species from Africa and Madagascar. On the basis of an ITS phylogeny, the authors question the monophyletic nature of family Elaphomycetaceae and of the genus Elaphomyces. The objective of this preliminary paper was not to propose a new phylogeny for Elaphomyces, but rather to draw attention to the very high dissimilarity among ITS sequences for Elaphomyces and to the unfortunate choice of species to represent the genus in most previous phylogenetic publications on Elaphomycetaceae and other cleistothecial ascomycetes. Our study highlights the need for examining the monophyly of this family and to verify the systematic status of Pseudotulostoma as a separate genus for stipitate species. Furthermore, there is an urgent need for an in-depth morphological study, combined with molecular sequencing of the studied taxa, to point out the phylogenetically informative characters of the discussed taxa.


Since the late 1970's, computer-aided process planning (CAPP) has attracted a large amount of research interest, which has led to a huge volume of literature published on this subject. The literature encompasses both reviews and research articles. The review articles are mostly technologically oriented. This paper takes a different angle to look back the CAPP research, that is, a statistic approach. The paper analyses the journals that have been publishing CAPP research works. The concept of "Subject Strength" of a journal is introduced and used to gauge the level of focus of a journal on a particular research subject/domain, i.e. CAPP. Discussions about the recent CAPP research works are presented in different categories as they fall in. The term "Technology Impact Factor (TIF)" is introduced to assess the level of impact of a particular technology, in terms of citation counts. All discussions and analyses are carried out based on the data gathered from the Elsevier's Scopus abstract and citation database. Finally, a discussion on the future development is presented. The literature suggests that this is the only review article of the similar nature in the first decade of the century.Copyright © 2010 by ASME


Background and Hypothesis: Inflammatory Bowel Disease is a significant cause of gastrointestinal pathology in children and adolescents, with increasing incidence. The medications used to control this disease have an overall low risk of detrimental side effects, but when they occur can be serious or life-threatening. The most important side effects of immunosuppression in IBD are infection and malignancy, but little is known about how these risks affect patients' and their families' decisions about medication use.  Clinical utilities are a standard methodology used to assign risk to various hypothetical health states. We hypothesized that lower health utility scores would be assigned to scenarios related to cancer than to infection, even if the risks or severity were similar.
Experimental Design or Project Methods: This study determines the clinical utility of immunosuppression and cancer / infection risk in children with inflammatory bowel disease using the standard gamble technique.  The standard gamble technique measures individual preferences for many different therapeutic modalities, under uncertain results. The study will look at the health utilities of at least 50 families at Riley hospital for Children and IU North, with at least 25 patients with ulcerative colitis and 25 patients with Crohn's disease. In addition to the perfect health and death, we propose to utilize six different hypothetical health states during this study: (1) untreated IBD, (2) on a medication with no side effects, (3) on a medication with risk of a treatable infection, (4) on a medication with risk of an untreatable infection, (5) on a medication with risk of a treatable cancer, (6) and on a medication with risk of an untreatable cancer. We will also gather subject demographics, family education, family income, and perform an assessment of numeracy. These variables will then be used in a regression model to assess the effect of these confounders.
Results: We have not yet enrolled subjects, but now that the tool and Standard Gamble design are complete, we expect to rapidly accrue enrollment over the next two weeks and will update results at that time.
Conclusion and Potential Impact: Health utility data in pediatric IBD are quite scarce, with room for further research. It is crucial to understand the health utilities in individuals with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), specifically in pediatric patients. This allows for cost-utility analysis to play a role in determining effectiveness for a wide variety of treatment modalities. It is also important when discussing treatment options with families when the risk of infection or cancer are present.  Knowledge gained from this study may help us design interventions that focus on educating families about the nature and magnitude of these important risks in immunosuppressive therapy.


