Background People with severe COPD have a burden of symptoms, often greater than those with lung cancer and have unmet need (Gore and Brophy 2000). A local palliative care needs analysis was conducted across primary and secondary care. Gaps were identified in the management of anxiety, breathlessness, social isolation, advance planning and carer support. Patients had high comparative admission rate and length of stay. A team, including a psychologist, OT, palliative and respiratory medicine and physiotherapy and a palliative care CNS, developed and delivered the programme.. The programmes focus was behavioural change through psycho-education, exercise and relaxation, underpinned by CBT. Method Referral was from acute respiratory service for those with at least 2 acute admissions in the previous 6 months, FEV1 of <50% predicted and optimised medical management. They attended the hospice programme for 5 weeks with transport provided. Two programmes were completed with a total of 12 patients and 3 carers HADS and CATS were taken at week 1 and week 6. 6 month pre and post course admission data was collected. Results Patients described; improvement in confidence and quality of life and improved management of their exacerbations. HADS and CATS remained unchanged. Initial data from programme 1 demonstrated reduction in total admissions from 7 to 4 and reduction in total bed days from 47 to 20, over a 6 month period. Conclusions Patient evaluated improvement in function and quality of life and reduction in hospital bed days would suggested continuation of the programme with a change in quality of life measurement. Reference Gore JM, Brophy CJ, Greenstone MA. How well do we care for patients with end stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease? Thorax 2000; 55:1000


A home is the single largest purchase that most households make, and it is one that usually requires some debt financing. Because housing debt is such a large component of households' balance sheets, it is important to understand the financing decision. In this paper, we use household level data from the HILDA survey to relate households' leverage to their observed characteristics using both graphical and econometric techniques. We also model the decisions to own a home and to have debt against it. We correct for any possible selection bias arising from these decisions before drawing conclusions about population behaviour. Much of the variation in leverage is attributable to the passage of time, as borrowers pay down their loans on schedule and the value of their homes rise. On top of these largely exogenous effects, we find evidence that some households make conscious decisions that strongly affect leverage. For example, Australian homeowners generally plan to pay off their mortgage before its contracted end date, and many are therefore ahead of schedule in paying off their housing debt. On the other hand, a minority of households have higher leverage than similar households because they have engaged in leveraged investment in both owner-occupied and rental housing.


In May 2013, after months of controversy, France legalized same-sex marriage and adoption by homosexual couples. Obstacles to adoption and parenting equality remain, however -- many of them in the form of cultural and political norms reflected and expressed in French adoption policies. In The Politics of Adoption, Bruno Perreau describes the evolution of these policies. In the past thirty years, Perreau explains, political and intellectual life in France have been dominated by debates over how to preserve "Frenchness," and these debates have driven policy making. Adoption policies, he argues, link adoption to citizenship, reflecting and enforcing the postcolonial state's notions of parenthood, gender, and Frenchness. After reviewing the complex history of adoption, Perreau examines French political debates over adoption, noting, among other things, that intercountry adoptions stirred far less controversy than the difference between the sexes in an adopting couple. He also discusses judicial action on adoption; child welfare agencies as gatekeepers to parenthood (as defined by experts); the approval process from the viewpoints of social workers and applicants; and adoption's link to citizenship, and its use as a metaphor for belonging. Adopting a Foucaultian perspective, Perreau calls the biopolitics of adoption "pastoral": it manages the individual for the good of the collective "flock"; it considers itself outside politics; and it considers not so much the real behavior of individuals as an allegorical representation of them. His argument sheds new light on American debates on bioethics, identity, and citizenship.


This essay reviews a new biography of Agnes Smedley, a radical American writer and journalist who secretly worked for the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party on various endeavors, including espionage. When Smedley was accused in the late 1940s of having been a Soviet spy, she staunchly denied the allegations and depicted herself as an innocent victim of a McCarthyite smear. Ruth Price, the author of the new biography, initially expected to find that Smedley had indeed been unjustly accused of spying for the Soviet Union. But as Price sifted through newly available materials from Russia and China, she made the disconcerting discovery that Smedley had in fact eagerly served as an agent of influence and spy for the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communists. This case illustrates some of the complexities that arise when assessing why certain Western intellectuals and government officials decided to become spies for the Soviet Union.


This paper describes the results from a collaborative research project in the UK, focussing on the recovery of waste heat from underground railway tunnels, using London as a case study. The aim of the project was to investigate the feasibility of combining cooling of London's underground railway tunnels with a waste heat recovery system. The recovered heat will then be transferred to a heat pump to upgrade its temperature, before delivery to a district heating network for reuse. The paper describes the proposed design for the combined cooling and heating system and the model that has been developed to evaluate its performance. A range of results from the study are presented and the potential benefits in terms of energy, carbon and cost savings are highlighted. The paper also introduces a related project, which builds on this case study and aims to identify and quantify the potential for waste heat recovery from a range of urban subterranean infrastructures, such as sewers and cable tunnels, as well as underground railway tunnels. Potential heat recovery and delivery methods will be investigated, in relation to the size and location of local end-user heat demand. Both of these projects focus on waste heat recovery in London, however, the results are applicable to most cities with underground infrastructure systems, both elsewhere in the UK and around the world.


Side weirs, also known as a lateral weirs, and overflow dams are free overflow regulation and diversion devices commonly encountered in hydraulic engineering. They are set into the side of a channel or river allowing to spill a part of the discharge over their crest when the surface of the flow in the main-channel exceeds a certain level. The lateral loss of water is reducing the sediment transport capacity in the main-channel yielding to aggradation and the formation of a local sediment deposit in the downstream weir alignment. The reduced cross section generates backwater effects and additional contraction and expansion losses. As a consequence, the head over the side weir rises and the side overflow discharge as well. The design discharge to be diverted over the weir is increased by this flow-sediment transport interaction. Since the interaction of side overflow with bed-load and bed morphology in a channel has not been studied so far, systematic tests have been performed. Three test series and one reference experiment without side weir have been carried out in a 20.00 m long, 1.50 m wide and 1.20 m high rectangular flume. The first test series consisted of a 3.00 m long side weir, the second one had a 6.00 m long weir and the third series was characterised by two weirs of 2.50 m length each. The approach discharge varied between 0.098 m3/s ≤ Q1 ≤ 0.222 m3/s. The overall flow regime has been subcritical. The average initial bottom slope was 0.21 %. The mobile bed was characterized by a median particle size of d50 = 0.72 mm. During the experiments the water surface, the 2D-velocity field, the side overflow discharge and sediment supply were measured. The final bed morphology has been recorded by means of digital photogrammetry. Based on the systematic experimental flume study a one- and a two-dimensional empirical model for the prediction of the mobile bed evolution near the side weir have been developed. The models allow a simple and straightforward estimation of the interaction of a side overflow with bed-load transport and bed morphology in engineering practice. The 1D-model represents the overall mobile bed evolution in the weir reach. The model takes into account a deposit being uniform over the channel width. The height of the deposit only varies in longitudinal direction. In addition to the 1D-approach the 2D-model incorporates the variation of the deposit over the channel width. For the parameterisation of the two models a Maxwell-type distribution function is applied. Input parameters for both models such as the location and height of the maximum bed elevation and a shape factor are expressed in terms of non-dimensional geometric channel and side weir variables as well as hydraulic parameters and bed load transport relations. For the 2D-approach an additional relationship considering the spanwise variation is developed. To implement the models in numerical flow simulations expressions for the location of the empirical deposit relative to the side weir are established. Regarding the impact of the deposit on the intensity of side overflow it has been found out that the spilled discharge might increase by a factor of up to ≈ 3 compared to fixed plane bed conditions. In this context about 25 % of the total increase are attributed to effects of form roughness and about 75 % to bed aggradation phenomena. In this regard the height of the deposit represents the most important parameter. The location of the deposit with respect to the position of the side weir has a smaller influence, whereas the downstream shape of the deposit is of minor importance. To test the prediction accuracy of the models they have been implemented into 1D-flow calculations. The predicted side overflow was about 85 % for the 1D-model and about 91 % for the 2D-model. The difference is mainly caused due to the implementation of the spanwise variation in the 2D-model. Besides the two models a simple relationship for direct estimation of side overflow discharge in presence of bed-load transport has been established. The empirical models have been applied in a case study on the Rhone river upstream of Lake Geneva in Switzerland. In the case of a flat bed without deposit a protection for a flood event with a hundred year return period persists. Taking into account the mobile bed evolution a protection even for an extreme flood might be obtained. This presumes a sufficiently large storage volume of the retention bassin. The skewed deposit induces the formation of an oscillatory erosion gutter downstream of the weir. For the description of the sine-generated evolution of the thalweg indicative expressions are proposed. In order to test the capability of a numerical tool to reproduce the bed aggradation phenomena observed in the experiments, 1D-numerical simulations with bed-load transport have been performed (DUPIRO). From these computations it can be concluded that the most experimental phenomena are captured with reasonable accuracy.


i»?i»?Reform of financial regulation is a priority on the international agenda. At the call of the Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (G-20), a number of new international standards have been issued, most notably Basel III. As a member of the G-20, the Financial Stability Board (FSB), and the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the People's Republic of China (PRC) is now on a faster track in adopting international standards. However, the key issue for the PRC—as well as many other emerging markets—is to how to keep focused on the domestic policy agenda while adopting the new global standards. Fortunately, the PRC's financial system has proved resilient to the recent financial crisis. As a result, banks in the PRC find it quite easy to meet the new Basel III capital and liquidity standards. Basel III is only part of an effective regulatory framework. While phasing in Basel III, the PRC needs other prudential tools such as a new provision ratio, in addition to the provision coverage ratio. Activity restriction will be another effective tool with the potential to prevent banks from becoming too complicated for bankers to manage and for the regulator to supervise. As we work hard to improve the effectiveness of the regulatory system at both the global and national level, we should remind ourselves of the importance of keeping the balance between enhanced regulation and promoting financial innovation—without the pendulum swinging too far.


