People readily generalize knowledge to novel domains and stimuli. We present a theory, instantiated in a computational model, based on the idea that cross-domain generalization in humans is a case of analogical inference over structured (i.e., symbolic) relational representations. The model is an extension of the Learning and Inference with Schemas and Analogy (LISA; Hummel & Holyoak, 1997, 2003) and Discovery of Relations by Analogy (DORA; Doumas et al., 2008) models of relational inference and learning. The resulting model learns both the content and format (i.e., structure) of relational representations from nonrelational inputs without supervision, when augmented with the capacity for reinforcement learning it leverages these representations to learn about individual domains, and then generalizes to new domains on the first exposure (i.e., zero-shot learning) via analogical inference. We demonstrate the capacity of the model to learn structured relational representations from a variety of simple visual stimuli, and to perform cross-domain generalization between video games (Breakout and Pong) and between several psychological tasks. We demonstrate that the model's trajectory closely mirrors the trajectory of children as they learn about relations, accounting for phenomena from the literature on the development of children's reasoning and analogy making. The model's ability to generalize between domains demonstrates the flexibility afforded by representing domains in terms of their underlying relational structure, rather than simply in terms of the statistical relations between their inputs and outputs. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).


Until the end of the Cold War the UK intelligence services were not officially acknowledged, and their personnel were banned from entering the public sphere. From 1989 the UK government began to put the intelligence services on a legal footing and to release the identity of the heads of the intelligence agencies. Since then, public engagement by the intelligence agencies has gathered pace. What this article hypothesises is that there is now, in the UK, an effective intelligence lobby of former insiders who engage in the public sphere – using on the record briefings – to counter criticism of the intelligence community and to promote a narrative and vision of what UK intelligence should do, how it is supported and how oversight is conducted. Content analysis and framing models of non-broadcast coverage of intelligence debates, focusing on the 36 months after the Snowden revelations, confirm an active and rolling lobby of current and former intelligence officials. The paper concludes that the extent of the lobby's interventions in the public sphere is a matter for debate and possible concern.


The Supreme Court has allowed primary and secondary schools to broadly regulate their students' speech, while expressing ambivalence over whether universities possess the same power. Despite the current federal circuit split over the public university's right to regulate student speech, commentators have largely ignored the issue. In this article, I examine the conflicting federal doctrine, and then offer a clarifying theory based on forgotten constitutional history. I recover the constitutional history of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment in order to argue that, with respect to constitutional rights such as free speech, a bright line exists between primary and secondary schools, on the one hand, and universities, on the other. In providing a detailed, historical analysis of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment debates, the article reveals that the ratifiers understood the Amendment to establish eighteen-year-olds as full-fledged citizens, with all the attendant constitutional rights and responsibilities. After covering the history of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment - and the subsequent, but now forgotten, legal incorporation of this history into constitutional and tort law - the article argues that a proper reading of the Constitution renders the state treating eighteen-year-olds as children unconstitutional. This, in turn, prohibits the in loco parentis university, and thereby creates a bright line between secondary schools and universities.


Of all musical activities, music listening is the
most ubiquitous and essential to all other
musical endeavors. In practice, however,
music listening is often over-looked as a
passive and prescribed activity. This article
has a three-fold purpose: (1) to describe music
listening as a thoughtful, creative, and
purposeful activity; (2) to explore the
connections among the four active musicmaking
approaches in terms of music listening;
and (3) to suggest ways teachers can
incorporate meaningful and active music
listening activities into their teaching practice.
Topics in the first section include foundations
of music listening as an activity and what
research in related literature offers. The
second section contains an exploration of links
among the four active music-making
pedagogies and their relationship to music
listening as instruction, with an emphasis on
Orff-Schulwerk and its connections to other
active music-making pedagogies. Finally, the
third section presents two practical
applications of music listening instruction
paired with active music-making tasks.
Because the National Cultural Policy now
links with the Australian Curriculum,
implications for the Australian music and
general classroom educators concludes this
article.


Water markets have long been proposed for California as a water management tool to increase water use efficiency. Variability of precipitation across time and space, a fast growing population with strong environmental concerns, a vocal agricultural sector, and a powerful service economy combine to create pressure on limited indigenous water supplies. While continued investments in conservation are needed to continue to reduce demand-side pressure, California water policymakers are seeking innovative market-based solutions to cooperatively and efficiently allocate water. So far, California has failed to create the key elements that would support a dynamic water market. This paper will review efforts to initiate a water market in California, provide an update on the state-of-the market, and suggest some solutions.


In this study, we propose applying non-uniform biasing current technique to improve the gain uniformity of the semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) for high-speed optical routers. The output pulses will have high-gain deviation because of the high-speed input pulses and the slow SOA gain recovery, thus resulting in a high system power penalty. The theoretical SOA operation principle is demonstrated using a segmentation model that employs the rate and propagation equations with third-order gain coefficients. The impact of the bias current on the SOA gain responses owing to the input packet of 1 mW input Gaussian pulses at a wavelength of 1550 nm is analysed in order to optimise the proposed non-uniform bias current shape. The uniform and the optimised non-uniform bias current techniques are investigated in terms of the SOA gain uniformity and the average output power for high-speed data rates from 10 to 160 Gb/s. The impact of the average bias current applied to the SOA on the non-uniform shape is also investigated at all input data rates. Results obtained show a significant improvement in the gain standard deviation of 4.6, 6.3, 8.7, 10.1 and 10.2 dB for the data rates of 10, 20, 40, 80 and 160 Gb/s, respectively, when applying 150 mA average non-uniform biasing and these values reaches 15.2, 16.3, 17.7, 18 and 17.4 dB at 200 mA. The proposed technique also offers an increase in the average output power for the input pulses compared with uniform biasing.


Conventional intraframe coding is performed in two steps. First, a block of pixels are predicted by copying previously reconstructed neighbor pixels of the block along an angular direction inside the block. Then, the prediction residual block is transform coded with the well-known 2D discrete cosine transform (DCT). Recently, it has been shown that transforming the intraprediction residuals with the odd type-3 discrete sine transform along the prediction direction and the DCT along the perpendicular direction improves the compression performance. More recently, a recursive prediction approach has been proposed to improve intra prediction performance. Both of these recent approaches utilize Markov processes to develop improvements in either the transform or the prediction step but not in both. In this paper, both the intraprediction and the transform steps are obtained based on 2D Markov processes. The derived overall intraframe coding approaches can generalize the mentioned two approaches, provide improved coding gains and produce less blocking effects at low bitrates.


The Federal Reserve's recent, unprecedented corporate debt purchases will further reduce the cost of corporate debt relative to equity. Given the already high degree of leverage in the corporate sector, I argue that this is a dangerous policy choice. However, the best solution is not to outlaw the Fed's crisis actions, but to reform other federal laws that create a debt bias in aggregate. I show how limiting the corporate interest deduction to those firms with a responsible debt-equity ratio would harmonize the goals of tax policy and bailout policy, establishing a coherent "capital structure policy" for the first time.


Most large corporations with big data have adopted more privacy measures in handling their sensitive/private data and as a result, employing the use of analytic tools to run across multiple sources has become ineffective. Joint computation across multiple parties is allowed through the use of secure multi-party computations (MPC). The practicality of MPC is impaired when dealing with large datasets as more of its algorithms are poorly scaled with data sizes. Despite its limitations, MPC continues to attract increasing attention from industry players who have viewed it as a better approach to exploiting big data. Secure MPC is however, faced with complexities that most times overwhelm its handlers, so the need for special software engineering techniques for resolving these threat complexities. This research presents cryptographic data security measures, garbed circuits protocol, optimizing circuits, and protocol execution techniques as some of the special techniques for resolving threat complexities associated with MPC's. Honest majority, asymmetric trust, covert security, and trading off leakage are some of the experimental outcomes of implementing these special techniques. This paper also reveals that an essential approach in developing suitable mitigation strategies is having knowledge of the adversary type.


In mid-1894, shortly after the death of David Dudley Field (one of the most powerful and famous, and least-loved, American lawyers of the 19th century), lawyer-journalist Irving Browne published an implausibly laudatory anecdote about Field, based on a letter in which Field claimed to have engaged in a longstanding act of secret philanthropy that was wholly out of character. An experienced observer of public affairs in 1894, or in 2011, surely could be forgiven for doubting the veracity of such a self-serving, out-of-character story, told only posthumously by a friendly journalist, and with no evidence to back it up. The Gilded Age was, after all, a time when politicians and power-mongers like Field could rely on select reporters and editors to serve as virtual publicists – mixing innuendo with truths, half-truths, and non-truths (often supplied by unidentified sources) in news stories that boosted their favorites. Neither Browne nor anyone else seems to have made any effort to verify Field's story, even though there were seemingly easy ways to do so. It is perhaps for those reasons that Browne's parable of the secretly saintly David Dudley Field, revealed only post-mortem in all the glory of his selfless kindness and generosity, was largely ignored at the time and has been ever since. But the story is true, or true at least as to Field's initial generosity. And there is evidence to back it up.


This paper formalizes the optimal design of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in the presence of interference between units, where an individual's outcome depends on the behavior and outcomes of others in her group. We focus on randomized saturation (RS) designs, which are two-stage RCTs that first randomize the treatment saturation of a group, then randomize individual treatment assignment. Our main contributions are to map the potential outcomes framework with partial interference to a regression model with clustered errors, calculate the statistical power of different RS designs, and derive analytical insights for how to optimally design an RS experiment. We show that the power to detect average treatment effects declines precisely with the ability to identify novel treatment and spillover estimands, such as how effects vary with the intensity of treatment. We provide software that assists researchers in designing RS experiments.