7-Hydroxystaurosporine (UCN-01) is a selective protein kinase C inhibitor in clinical trial for cancer treatment. In this study, we found that nanomolar concentrations of camptothecin (CPT), a topoisomerase I inhibitor, arrest or delay cell cycle progression during the S and G2 phases in p53 mutant human colon carcinoma HT29 cells and that UCN-01 abrogates the S-phase arrest or delay induced by CPT. Under these conditions, CPT increased cyclin A levels and cyclin A/cyclin-dependent kinase 2 activity. UCN-01 prevented the increase of cyclin A/cyclin-dependent kinase 2 activity induced by CPT and enhanced Cdc2 kinase activity. Replication protein A (RPA2) was hyperphosphorylated after CPT treatment, and this effect was also abrogated by UCN-01. UCN-01 potentiated the cytotoxicity of CPT and reduced by 6-fold the concentration of CPT required to kill 50% of the HT-29 cells, as determined by clonogenic assays. This effect was observed at concentrations of UCN-01 that alone were not cytotoxic and had no detectable effect on cell cycle progression. UCN-01 markedly potentiated the cytotoxicity of CPT also in HCT116/E6 and MCF-7/ADR cells defective for p53 function, whereas significantly less potentiation was observed in p53-wild-type HCT116 and MCF-7 cells. These results suggest the existence of an S-phase checkpoint that delays replication and that may extend the time available for DNA repair. Thus, pharmacological abrogation of CPT-induced S- and G2-phase checkpoints by UCN-01 may provide an effective strategy for enhancing the chemotherapeutic activity of CPT, particularly against p53-defective tumors.


Abstract In this project, we examined the development of a sustainable inclusive education system in western Kenya by combining community-based participatory research (CBPR) and decolonizing methodologies. Through three cycles of qualitative interviews with stakeholders in inclusive education, participants explained what they saw as foundational components of how to create more inclusive primary school classrooms utilizing existing school and community resources. The combination of CBPR and decolonizing methodologies, along with other project factors ultimately led to more inclusive placements for primary students with disabilities. We highlight this increase enrollment of students with disabilities in primary schools with excerpts from qualitative interviews with participants. In addition to the increase of the number of students with disabilities accessing schools for the first time, we found many methodological tensions inherent in this research. Such challenges included: researcher positionality, researcher outsider status, decolonizing approaches to language, and disseminating results in meaningful, ethical, and culturally appropriate ways.


For semimetals such as bismuth, ultrafast femtosecond laser-excited coherent phonons at laser fluences below the damage threshold have been studied extensively. In this work, we investigate whether or not coherent phonon oscillations contribute to material's permanent damage, or can enhance or suppress such damage. We employed temporally-shaped femtosecond pulses to either enhance or cancel coherent phonon oscillations. Our results showed a clear difference in material's damages caused by femtosecond pulses that enhance and cancel phonon oscillations, demonstrating the possibility of controlling phase changes by coherent control of phonon oscillations.


The aim of this work is to analyze the asymptotic behaviour of the eigenmodes of some elliptic eigenvalue problems set on domains becoming unbounded in one or several directions. In particular, in the case of a linear elliptic operator in divergence form, we prove that the sequence of the $ k$-th eigenvalues convergences to the first eigenvalue of an elliptic problems set on the section of the domain. Moreover, an optimal rate of convergence of this sequence is given.


Since the nineteenth century, the churches of the Reformation have had a prominent place in Latin America. The reflection on and development of a pastoral, and later, of a contextualized practical theology has become a reality. The goal of this chapter is to study how practical theol-ogy is constituted from a practical and theoretical standpoint in one theological school, in this case the School of Theology at Faculdades EST in southern Brazil. First, it addresses how, in the beginning, the school's emphasis was on the education of the pastors for the development of parishes. Later, this emphasis shifted to a theological praxis for peace and social justice motivated by Latin American liberation theology in the church as part of a renewed search for its identity. With the implementation of the Graduate School of Theology, the discipline of practical theol-ogy, together with its sub-disciplines, has tried to assert its own identity in critical dialogue with the demands of a changing social, cultural and political context, religious diversity and issues of gender, corporeity and research in partnership with other areas of knowledge. The publication of a compendium of practical theology at the end of the 1990s points to this new stage. The pres-ent challenge is to understand the perspectives for practical theology in this concrete space, while also considering the current situation of global and local political changes, to effectively respond to the social and ecclesiastical challenges.