Background Three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy (3D-CRT) and intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) techniques are used for the treatment of patients with laryngeal cancer. Objective This study aimed to investigate the effects of these 2 treatment techniques on the planning target volume (PTV) (laryngeal cancer), dose homogeneity, dose of organs at risk (OARs) (parotid glands), and conformity index. Methods This study compared 2 treatment techniques and was conducted from October 2018 to April 2019 at the Zhianawa Cancer Center (ZCC), Sulaimaniyah, Iraq. Eight patients with laryngeal cancer were selected for this study. 3D-CRT and IMRT were used to produce the maximum dose of target volume coverage and minimum dose to the parotid glands. Elekta synergy with a photon beam of 6 MV was used for all measurements. Data analysis was performed using the available statistical package of SPSS 25. Results The comparison of 3D-CRT with IMRT showed that the mean conformity index value for IMRT was more conformal than the 3D-CRT plan (0.956, 0.945, respectively), but the homogeneity index was better with 3D-CRT than with IMRT (0.175, 0.202, respectively). The mean dose for Rt. parotid glands was higher with IMRT than with 3D-CRT (232.71, 23.26, respectively), and in both plans the mean dose was less than 26 Gy (the standard tolerance value). While in the Lt. parotid gland the mean dose was higher with 3D-CRT than with IMRT (26.95, 23.71, respectively), the mean dose with 3D-CRT was greater than 26 Gy. The amount of PTV was significantly greater with the IMRT technique than with 3D-CRT (52.15±1.61, 51.09.4±0.74 Gy, respectively). Conclusion This study further supports that IMRT has improved the long-term quality of life of patients with laryngeal cancer.


Gibbs random field (GRF) models and features from cooccurrence matrices are typically considered as separate but useful tools for texture discrimination. The authors show an explicit relationship between cooccurrences and a large class of GRF's. This result comes from a new framework based on a set-theoretic concept called the "aura set" and on measures of this set, "aura measures." This framework is also shown to be useful for relating different texture analysis tools. The authors show how the aura set can be constructed with morphological dilation, how its measure yields cooccurrences, and how it can be applied to characterizing the behavior of the Gibbs model for texture. In particular, they show how the aura measure generalizes, to any number of gray levels and neighborhood order, some properties previously known for just the binary, nearest-neighbor GRF. Finally, the authors illustrate how these properties can guide one's intuition about the types of GRF patterns which are most likely to form. >


Abstract. Marine isotope stage (MIS) 13 (~500 000 years ago) has been recognized as atypical in many paleoclimate records and, in particular, it has been connected to an exceptionally strong summer monsoon throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Here, we present a multi-proxy study of a sediment core taken from the Murray Ridge at an intermediate water depth in the northern Arabian Sea that covers the last 750 000 years. Our results indicate that primary productivity conditions were anomalously high during MIS 13 in the Arabian Sea and led to extreme carbonate dissolution and glauconitization in the deep-sea sediments. These observations could be explained by increased wind driven upwelling of nutrient-rich deep waters and, hence, by the occurrence of an exceptionally strong summer monsoon event during MIS 13, as it was suggested in earlier studies. However, ice core records from Antarctica demonstrate that atmospheric methane concentrations, which are linked to the extent of tropical wetlands, were relatively low during this period. This constitutes a strong argument against an extremely enhanced global monsoon circulation during MIS 13 which, moreover, is in contrast with results of transient climate modelling experiments. As an alternative solution for the aberrant conditions in the Arabian Sea record, we propose that the high primary productivity was probably related to the onset of an intensive meridional overturning circulation in the Atlantic Ocean at the end of the Mid-Pleistocene transition. This may have led to an increased supply of nutrient-rich deep waters into the Indian Ocean euphotic zone, thereby triggering the observed productivity maximum.


Scholars have largely overlooked philosopher Soren Kierkegaard's thoughts on occupational, vocational, and work topics, although he did concern himself with occupational topics. This theoretical piece explores Kierkegaard's concept of "leveling" (Nivelleringen), connecting it to human resource development (HRD) and organizational socialization processes, which are often conducted by HRD departments. Organizational socialization is important as it provides newcomers with functional and cultural information. Similar to the concept of leveling, however, organizational socialization can provide employees with taken-for-granted socially constructed definitions of the self. This article proposes expanding edification and capability for individuals in the workplace via Kierkegaardian indirect communication in HRD and organizational socialization practices.


A 12-week study was conducted to evaluate the productive performance of Bovans White laying hens fed high-nutrient-density diets under Egyptian summer conditions. Two hundred hens were randomly assigned to five equal dietary treatments, five replications each. Birds were kept at community cages in an open-sided laying house, provided with a daily photoperiod of 16 h and managed similarly. A control diet was formulated (as fed basis) to contain a metabolizable energy of 2880 kcal kgG, 17.40% crude protein, 4.35% Ca, 0.43% nonphytate P, 0.84% lysine, 0.41% methionine and 0.70% methionine plus cysteine. Four high nutrient density diets were also compounded to contain 102.5, 105, 107.5 and 110% of the nutrients present in the control diet, thus five mash diets were composed and used from 44-56 weeks of age. The criteria of response were feed intake, egg production, egg weight, egg mass, feed conversion, body weight change, egg components and certain traits of egg quality, nutrient digestibility and some blood plasma parameters. Feeding the high nutrient density diets exerted no positive effect on productive performance of hens, digestibility of nutrients (dry matter, organic matter, crude protein, ether extract, crude fiber, nitrogen-free extract and ash retention), some egg quality traits and most blood parameters examined but positively affected weight change, percent albumen, shell thickness, yolk index and Haugh units. It is concluded that increasing dietary nutrient density up to 110% of the recommended requirements of Bovans White laying hens does not improve their productive performance under Egyptian summer conditions.


The following text is taken from the publisher's website:

"Sir Arthur Bryant and National History in Twentieth-Century Britain is a significant new study of the work of the popular historian and journalist, Sir Arthur Bryant (1899-1985). Since his death, scholarly interest in Bryant has focused on his Nazi sympathies in the late 1930s. Julia Stapleton broadens our understanding of the man and the writer.

Stapleton illuminates Bryant's romantic ideal of his nation. She explores the historian's success in writing for a broad middlebrow audience, aided by his firsthand experience of two world wars; and she traces the decline of Bryant's authority beginning in the 1960s as the discipline of history diversified and new ties were forged between professional historians and popular readerships.

Stapleton suggests that Bryant prefigured and sustained a form of nationalism that remained nascent within the British population (though not always its elites) deep into the twentieth century, as the Falklands episode and the recent resurgence of English national identity well illustrates. Twenty years after his death, when history has scaled new heights of popularity, a study of the historian whose work made perhaps the largest public impact in twentieth-century Britain could not be more timely."


Membrane-associated and secreted proteins are synthesized and undergo early stages of processing--including folding into the proper conformation--within the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). Lipid components of the cell's major membrane system are also synthesized in the ER, but how the amounts of ER proteins and lipids are coordinated is unclear. ER stress, which leads to an increased number of misfolded proteins, elicits the unfolded protein response (UPR). One element of the UPR involves activation of IRE1, an ER transmembrane kinase and endoribonuclease that cleaves the mRNA transcript for the transcription factor X-box binding protein 1 (XBP1) so that it encodes the active [XBP1(S)] rather than the inactive [XBP1(U)] form. XBP1(S) then stimulates the transcription of ER-resident proteins (see Ron and Hampton). Sriburi et al. transduced NIH-3T3 fibroblasts with retroviral vectors encoding XBP1(S) or XBP1(U) and found that cells overexpressing XBP1(S) showed increased ER volume and surface area, as assessed by electron microscopy and immunofluorescence. XBP1(S) cells showed a fourfold increase in phosphatidylcholine synthesis, as judged by incorporation of radiolabeled choline, and increased amounts of both phosphatidylcholine and phosphatidylethanolamine. Further, these cells showed increased activity of enzymes involved in phosphatidylcholine biosynthesis, through what appeared to be a posttranscriptional mechanism. Thus, the authors propose that, in cells undergoing the UPR, XBP1(S) serves to coordinate increased production of ER proteins and lipids to meet the increased cellular demand on the ER. R. Sriburi, S. Jackowski, K. Mori, J. W. Brewer, XBP1: A link between the unfolded protein response, lipid biosynthesis, and biogenesis of the endoplasmic reticulum. J. Cell Biol. 167, 35-41 (2004). [Abstract] [Full Text] D. Ron, R. Y. Hampton, Membrane biogenesis and the unfolded protein response. J. Cell Biol. 167, 23-25 (2004). [Abstract] [Full Text]


The decreasing costs of molecular profiling has fueled the biomedical research community with a plethora of new types of biomedical data, enabling a breakthrough towards a more precise and personalized medicine. However, the release of these intrinsically highly sensitive data poses a new severe privacy threat. While biomedical data is largely associated with our health, there also exist various correlations between different types of biomedical data, along the temporal dimension, and also in-between family members. However, so far, the security community has focused on privacy risks stemming from genomic data, largely overlooking the manifold interdependencies between other biomedical data. In this paper, we present a generic framework for quantifying the privacy risks in biomedical data taking into account the various interdependencies between data (i) of different types, (ii) from different individuals, and (iii) at different time. To this end, we rely on a Bayesian network model that allows us to take all aforementioned dependencies into account and run exact probabilistic inference attacks very efficiently. Furthermore, we introduce a generic algorithm for building the Bayesian network, which encompasses expert knowledge for known dependencies, such as genetic inheritance laws, and learns previously unknown dependencies from the data. Then, we conduct a thorough inference risk evaluation with a very rich dataset containing genomic and epigenomic data of mothers and children over multiple years. Besides effective probabilistic inference, we further demonstrate that our Bayesian network model can also serve as a building block for other attacks. We show that, with our framework, an adversary can efficiently identify the parent-child relationships based on methylation data with a success rate of 95%.