Adversaries are often able to penetrate networks and compromise systems by exploiting vulnerabilities in people and systems. The key to the success of these attacks is information that adversaries collect throughout the phases of the cyber kill chain. We summarize and analyze the methods, tactics, and tools that adversaries use to conduct reconnaissance activities throughout the attack process. First, we discuss what types of information adversaries seek and how and when they can obtain this information. Then, we provide a taxonomy and detailed overview of adversarial reconnaissance techniques. The taxonomy introduces a categorization of reconnaissance techniques based on the source as third-party and human-, and system-based information gathering. This article provides a comprehensive view of adversarial reconnaissance that can help in understanding and modeling this complex but vital aspect of cyber attacks as well as insights that can improve defensive strategies, such as cyber deception.


Improving the understanding of American woodcock (Scolopax minor) migration ecology has been identified as a priority information need for woodcock management. Developments in remote tracking technology and analytical techniques present an opportunity to gain insight into woodcock migratory connectivity and migration phenology and to evaluate the degree in which the current two-region (Eastern and Central) basis for woodcock management represents migratory movements. To analyze woodcock migration using band return records, I excluded observations that took place during the migratory period. Using this dataset, 17.9% of records showed crossover between management regions, higher than the < 5% crossover found in studies including non-migratory band returns. During autumn migration, woodcock from the Central Region largely migrated to destinations within the Central Region, whereas woodcock from the Eastern Region migrated to destinations across their wintering range, mixing with individuals from the Central Region. Between 2013 and 2016, I deployed 75 satellite transmitters on woodcock. I tracked the migration paths of 61 woodcock and documented 88 woodcock migrations. Average migration duration was longer during spring migration (53 days) than during autumn migration (31 days) because woodcock made a higher number of closetogether migratory stopovers, not because woodcock stayed at individual stopovers longer during spring migration. Woodcock captured in the Central Management Region used 2 primary migrations routes: a Western Route and a Central Route. The Western Route ran north-south, connecting the breeding and wintering grounds of the Central Management Region. The hourglass-shaped Central Route connected an area on the wintering grounds reaching from Texas to Florida, to sites throughout northeastern North America. Woodcock following the Central Route funneled between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi Alluvial Valley in western Tennessee during both autumn and spring migration. A higher than anticipated percentage (36%, n = 12) of marked woodcock captured in Texas and Louisiana and monitored during spring migration migrated to breeding-period sites in the Eastern Management Region, raising questions about the biological basis of managing woodcock as separate populations. The supplementary material includes woodcock capture information (Appendix I), information on individual stopovers (Appendix II), and migration maps for individual woodcock (Appendix III).


SARS-CoV-2 spike N-terminal domain harbors a potent epitope that can be modulated by binding of natural linear tetrapyrroles. The coronaviral spike is the dominant viral antigen and the target of neutralizing antibodies. We show that SARS-CoV-2 spike binds biliverdin and bilirubin, the tetrapyrrole products of heme metabolism, with nanomolar affinity. Using cryo–electron microscopy and x-ray crystallography, we mapped the tetrapyrrole interaction pocket to a deep cleft on the spike N-terminal domain (NTD). At physiological concentrations, biliverdin significantly dampened the reactivity of SARS-CoV-2 spike with immune sera and inhibited a subset of neutralizing antibodies. Access to the tetrapyrrole-sensitive epitope is gated by a flexible loop on the distal face of the NTD. Accompanied by profound conformational changes in the NTD, antibody binding requires relocation of the gating loop, which folds into the cleft vacated by the metabolite. Our results indicate that SARS-CoV-2 spike NTD harbors a dominant epitope, access to which can be controlled by an allosteric mechanism that is regulated through recruitment of a metabolite.


Background: Quality
in health care has traditionally been determined based on clinical or health
outcomes. However, these factors may not be the only aspects of health care
that are important to patients. Within rehabilitation factors related to the
process of care, the way in which rehabilitation services are delivered, may
also be important to patients when defining quality of care. Objective: The
purpose of this study was to examine and compare the preferences of older
people receiving post-acute outpatient rehabilitation or residential
intermediate (transition) care for alternative configurations of rehabilitation
programs. Methods: A discrete choice experiment (DCE) was designed to elicit
the preferences of older people for the design and delivery of post-acute
rehabilitation programs. The participants were older adults (≥65 years)
receiving post-acute outpatient rehabilitation or residential intermediate
(transition) care in South Australia. Each participant was presented with a
series of choice questions involving two hypothetical programs, the characteristics
of which varied in every choice. Participants were then asked to select their
preferred program. Results: Despite marked differences in case-mix and
dependency levels, the preferences of the two groups were very similar,
focusing on relationships and communication with health care professionals.
Both groups demonstrated very strong preferences for the use of an electronic
medical record and for receiving information about their treatment and
progress via a meeting with a specialist physician and nurse. The outpatient
rehabilitation group also exhibited a strong preference for a shared decision
making model in relation to their future care needs. Conclusions: The findings
highlight the commonality of preferences of older patients receiving post-acute
services for the optimal configuration of rehabilitation services. Issues
prioritised were service integration and access to senior medical and nursing
staff. The study demonstrates the practicality and validity of DCEs to
determine older people's preferences in defining quality of care.


In Data Mining, the usefulness of association rules is strongly limited by the huge amount of delivered rules. To overcome this drawback, several methods were proposed in the literature such as item set concise representations, redundancy reduction, and post processing. However, being generally based on statistical information, most of these methods do not guarantee that the extracted rules are interesting for the user. Thus, it is crucial to help the decision-maker with an efficient post processing step in order to reduce the number of rules. This paper proposes a new interactive approach to prune and filter discovered rules. First, we propose to use ontologies in order to improve the integration of user knowledge in the post processing task. Second, we propose the Rule Schema formalism extending the specification language proposed by Liu et al. for user expectations. Furthermore, an interactive framework is designed to assist the user throughout the analyzing task. Applying our new approach over voluminous sets of rules, we were able, by integrating domain expert knowledge in the post processing step, to reduce the number of rules to several dozens or less. Moreover, the quality of the filtered rules was validated by the domain expert at various points in the interactive process. KeywordsClustering, classification, and association rules, interactive data exploration and discovery, knowledge management applications.


Abstract Hypnosis and meditation, as a whole, form a heterogeneous complex of psychosomatic techniques able to control mind and body regulation. Hypnosis has been pragmatically used for limited therapeutic targets, while Eastern meditation has much wider philosophical and existential implications, aiming for a radical liberation from all illusions, attachments, suffering and pain. The available data on the history, phenomenology, and neuropsychology of hypnosis and meditation show several common features, such as the following: (a) induction based on focused attention; (b) capability to reach an intentional control of both biologic-somatic activities and conscious-unconscious processes; (c) activation/deactivation of several brain areas and circuits (e.g., the default modality network and pain neuromatrix) with a relevant overlapping between the two.


End-to-end (E2E) systems have achieved competitive results compared to conventional hybrid hidden Markov model (HMM)-deep neural network based automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems. Such E2E systems are attractive due to the lack of dependence on alignments between input acoustic and output grapheme or HMM state sequence during training. This paper explores the design of an ASR-free end-to-end system for text query-based keyword search (KWS) from speech trained with minimal supervision. Our E2E KWS system consists of three sub-systems. The first sub-system is a recurrent neural network (RNN)-based acoustic auto-encoder trained to reconstruct the audio through a finite-dimensional representation. The second sub-system is a character-level RNN language model using embeddings learned from a convolutional neural network. Since the acoustic and text query embeddings occupy different representation spaces, they are input to a third feed-forward neural network that predicts whether the query occurs in the acoustic utterance or not. This E2E ASR-free KWS system performs respectably despite lacking a conventional ASR system and trains much faster.


One of the world's poorest countries following the devastation of the Korean War, the Republic of Korea is now the world's fifth largest trading partner and a major manufacturer of semiconductors, LCDs (liquid crystal displays), digital TVs, mobile phones, automobiles, shipbuilding, and steel. The ICT sector has played an important role in this transformation, being the single most important engine of economic growth in the country. This research analyzes the impact ICT has had on the Korean economy, illustrating the main government's policies in the area and discussing their effectiveness. The Korean ICT development strategy has been based on the following elements, that should be considered by any country willing to use ICT as a growth engine: 1) leadership and commitment, 2) human capacity building, 3) institutional arrangements, 4) legal framework, and 5) presence of a funding mechanism for the implementation of ICT master plans, capable of operating even in times of economic crisis.


This study uses a laboratory valuation experiment to examine whether food fraud occurring in one country affects the valuation of products from that country as well as products from other countries. We use a between-subject experiment design to compare consumers' valuation of extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) from different countries with and without exposure to information about olive oil fraud occurring in one of the countries. Results show that information about olive oil fraud in one country negatively affects the valuation of EVOO not only from that country but also from other countries, indicating negative spillover effects of food fraud.