OBJECTIVE--To assess the safety and efficacy of a preparation of mesalazine (5-aminosalicylic acid) coated with a pH dependent resin (Eudragit L) as compared with sulphasalazine in patients with active mild to moderate ulcerative colitis. DESIGN--Eight week randomised double blind parallel group study. SETTING--Forty six gastroenterology outpatient clinics in seven countries. PATIENTS--Two hundred and twenty patients aged 18-70 who met the following criteria: clinical activity index greater than or equal to 6 and endoscopic index greater than or equal to 4; no concomitant treatment for ulcerative colitis; no hypersensitivity to salicylates or sulphonamides. Of the 164 patients eligible for efficacy analysis, 87 received the coated preparation of mesalazine and 77 sulphasalazine. Most of the remaining patients (28 in each group) were ineligible for the efficacy analysis because of treatment with steroid enemas. All pretrial characteristics were comparable in the two treatment groups. INTERVENTIONS--Coated mesalazine (Mesasal) 1.5 g daily or sulphasalazine 3.0 g daily for eight weeks. Compliance monitored by pill counts. END POINT--Clinical and endoscopic remission. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS--Clinical activity measured by daily diary cards, assessment by investigators, and laboratory findings. Endoscopic evaluation at week 8. After four weeks 50 of 70 patients (71%) taking coated mesalazine and 38 of 58 (66%) taking sulphasalazine had achieved remission of their disease by eight weeks remission rates were 74% (37/50 patients) and 81% (35/43) in the two treatment groups respectively. Endoscopic remission at eight weeks was recorded in 20 of 41 patients (49%) taking coated mesalazine and 18 of 38 (47%) taking sulphasalazine. There was a higher incidence of adverse events among patients taking sulphasalazine (25/105; 24%) than among those taking coated mesalazine (16/115; 14%). CONCLUSION--Mesalazine coated with Eudragit L is a safe, logical alternative to sulphasalazine.


N-benzoyl-3,3-dinitroazetidine (BDNAZ) is a derivative of 3,3-dinitroazetidine (DNAZ). Its thermal behaviour was studied by DSC methods. The results show that there are one melting process and two exothermic decomposition processes. The kinetic parameters of the intense exothermic decomposition process were obtained from the analysis of the DSC curves. The apparent activation energy, pre-exponential factor and the mechanism function are 170.77 kJ mol-1, 1014.12 s-1 and f(α) = (1-a)-1/2, respectively. The specific heat capacity of BDNAZ was determined with a continuous Cp mode of a micro-calorimeter. The standard mole specific heat capacity of BDNAZ was 286.31 J mol1 K-1 at 298.15 K. Using the relationship between Cp and T with the thermal decomposition parameters, the time of the thermal decomposition from initialization to thermal explosion (adiabatic time-to-explosion, tTIAD), the self-accelerating decomposition temperature (TSADT), thermal ignition temperature (TTIT), critical temperatures of thermal explosion (Tb) and period of validity (t0.9) were obtained to evaluate its thermal safety. The detonation velocity (D) and pressure (P) of BDNAZ were estimated by using the nitrogen equivalent equation according to the experimental density.


Public-key encryption with keyword search (PEKS) is a versatile tool. It allows a third party knowing the search trapdoor of a keyword to search encrypted documents containing that keyword without decrypting the documents or knowing the keyword. However, it is shown that the keyword will be compromised by a malicious third party under a keyword guess attack (KGA) if the keyword space is in a polynomial size. We address this problem with a keyword privacy enhanced variant of PEKS referred to as public-key encryption with fuzzy keyword search (PEFKS). In PEFKS, each keyword corresponds to an exact keyword search trapdoor and a fuzzy keyword search trapdoor. Two or more keywords share the same fuzzy keyword trapdoor. To search encrypted documents containing a specific keyword, only the fuzzy keyword search trapdoor is provided to the third party, i.e., the searcher. Thus, in PEFKS, a malicious searcher can no longer learn the exact keyword to be searched even if the keyword space is small. We propose a universal transformation which converts any anonymous identity-based encryption (IBE) scheme into a secure PEFKS scheme. Following the generic construction, we instantiate the first PEFKS scheme proven to be secure under KGA in the case that the keyword space is in a polynomial size.


ABSTRACT Landmarks play key roles in human wayfinding and mobile navigation systems. Existing computational landmark selection models mainly focus on outdoor environments, and aim to identify suitable landmarks for guiding users who are unfamiliar with a particular environment, and fail to consider familiar users. This study proposes a familiarity-dependent computational method for selecting suitable landmarks for communicating with familiar and unfamiliar users in indoor environments. A series of salience measures are proposed to quantify the characteristics of each indoor landmark candidate, which are then combined in two LambdaMART-based learning-to-rank models for selecting landmarks for familiar and unfamiliar users, respectively. The evaluation with labelled landmark preference data by human participants shows that people's familiarity with environments matters in the computational modelling of indoor landmark selection for guiding them. The proposed models outperform state-of-the-art models, and achieve hit rates of 0.737 and 0.786 for familiar and unfamiliar users, respectively. Furthermore, semantic relevance of a landmark candidate is the most important measure for the familiar model, while visual intensity is most informative for the unfamiliar model. This study enables the development of human-centered indoor navigation systems that provide familiarity-adaptive landmark-based navigation guidance.