Coal is one of the world's most important sources of energy, fuelling almost 40% of electricity worldwide. The burning of coal produced coal ash that mostly consists of Fly Ash and Bottom Ash. Bottom Ash (normally recognized as coal combustion residues from pulverized fuel power stations) has been categorized as solid garbage. However, the utilization of Bottom Ash in construction-related applications has received some attention within the last decade. This project aimed at determining the strength and compressibility of Kaolin, mixed with 25 %, 50% and 60% of bottom ash. Kaolin, in powdered forms, was mixed with Bottom Ash and compacted at optimum moisture content. The strength and compressibility of the compacted samples were determined from direct shear test, unconsolidated undrained triaxial tests, and one-dimensional consolidation test, besides the California Bearing Ratio and permeability tests. It was observed that the granular nature of Bottom Ash increased the friction angle of Kaolin, increased the permeability and expedite the consolidation rate. However, the addition of 25% Bottom Ash gives the highest shear strength of Kaolin while the addition of 60% Bottom Ash gives the highest permeability and coefficient of consolidation. This results show that Bottom Ash can be used to increase the strength of soil, in particular the soft soil and also could expedite the consolidation of the soil. This is due to the granular nature of the materials that could increase the voids in the mixtures and also contribute to increase in friction angles.


Erzincan Basin was investigated using gravity data within the scope of this study. It is also aimed to reveal the discontinuities in the work area as well as the buried discontinuities. Boundary determination filters and analysis of the structure of the data and its connection are revealed and clear information is obtained. Gravity anomalies were applied with an upward continuation method for 0.25, 0.50, 0.75 and 1 km levels. Total Horizontal Derivative (THD) filter, Analytical Signal (AS) filter, Tilt Angle Derivative (Tilt) filter, Total Horizontal Derivative (THDR) filter, Theta Angle Derivative (Cos ɵ) filter, Hyperbolic Tilt Angle Derivative (HTAD) were applied to upward continued data. The discontinuities in the region and the boundaries of the geological structure were revealed. Tilt and Theta Angle derivatives yield the best results from the applied derivative based filters. The obtained data were compared with the existing surface geology and the compatibility between the formations was checked. New discontinuities were found in addition to the discontinuities determined from surface observations in the light of the obtained results. Erzincan Basin was modeled in three dimensions using gravity data of the study area. As a result of modeling, Erzincan Basin has been determined to have an average thickness of 7 km.Total Horizontal Derivative (THD) filter, Analytical Signal (AS) filter, Tilt Angle Derivative (TAd) filter, Total Horizontal Derivative (THDR) filter, Teta Angle Derivative (Cos ɵ) filter, Hyperbolic Tilt Angle Derivative (HTAD) were applied to upward continued data. The discontinuities in the region and the boundaries of the geological structure were revealed. Tilt and Theta angle derivatives yield the best results from the applied derivative based filters. The obtained data were compared with the existing surface geology and the compatibility between the formations was checked. New discontinuities were found in addition to the discontinuities determined from surface observations in the light of the obtained results. Erzincan basin is modeled in three dimensions using gravity data of the study area. As a result of modeling, Erzincan Basin has been determined to have an average thickness of 7 km.


In this book, Jungian analyst Allan Guggenbuhl develops a completely new psychological theory about men. His idea is that traditional psychology has failed to tackle the main objectives that motivate men in their private and public lives.When men dedicate themselves to work, fight for social causes, start families, or get crazy over sports, they are enacting concealed mythic patterns -- patterns that lie at the very heart of our culture. Men have a natural affinity for myth and mythmaking which, Guggenbuhl maintains, results in grandiose aspirations and what often appears to be the purest sort of self-indulgence. At the same time, such thinking also helps to explain a seeming helplessness that men have in dealing with their own feelings.Once all of this is understood, Guggenbuhl maintains, a true equality in relationships, based on the differences between the sexes, can also be attained. Men can thereby achieve a greater understanding and more realistic appreciation of their strengths and weaknesses.


The goal of subspace segmentation is to partition a set of data drawn from a union of subspace into their underlying subspaces. The performance of spectral clustering based approaches heavily depends on learned data affinity matrices, which are usually constructed either directly from the raw data or from their computed representations. In this paper, we propose a novel method to simultaneously learn the representations of data and the affinity matrix of representation in a unified optimization framework. A novel Augmented Lagrangian Multiplier based algorithm is designed to effectively and efficiently seek the optimal solution of the problem. The experimental results on both synthetic and real data demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed method and its superior performance over the state-of-the-art alternatives.


This article discusses the key methodological shortcomings of experimental regulations and regulatory sandboxes. I argue that the poor design and implementation of these experimental legal regimes have both methodological and legal implications. The deficient design of experimental regulations and regulatory sandboxes can have three adverse effects: First, the internal validity of experimental legal regimes is limited because it is unclear whether the verified results are the direct result of the experimental intervention or other circumstances. The limited external validity of experimental legal regimes impedes the generalizability of the experiment. Second, experimental legal regimes that are not scientifically sound make a limited contribu-tion to the advancement of evidence-based lawmaking and the rationalization of regulation. Third, methodological deficiencies may result in the violation of legal principles which require that experimental regulations follow objective, transparent, and predictable standards. I contribute to existing comparative public law and law and methods literature with an interdisciplinary framework which can help improve the design of experimental regulations and regulatory sandboxes. I draw on social science literature on the methods of field experiments to offer novel methodological insights for a more transparent and objective design of experimental regulations and regulatory sandboxes.


Structural crystallography and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy are the predominant techniques for understanding the biological world on a molecular level. Crystallography is constrained by the ability to form a crystal that diffracts well and NMR is constrained to smaller proteins. Although powerful techniques, they leave many soluble, purified structurally uncharacterized protein samples. Small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) is a solution technique that provides data on the size and multiple conformations of a sample, and can be used to reconstruct a low-resolution molecular envelope of a macromolecule. In this study, SAXS has been used in a high-throughput manner on a subset of 28 proteins, where structural information is available from crystallographic and/or NMR techniques. These crystallographic and NMR structures were used to validate the accuracy of molecular envelopes reconstructed from SAXS data on a statistical level, to compare and highlight complementary structural information that SAXS provides, and to leverage biological information derived by crystallographers and spectroscopists from their structures. All the ab initio molecular envelopes calculated from the SAXS data agree well with the available structural information. SAXS is a powerful albeit low-resolution technique that can provide additional structural information in a high-throughput and complementary manner to improve the functional interpretation of high-resolution structures.


Blast loads are categorized as far-field and near-field loads in terms of the scaled distance. Far-field and near-field loading are associated with explosions that occur at scaled distances of more than or less than 1.18 m/kg, respectively. The blast waves from a far-field explosion arrive simultaneously at and exert uniformly distributed pressure on a target. Response computations can be performed using the semi-empirical relations (charts) presented in UFC-3-340 design manual, ConWep program or high fidelity physics based commercial software like LS-DYNA, AUTODYN, and ABAQUS. On the other hand, for near-field blasts, the interaction between blast waves and structures is more complex. Near-field events are characterized by a high temperature fireball and extremely high magnitude, spatially and temporally non-uniform overpressure. It has been reported by many researchers that existing empirical relationships are inaccurate to determine blast parameters of near-field explosions. Numerical codes exist that are capable of modeling the detonation process, propagation of shock wave and shock-structure interaction for near-field explosions. However, well-established experimental data that can be used to validate such models is limited. Furthermore, the experimental data available is focused on response of reinforced concrete (RC) slabs/walls, various façade elements and steel plates. A review of the literature suggests that there is limited experimental work on response of RC columns in the near-field and especially contact explosions. This article reviews the state-of-the-art of near-field and contact explosions to understand the current level of knowledge in this field and to identify research needs/gaps.