The World Council of Churches (WCC) has been involved in a variety of inter-religious dialogue projects and initiatives over many years. Dialogue with other religions—or with the peoples of those religions—is of significance and import, not least because of the value placed upon peaceful co-existence and harmonious inter-communal relations. However, of all bi-lateral endeavours, it is arguably the arena of Christian–Muslim relations which has been, and remains, the most challenging, problematic, and pressing for the Christian community at large—and, complementarily, for the Muslim umma also. This article attempts an overview of development in Christian–Muslim dialogue undertaken under the auspices of the WCC since around the mid-twentieth century. Early explorations, when the prospect of dialogue with Muslims was being canvassed, will be discussed. A significant 1972 consultation will be noted, followed by a review of salient features pertaining to the extension of the field of engagement in Christian–Muslim dialogue, and a note on some difficulties and challenges encountered. A comment on a sequence of regional events undertaken during the 80s will precede a discussion of developments in the clarification of issues that took place during the 90s. Finally, issues and challenges that are evident in the opening years of the third millennium of the Common Era will be briefly touched on.


Marker Detection in Aerial Images Yazeed Alharbi The problem that the thesis is trying to solve is the detection of small markers in high-resolution aerial images. Given a high-resolution image, the goal is to return the pixel coordinates corresponding to the center of the marker in the image. The marker has the shape of two triangles sharing a vertex in the middle, and it occupies no more than 0.01% of the image size. An improvement on the Histogram of Oriented Gradients (HOG) is proposed, eliminating the majority of baseline HOG false positives for marker detection. The improvement is guided by the observation that standard HOG description struggles to separate markers from negatives patches containing an X shape. The proposed method alters intensities with the aim of altering gradients. The intensity-dependent gradient alteration leads to more separation between filled and unfilled shapes. The improvement is used in a two-stage algorithm to achieve high recall and high precision in detection of markers in aerial images. In the first stage, two classifiers are used: one to quickly eliminate most of the uninteresting parts of the image, and one to carefully select the marker among the remaining interesting regions. Interesting regions are selected by scanning the image with a fast classifier trained on the HOG features of markers in all rotations and scales. The next classifier is more precise and uses our method to eliminate the majority of the false positives of standard HOG. In the second stage, detected markers are tracked forward and backward in time. Tracking is needed to detect extremely blurred or distorted markers that are missed by the previous stage. 5 The algorithm achieves 94% recall with minimal user guidance. An average of 30 guesses are given per image; the user verifies for each whether it is a marker or not. The brute force approach would return 100,000 guesses per image.


In developing countries, the emerging mega cities face a number of interlinked issues, such as, increased flow of trading activities (particularly in the coastal cities), expansion in manufacturing and service sectors (because of a relatively developed infrastructure). As a combined effect of these factors there is a significant increase in population from within and neighboring countries. The situation aggravates even further when the huge influx of population exerts enormous pressure on limited physical and social infrastructure of a city. The obtained situation is thus observed with increased environmental degradation and significant rise in poverty levels.The coastal city of Karachi which is the largest city of Pakistan is now considered as one of the ten biggest mega cities in the world and appears as a classic case of such type of expansion in its size of population. As per the last population census of 1998 in the country, Karachi had a population of 9.8 million (though controversial). In absence of the new population census which was due in 2008, different estimates suggest that the current population size of Karachi city would be around 20 to 25 million. Along with the population growth, an average income level of its inhabitants has also caused upward shifts in consumption expenditures. The simultaneous raise in production of solid waste, as an outcome of improved standards of living and increased business activities, has impaired the city's institutional capacity to properly dispose off and recycle the solid wastes. In the obtained situation, the remaining part of solid waste is disposed off and recycled by the private sector.


The water quality of rivers is an issue of serious concern today. Rivers are heavily impacted due to their use for carrying off the industrial, municipal, agricultural and domestic effluents. Water samples were collected for the present study from the Ganga River at Kanpur, Allahabad and Varanasi sites, during the period 2011-2012. The minimum temperature (17°C) was recorded in winter season. The pH, TDS, EC, sulphate, phosphate, nitrate, BOD and COD values exhibited their minimum at Allahabad site. The chloride and dissolved oxygen were recorded minimum at Kanpur site while alkalinity and total hardness had their lowest values at Varanasi site. The water quality of the Kanpur site was very poor compared to Varanasi and Allahabad sites. However, the Ganga river waters could host some tolerant fish species such as the exotic Cyprinus carpio and Oreochromis niloticus and also catfishes. All these species are very hardy, in respect of poor water quality, thus they (exotic species) have powerfully invaded in degraded systems worldwide.


Since 1990s, companies have started to shift their productions to the low-cost countries and this strategy is commonly known as offshoring. However, over the past years, the evidence shows that offshoring strategies may not continue to be beneficial for the organization's companies activities. Consequently during the recent years, companies have begun to pay more attention to unquantifiable factors, such as the supply chain issue and strategy factors rather than simply relying on and the lowest price that in turn can mean the highest risk and high total cost. Having considered the discrepancy between the initially estimates cost of offshoring and those of actually occurred, companies are coming back through re-shoring strategies. In this paper, an overview of the main literature has been conducted to provide a better understanding of the term re-shoring. In the first section, various definitions and explanation of the concept of re-shoring will be presented. After that, the main motivations behind the re-shoring are discussed. The second part relies on the concept of resilience. We analyze resilience as a resource and response to the recent economic and financial crisis. In particular, this paper analyzes the role of economic resilience of the territories belonging to companies that have adopted offshoring strategies in the past and whether this has contributed to repatriation phenomena. In this regard, with the aid of recent data, we intend to understand the behavior of companies that have carried out re-shoring actions and their links with the economic resilience of the Italian regions. We also present whether there is a relationship at regional level between companies that have made re-shoring choices and the degree of economic resilience of a regional area. Finally, the critical considerations will be presented.


Women's grief seeds the Lost Cause mythology. Immediately after the Civil War, white women across the South organized to retrieve and rebury the remains of Confederate soldiers scattered throughout the region. In Virginia alone, these Ladies' Memorial Associations (LMAs) relocated and reinterred the remains of more than 72,000 soldiers, nearly 28 percent of the 260,000 Confederate soldiers who perished in the war. Challenging the notion that southern white women were peripheral to the Lost Cause movement until the 1890s, Caroline Janney claims these women's place in the historical narrative by exploring their role as the creators and purveyors of Confederate tradition between 1865 and 1915.Although not considered "political" or "public actors," upper- and middle-class white women carried out deeply political acts by preparing elaborate burials and holding Memorial Days in a region still occupied by northern soldiers. Janney argues that in identifying themselves as mothers and daughters in mourning, LMA members crafted a sympathetic Confederate position that Republicans, northerners, and, in some cases, southern African Americans could find palatable. Long before national groups such as the Women's Christian Temperance Union and the United Daughters of the Confederacy were established, Janney shows, local LMAs were earning sympathy for lost Confederates. Janney's exploration introduces new ways in which gender played a vital role in shaping the politics, culture, and society of the late nineteenth-century South.


The need to measure the response of the oculomotor system, such as ocular accommodation, accurately and in real-world environments is essential. New instruments have been developed over the past 50 years to measure eye focus including the extensively utilised and well validated Canon R-1, but in general these have had limitations such as a closed field-of-view, a poor temporal resolution and the need for extensive instrumentation bulk preventing naturalistic performance of environmental tasks. The use of photoretinoscopy and more specifically the PowerRefractor was examined in this regard due to its remote nature, binocular measurement of accommodation, eye movement and pupil size and its open field-of-view. The accuracy of the PowerRefractor to measure refractive error was on averaging similar, but more variable than subjective refraction and previously validated instrumentation. The PowerRefractor was found to be tolerant to eye movements away from the visual axis, but could not function with small pupil sizes in brighter illumination. The PowerRefractor underestimated the lead of accommodation and overestimated the slope of the accommodation stimulus response curve. The PowerRefractor and the SRW-5000 were used to measure the oculomotor responses in a variety of real-world environment: spectacles compared to single vision contract lenses; the use of multifocal contact lenses by pre-presbyopes (relevant to studies on myopia retardation); and 'accommodating' intraocular lenses. Due to the accuracy concerns with the PowerRefractor, a purpose-built photoretinoscope was designed to measure the oculomotor response to a monocular head-mounted display. In conclusion, this thesis has shown the ability of photoretinoscopy to quantify changes in the oculomotor system. However there are some major limitations to the PowerRefractor, such as the need for individual calibration for accurate measures of accommodation and vergence, and the relatively large pupil size necessary for measurement.


We consult scientific expert witnesses in almost every field of law. Yet even in cases involving a strong scientific consensus, the powerful qualities of scientific knowledge are easily lost in translation. Moreover, even prominent scientists who are committed to providing accurate information to legal fact-finders may suffer reputational harm simply for participating in an adversarial process.This article analyzes the connection between law and science through the expert witness from the perspectives of epistemology and cross-cultural communication, focusing on the distinct ways in which scientists and lawyers know, value and express their knowledge. When a lawyer meets with a scientific expert witness, more confusion attends their interaction than either likely realizes. Linguistic translation is necessary -- but not only translation of the substance of science into terms accessible to the legal fact-finder. An additional form of translation is essential, though the need for it may go unnoticed: that of homonyms -- terms that are superficially identical in law and science (such as "fact," "uncertainty," and "proof") but which have deeply different meanings in their respective disciplines. Lawyers and scientists may be using the same words without realizing that they are talking past each other.Cultural translation is also required: while their professional norms with respect to fact-finding have some overlap, they also contrast so sharply that professional behavior for the lawyer would constitute malpractice for the scientist. In their cultures of knowledge-production, the scientist is most closely analogous to the judge: the professional identities of both are founded in their neutrality. However, when the scientific fact-finder's report is presented to the legal fact-finder through the work of the lawyer, the scientist can appear partisan -- and even risks becoming partisan. For a scientist, the appearance of partisanship is an appearance of impropriety that can cause her debilitating professional harm, threatening her professional identity.The purpose of this article is to identify and explain the homologies and false cognates between law and science, to better equip lawyers and judges to make proper interdisciplinary translations in the process of speaking science to law.