Human JNK1 is essential for IL-17A/F–dependent mucocutaneous immunity to Candida and for TGF-β–dependent homeostasis of connective tissues. Putting JNK1 on the immunodeficiency map Impaired TH17 immunity is the shared element among the group of inherited immunodeficiencies associated with chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis (CMC). Li et al. studied three patients from a single family who had CMC associated with an atypical form of connective tissue disorder with some features of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. Whole-exome sequencing identified a previously unreported loss-of-function splice-site mutation in the MAPK8 gene encoding c-Jun N-terminal kinase 1 (JNK1) that causes JNK1 haploinsufficiency with autosomal dominant inheritance. The complex clinical phenotype in these patients results from defects in signaling downstream of both IL-17 and TGF-β cytokines. These findings demonstrate that JNK1-mediated signaling plays a critical role in maintaining normal immunity to Candida as well as supporting TGF-β–dependent homeostasis of connective tissues. Genetic etiologies of chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis (CMC) disrupt human IL-17A/F–dependent immunity at mucosal surfaces, whereas those of connective tissue disorders (CTDs) often impair the TGF-β–dependent homeostasis of connective tissues. The signaling pathways involved are incompletely understood. We report a three-generation family with an autosomal dominant (AD) combination of CMC and a previously undescribed form of CTD that clinically overlaps with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS). The patients are heterozygous for a private splice-site variant of MAPK8, the gene encoding c-Jun N-terminal kinase 1 (JNK1), a component of the MAPK signaling pathway. This variant is loss-of-expression and loss-of-function in the patients' fibroblasts, which display AD JNK1 deficiency by haploinsufficiency. These cells have impaired, but not abolished, responses to IL-17A and IL-17F. Moreover, the development of the patients' TH17 cells was impaired ex vivo and in vitro, probably due to the involvement of JNK1 in the TGF-β–responsive pathway and further accounting for the patients' CMC. Consistently, the patients' fibroblasts displayed impaired JNK1- and c-Jun/ATF-2–dependent induction of key extracellular matrix (ECM) components and regulators, but not of EDS-causing gene products, in response to TGF-β. Furthermore, they displayed a transcriptional pattern in response to TGF-β different from that of fibroblasts from patients with Loeys-Dietz syndrome caused by mutations of TGFBR2 or SMAD3, further accounting for the patients' complex and unusual CTD phenotype. This experiment of nature indicates that the integrity of the human JNK1-dependent MAPK signaling pathway is essential for IL-17A– and IL-17F–dependent mucocutaneous immunity to Candida and for the TGF-β–dependent homeostasis of connective tissues.


The author assesses the shortfall risk of life-cycle investment funds. Since products offered by competing providers have differing risk-return characteristics, he uses a probabilistic measure of shortfall risk. The results indicate that risk-averse investors should not necessarily choose life-cycle investment funds with the lowest allocation to equities. A low rate of saving and/or a high minimally acceptable level of retirement income can make aggressive life-cycle equity allocation optimal. The approach outlined in this article will prove useful to financial planers, investors, portfolio managers, and policy makers in assessing the risk and return characteristics of competing life-cycle investment products.