We investigated the timing of the right and left antler casting in semi-domesticated reindeer ( Rangifer tarandus tarandus L.) in relation to parturition using 139 antlered adult individually marked females in 2008-09 between May 5 and June 2; a period when all calves were born and all females cast their antlers. We analysed time of casting of right and left antler in relation to pregnancy, female age and body weight, weight and sex of the calf, and birth date.  Seven of the females were non-pregnant (barren) and cast their antlers during the second week of May and at the same time as some of the females that gave birth initiated antler casting. Postpartum retention of antlers varied from 0 to 15 days. We found no difference between left and right antler casting schedule and within two days apart, 91% of the females had cast both antlers. The maximum number of antler castings per day occurred on the seventh day after parturition. Of the 132 females that gave birth, 7 females (5.3%) cast both antlers 5 – 23 days before calving, three females cast right antler 6 – 10 days before and the left antler 2 – 5 days after calving and one female that bore only a left antler casted a day before calving. Antler casting among lactating females was related only to female age, indicating that older females cast antlers earlier than younger females ( i.e. 3 days earlier than the pooled mean of 7.6 days). Apart from calving date being two days later among the 7 females that alternated their casting schedule, female body weights, calf sex and calf birth weight among them did not differ between the two years. We conclude that it is a small but consistent antler casting overlap between barren and pregnant/lactating females, indicating that the control mechanism for casting of antlers is not "fool proof" and that antler status prior to parturition does not accurately predict pregnancy status in this domestic reindeer group. Normal 0 21 false false false SV X-NONE X-NONE


We propose a new scripting language called DSL bas- ed on the synchronous/reactive model. In DSL, sys- tems are composed of several sites executed asyn- chronously, and each site is running scripts in a syn- chronous parallel way. Scripts may call functions that are considered in an abstract way: their effect on the memory is not considered, but only their "orchestra- tion" i.e. the organisation of their calls in time and in place (the site where they are called). The mapping of sites onto cores allows one to benefit from multi- core architectures. Two properties are assumed by DSL: reactivity of sites and absence of interferences between scripts run by distinct sites. We consider several variants of DSL. In the first variant, functions are defined in FunLoft. In the second variant of DSL, functions are defined in ReactiveML and the JoCaml system is used for asynchronous inter-sites communi- cations. The third variant is based on SugarCubes which is a Java based framework for reactive pro- gramming. Finally, in the fourth variant, functions are defined in Scheme/Bigloo.


You're always negotiating. Whether making a business deal, talking to friends or booking a holiday, negotiation is going on. And most of us are terrible at it. Stuart Diamond is often described as 'the world's leading negotiator'. He runs the most popular course at Wharton business school, he advises Google and the UN on how to make deals, and his negotiating methods have settled thousands of disputes including the Hollywood writers' strike. In this bestselling book, Diamond reveals the secrets behind getting more in any negotiation - whatever 'more' means to you. "Getting More" is accessible, jargon-free, innovative...and it works.


Recent studies have predicted extraordinary properties for transverse domain walls in cylindrical nanowires: zero depinning current, the absence of the Walker breakdown, and applications as domain wall oscillators. In order to reliably control the domain wall motion, it is important to understand how they interact with pinning centers, which may be engineered, for example, through modulations in the nanowire geometry (such as notches or extrusions) or in the magnetic properties of the material. In this paper we study the motion and depinning of transverse domain walls through pinning centers in ferromagnetic cylindrical nanowires. We use (i) magnetic fields and (ii) spin-polarized currents to drive the domain walls along the wire. The pinning centers are modelled as a section of the nanowire which exhibits a uniaxial crystal anisotropy where the anisotropy easy axis and the wire axis enclose a variable angle ?P. Using (i) magnetic fields, we find that the minimum and the maximum fields required to push the domain wall through the pinning center differ by 30%. On the contrary, using (ii) spin-polarized currents, we find variations of a factor 130 between the minimum value of the depinning current density (observed for ?P=0?, i.e., anisotropy axis pointing parallel to the wire axis) and the maximum value (for ?P=90?, i.e., anisotropy axis perpendicular to the wire axis). We study the depinning current density as a function of the height of the energy barrier of the pinning center using numerical and analytical methods. We find that for an industry standard energy barrier of 40 kBT, a depinning current of about 5 ?A (corresponding to a current density of 6×1010 A/m2 in a nanowire of 10 nm diameter) is sufficient to depin the domain wall. We reveal and explain the mechanism that leads to these unusually low depinning currents. One requirement for this depinning mechanism is for the domain wall to be able to rotate around its own axis. With the right barrier design, the spin torque transfer term is acting exactly against the damping in the micromagnetic system, and thus the low current density is sufficient to accumulate enough energy quickly. These key insights may be crucial in furthering the development of novel memory technologies, such as the racetrack memory, that can be controlled through low current densities.


Abstract. This study presents a novel methodology for the remote monitoring of aerosol
components over large spatial and temporal domains. The concept is realized
within the GRASP (Generalized Retrieval of Aerosol and Surface Properties)
algorithm to directly infer aerosol components from the measured radiances.
The observed aerosols are assumed to be mixtures of hydrated soluble
particles embedded with black carbon, brown carbon, iron oxide, and other
(non-absorbing) insoluble inclusions. The complex refractive indices of the
dry components are fixed a priori (although the refractive index of the
soluble host is allowed to vary with hydration), and the complex refractive
indices of the mixture are computed using mixing rules. The volume fractions
of these components are derived along with the size distribution and the
fraction of spherical particles, as well as the spectral surface reflectance in
cases when the satellite data are inverted. The retrieval is implemented as a
statistically optimized fit in a continuous space of solutions. This
contrasts with most conventional approaches in which the type of aerosol is
either associated with a pre-assumed aerosol model that is included in a set
of look-up tables, or determined from the analysis of the retrieved aerosol
optical parameters (e.g., single scattering albedo, refractive index, among others, provided by the AERONET retrieval algorithm); here, we retrieve the aerosol
components explicitly. The approach also bridges directly to the quantities
used in global chemical transport models. We first tested the approach with
synthetic data to estimate the uncertainty, and then applied it to real
ground-based AERONET and spaceborne POLDER/PARASOL observations; thus, the
study presents a first attempt to derive aerosol components from satellite observations specifically tied to global chemical transport model quantities. Our results
indicate aerosol optical characteristics that are highly consistent with
standard products (e.g., R of ∼0.9 for aerosol optical
thickness) and demonstrate an ability to separate intrinsic optical
properties of fine- and coarse-sized aerosols. We applied our method to
POLDER/PARASOL radiances on the global scale and obtained spatial and
temporal patterns of the aerosol components that agree well with existing
knowledge on aerosol sources and transport features. Finally, we discuss
limitations and perspectives of this new technique.


Background & Aims: Spirituality and its components due to their effect on psychological constructs and their potential influence on organizational performance have been the researchers' concerns in recent years. This study aims to determine the relationship between the religious / spiritual components with mental health and hope for the future in hospital staff. Material & Methods : It was a cross-sectional study. The study population were public hospitals' staff of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences (n=4000) from whom 250 were recruited by simple random sampling during 2010. Data was collected by three questionnaires including hope for the future, mental health and components of religion / spirituality (including existential well-being, motivation, devotion & coping, spiritual transcendence, religious support, religious attitudes & practices) and analyzed by Pearson Correlation and Stepwise regression using SPSS-PC (v. 18). Results : There were significant relationships between Existential Well-Being and Hope for the Future, Motivation, Devotion & Coping and Hope for the Future, and Mental Health and Hope for the Future (P<0/01). Also, all religious / spiritual components had significant correlations with mental health (P<0/01). Stepwise regression analysis showed that there are significant relationships between hope for the future and Motivation, Devotion and Coping with variance of 5% in the first step; between hope for the future Motivation, Devotion and Coping with Mental Health with variance of 6/4% in the second step, between hope for the future and Motivation, Devotion and Coping with Mental Health and Existential Well-Being with variance of 9/1% in the third step; and between hope for the future and the combination of Motivation, Devotion and Coping and Existential Well-Being with variance of 8/9% in the fourth step. Conclusion : The findings indicated that Motivation, Devotion and Coping, and Existential Well-Being were respectively the most important religious-spiritual components which along with mental health affect hope for the future in the hospital staff.