Family farms have the most important role in agricultural production of Republic of Serbia. However, family farms are in very bad economic position and usually make low profits. That is why family farms have problems with financing of current assets as well as fixed assets. Because family farms in Serbia are not able to provide enough money for investments they have to be financed mostly by loans. Nowadays, there are two possibilities for financing offixed assets and current assets. Farmers may apply for loans provided by Serbian government or take a loan from commercial banks. The goal of this paper is analysis of different possibilities for financing of agricultural production. Different sources of financing of current assets andfixed assets cause changes in interest costs and profit offamily farms. Different terms offinancing for family farms in Serbia are shown and compared in the paper. As an example, influence of interest costs on profit made in dairy production is analyzed. On the basis of these results appropriate measures of agrarian policy as well as transformations in financial system in Serbia are suggested.


The Blue Division, Spain's most notable military contribution to the Second World War, has been examined from many different perspectives, though the role of communication has not featured among them. This study aims to analyse the role played by Spanish state radio in the creation and maintenance of Spain's war effort in that period. In order to achieve this, we used documentary sources, and more specifically, reconstructed the radio programming schedules, mainly using the press, due to the lack of audio recordings from the era. Finally, this work explores the role of radio from the Blue Division's inception through to its official disbandment; or, put another way, the transition from commitment to the Axis powers to gradual estrangement from them. A dual transition process occurred on Radio Nacional de España: firstly, from zealous glorification to the silencing of the divisionaries by official order. The second transition was from a radio station that, since the Civil War, had lost its persuasive power, to a new perception of propaganda based on the familiar and the emotional.


Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) was developed over 25 years ago to bridge the qualitative and quantitative research gap. On searching PubMed and the Journal of Mixed Methods Research, this review identified 30 original research studies that used QCA. Perceptions that QCA is complex and provides few relative advantages over other methods may be limiting QCA adoption. Thus, to overcome these perceptions, this article demonstrates how to perform QCA using data from 15 institutions that implemented universal tumor screening programs to identify patients at high risk for hereditary colorectal cancer. In this example, QCA revealed a combination of conditions unique to effective universal tumor screening programs. Results informed additional research and provided a model for improving patient follow-through after a positive screen.


This paper discusses the use of liquid crystals (LCs) to study the domain structure in magnetic materials. Domains on the surface of thin amorphous films made from cobalt-containing alloys have been studied by means of LCs that possess giant diamagnetic anisotropy. The results of using LCs are compared with the results obtained using magnetic emulsions. © 2005 Optical Society of America


The purpose of conducting this study was to investigate factors contributing to continued illiteracy among adults in Tanzania focusing on Mwanga District in Kilimanjaro Region applying a case study approach. Three Hypotheses were used as guidelines for this study, namely: lack of knowledge on the concept of literacy among community members, negative views of community members on the importance of adult literacy, and lack of understanding of district education managers on their role in promoting adult literacy. Intensive interview was carried out. Forty five respondents - grouped into five categories, namely: villagers, teachers, Ward Education Coordinators, District Education Officers and Regional Education Officers. Specific objectives were examine the perceptions of community members on concept of literacy, explore views of community members on the importance of literacy and assess the views of district managers on their roles in promoting literacy. The findings showed that adult illiteracy was contributed by failure to acknowledge the importance of literacy, an increase of the number of illiterate school dropout, and failure of the government to take responsibility in supporting adult education programmes after completion of basic literacy programmes. Lack fund for supervision and running adult literacy programmes. The recommendations put forward are that: the government should provide sufficient funds to run adult education programmes, improvement of methodologies and techniques in facilitating adult learning and teachings, strong commitment of political leaders to support adult programmes so as to attract adult learners to attend classes. The researcher outlined recommendations for further studies that should be investigate effectiveness, methodologies and techniques in teaching adults and evaluation in adult programmes.


This paper examines the 2012 speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People (the national parliament building) marking the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the current version of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China. While Xi's speech formally functions in an epideictic capacity, its substantive content suggests a severely flawed constitutional system. Through the close analysis of the speech, this paper argues that the text of Xi's address exposes many critical tensions intrinsic to China's single-party political system, most notably the flawed implementation of the constitution. In its substantive capacity, the speech served as a stern warning about the gaping chasm that separates the written constitution from actual political practices in China, as well as the pressing need to formalize the Party-state relationship through the separation of powers between the Party and the state.


The UCSF basic science PhD graduate programs collaborate to offer a spring quarter curriculum designed around minicourses formatted as intensive, round-table discussions of current literature on specific topics. The quarter is divided into three modules of two to three weeks each with programs offering several minicourse choices per module. Students should refer to their program administrator for information about minicourse requirements to satisfy core and/or elective requirements. While all mini-courses will be available to all students, first year students will be given first priority. Participating programs include Biological and Medical Informatics, Biomedical Sciences, Biophysics, Chemistry & Chemical Biology, Developmental & Stem Cell Biology, Neuroscience, Pharmaceutical Sciences & Pharmacogenomics and Tetrad. Students enrolled in these programs may contact their program administrator for information about enrollment.


OTS44 is one of only four free-floating planets known to have a disk. We have previously shown that it is the coolest and least massive known free-floating planet (∼12 ) with a substantial disk that is actively accreting. We have obtained Band 6 (233 GHz) ALMA continuum data of this very young disk-bearing object. The data show a clear unresolved detection of the source. We obtained disk-mass estimates via empirical correlations derived for young, higher-mass, central (substellar) objects. The range of values obtained are between 0.07 and 0.63 (dust masses). We compare the properties of this unique disk with those recently reported around higher-mass (brown dwarfs) young objects in order to infer constraints on its mechanism of formation. While extreme assumptions on dust temperature yield disk-mass values that could slightly diverge from the general trends found for more massive brown dwarfs, a range of sensible values provide disk masses compatible with a unique scaling relation between and M* through the substellar domain down to planetary masses.


Although a large body of research has investigated how consumers use goods to signal their status, little is known about how brands manage status. The very few studies that have examined this topic are grounded in the traditional conception of status and focus on the possession and display of status signals. The authors offer an alternative understanding of status management by investigating the role of interactions in the service encounter. Drawing from extensive ethnographic work in luxury stores, they investigate how brands (re)configure the status games that surface in the service encounter. They show that through the material and social cues of the servicescape, brands shape consumers' class subjectivities—that is, they make consumers behave as class subjects who have a specific understanding of their position in the social hierarchy. Thus, managing status requires the active creation and management of consumers as class subjects. There is a shift from managing branded goods that signal status to managing customer experiences that make consumers enact status positions. This research helps identify new ways to manage status brands, especially luxury brands.


This paper undertakes a detailed analysis of today's standard theory of the philanthropic sector, in order to provide a new model that is both more accurate in its details and more comprehensive in its scope. The standard theory accounts for the philanthropic sector as subordinate and supplementary to our capitalist market economy and liberal democratic polity. That approach has two basic short-comings: Its explanation of both the state and philanthropy as adjuncts to the market fails to appreciate the ways in which all three sectors support and supplement each other. Even more basically, the standard model's primary focus on the market ignores how the demands that we make on both the state and the market ultimately derive from value systems the philanthropic sector not only gives us, but also shapes us to accept. From this perspective, the philanthropic sector functions, not as an adjunct to the state and the market, under their standards of consumer demand and majority preference, but rather as both their foundation and their metric.


M. F. Burnyeat taught for 14 years in the Philosophy Department of University College London, then for 18 years in the Classics Faculty at Cambridge, 12 of them as the Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy, before migrating to Oxford in 1996 to become a Senior Research Fellow in Philosophy at All Souls College. The studies, articles and reviews collected in these two volumes of Explorations in Ancient and Modern Philosophy were all written, and all but two published, before that decisive change. Whether designed for a scholarly audience or for a wider public, they range from the Presocratics to Augustine, from Descartes and Bishop Berkeley to Wittgenstein and G. E. Moore. Their subject-matter falls under four main headings: 'Logic and Dialectic' and 'Scepticism Ancient and Modern', which are contained in this first volume; 'Knowledge' and 'Philosophy and the Good Life' make up the second volume. The title 'Explorations' well expresses Burnyeat's ability to discover new aspects of familiar texts, new ways of solving old problems. In his hands the history of philosophy becomes itself a philosophical activity.


ABSTRACT Coordinated variation among positions in amino acid sequence alignments can reveal genetic dependencies at noncontiguous positions, but methods to assess these interactions are incompletely developed. Previously, we found genome-wide networks of covarying residue positions in the hepatitis C virus genome (R. Aurora, M. J. Donlin, N. A. Cannon, and J. E. Tavis, J. Clin. Invest. 119:225–236, 2009). Here, we asked whether such networks are present in a diverse set of viruses and, if so, what they may imply about viral biology. Viral sequences were obtained for 16 viruses in 13 species from 9 families. The entire viral coding potential for each virus was aligned, all possible amino acid covariances were identified using the observed-minus-expected-squared algorithm at a false-discovery rate of ≤1%, and networks of covariances were assessed using standard methods. Covariances that spanned the viral coding potential were common in all viruses. In all cases, the covariances formed a single network that contained essentially all of the covariances. The hepatitis C virus networks had hub-and-spoke topologies, but all other networks had random topologies with an unusually large number of highly connected nodes. These results indicate that genome-wide networks of genetic associations and the coordinated evolution they imply are very common in viral genomes, that the networks rarely have the hub-and-spoke topology that dominates other biological networks, and that network topologies can vary substantially even within a given viral group. Five examples with hepatitis B virus and poliovirus are presented to illustrate how covariance network analysis can lead to inferences about viral biology.