Paleoseismic evidence and seismic-hazard analysis suggest that the city of Rome, Italy, has experienced considerable earthquake ground motion since its establishment more than 2000 years ago. Seismic hazards in Rome are mainly associated with two active seismogenic areas: the Alban Hills and the Central Apennines regions, located about 20 km southeast and 80–100 km east of central Rome. Within the twentieth century, M 6.8 and M 5.3 earthquakes in the Apennines and the Alban Hills, respectively, have generated intensities up to Mercalli-Cancani-Sieberg scale (MCS) VII in the city. With a lack of strong-motion records, we have generated a 3D velocity model for Rome, embedded in a 1D regional model, and estimated long-period (!1 Hz) ground motions for such scenarios from finite-difference simulations of viscoelastic wave propagation. We find 1-Hz peak ground velocities (PGVs) and peak ground accelerations (PGAs) of up to 14 cm/sec and 44 cm/sec, respectively, for a M 5.3 Alban Hills scenario, largest near the northwestern edge of the Tiber River. Our six simulations of a M 7.0 Central Apennine scenario generate 0.5-Hz PGVs in Rome of up to 9 cm/sec, as well as extended duration up to 60 sec. The peak motions are similar to, but the durations much longer than those from previous studies that omitted important wave-guide effects between the source and the city. The results from the two scenarios show that the strongest ground-motion amplification in Rome occurs in the Holocene alluvial areas, with strong basin edge effects in the Tiber River valley. Our results are in agreement with earlier 2D SHwave results showing amplification of peak velocities by up to a factor of 2 in the alluvial sediments, largest near the contact to the surrounding Plio-Pleistocene formations. Our results suggest that both earthquakes from the Alban Hills and the Central Apennines regions contribute to the seismic hazards in Rome. Although earthquakes from the former area may generate the larger peak motions, seismic waves from the latter region may generate ground motions with extended durations capable of causing significant damage on the built environment.


Juvenile Batten disease is a neurodegenerative disease caused by accelerated apoptotic death of photoreceptors and neurons attributable to defects in the CLN3 gene. CLN3 is antiapoptotic when overexpressed in NT2 neuronal precursor cells. CLN3 negatively modulates endogenous ceramide levels in NT2 cells and acts upstream of ceramide generation. Because defects in regulation of apoptosis are involved in the development of cancer, we evaluated the expression of CLN3 on both mRNA and protein levels in a variety of cancer cell lines and solid colon cancer tissue. We also observed the effect of the blocking of CLN3 protein expression on cancer cell growth, survival, ceramide production, and apoptosis by using an adenovirus-bearing antisense CLN3 construct. We show that CLN3 mRNA and protein are overexpressed in glioblastoma (U-373G and T98g), neuroblastoma (IMR-32 and SK-N-MC), prostate (Du145, PC-3, and LNCaP), ovarian (SK-OV-3, SW626, and PA-1), breast (BT-20, BT-549, and BT-474), and colon (SW1116, SW480, and HCT 116) cancer cell lines but not in pancreatic (CAPAN and As-PC-1) or lung (A-549 and NCIH520) cancer cell lines. CLN3 is also up-regulated in mouse melanoma and breast carcinoma cancer cell lines. We found CLN3 expression is 22–330% higher than in corresponding normal colon control tissue in 8 of 10 solid colon tumors. An adenovirus-expressing antisense CLN3 (Ad-ASCLN3) blocks CLN3 protein expression in DU-145, BT-20, SW1116, and T98g cancer cell lines as seen by Western blot. Blocking of CLN3 expression using Ad-AS-CLN3 inhibits growth and viability of cancer cells. It also causes elevation in endogenous ceramide production through de novo ceramide synthesis and results in increased apoptosis as shown by propidium iodide and JC-1 staining. This suggests that Ad-AS-CLN3 may be an option for therapy in some cancers. More importantly these results suggest that CLN3 is a novel molecular target for cancer drug discovery.


Recently, we have seen a growing trend in the design and fabrication of personalized figurines, created by scanning real people and then physically reproducing miniature statues with 3D printers. This is currently a hot topic both in academia and industry, and the printed figurines are gaining more and more realism, especially with state-of-the-art facial scanning technology improving. However, current systems all contain the same limitation - no previous method is able to suitably capture personalized hair-styles for physical reproduction. Typically, the subject's hair is approximated very coarsely or replaced completely with a template model. In this paper we present the first method for stylized hair capture, a technique to reconstruct an individual's actual hair-style in a manner suitable for physical reproduction. Inspired by centuries-old artistic sculptures, our method generates hair as a closed-manifold surface, yet contains the structural and color elements stylized in a way that captures the defining characteristics of the hair-style. The key to our approach is a novel multi-view stylization algorithm, which extends feature-preserving color filtering from 2D images to irregular manifolds in 3D, and introduces abstract geometric details that are coherent with the color stylization. The proposed technique fits naturally in traditional pipelines for figurine reproduction, and we demonstrate the robustness and versatility of our approach by capturing several subjects with widely varying hair-styles.