Bloody War: Songs 1924-1939. Tompkins Square TSQ 2479. The tragic inevitability of war has traditionally produced great literature, theatre, art, cinema, and music. Genres of war songs are more distinct than most popular entertainment forms and each war seems to inspire a repetition of a progression that begins with patriotic "let's go to war" compositions to accompany the outbreak of war, followed by comic songs about wartime on the home-front and the life of hapless soldiers in basic training, propaganda tunes mocking the enemy, romantic ballads capturing the longing of separated lovers, and, ultimately, darkly intimate works mourning the lost and savage satires condemning the decisions to go to war in the first place. In Tompkins Square's fine single-disc collection Bloody War: Songs 1924-1939 the varied vintage country and blues artists featured perform war songs of various kinds and of earlier eras, but in this case emphasizing personal responses to the human toll of war over polemical, sentimental, or propagandistic approaches (although a few of these are included). The result is a bracing immersion in vintage sounds that otherwise is startlingly timely in content as America ends its involvement in one war and expands its engagement in another. The fifteen tracks on this unique album, recorded in the decades between the First World War and the Second, actually encompass war songs written during several conflicts, but most particularly the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, and World War I. Instead of the usual Sousa-esque brass bands or upbeat show business approach to these war songs, Bloody War: Songs 1924-1939 features comparatively little-known folk artists applying a more introspective or satiric approach within the country and blues style. As such, this set offers up unique sounds for even the most familiar compositions, as is especially evident in such chestnuts as the World War I songs "It's a Long Way to Tipperary," here performed plaintively by Frank Hutchison, and "Johnnie, Get Your Gun," sung and played with brio by Earl Johnson and His Clodhoppers. Not surprisingly, the subject of death dominates this disc in several tracks beginning with the first, "Just As the Sun Went Down," sung to his own guitar accompaniment by Zeke Morris (recorded on 14 February 1936 in Charlotte, North Carolina). This 1898 song imagines a dying soldier on a battlefield reflecting on his love for his family. A similar approach is evident in a Civil War song, "Not a Word of That Be Said" (captured on 21 August 1939 in Atlanta, Georgia) by Wade Mainer and the Sons of the Mountaineers, which dramatizes the brother-against-brother nature of civil war as another dying soldier attempts to communicate with his brother on the enemy's side, who may have shot him. The grimmest of all is African America songwriter Gussie L. Davis's Spanish-American War-era song, "He Is Coming to Us Dead" (recorded on 18 October 1927 in Atlanta), sung by vocalist-fiddler G. B. Grayson and guitar player Henry Whitter. The song is a harrowing account of a father waiting in a train station's freight department to receive his son's body. A more elegiac tone is introduced in George F. Root's Civil War ballad, "The Old Vacant Chair," which grieves for the loss of a household's head in a Dixon Brothers vocal (recorded 23 June 1936 in Charlotte). Most moving is Buell Kazee's pithy vocal (preserved on 18 January 1928 in New York) of "The Faded Coat of Blue," which memorializes a fallen Union soldier, a song performed regularly a few decades later by The Carter Family. …


Background Maternal smoking during pregnancy is a major cause of intrauterine growth restriction and childhood obesity, but only a few studies have examined the association of smoking cessation before and during pregnancy with fetal and childhood growth. We examined this association in a prospective cohort study in Japan. Methods Our study included children born between 1991 and 2006 and their mothers. Using a questionnaire, maternal smoking status was recorded at pregnancy. The anthropometric data of the children were collected during a medical check-up at age 3 years. Multiple linear and logistic regression models were used for data analysis stratified by sex. Results In total, 2663 mothers reported their smoking status during early pregnancy, and data were collected from 2230 (83.7%) children at age 3 years. Maternal smoking during pregnancy was associated with a significant reduction in birth weight (approximately 120–150 g). Body mass index at age 3 years was significantly higher among boys born to smoking mothers than among boys born to nonsmoking mothers. Maternal smoking during pregnancy was associated with overweight at age 3 years among boys (adjusted odds ratio, 2.4; 95% CI, 1.03–5.4). However, among women who stopped smoking in early pregnancy, there was no increase in the risks of a small for gestational age birth or childhood overweight at age 3 years. Conclusions Children born to mothers who stopped smoking before or during early pregnancy had appropriate fetal and childhood growth.


'Targeted selective treatment' (TST) is the concept of targeting anthelmintic treatments to individual animals that will benefit from treatment, rather than giving whole flock treatments. The purpose of TST is to delay the onset of anthelmintic resistance in nematode populations. Two key issues that have delayed the utilization of TST are; a) the need for a convenient and reliable method for identifying animals less likely to cope with nematode challenge; and b) the risk that some animals will be left with nematode burdens sufficient to cause sub-clinical disease that compromises production and welfare. To investigate these issues, this thesis tested the hypothesis that body condition can indicate the ability of mature sheep to better cope with nematodes (and therefore remain untreated), thereby providing a convenient selection method for TST strategies in a Mediterranean climate, where Trichostrongylus spp. and Teladorsagia circumcincta are the predominant nematode parasites. The risk of loss of production and welfare by leaving some animals untreated was examined by modelling simulations, based on data derived from field studies, and on computer models, with various proportions of the flock remaining untreated to determine the threshold proportions of sheep to leave untreated. This approach indicated the trade-offs between delaying anthelmintic resistance with production loss and animal welfare associated with nematode burdens resultant from leaving animals untreated. Further to this, an investigation of Western Australian sheep producers (farmers) identified factors associated with the acceptance of sustainable nematode control practices, especially those likely to facilitate the adoption of TST and act as the basis for the development of communication strategies to producers. The findings of this research provide evidence-based recommendations for the sheep industry regarding sustainable nematode management strategies utilising TST in Mediterranean environments and the facilitation of adoption of TST strategies. In conclusion, the general hypothesis was shown to be applicable, that a body condition score-based TST control program can be practical to implement and will delay anthelmintic resistance in adult Merino sheep in a Mediterranean environment.


The designs and implementations of efficient aggregate data structures have been important issues in functional programming. It is not clear how to select a good representation for an aggregate when access patterns to the aggregate are highly variant, or even unpredictable. Previous approaches rely on compile--time analyses or programmer annotations. These methods can be unreliable because they try to predict a program's behavior before it is executed.We propose a probabilistic approach, which is based on Markov processes, for automatic selection of data representations. The selection is modeled as a random process moving in a graph with weighted edges. The proposed approach employs coin tossing at run--time to help choosing a suitable data representation. The transition probability function used by the coin tossing is constructed in a simple and common way from a measured cost function. We show that, under this setting, random selections of data representations can be quite effective. The probabilistic approach is used to implement bag aggregates, and the performance results are compared to those of deterministic selection strategies.


STUDY DESIGN
.: This is secondary research examining the longitudinal mediation effect within a structural equation model.

OBJECTIVE
.: To identify possible mechanisms which mediate the effects of a cognitive behavioural approach upon disability and pain in low back pain patients.

SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA
.: Cognitive behavioural interventions (CBIs) can improve pain and disability in low back pain (LBP) but the mechanisms of action are unclear. We used data from a large randomised controlled trial to investigate mediators of the treatment effect of CBI.

METHODS
.: Pain self-efficacy, fear-avoidance, physical and mental functioning were selected as candidate mediators based on the theoretical rationale of the intervention. The primary treatment outcomes were the Roland Morris Questionnaire (RMDQ) and the modified-Von Korff scale (MVK pain and disability) at 12-months. We used structural equation models to estimate the contribution of mediators. All models were tested for goodness-of-fit using chi-square, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation, Adjusted Goodness of Fit Index and Bentler Comparative Fit Index.

RESULTS
.: We included 701 adults with LBP. The average RMDQ score at baseline for those on the intervention arm was 8.8 (Standard Deviation 5.0). The intervention was effective in reducing disability and pain at 12-months. Change in mental functioning was not a significant mediator. Changes to pain self-efficacy, fear-avoidance and physical functioning were causal mediators of the treatment effect at 12-months (RMDQ b= -0.149, p < 0.001; MVK-pain b = -0.181, p < 0.001 and MVK-disability b = -0.180, p < 0.001). Overall, the SEM model exceeded the threshold for acceptable goodness-of-fit.

CONCLUSIONS
.: Fear-avoidance and self-efficacy were important causal mediators of the cognitive behavioural treatment effect. Self-assessed change in physical function was a causal mediator but mental functioning was not. This suggests people need to experience meaningful change in physical function and beliefs but not in mental functioning associated with LBP, to achieve a treatment benefit.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE
2.


The current financial crisis has hit the banking giants of the world really hard. It is striking to note that some of the large Chinese commercial banks have emerged to be the biggest winners as a result of the crisis, thanks to reforms over the past 10 years. The most significant reform before the crisis was ownership diversification, aiming to improve corporate governance and efficiency. Within 1 year from October 2005, three of the four biggest State-Owned Banks (SOBs) were listed on the stock exchanges. This article will study whether this reform has really improved bank efficiency. Adopting the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach, this article examines whether Initial Public Offering (IPO) is effective in enhancing bank performance. Using data of 14 listed banks during 1999 to 2008, the results show that on average, bank efficiency increased by almost 5% after listing. Despite the fact that Joint Equity Banks (JEBs) still perform better than SOBs, the latter manage to catch up and reduce the efficiency gap with the former during the past few years. This in part explains why the Chinese banking system has been less affected by the current world financial crisis than their western counterparts, leading to an important conclusion that SOB reforms in China over the past 10 years have produced remarkable results.