Gamma heavy chain disease (HCD) is a rare variant of HCD, a family of syndromes associated with or representing a B cell malignancy variant. The hallmark characteristic and the pathogenic mechanism of HCD is the synthesis of a mutant, misfolded immunoglobulin heavy chain (IgH) incapable of either reaching a quaternary conformation with the immunoglobulin light chain (IgL) and/or being degraded by the proteasome. The isotype of mutated IgH (α,γ or μ) determines the nomenclature of HCD subtypes. Less than 200 cases of gamma HCD have been published. Gamma HCD predominantly affects women in their 5-6 decade of life, and a pre-existing autoimmune disease is present in about a quarter of patients. Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is the most commonly associated autoimmune disorder, but association with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), Sjögren syndrome, myasthenia gravis, vasculitis and idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) has been reported. The vast majority of patients with gamma HCD have a localized or systemic lymphoplasmacytic lymphoma. Gamma HCD patients can present with disseminated lymphomatous involvement, localized (medullary or extramedullary) lymphomatous disease or with no apparent lymphomatous involvement. Disseminated lymphoma is the most common form, being diagnosed in 57-66% of patients with gamma HCD. These patients typically present with B symptoms such as fever, fatigue, and unintentional weight loss. Circa half of the patients have generalized lymphadenopathy, splenomegaly, and more rarely hepatomegaly. Twenty-five percent of patients with gamma HCD present with either localized medullary disease or localized extramedullary disease. Lymphomatous infiltration is present only in the bone marrow in the former, and in extranodal sites in the latter. The most common site of extranodal involvement is the skin, although involvement of thyroid and parotid, oropharynx, and gastrointestinal tract has been reported. Gamma HCD patients with no identifiable lymphoma at diagnosis (~9-17%) typically have a pre-existing autoimmune condition, with associated symptoms and signs. Definitive diagnosis is based on the identification of a gamma immunoglobulin heavy chain (IgH) without associated Ig light chain (IgL) assessed using serum or urine protein electrophoresis (SPEP or UPEP, respectively) and immunofixation (IF). Treatment ranges from expectant management for patients with no detectable lymphoma, to local surgical or radiation therapy for localized extramedullary disease, and combination therapies for systemic and localized medullary disease. Prognosis is very good in patients with no detectable lymphoma or completely treated, limited extramedullary lymphoma; patients with systemic disease can have a rapidly aggressive or more indolent course with highly variable median survival (1 month to over 20 years).


Preventing Emerging Infectious Diseases: A Strategy for the 21st Century outlines new measures toward achieving emerging infectious disease prevention and control. The updated plan signals the second phase of the campaign launched in 1994 with the publication of Addressing Emerging Infectious Disease Threats: A Prevention Strategy for the United States, a collaborative effort of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under the leadership of the National Center for Infectious Diseases and institutions and agencies throughout the United States and abroad. The objectives and activities in the updated plan are organized under the same four goals described in the 1994 publication: surveillance and response, applied research, infrastructure and training, and prevention and control. Nine specific priority program areas are outlined: antimicrobial resistance; foodborne and waterborne diseases; vector-borne and zoonotic diseases; diseases transmitted through blood transfusions or blood products; chronic diseases caused by infectious agents; vaccine development and use; diseases of people with impaired host defenses; diseases of pregnant women and newborns; and diseases of travelers, immigrants, and refugees. Achieving the goals outlined in the updated plan will continue to require sustained and coordinated efforts of agencies and organizations, state and local health departments (surveillance of infectious diseases), academic centers and other federal agencies (research), health-care providers and health-care networks (guideline development and dissemination), international organizations (outbreak responses overseas), and other partners. The executive summary of Preventing Emerging Infectious Diseases: A Strategy for the 21st Century will be released as a special issue of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on September 10, 1998. An electronic version of the full document as well as information on how to order a print copy will be available shortly afterwards at http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/ ncid.htm. First Congress of the European Society for Emerging Infections, September 13-16, 1998, Budapest, Hungary


Objectives. We assessed current levels of food insecurity among a large, diverse sample of parents and examined associations between food insecurity and parental weight status, eating patterns, and the home food environment. Methods. Project F-EAT (Families and Eating and Activity Among Teens) examined the home food environments of adolescents. Parents and caregivers (n=2095) living with adolescents from the Minneapolis–St. Paul, Minnesota school districts completed mailed surveys during a 12-month period in 2009– 2010. We performed our assessments using multivariate regressions. Results. Almost 39% of the parents and caregivers experienced household food insecurity, whereas 13% experienced very low food security. Food insecurity was significantly associated with poorer nutrition-related variables such as higher rates of parental overweight and obesity, less healthy foods served at meals, and higher rates of binge eating. Food-insecure parents were 2 to 4 times more likely to report barriers to accessing fruits and vegetables. Conclusions. Food insecurity was highly prevalent. Environmental interventions are needed to protect vulnerable families against food insecurity and to improve access to affordable, healthy foods. (Am J Public Health. 2012;102: 520–526. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2011.300390)


Models describing the modulation of galactic cosmic rays in the heliosphere have been
developed and investigated. These models are numerical solutions of the cosmic ray
transport equation under idealized heliospheric conditions. Primarily, the models were
used to predict the radial gradient g r of galactic cosmic rays in the vicinity of the Earth
during solar-minimum conditions specified by a flat neutral sheet and no propagating shock
disturbances. It was found that g r was not sensitive to the assumed value of the cosmic
ray distribution at the Sun, but was very sensitive to (a) the diffusion coefficients used to
specify the rate of diffusion of the cosmic ray distribution near the Sun, and (b) the choice
of the integrating algorithm used to determine the distribution from the transport equation.
The stability of each integrating algorithm used was also investigated. There have been
many measurements of the value of g,. at Earth in the past, mainly derived from data
collected by polar-based neutron monitors or detectors on board satellites. From all sources
of data and over a wide range of energy (tens of MeV to ~100 GeV) the general consensus
is that g,. at Earth is less than 5% AU-1 and probably around 1-2 % AU-1 . The models
investigated in this thesis predict a gradient in this range but only if certain diffusion
coefficients are specified.
The models were also used to investigate the relative importance of shocks, or propagating
solar disturbances, to the total eleven year cycle of cosmic ray modulation for medium
energy (1-10 GeV) particles. It was found that such disturbances were unable to produce
the observed intensity difference seen from solar minimum to solar maximum. It was
concluded that these, and higher energy particles, are modulated significantly by changes in
the overall global average heliospheric magnetic field through bulk drift motion. An
example of this bulk-drift modulation was investigated by looking at the correlation of
neutral-sheet position with isotropic intensity wave variations seen in the cosmic ray data.
For this analysis, a generalized model of the neutral sheet was developed..
An independent measurement of g r was also calculated from data collected by the network
of cosmic ray detectors operated by the Hobart cosmic ray group during the years 1975-78
and 1982-85. This group consists of the Cosmic Ray Section of the Australian Antarctic
Division and the Cosmic Ray Section of the University of Tasmania (Physics Department).
The gradient g r was determined by applying a north-south anisotropy analysis to the data.
The value of g r obtained was sensitive to the assumed energy spectrum of the north-south
anisotropy but was not inconsistent with other experimentally determined values. The
gradient was generally less than 5% AU -1 . It was necessary to calculate coupling
coefficients and atmospheric correction coefficients for the Mawson muon telescopes in
order to use the data from these detectors in the north-south anisotropy analysis.


The Bingham Canyon porphyry copper-gold-molybdenum deposit is one of the largest and highest-grade porphyry orebodies in the world. This study focused on the northwest side of the deposit where quartz mon-zonite porphyry (QMP), the first and largest porphyry intrusion, hosts the bulk of the high-grade copper-gold ore (>1.0% Cu, >1.0 ppm Au). The north-northeast–trending, high-grade zone had pre-mining dimensions of 1,500 m strike, >300 m vertical, and 500 m width and contained more than 500 million tonnes (Mt) of ore associated with potassic alteration and abundant quartz veins. The lack of superimposed sericitic alteration yielded ideal exposures in which to study the early, high-temperature stages of ore formation, a style of mineralization that in many porphyry deposits represents the major period of copper introduction.

We mapped multiple porphyry dikes in the sequence: (1) QMP, (2) latite porphyry (LP), (3) biotite porphyry (BP), (4) quartz latite porphyry breccia (QLPbx), and (5) quartz latite porphyry (QLP). Porphyry dikes, faults, and quartz veins are steeply dipping and have two dominant orientations; north-northeast– and northwest-striking. Dikes have a north-northeast strike but they thicken and develop northwest-trending apophyses and host high-grade copper-gold zones at intersections with northwest-faults, indicating that magmatic-hydrothermal fluids were focused by these structural intersections.