We present a novel technique for the efficient boundary evaluation of sweep operations applied to objects in polygonal boundary representation. These sweep operations include Minkowski addition, offsetting, and sweeping along a discrete rigid motion trajectory. Many previous methods focus on the construction of a polygonal superset (containing self‐intersections and spurious internal geometry) of the boundary of the volumes which are swept. Only few are able to determine a clean representation of the actual boundary, most of them in a discrete volumetric setting. We unify such superset constructions into a succinct common formulation and present a technique for the robust extraction of a polygonal mesh representing the outer boundary, i.e. it makes no general position assumptions and always yields a manifold, watertight mesh. It is exact for Minkowski sums and approximates swept volumes polygonally. By using plane‐based geometry in conjunction with hierarchical arrangement computations we avoid the necessity of arbitrary precision arithmetics and extensive special case handling. By restricting operations to regions containing pieces of the boundary, we significantly enhance the performance of the algorithm.


High-throughput sequencing libraries are typically limited by the requirement for nanograms to micrograms of input DNA. This bottleneck impedes the microscale analysis of ecosystems and the exploration of low biomass samples. Current methods for amplifying environmental DNA to bypass this bottleneck introduce considerable bias into metagenomic profiles. Here we describe and validate a simple modification of the Illumina Nextera XT DNA library preparation kit which allows creation of shotgun libraries from sub-nanogram amounts of input DNA. Community composition was reproducible down to 100 fg of input DNA based on analysis of a mock community comprising 54 phylogenetically diverse Bacteria and Archaea. The main technical issues with the low input libraries were a greater potential for contamination, limited DNA complexity which has a direct effect on assembly and binning, and an associated higher percentage of read duplicates. We recommend a lower limit of 1 pg (∼100–1,000 microbial cells) to ensure community composition fidelity, and the inclusion of negative controls to identify reagent-specific contaminants. Applying the approach to marine surface water, pronounced differences were observed between bacterial community profiles of microliter volume samples, which we attribute to biological variation. This result is consistent with expected microscale patchiness in marine communities. We thus envision that our benchmarked, slightly modified low input DNA protocol will be beneficial for microscale and low biomass metagenomics.


In Snowdonia and Llŷn three prograde stages in metapelites (Gwna Group to Wenlock) are recognized: Stage I, with white mica crystallinity values >0.43Δ°2θ; Stage II, 0.43–0.26Δ°2θ; Stage III, <0.26 Δ°2θ. Isocrysts at 0.03Δ°2θ intervals are drawn separately for pelites above and below the sub-Arenig unconformity. Approximately concordant isocryst patterns characterize the unconformity in the northwestern and southeastern limbs of the Snowdonia Syncline, whereas discordant patterns are developed northwest of the Aber–Dinlle Fault and at the closure of the Ynyscynhaiarn Anticline. The contrasting patterns are the result of a pre-Arenig burial metamorphism. In post-Tremadoc pelites belts of steep metamorphic gradient coincide with belts of high strain, and a broad area of higher grade Caradoc pelites coincides with the core of the Snowdonia Syncline. The later metamorphism is related to Caledonian deformation rather than to burial. Pelite alteration adjacent to small, intermediate to acid plutons suggests emplacement before the Caledonian regional metamorphism. A close correlation exists between metabasite zones and metapelite stages.


Third-party funding is an arrangement whereby an outside entity finances the legal representation of a party involved in litigation or arbitration. The outside entity — called a "third-party funder" — could be a bank, hedge fund, insurance company, or some other entity or individual that finances the party's legal representation in return for a profit. Third-party funding is a controversial, dynamic, and evolving phenomenon. The practice has attracted national headlines and the attention of the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (Advisory Committee). The Advisory Committee stated in a recent report that "judges currently have the power to obtain information about third-party funding when it is relevant in a particular case," but the Committee did not provide any additional guidance on how to determine the relevance of third-party funding. What information should be obtained, and from whom? This Article offers that needed guidance by setting forth revisions and reinterpretations of procedural rules to provide judges and arbitrators with disclosure requirements and a framework for handling known issues as they arise. By revising and interpreting the procedural rules as suggested in this Article, judges and arbitrators will be able to gain a better sense of the prevalence, structures, and impact of third-party funding and its effects (if any) on dispute resolution procedures. Over time, these observations will reveal the true systemic impact of third-party funding and contribute to developing more robust third-party funding procedural regulations.