Slavery in the American Republic: Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861. By David F. Ericson. (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2011. Pp. ix, 298. Cloth, $37.50.)Reviewed by Richard R. JohnThe relationship of slavery and American politics is a historical perennial. In Slavery in the American Republic, political scientist David F. Ericson joins the discussion by emphasizing the positive role that the presence of slavery in the American republic played the development of the federal government. In the "traditional narrative," Ericson contends, slavery had little to do with the development of the American state, or, at most, slowed its rise (17). Ericson finds this narrative mistaken. The mordant warnings of slaveholders John Randolph and Nathanial Macon that federal public-works spending might establish precedents that could doom the "peculiar institution" were overblown and unrepresentative. More characteristic was the long involvement of the army in the Second Seminole War, a conflict that, in Ericson's view, was less about land hunger or anti-Native American prejudice than the elimination of a popular haven for escaped slaves. To make his point, Ericson proposes a number of counterfactuals that take the form of a syllogism: no slavery, less (federal) government.Ericson freely concedes that his linkage of slavery and federal public policy is not exactly novel. Indeed, it is not altogether obvious how many historians, as opposed to political scientists, he would lump together in the "traditional" category. Don E. Fehrenbacher's The Slaveholding Republic (Oxford, UK, 2001) covered many of the same topics with greater authority, while Robin E. Einhorn's American Taxation, American Slavery (Chicago, 2006) deftly probed the relationship of slavery and federal taxation. Ericson's innovation, rather, is to demonstrate quantitatively that slavery hastened "state development," a term of art for political scientists that Ericson equates not with the capacity of the state to attain specific goals, as earlier political scientists contended, but, rather, with the ability of federal officeholders to operate independently of constituent pressure.Ericson opens his narrative in 1791, a convenient starting point, since it permits him to sidestep the vexed debate over the relationship of slavery to the federal Constitution. Following an opening chapter in which he distinguishes his approach from the various "politics and history" scholars (2) who persist in downplaying the power of the federal government in the early republic, Ericson devotes chapters to the cost of federal government involvement in the suppression of the international slave trade, the relocation of ex-slaves in Liberia, the capture of fugitive slaves, slavery-related military ventures, and the employment of slaves by the federal government. In the 1791-1861 period, Erickson contends, lawmakers devoted 2.8 percent of federal expenditures ($51 million) to slavery-related tasks. Of this total, over half- $30 million - went to the prosecution of the Second Seminole War, with an additional $10 million for Texas debt relief- an expenditure that he throws into the mix even though he is agnostic as to whether slaveholder-driven land hunger precipitated the Mexican-American War.While Ericson displays considerable ingenuity in number crunching, his interest extends beyond the merely quantitative. How, he asks, did the presence of slavery hasten changes in state behavior that "in turn" led to state development (16)? To answer this question, he ventures a number of speculative claims. …


Plant species differ in many functional traits that drive differences in rates of photosynthesis, biomass allocation, and tissue turnover. Yet, it remains unclear how – and even if – such traits influence whole-plant growth, with the simple linear relationships predicted by existing theory often lacking empirical support. Here we present a new theoretical framework for understanding the effect of diverse functional traits on plant growth and shade-tolerance, extending a widely-used theoretical model that links growth rate in seedlings with a single leaf trait to explicitly include influences of size, light environment, and five other prominent traits: seed mass, height at maturation, leaf mass per unit leaf area, leaf nitrogen per unit leaf area, and wood density. Based on biomass production and allocation, this framework explains why the influence of prominent traits on growth rate and shade tolerance often varies with plant size and why the impact of size on growth varies among traits. Considering growth rate in height, we find the influence of: i) leaf mass per unit leaf area is strong in small plants but weakens with size, ii) leaf nitrogen per unit leaf area does not change with size, iii) wood density is present across sizes but is strongest at intermediate sizes, iv) height at maturation strengthens with size, and v) seed mass decreases with size. Moreover, we show how traits moderate plant responses to light environment and also determine shade tolerance, supporting diverse empirical results. By disentangling the effects of plant size, light environment and traits on growth rates, our results provide a solid theoretical foundation for trait ecology and thus provide a platform for understanding growth across diverse species around the world.


We treat a surface finite element method that is based on the trace of a standard finite element space on a tetrahedral triangulation of an outer domain that contains a stationary 2D surface. This surface FEM is used to discretize partial differential equation on the surface. We demonstrate the performance of this method for stationary and time-dependent diffusion equations. For the stationary case, results of an adaptive method based on a surface residual- type error indicator are presented. Furthermore, for the advection-dominated case a SUPG stabilization is introduced. The topic of finite element stabilization for advection-dominated surface transport equations has not been addressed in the literature so far.


Gas-phase IR photoacoustic (PA) spectra have been obtained for the volatile, solid pentacarbonyl(methyl)metal(I) complexes, CH3Mn(CO)5 and CH3Re(CO)5. The gaseous samples were apparently produced directly in the PA sample cup as the result of local surface heating effects. Vibrational assignments are given for the gas-phase spectra, especially for the binary v(CO) overtone and combinations which absorb in the near-IR region at ∼4000 cm−1. The data provide further support for near-IR/PA spectroscopy being a useful technique for the rapid, nondestructive identification of small amounts of organometallic carbonyl complexes.


Wave‐like disturbances have been observed in the ionospheric plasma for several decades using a wide range of remote sensing techniques. In this paper, the use of Dynasonde‐derived ionospheric "tilt" measurements is demonstrated to determine the dominant features of the underlying acoustic gravity wave spectrum and its height variation. The diurnal ionospheric variability introduces data gaps of varying length and distribution at any constant height level. This excludes the use of conventional fast Fourier transform techniques for spectral calculations. To obtain a complete and accurate image of the height variability of the wave activity in the thermosphere‐ionosphere, a method is required that would provide physically comparable results at all altitudes, regardless of the variations in sampling. In addition, the true geophysical variability should be distinguished from overlapping noise. The proposed solution is a combination of the well‐known Lomb‐Scargle and Welch methods, with the dataset of interest being divided into several overlapping subintervals and the mean spectrum calculated using results for those subintervals for which the power spectral density integral equals the time domain variance within a preset tolerance. The choice of the tolerance value is justified by means of numerical simulations using synthetic data similar to the tilt measurements. The proposed method is verified using a 10 day long dataset obtained with the Wallops Island Dynasonde. Results obtained with this method are compared in this paper with those obtained with a basic implementation and with a filtering method based on the amount of available data. A considerable reduction in the number of artifacts is observed with the use of this innovative approach, allowing reliable conclusions to be derived regarding the acoustic gravity wave spectrum and its height variability.


Northeastern forests are being impacted by unprecedented environmental stressors, including acid deposition, invasive pests, and climate change. Forest health monitoring at a landscape scale is necessary to evaluate the changing condition of forest resources and to inform management of forest stressors. Traditional forest health monitoring is often limited to specific sites experiencing catastrophic decline or widespread mortality. Satellite remote sensing can complement these efforts by providing comprehensive forest health assessments over broad regions. Subtle changes in canopy health can be monitored over time by applying spectral vegetation indices to multitemporal satellite imagery. This project used historical archives of Landsat-5 TM imagery and geographic information systems to examine forest health trends in the northern Green Mountains of Vermont from 1984 to 2009. Results indicate that canopy health has remained relatively stable across most of the landscape, although decline was present in localized areas. Significant but weak relationships were discovered between declining forest health and spruce-fir-paper birch forests at high elevations. Possible causes of decline include the interacting effects of acid deposition, windthrow, and stressful growing environments typical of montane forests.


An administrative health register containing health care data for over 2 million patients will be used to search for factors that can affect the treatment of heart failure. In the study, we will measure the effects of employed treatment for various groups of heart failure patients, using different measures of effectiveness. Significant deviations in effectiveness of treatments of the various patient groups will be reported and factors that may help explaining the effect of treatment will be analyzed. Identification of the most important factors that may help explain the observed deviations between the different groups will be derived through generation of predictive models, for which variable importance can be calculated. The findings may affect recommended treatments as well as highlighting deviations from national guidelines.


The general goal of using multi agent networks for complex problem solving is the maximisation of the quality of the result to be obtained at minimum cost. Both the granularity of the agent society and the competence assigned to each individual agent determine the information flow in the network. The great number of parameters involved make it difficult for the designer to optimally adapt the structure of the network to a given class of tasks. In this paper we outline possible network structures and present an approach for determining a number of important statistical parameters characterising the network at a relatively abstract level. The abstraction enables a comparison of different network structures. The methods for the analysis may, however, be readily refined to evaluate a specific problem. As an example we discuss the use of the multiagent paradigm for structuring the cooperation of sensor networks in robotics. Our analysis is supplemented by simulation results, which prove a superiority of lateral over pure hierarchical coordination, particularly under severe environmental conditions, such as agent failure.


This paper proposes an improved Z-source inverter topology. Compared to the traditional Z-source inverter, it can reduce the Z-source capacitor voltage stress significantly to perform the same voltage boost, and has inherent limitation to inrush current at startup. The control strategy of the proposed Z-source inverter is exactly the same as the traditional one, so all the existing control strategy can be used directly. A soft-start strategy is also proposed to suppress the inrush surge and the resonance of Z-source capacitors and inductors. The operation principle of the proposed topology and comparison with the traditional topology are analyzed in detail. Simulation and experimental results are given to demonstrate the new features of the improved topology.


A 56-day feeding trial was conducted to determine the effects of supplementing diets of juvenile Japanese flounder, Paralichthys olivaceus, with Eucheuma denticulatum (EDP). Isonitrogenous and isolipidic test diets were prepared using a fishmeal-based positive control diet (PC) and a fishmeal-soy protein concentrate negative control diet (NC) supplemented with 3 (D3%), 6 (D6%) and 9% (D9%) EDP. The test diets were assigned to tanks (12 fish tank−1, initial mean body weight of 0.42 ± 0.01 g) in triplicates. Results of the feeding trial indicated that growth rates and feed efficiency significantly improved (P < 0.05) when 3% EDP was supplemented in the diets. However, there was a significant reduction (P < 0.05) of growth and feed efficiency in fish fed diets with higher supplementation levels. Protein, lipid, dry matter and ash contents of carcass and their corresponding nutrient retention values were not markedly altered in all dietary treatments. Fish fed diets supplemented with EDP exhibited higher (P < 0.05) omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid accumulation in dorsal muscle when compared with those of fish fed NC. Blood chemical parameters showed significant differences (P < 0.05) in total cholesterol and triglyceride levels. These results suggest that EDP can be efficiently utilized by Japanese flounder and can promote best growth and feed utilization at a level of 3%.