Each porphyry intrusion was accompanied by a similar sequence of veins, potassic alteration, and sulfides. Biotite veinlets were followed by fractures with early dark micaceous (EDM) halos of sericite, K-feldspar, biotite, andalusite, and local corundum containing disseminated bornite-chalcopyrite-gold. EDM halos are cut by multiple generations of A-quartz veins representing the main Cu-Au ore-forming event. Postdating all intrusions are quartz-molybdenite veins followed by quartz-sericite-pyrite veins.

Cathodoluminescence (CL) petrography identified distinct A-quartz veinlets consisting of dark-luminescing quartz filling fractures and dissolution vugs in earlier A-quartz veins and adjacent porphyry wall rock. These veinlets contain abundant bornite and chalcopyrite and minor K-feldspar and are closely linked in time to the introduction of the bulk of the copper and gold. Although a similar sequence of veins was repeated on emplacement of all porphyry intrusions, the vein density and intensity of potassic alteration declined with time. The youngest porphyry, QLP, is mostly weakly mineralized and locally unaltered. These observations indicate that magmatic-hydrothermal fluids underwent a similar physiochemical evolution during and immediately following emplacement of each of several porphyry dikes. The relationship between EDM veins and A-quartz veins requires that the flux of magmatic fluid from the magma chamber occurred in an episodic manner as opposed to a continuous discharge.

Vein truncation relationships coupled with abrupt changes in copper-gold grades, sulfide ratios, and potassic alteration intensity at porphyry intrusive contacts indicate that the mass of introduced copper and gold decreased significantly during successive porphyry intrusive-hydrothermal cycles, presumably due to depletion of metals and volatiles in the underlying magma chamber.


Just as an individual is rightly concerned about the privacy of their personally identifying information, so also is a group of people, a community, concerned about the privacy of sensitive information entrusted to their care. Our research seeks to develop a better understanding of the factors contributing to the sensitivity of community information, of the privacy threats that are recognized by the community, and of the means by which the community attempts to fulfill their privacy responsibilities. We are also interested in seeing how the elements of a community privacy model that we developed are related to the findings from the studies of communities. This thesis presents the results of a series of focus group sessions conducted in corporate settings. Three focus group interviews were conducted using participants from two information technology companies and one research group from the university. Three themes emerged from the analysis of these focus group interviews which are described as privacy awareness, situated disclosures, and confinement of sensitive information. These three themes capture the character and complexity of community oriented privacy, and expose breakdowns in current approaches.


Medications that can mitigate against radiation injury are limited. In this study, we investigated the ability of recombinant human growth hormone (rhGH) to mitigate against radiation injury in mice and nonhuman primates. BALB/c mice were irradiated with 7.5 Gy and treated post-irradiation with rhGH intravenously at a once daily dose of 20 µg/dose for 35 days. rhGH protected 17 out of 28 mice (60.7%) from lethal irradiation while only 3 out of 28 mice (10.7%) survived in the saline control group. A shorter course of 5 days of rhGH post-irradiation produced similar results. Compared with the saline control group, treatment with rhGH on irradiated BALB/c mice significantly accelerated overall hematopoietic recovery. Specifically, the recovery of total white cells, CD4 and CD8 T cell subsets, B cells, NK cells and especially platelets post radiation exposure were significantly accelerated in the rhGH-treated mice. Moreover, treatment with rhGH increased the frequency of hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells as measured by flow cytometry and colony forming unit assays in bone marrow harvested at day 14 after irradiation, suggesting the effects of rhGH are at the hematopoietic stem/progenitor level. rhGH mediated the hematopoietic effects primarily through their niches. Similar data with rhGH were also observed following 2 Gy sublethal irradiation of nonhuman primates. Our data demonstrate that rhGH promotes hematopoietic engraftment and immune recovery post the exposure of ionizing radiation and mitigates against the mortality from lethal irradiation even when administered after exposure.


Generative modeling has evolved to a notable field of machine learning. Deep polynomial neural networks (PNNs) have demonstrated impressive results in unsupervised image generation, where the task is to map an input vector (i.e., noise) to a synthesized image. However, the success of PNNs has not been replicated in conditional generation tasks, such as super-resolution. Existing PNNs focus on single-variable polynomial expansions which do not fare well to two-variable inputs, i.e., the noise variable and the conditional variable. In this work, we introduce a general framework, called CoPE, that enables a polynomial expansion of two input variables and captures their auto- and cross-correlations. We exhibit how CoPE can be trivially augmented to accept an arbitrary number of input variables. CoPE is evaluated in five tasks (class-conditional generation, inverse problems, edges-to-image translation, image-to-image translation, attribute-guided generation) involving eight datasets. The thorough evaluation suggests that CoPE can be useful for tackling diverse conditional generation tasks. The source code of CoPE is available at \url{https://github.com/grigorisg9gr/polynomial_nets_for_conditional_generation}.


A new type of imaging Raman microscope is described. First the advantages and disadvantages of the two possible approaches to Raman microscopy based on signal detection by means of a charge-coupled-device camera (i.e., direct imaging and image reconstruction) are discussed. Arguments are given to show that in most cases direct imaging is to be preferred over image reconstruction, because it provides the desired information in less time. In the direct imaging Raman microscope presented in this communication, detection of scattered light occurs in a narrow interval around a fixed wavelength. Selection of the Raman wavenumber shift at which an image is recorded is established by tuning the wavelength of the exciting laser light in such a way that the wavelength of the Raman scattered light with the desired Raman shift coincides with the detected wavelength. The microscope has been incorporated in a Raman microspectrometer in a way that enables easy switching between the imaging and the multichannel spectroscopy modes of operation. Bright field, fluorescence, and Raman microscopic images can be obtained.


The features that surrounds a location often characterize a luxury home, be it natural or manmade facilities ranging from rock view, mountain side, water front, parks, golf course, school districts or downtown districts. Other classification criteria include customization levels, historical or architectural importance and also absence of crime, commercialization and industrialization. However the design requirements for these facilities vary according to the location of the region and the needs of the final user. The basic design consideration for luxury homes has been space, materials and aesthetics; much attention has not been paid to user's requirement, this has led to continuous post-constructional transformation of these buildings. This paper evaluates the design requirements for prospective luxury homeowners in Kano state, Nigeria through identification and analysis of their requirements and variations. This study is also part of a user participatory research carried out in housing customization and data was collected from the aforementioned study area through administering questionnaire and this collected data was analyzed using SPSS and MSExcel. The results are presented in tables and charts. The paper will conclude by showing the design requirements of prospective house owners in luxury homes that will enhance user participation in luxury home designs. Recommendations are made for architects to embark on user survey before design so that the final homeowners can adhere to design decisions taken by the architect.


Policies that reduce emissions of greenhouse gases can simultaneously alter emissions of conventional pollutants that have deleterious effects on human health and the environment. This paper first describes how these "ancillary" benefits—benefits in addition to reduced risks of climate change—can result from greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation efforts. It then discusses methodologies for assessing ancillary benefits and provides a critical review of estimates associated with reductions of criteria air pollutants. We find that these benefits in the U.S. may be significant, indicating a higher level of "no regrets" greenhouse gas abatement than might be expected based on simple economic calculations of abatement cost. However, the magnitude of ancillary benefits realized by any program of GHG mitigation is highly dependent on the location, pollutant, degree of exposure, and the economic behavior of individuals in response to the program. It is also highly dependent on the interaction of GHG abatement policies with the policies used for regulating conventional pollutants. We identify a rule of thumb to suggest ancillary benefits could be on the order of 30 percent of the incremental cost of GHG mitigation. For modest carbon reduction that do not result in changes in emissions of sulfur dioxide by electric utilities, ancillary benefits may be as high as $7 per ton. Greater benefits could be obtained with larger GHG reductions, although the costs of abatement would also be much greater.


The relationship among cost functions, distance functions, and technical inefficiency are utilized to show how technical inefficiency scores can be incorporated into the specification of a profit function and a related system of output supply and input demands. A method also is introduced for incorporating allocative efficiency scores into the same system. The theoretical and empirical approach requires fewer assumptions than those made in many studies. An illustrative example is provided for Russian agriculture for 1194-95, a period when significant technical and allocative inefficiency was known to exist. The results demonstrate inefficiency limits the supply response to prices, thus leading to lower estimates of output response compare to a traditional supply model in which efficiency is assumed.


India has a very old and rich tradition in the textile industry. Textile is a decisive part of Indian economy; The Indian Textile Industry has grown phenomenally and has an overwhelming presence in the economic life of the country. Apart from providing one of the basic necessities of life, textile industry also plays a pivotal role through its contribution to industrial output, employment generation and the export earnings of the country. Textile is a flexible material made by interlacing or connecting threads made of natural fibers like wool and cotton or synthetic (man-made) fibers like polyester. Textile floor coverings are textiles meant to be used on floor surfaces. They include carpets and related materials that are secured to a floor by something like staples, tacks or glue, as well as removable area rugs. Textile floor coverings are made by processes like knitting, weaving or needle-tufting, in which fibers are forced through a backing by using a needle. Another layer is then applied below the backing to secure the tufts in place. ISO and ASTM standards are numerous and cover a whole range of processes used in making textile floor coverings, whether handmade or machine made. Main objective of the study is To find out the export performance of live animal products of India during the period of 20052019. The study makes use of statistical techniques such as Percentage analysis, Growth analysis, Standard Deviation, CAGR and CV in analyzing the data for finding the result.