The United Nations Centre for Trace Facilitation and eBusiness (UN/CEFACT) provides a conceptual approach named Core Components for defining business document types based on generic, reusable building blocks. For facilitating interoperability in Electronic Data Interchange, these reusable building blocks are defined in an all-embracing manner. Accordingly, business partners customize the standard business document types for fitting their needs and requirements, resulting in different business document type variants. However, the approach is missing sufficient mechanisms for managing business document model variants. First, customizing standardized business document types is purely based on a textual specification. Second, the variability present within the Core Component approach lacks an explicit representation. In this paper, we aim at making variability explicit as well as adding a formal aspect to the business document type customization process by employing variability concepts from Product Line Engineering. Furthermore, based on having explicit variability models, business partners are provided with an approach for customizing business document types through configuring variability models.


We develop a dictionary of linguistic extremity in earnings conference calls, a setting where managers have considerable latitude in the language they use, to study the role of extreme language in corporate reporting. Controlling for tone (positive versus negative) of language, we document that when managers use more extreme words in earnings conference calls, trading volume around the call increases and stock prices react more strongly. In addition, both effects are more pronounced for firms with weaker information environments. Linguistic extremity also affects analyst opinions and contains information about a firm's future operating performance. As such, our results provide evidence that markets are influenced not just by what managers say, but also how they say it, with extreme language playing an important role in communicating reality and not merely reflecting hyperbole.


Taking into account that the incidence and mortality from breast cancer are still important in the world, this type of cancer being a health issue, we consider it useful to review an important therapeutic arsenal represented by HER2 inhibitors. We present trastuzumab as the first HER2 inhibitor used in therapy and the main new compounds used today or being tested (ado-trastuzumab emtansine, trastuzumab deruxtecan, margetuximab etc.). We also underline the importance of combinations both between HER2 inhibitors and between HER2 inhibitors and chemotherapy. Finally, we considered it useful to present the therapeutic results with these compounds in real practice compared to the situation from clinical trials.


War Museums and Agonistic MemoryWithin the EU-Horizon-2020-funded project Unsettling Remembering and Social Cohesion in
Transnational Europe (UNREST),1 one work package (WP4) analyzed the memorial regimes of
museums related to the history of World War I and World War II in Europe. An article by Anna
Cento Bull and Hans Lauge Hansen (2016) entitled "Agonistic Memory" provided the theoretical
framework for the analysis. Drawing on Chantal Mouffe's work (2005, 2013), the authors distinguish
three memorial regimes: antagonistic, cosmopolitan, and agonistic.Unexpected Encounters: Museums Nurturing Living and Ageing WellAs the world's population ages, how can museums nurture living and aging well? The conference
Unexpected Encounters: Museums Nurturing Living and Ageing Well, organized by the Research
Centre for Museums and Galleries (RCMG) from the School of Museum Studies, University of
Leicester, set out to interrogate this question, and invited conference delegates to consider how
museums unconsciously make assumptions about older people and perpetuate the dominant
societal view of aging as a "problem."


This article describes a new recessive insertional mutation in the transgenic line TgN2742Rpw that causes deafness and circling behavior in mice. Histologic analysis revealed virtually complete loss of the cochlear neuroepithelium (the organ of Corti) in adult mutant mice. In association with the neuroepithelial changes, there is a dramatic reduction of the cochlear nerve supply. Adult mutants also show morphological defects of the vestibular apparatus, including degeneration of the saccular neuroepithelium and occasional malformation of utricular otoconia. Audiometric evaluations demonstrated that the mice displaying the circling phenotype are completely deaf. Molecular analysis of this mutant line revealed that the transgenic insertion occurred without creating a large deletion of the host DNA sequences. The mutant locus was mapped to a region on mouse chromosome 10, where other spontaneous, recessive mutations causing deafness in mice have been mapped.


Big data and its potential, use, and hopes seem to grow more valuable for commercial and research purposes alike. Nevertheless, problems start to arise as soon as the technical and epistemic potential of big data is overemphasized. Big data, like any other traces of human behavior, must be contextualized. This seems even more important since all types of digital traces are molded by specific operations and procedures as well as methods inscribed into digital infrastructures. These infrastructures are the necessary precondition for the emergence of digital traces, yet they pose a challenge for research because they are by no means static, but rather moving continuously. By reconstructing the trajectory of the UDID (unique device identifier) and its contested role within Apple's App Store ecology, this article presents an empirical perspective on how the contexts and preconditions of tracing capabilities are the result of continuous negotiation processes. The method presented in the article bridges the debates on the moving architectures of digital media and the search for suitable process-driven approaches.