AIM To evaluate the association between the Mediterranean diet (MD) pattern and its components, and advanced colorectal polyps (adenoma and serrated adenoma). METHODS A case-control study among patients undergoing screening, diagnostic or surveillance colonoscopies during 2010-2015 at the Tel-Aviv Medical Center, Gastroenterology Department. Cases with advanced polyps were defined as: Advanced adenoma [> 10 mm, with features of high grade dysplasia (HGD) or villous histology], advanced serrated adenoma (> 10 mm or with dysplasia) or multiple (≥ 3) non-advanced adenomas or serrated adenomas. Cases of non-advanced adenomas were defined as adenomas < 10 mm, without features of HGD or villous histology. Controls were defined as those without polyps at the current colonoscopy and without a history of colorectal polyps. Data collection included: anthropometrics measured according to a standardized protocol, fasting blood tests performed at the same lab, medical history recorded by a structured interview and dietary intake evaluated by a 116-item food frequency questionnaire. Adherence to the MD components was evaluated according to intake above/below the sample median, for potentially beneficial/detrimental components respectively, as accepted. RESULTS We recruited 206 cases with advanced polyps, 192 cases with non-advanced adenoma and 385 controls. The number of adhered MD components was inversely associated with a diagnosis of advanced polyps in a dose-response manner (OR = 0.34, 95%CI: 0.17-0.65; OR = 0.22, 95%CI: 0.11-0.43; and OR = 0.18, 95%CI: 0.07-0.47 for 3-4, 5-7 and 8-10 components, respectively), but not with non-advanced adenomas (OR = 0.54, 95%CI: 0.25-1.13; OR = 0.48, 95%CI: 0.23-0.99; and OR = 0.43, 95%CI: 0.16-1.12 for 3-4, 5-7 and 8-10 components, respectively). Low intake of sugar-sweetened beverages and red meat, as well as high intake of fish, were inversely associated with advanced polyps (OR = 0.56, 95%CI: 0.36-0.87; OR = 0.63, 95%CI: 0.42-0.95; and OR = 0.66, 95%CI: 0.44-0.99, respectively), while only low intake of red meat was inversely associated with non-advanced adenomas (OR = 0.71, 95%CI: 0.49-0.97). CONCLUSION A better adherence to the MD, specifically low intake of sugar-sweetened beverages and red meat as well as high intake of fish, is related to lower odds for advanced polyps.


Most vacuolar proteins are synthesized on rough endoplasmic reticulum as proprotein precursors and then transported to the vacuoles, where they are converted into their respective mature forms by vacuolar processing enzymes (VPEs). In the case of the seed storage proteins, this process is of major importance, as it conditions the establishment of vigorous seedlings. Toward the goal of identifying proteome signatures that could be associated with the origin and early diversification of angiosperms, we previously characterized the 11S-legumin-type seed storage proteins from Amborella trichopoda, a rainforest shrub endemic to New Caledonia that is also the probable sister to all other angiosperms (Amborella Genome Project, 2013). In the present study, proteomic and genomic approaches were used to characterize the VPE family in this species. Three genes were found to encode VPEs in the Amborella's genome. Phylogenetic analyses showed that the Amborella sequences grouped within two major clades of angiosperm VPEs, indicating that the duplication that generated the ancestors of these clades occurred before the most recent common ancestor of living angiosperms. A further important duplication within the VPE family appears to have occurred in common ancestor of the core eudicots, while many more recent duplications have also occurred in specific taxa, including both Arabidopsis thaliana and Amborella. An analysis of natural genetic variation for each of the three Amborella VPE genes revealed the absence of selective forces acting on intronic and exonic single-nucleotide polymorphisms among several natural Amborella populations in New Caledonia.


Nuzzo, JL, Anning, JH, and Scharfenberg, JM. The reliability of three devices used for measuring vertical jump height. J Strength Cond Res 25(9): 2580-2590, 2011—The purpose of this investigation was to assess the intrasession and intersession reliability of the Vertec, Just Jump System, and Myotest for measuring countermovement vertical jump (CMJ) height. Forty male and 39 female university students completed 3 maximal-effort CMJs during 2 testing sessions, which were separated by 24-48 hours. The height of the CMJ was measured from all 3 devices simultaneously. Systematic error, relative reliability, absolute reliability, and heteroscedasticity were assessed for each device. Systematic error across the 3 CMJ trials was observed within both sessions for males and females, and this was most frequently observed when the CMJ height was measured by the Vertec. No systematic error was discovered across the 2 testing sessions when the maximum CMJ heights from the 2 sessions were compared. In males, the Myotest demonstrated the best intrasession reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient [ICC] = 0.95; SEM = 1.5 cm; coefficient of variation [CV] = 3.3%) and intersession reliability (ICC = 0.88; SEM = 2.4 cm; CV = 5.3%; limits of agreement = −0.08 ± 4.06 cm). Similarly, in females, the Myotest demonstrated the best intrasession reliability (ICC = 0.91; SEM = 1.4 cm; CV = 4.5%) and intersession reliability (ICC = 0.92; SEM = 1.3 cm; CV = 4.1%; limits of agreement = 0.33 ± 3.53 cm). Additional analysis revealed that heteroscedasticity was present in the CMJ when measured from all 3 devices, indicating that better jumpers demonstrate greater fluctuations in CMJ scores across testing sessions. To attain reliable CMJ height measurements, practitioners are encouraged to familiarize athletes with the CMJ technique and then allow the athletes to complete numerous repetitions until performance plateaus, particularly if the Vertec is being used.


The aim of this paper is to review the potentialities and major methodological challenges of integrating remote sensing (RS) and geographic information system (GIS) with socioeconomic data from published articles or book chapters. RS and GIS combined with social science (SS)(termed as geoinformation technology) serve many applications for sustainable management and monitoring of the environment. This combined approach gives more accurate results than the single one. It makes information available about the trend and pattern of land use and land cover change (LUCC) with socioeconomic variables like population, demographic or income. This combined study which links RS and GIS with socioeconomic data can also be used successfully for monitoring transmission rate of disease and mapping or preparing vulnerability index. For impact assessment and modelling, this combined technology provides better results than the single one. There are some methodological problems for the researchers to link completely two different disciplines as the object of study and observational unit is completely different. However, this interdisciplinary study is gaining popularity day by day to researchers from different disciplines as well as decision makers.


This guide is primarily for evaluators working in the international development sector. However if you are a commissioner of an evaluation an evaluation manager or a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) officer you too will find it useful. Too often evaluations are shelved with very little being done to bring about change within organisations that requested the evaluation in the first place. This guide will explain how you can make your evaluations more useful. It will help you to better understand some conceptual issues and appreciate how evaluations can contribute to changing mindsets and empowering stakeholders. On a practical level the guide presents core guiding principles and pointers on how to design and facilitate evaluations that matter. Furthermore it shows you how you can get your primary intended users and other key stakeholders to contribute effectively to the evaluation process. (Excerpt)


Arthur Ducklin (1917–1965) operated on the fringes of British politics in the 1950s and 60s as self-styled leader of the right-wing League of Albion. He is best remembered for his innovative style of political activism. Ducklin was an avid believer in "Peithonics", the theory of mass manipulation pioneered by US psychologist S McKenzie Strutt. The central tenet of Peithonics was that "persuasion has nothing to do with truth".

Strutt developed the Peithotron, an electronic device claimed to influence the mood of a subject through the generation of low-frequency electromagnetic radiation at levels matching those of human brain activity. By combining frequencies in complex interference patterns, Strutt's machine could be tuned to render a state of suggestibility in bystanders.

In 1957 Ducklin acquired a Peithotron, and deployed it at League rallies with the intention of making easy converts. The effect relied upon a degree of rage in the audience, which the machine could exacerbate.

Ducklin's confused ideology undermined his ambition to found a mass movement and he eventually turned his attention to supporting the campaigns of others. He was often to be seen with his Peithotron in the background at political rallies around the world. His death in a remote town in Panama was both sudden and unexplained.

We are grateful to League of Albion Publishing, for their generous loan of Ducklin's original Peithotron to this exhibition.


Documenting how students with learning disabilities (LD) initially conceive of fractional quantities, and how their understandings may align with or differ from students with mathematics difficulties, is necessary to guide development of assessments and interventions that attach to unique ways of thinking or inherent difficulties these students may face understanding fraction concepts. One way to characterize such conceptions is through the creation of a framework that depicts key understandings evidenced as students work with problematic situations. The present study extends current literature by presenting key understandings of fractions, documented through problem-solving activity, language, representations, and operations, evidenced by students with LD and mathematics difficulties as they engaged with equal sharing problems. Clinical interviews were conducted with 43 students across the second, third, fourth, and fifth grades. Results of the study suggest that students with LD hold similar informal notions of key understandings of fractions as students with mathematics difficulties and that many of the students evidenced rudimentary understandings of fractional quantities. Researchers discuss implications of the findings in relation to considerations for designing interventions to support and extend students' initial conceptions of fractional quantity.