Summary
Demography and conservation status of many wild organisms are increasingly shaped by interactions with humans. This is particularly the case for large, wide-ranging carnivores.
Using 206 mortality records (1999–2012) of lions in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe, we calculated mortality rates for each source of anthropogenic mortality, modelled risk of anthropogenic mortality across the landscape accounting for time lions spent in different parts of the landscape, and assessed whether subsets of the population were more at risk.
Anthropogenic activities caused 88% of male and 67% of female mortalities; male mortality being dominated by trophy hunting while the sources for female mortality were more varied (bycatch snaring, retaliatory killing, hunting).
Landscapes of anthropogenic mortality risk revealed that communal subsistence farming areas, characterized by high risk (due to retaliatory killing) but avoided by lions, are population sinks. Trophy hunting areas and areas within protected areas bordering communal farmland, where bushmeat snaring is prevalent, form 'ecological traps' (or 'attractive sinks').
Lions avoided risky areas, suggesting they may make behavioural decisions based on perceptions of risk. Experienced adults used risky areas less and incorporated lower proportions of them in their home ranges than young individuals, suggesting that the latter may either be naive or forced into peripheral habitats.
Synthesis and applications. This paper contributes to an understanding of how large carnivore populations are affected by anthropogenic mortality across the conservation landscape. This is critical to designing focussed, appropriate and cost-effective conservation management strategies. Agricultural areas are intuitively identified by conservationists as being risky for carnivores due to retaliatory killing, with threats largely mitigated against by improving livestock protection. However, parts of protected areas may also form less easily identified 'attractive sinks' for carnivores. In particular, trophy hunting areas adjacent to national parks need careful management to avoid damaging effects of overhunting. Law enforcement is needed to reduce the effects of bushmeat poaching on predators and other wildlife in protected areas. To be most effective, resource-limited antipoaching activities should prioritize wildlife-rich areas close to human settlement as these tend to be hot spots for bushmeat poaching.


Background The influence of high blood alcohol level (BAL) on the outcome of severely injured patients and the corresponding pathophysiological changes is a controversial issue. Objective To carry out a prognostic study to compare the physiological values and short-term outcome of severely injured patients depending on their serum alcohol level. Methods A total of 383 severely injured patients with an Injury Severity Score (ISS) ≥17 were admitted to the trauma division between October 2008 and December 2009 and enrolled into this study. Patients were grouped according to their BAL (>0.5‰,'BAL positive' vs <0.5‰,'BAL negative'). Trauma mechanism, pattern of injury and its treatment, and a course of intensive care treatment, physiological parameters and outcome with respect to mortality were analysed. Results Both groups had similar ISS. In comparison with the BAL-negative group, patients in the BAL-positive group had a significantly lower Glasgow Coma Scale score (9.64 vs 12 points; p=0.005) and, although not significant, a trend towards higher values of the Abbreviated Injury Score for the head (3.29 vs 2.81 points; p=0.146). Furthermore, significantly higher lactate (3.11 mmol/L vs 2.02 mmol/L; p<0.001) levels and lower median arterial pressure values (87.9 mm Hg vs 99.4 mm Hg; p=0.006) were seen in the BAL-positive group at day of admission. However, the overall in-hospital mortality was comparable to that in BAL-negative patients (19.6% vs 21.5%). Similarly, hospital stay (15.29 vs 17.55 days) and duration of intensive care unit treatment (8.53 vs 8.36 days) were not significantly affected by a high BAL upon admission. Conclusions Severely injured patients with a raised BAL have a higher incidence of severe traumatic brain injury and worse initial physiological parameters. However, the survival rate and in-hospital stay is not influenced. This supports the theory of a neuroprotective role of alcohol.


Energy consumption in residential buildings consumes 22% of the total US energy each year and is highly impacted by the occupant behavior. In order to model domestic demand profiles more accurately, it is important to understand occupancy behavior profile. Four low income houses in Texas are used as the test beds. The occupancy sensors are installed in every room. The real-life occupancy data from the occupancy sensors were compared with the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) data. The study period is from July 1 to August 31. The preliminary result shows that there is a similarity between ATUS data and actual occupancy profile. In addition, simulations in EnergyPlus were conducted to test how much energy consumption can be saved based on the thermostat control of real-life occupancy behavior patterns. The results show that such control can save cooling energy by 7%.


The aim of this study is to identify factors impacting consumer attitudes towards the purchase of functional foods, also known as foods with a positive physiological impact on health, in Hungary. Our work also focuses on the volume of information currently available to consumers when making such a choice, and on identifying consumer clusters. Particular attention is paid to the extent to which the available information can impact the respective purchase decision, which channels are used in obtaining such information, and which information is considered reliable or unreliable by shoppers. Based on the results of focus group research, we conducted a questionnaire-based survey (n=502). To reduce the high number and hard-to-interpret attitude variables, a factor analysis was performed, followed by the formation of consumer segments via cluster analysis according to the consumer attitude indicators. These segments were termed Health-conscious consumers, Consumers with limited information, The sceptics and The price conscious, and were characterised according to socio-demographic, behavioural and attitude variables. Then, we sought to identify the sources of information that would best address a given segment, and explored the efficiency of information transfer in the functional food market.


The Varieties of Capitalism literature has drawn little attention to industrial renewal and diversification, while the related diversification literature has neglected the institutional dimension of industrial change. Bringing together both literatures, the paper proposes that institutions have an impact on the direction of the diversification process, in particular on whether countries gain a comparative advantage in new sectors that are close or far from what is already part of their existing industrial structure. We investigate the diversification process in 23 developed countries by means of detailed product trade data in the period 1995-2010. Our results show that relatedness is a stronger driver of diversification into new products in coordinated market economies, while liberal market economies show a higher probability to move in more unrelated industries: their overarching institutional framework gives countries more freedom to make a jump in their industrial evolution. In particular, we found that the role of relatedness as driver of diversification into new sectors is stronger in the presence of institutions that focus more on 'non-market' coordination in the domains of labor relations, corporate governance relations, product market relations, and inter-firm relations. JEL codes: B52, L16, O43, P16, P51


High-precision 40 Ar/ 39 Ar isotopic ages obtained from Cenozoic volcanic rocks and subvolcanic intrusions document the age of initiation and the temporal evolution of extensional and strike-slip faulting in the western Basin and Range Province. In the northern Wassuk Range, faulting began between ca. 26 and 24.7 Ma; both normal and strike-slip faults are bracketed between 23.1 and 22.2 Ma, and between 15 and 14 Ma. These ages document inception of the Ancestral Walker Lane, a northwest-trending zone of right-transtensional faulting in western Nevada that separated extending crust on the east from the unextended Sierra Nevada block on the west at lat 39°N. We speculate that the southwesterly migrating, episodic Oligocene–early Miocene, east-west extensional faulting in the Basin and Range thinned and weakened the crust, allowing right-slip faults to develop in the Walker Lane in response to San Andreas right-shear in California. Southwest of the Walker Lane there was no faulting prior to 15 Ma. Here, in the Yerington district, andesitic magmatism began at ca. 15 Ma and was followed by >150% east-west extension along closely spaced (1–2 km) normal faults with up to 4 km of offset each (Proffett, 1977). These faults tilted older Cenozoic rocks 35°–40°W. Our new 40 Ar/ 39 Ar ages substantially revise earlier K-Ar ages of the timing of extension and establish that andesite lava flows cut by normal faults are 13.8–15 Ma, and that these faults are intruded by 12.6–13.0 Ma dacites. Rapid extension is thus bracketed to a 0.7–1.7 m.y. interval at 95% confidence, indicating local, east-west strain rates of 2–4 × 10 −14 /s (5–10 mm/yr). Following this period, lower rates of extension prevailed near Yerington along more widely spaced normal oblique-slip faults that localized clastic sedimentation of the Wassuk Group between 11 and 8 Ma. These faults and sedimentary rocks are more abundant southwest of Yerington in a belt parallel to the Walker Lane in previously little-extended crust. From 7 Ma to present, normal right-oblique slip faults with a lower rate of extension than the previous two periods produced the modern ranges near Yerington and extend 100 km southwest of the Walker Lane, which continues to be the locus of strike-slip faulting. Thus, since 15 Ma the margin of the Basin and Range has moved progressively 100 km west creating the broad Walker Lane belt and lower strain rates near Yerington.


Abstract Bushmeat hunting is a pantropical threat to rainforest mammals. Understanding its effects on species richness, community composition and population abundance is of critical conservation relevance. As data on the pre-hunting state of mammal populations in Africa are not generally available, we evaluated the impacts of illegal bushmeat hunting on the mammal community of two ecologically similar forests in the Udzungwa Mountains of Tanzania. The forests differ only in their protection status: one is a National Park and the other a Forest Reserve. We deployed systematic camera trap surveys in these forests, amounting to 850 and 917 camera days in the Forest Reserve and the National Park, respectively, and investigated differences between the two areas in estimated species-specific occupancies, detectabilities and species richness. We show that the mammal community in the Forest Reserve is degraded in all aspects relative to the National Park. Species richness was almost 40% lower in the Forest Reserve (median 18 vs 29 species, highest posterior density intervals 15–30 and 23–47, respectively). Occupancy of most species was also reduced significantly and the functional community appeared significantly altered, with an increase in rodents, and loss of large carnivores and omnivores. Overall, our results show how ineffective reserve management, with almost absent law enforcement, leads to uncontrolled illegal hunting, which in turn has a significant impact on the mammal fauna of globally important sites for conservation.


This paper studies the practical pricing of Bermudan swap options, attempting to find both lower and upper bounds for the option price. It uses the BGM model with three driving factors and Monte Carlo simulation for determining the evolution of forward interest rates. A discretisation proposed by Glasserman is used, as an alternative to direct discretisation of the forward rates. Two suboptimal exercise strategies using exercise boundaries proposed by Andersen are evaluated for finding the lower bound for the option price. A perfect foresight strategy is evaluated for finding an upper bound. This paper also studies the systematic errors in the forward rate evolution and discusses simple measures for reducing their impact on the option pricing.


Religious symbols are part of our world, relating to another world. In order to understand the process by which symbols grow and develop, the particular context of a symbol is important. In this article a particular theory as to what symbols are, is presented. Religion presupposes the existence of two worlds: this-worldly (profane) and the other-worldly (sacred). The means of communication and reference between these two worlds are symbols. Two examples are investigated so as to indicate how symbols can over time either be demoted or promoted. In the case of the Asherah and asherah as related in the Old Testament a demotion of a symbol is illustrated. The growth of ancient Egyptian religion is an example of a possible promotion of symbols. The conditions under which these processes can occur are investigated.


Author(s): Cogdell, Christina | Abstract: Toward a Living Architecture? examines the emerging field of generative architecture and its nexus with computation, biology, and complexity. Based on Christina Cogdell's field research in architecture studios and biological labs, this book critiques generative architecture by evaluating its scientific rhetoric and disjunction from actual scientific theory and practice, definitively explaining the role of the natural sciences within contemporary architecture.


Increasingly across the United States pregnant women who seek help for drug addiction are finding themselves in a courtroom defending criminal charges instead of a doctor's office or rehabilitation facility. Women are being criminally charged for being addicted to drugs, an offense not punishable by criminal law in any other circumstance than pregnancy. While these women are being charged after the birth of their child, the drug abuse occurred while they were pregnant. The history of reproductive rights and drug legislation and the history of pregnant women who are criminally prosecuted for the use of controlled substances will be addressed in Part I of this article. Part II of this article provides a broad analysis of how each state currently addresses the ever-prevalent prosecution of these women, including a chart with the relevant statutes and cases. Part III explains why the issue is deeper than due process rights and whether the legislatures intended for child or minor to include fetus or unborn child. Finally, Part IV discusses other possible options states should explore to put a stop to the creation of a new class of felons.


Abstract
Previous research findings suggest that maths anxiety may mask an individual's true maths ability. The overarching aim of the studies presented in the current thesis was to
empirically study possible mechanisms underpinning the typically observed negative relationship between maths anxiety and maths performance. One of the main theoretical
explanations for the relationship between maths anxiety and performance has focused on the influence of maths anxiety on working memory. In particular, processing efficiency theory (Eysenck & Calvo, 1992) accounts of anxiety effects refer to the role of worry in draining working memory resources, and other accounts also refer to
potential problems with a deficient inhibition mechanism associated with intrusive thoughts. However, previous research has failed to adequately investigate a processing
efficiency account of maths anxiety effects. Using self-report measures of maths anxiety and performance on two-digit addition verification tasks, the studies presented in this thesis attempt to address this, also taking into account the recent update to processing efficiency theory: attentional control theory (Eysenck, Santos, Derakshan & Calvo,2007).
Initially, in order to address the question of whether there are neuropsychological correlates of maths anxiety, perhaps associated with increased activation within the frontal cortex, an experiment employing an electroencephalogram methodology was used to measure event-related potentials (ERPs) in response to mental arithmetic. Results showed no evidence for an effect of maths anxiety on ERPs. Despite this, the typical negative relationship between maths anxiety and performance was observed. The subsequent studies therefore attempted to investigate the mechanisms behind this.
The next experimental study used a modified version of the Cognitive Intrusions Questionnaire (Freeston et al., 1993) to assess self-reported in-task intrusive thoughts.
Maths anxiety was found to be related to specific task-related intrusive thoughts. In turn, some cognitive intrusions were related to performance. However, there was no evidence to suggest a joint relationship between maths anxiety and cognitive intrusions in explaining maths performance, providing little support for some of the existing explanations of maths anxiety effects.
The third experimental study used a novel eye-tracking methodology to investigate the role of eye-movements in explaining the maths anxiety-to-performance relationship. However, maths anxiety was not found to moderate the relationship between eye-movement, e.g. fixations, dwell-time, and saccades, and performance, despite eye-movements being a strong predictor of performance.
Across studies, and particularly on maths problems involving a carry operation, maths anxiety was found to be related to longer response times to correctly answered
maths problems, with some inconsistency in error rates. Such maths anxiety-toperformance relationships are consistent with key assumptions of a processing
efficiency and attentional control account of anxiety effects on performance. The exact mechanisms underpinning this relationship, however, remain unclear.
In addition, the thesis reports on and presents a newly developed scale for measuring maths anxiety. The need for a new scale arose out of acknowledgement of validity issues with existing scales and the new Mathematics Anxiety Scale – U.K. has
been shown to be both a reliable and valid tool for measuring maths anxiety in a British, and potentially European, undergraduate population.


Modern politics is mediated politics, and the media constitute the most important source of information and channel of communication between the governors and the governed. Media and politics are thus inextricable linked together, with the media playing an important role in contemporary democracies and for political processes. While this is true for virtually all advanced democracies, there are still important differences between countries depending on, for example, their media systems and political systems. The purpose of Communicating Politics: Political Communication in the Nordic Countries is consequently to de-scribe and analyze both the political communication systems and cases of political communication processes in Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. Taken together, the chapters explore differences as well as similarities between the Nordic countries, and provide a broad view of political communication systems, practices and research perspectives in the Nordic countries.


FSH and IGF-I synergistically stimulate gonadal steroid production; conversely, silencing the FSH or the IGF-I genes leads to infertility and hypogonadism. To determine the molecular link between these hormones, we examined the signaling cross talk downstream of their receptors. In human and rodent granulosa cells (GCs), IGF-I potentiated the stimulatory effects of FSH and cAMP on the expression of steroidogenic genes. In contrast, inhibition of IGF-I receptor (IGF-IR) activity or expression using pharmacological, genetic, or biochemical approaches prevented the FSH- and cAMP-induced expression of steroidogenic genes and estradiol production. In vivo experiments demonstrated that IGF-IR inactivation reduces the stimulation of steroidogenic genes and follicle growth by gonadotropins. FSH or IGF-I alone stimulated protein kinase B (PKB), which is also known as AKT and in combination synergistically increased AKT phosphorylation. Remarkably, blocking IGF-IR expression or activity decreased AKT basal activity and abolished AKT activation by FSH. In GCs lacking IGF-IR activity, FSH stimulation of Cyp19 expression was rescued by overexpression of constitutively active AKT. Our findings demonstrate, for the first time, that in human, mouse, and rat GCs, the well-known stimulatory effect of FSH on Cyp19 and AKT depends on IGF-I and on the expression and activation of the IGF-IR.


BACKGROUND
Even in the drug-eluting stent (DES) era, the restenosis rate of the follow-up period after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is higher in haemodialysis (HD) patients than in non-HD patients. Therefore, higher restenosis remains a clinical limitation in HD patients, and a simple clinical method to predict patients likely to have restenosis after stent implantation is attractive. The present study investigated the potential relationship between aortic valvular calcification (AVC) and angiographical restenosis at follow-up after DES implantation in patients on maintenance HD.

METHODS
In the study, 97 patients were enrolled. We prospectively performed echocardiography before elective PCI with DES implantation. Angiographic follow-up was scheduled between 6 and 8 months after PCI. Restenosis at follow-up was defined as a diameter stenosis of > or =50% by measuring quantitative coronary angiography.

RESULTS
Of the enrolled patients, 59 patients (60.8%) had AVC. Complete angiographical follow-up was obtained in 86 patients (88.7%). The angiographical restenosis rate during the follow-up period was 24.7% in patients with AVC and 8.9% in patients without AVC [hazard ratio (HR) 3.36; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.18-9.56, P = 0.023]. Even after multivariate adjustment including covariates related to atherogenecity, AVC remained an independent predictor of restenosis after implanting DES (HR 3.83; 95% CI 1.14-12.9, P = 0.029). Late lumen loss suggesting neointimal growth after DES implantation was 0.28 +/- 0.70 mm in the non-AVC group and 0.64 +/- 0.90 mm in the AVC group (P = 0.013).

CONCLUSIONS
AVC provides predictive information regarding DES implantation in patients on maintenance HD.


Program slicing is a technique that determines which statements in a program affect or are affected by another statement in that program. Static forward slicing, in particular, can be used for impact analysis by identifying all potential effects of changes in software. This information helps developers design and test their changes. Unfortunately, static slicing is too imprecise—it often produces large sets of potentially affected statements, limiting its usefulness. To reduce the resulting set of statements, other forms of slicing have been proposed, such as dynamic slicing and thin slicing, but they can miss relevant statements. In this paper, we present a new technique, called Probabilistic Slicing (p-slicing), that augments a static forward slice with a relevance score for each statement by exploiting the observation that not all statements have the same probability of being affected by a change. P-slicing can be used, for example, to focus the attention of developers on the "most impacted" parts of the program first. It can also help testers, for example, by estimating the difficulty of "killing" a particular mutant in mutation testing and prioritizing test cases. We also present an empirical study that shows the effectiveness of p-slicing for predictive impact analysis and we discuss potential benefits for other tasks.