How can discharge planning (DP) for patients who require care in the home following a period in hospital be understood and developed through the lenses of complexity theory? With the help of complexity theory and practice-based narrative research this study discloses the formal routines and complex dynamic practices that are associated with DP. A study of the literature established that there was an almost total absence of complexity-theoretical perspectives on interpreting and developing DP. The researchers collected narratives about the DP processes using qualitative interviews with the nurses responsible for this in a hospital ward: these were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. They also participated in and documented meetings where these nurses, as a group, discussed DP. The findings show that nurses have to continuously deal with uncertainty, surprises and the unknown. They have to make sense and take charge of dynamic complex events and new knowledge, and manage complex relations and information. The researchers argue that looking upon practice from the lenses of complexity theory, and therefore accepting the complexity of practice, could facilitate the development of nurses' skills in order to guarantee good quality in DP.


This article describes an extension to the use of heteroskedastic ordered probit (HETOP) models to estimate latent distributional parameters from grouped, ordered-categorical data by pooling across multiple waves of data. We illustrate the method with aggregate proficiency data reporting the number of students in schools or districts scoring in each of a small number of ordered "proficiency" levels. HETOP models can be used to estimate means and standard deviations of the underlying (latent) test score distributions but may yield biased or very imprecise estimates when group sample sizes are small. A simulation study demonstrates that the pooled HETOP models described here can reduce the bias and sampling error of standard deviation estimates when group sample sizes are small. Analyses of real test score data demonstrate the use of the models and suggest the pooled models are likely to improve estimates in applied contexts.


We consider the problem of bounding the probability of buffer overflow in a network node receiving independent inputs that are each constrained by arrival curves, but that are served as an aggregate. Existing results (Kesidis et al., (2000), and Chang et al., (2001)) assume that the node is a constant rate server. However, in practice, one finds various types of schedulers that do not provide a constant service rate, and thus to which the existing bounds do not apply. Now many schedulers can be adequately abstracted by a service curve property. We extend the results in Kesidis and Chang to such cases. As a by-product, we also provide a slight improvement to the bound in Chang. Our bounds are valid for both discrete and continuous time models.


capillary three With nearly the same small amount of blood and the same effort we also 11 additional results of This innovative book integrates the disciplines of biomedical science, biomedical engineering, biotechnology, physiological engineering, and hospital management technology. Herein, Biomedical science covers topics on disease pathways, models and treatment mechanisms, and the roles of red palm oil and phytomedicinal plants in reducing HIV and diabetes complications by enhancing antioxidant activity. Biomedical engineering coves topics of biomaterials (biodegradable polymers and magnetic nanomaterials), coronary stents, contact lenses, modelling of flows through tubes of varying cross-section, heart rate variability analysis of diabetic neuropathy, and EEG analysis in brain function assessment. Biotechnology covers the topics of hydrophobic interaction chromatography, protein scaffolds engineering, liposomes for construction of vaccines, induced pluripotent stem cells to fix genetic diseases by regenerative approaches, polymeric drug conjugates for improving the efficacy of anticancer drugs, and genetic modification of animals for agricultural use. Physiological engineering deals with mathematical modelling of physiological (cardiac, lung ventilation, glucose regulation) systems and formulation of indices for medical assessment (such as cardiac contractility, lung disease status, and diabetes risk). Finally, Hospital management science and technology involves the application of both biomedical engineering and industrial engineering for cost-effective operation of a hospital.


Aim: The aim of this study was to describe and evaluate the effect of an individually tailored behavioral medicine treatment in physical therapy, based on a functional behavioral analysis (FBA), for tension-type headache (TTH). Patients and methods: A single-case study with A1-A2-B-A3 design of two patients with TTH was conducted. Outcome variables were headache frequency, headache index (mean intensity), consumption of analgesics, self-efficacy in headache management (Headache Management Self-efficacy Scale [HMSE]), disability, and perceived loss of happiness for activities with family and friends. Results: The results showed that headache frequency and headache index decreased for one of the patients. Self-efficacy in headache management increased markedly for both patients. Conclusion: A behavioral medicine treatment in physical therapy based on an FBA can be a way for physical therapists to handle patients with TTH. Future investigations should focus on large group studies with longer observation periods.


We suggest a subtle, yet far-reaching, tension in the objectives specified by the Monetary Control Act of 1980 (MCA) for the Federal Reserve's role in providing retail payment services, such as check processing. Specifically, we argue that the requirement of an overall cost-revenue match, coupled with the goal of ensuring equitable access on a universal basis, partially shifted the burden of cost recovery from high-cost to low-cost service points during the MCA's early years, thereby allowing private-sector competitors to enter the low-cost segment of the market and undercut the relatively uniform prices charged by the Fed. To illustrate this conflict, we develop a voter model for what begins as a monopoly setting in which a regulatory regime that establishes a uniform price irrespective of cost differences, and restricts total profits to zero, initially dominates through majority rule both deregulation and regulation that sets price equal to cost on a bank-by-bank basis. Uniform pricing is dropped in this model once cream skimming has subsumed half the market. These results help illumine the Federal Reserve's experience in retail payments under the MCA, particularly the movement over time to a less uniform fee structure for check processing.


Idle speed control is a landmark application of feedback control in automotive vehicles that continues to be of significant interest to automotive industry practitioners, since improved idle performance and robustness translate into better fuel economy, emissions and drivability. In this paper, we develop a model predictive control (MPC) strategy for regulating the engine speed to the idle speed set-point by actuating the electronic throttle and the spark timing. The MPC controller coordinates the two actuators according to a specified cost function, while explicitly taking into account constraints on the control and requirements on the acceptable engine speed range, e.g., to avoid engine stalls. Following a process proposed here for the implementation of MPC in automotive applications, an MPC controller is obtained with excellent performance and robustness as demonstrated in actual vehicle tests. In particular, the MPC controller performs better than an existing baseline controller in the vehicle, is robust to changes in operating conditions, and to different types of disturbances. It is also shown that the MPC computational complexity is well within the capability of production electronic control unit and that the improved performance achieved by the MPC controller can translate into fuel economy improvements.


OBJECTIVES
To determine if there were any differences in antiretroviral treatment (ART) use across the three eastern states of Australia, New South Wales (NSW), Victoria and Queensland, during the period 1997 to 2006.

METHODS
We used data from a clinic-based cohort, the Australian HIV Observational Database (AHOD), to determine the proportion of HIV-infected patients on ART in selected clinics in each state and the proportion of treated patients with an undetectable viral load. Data from the national Highly Specialised Drugs program and AHOD were used to estimate total numbers of individuals on ART and the proportion of individuals living with HIV on ART nationally and by state. Data from the HIV Futures Survey and the Gay Community Periodic Survey were used to determine the proportion of community-based men who have sex with men on ART. The proportion of patients with primary HIV infection (PHI) who commenced ART within 1 year of diagnosis was obtained from the Acute Infection and Early Disease Research Program (AIEDRP) CORE01 protocol and Primary HIV and Early Disease Research: Australian Cohort (PHAEDRA) cohorts.

RESULTS
We estimated that the numbers of individuals on ART increased from 3181 to 4553 in NSW, 1309 to 1926 in Victoria and 809 to 1615 in Queensland between 2000 and 2006. However, these numbers may reflect a lower proportion of individuals living with HIV on ART in NSW compared with the other states (37% compared with 49 and 55% in 2000). We found similar proportions of HIV-positive men who have sex with men participants were on ART in all three states over the study period in the clinic-based AHOD cohort (81-92%) and two large, community-based surveys in Australia (69-85% and 49-83%). Similar proportions of treated patients had an undetectable viral load across the three states, with a consistently increasing trend over time observed in all states. We found that more PHI patients commenced treatment in the first year following HIV diagnosis in NSW compared with Victoria; however, the sample size was very small.

CONCLUSIONS
For the most part, patterns of ART use were similar across NSW, Victoria and Queensland using a range of available data from cohort studies, community surveys and national prescription databases in Australia. However, there may be a lower proportion of individuals living with HIV on ART in NSW compared with the other states, and there is some indication of a more aggressive treatment approach with PHI patients in NSW compared with Victoria.


Reproductive phenologies of plants are constrained by climate in highly seasonal regions. In contrast, plants growing in wet tropical forests are freed from many abiotic constraints, which in canopy tree communities lead to a rich diversity of phenological patterns within and among individuals, species and communities. However, basic descriptions of tropical phenological patterns and the processes that shape them are rare. Here, we document the individual-, population-, and landscape-level phenological patterns of two dominant families of understory woody plants important to avian frugivores, the Melastomataceae and Rubiaceae, along an elevational transect in Costa Rica. The 226 individual plants belonging to 35 species in this study, varied in the number of reproductive bouts/year, and the timing, duration, and synchrony of reproductive stages. This variation was not related to factors related to their interactions with mutualists and antagonists, nor did it appear to be constrained by phylogeny. Diverse phenological patterns among species led to relatively aseasonal patterns at the community and landscape level. Overall, evidence for biotic processes shaping temporal patterns of fruiting phenology was weak or absent. These findings reveal a number of unexplained patterns, and suggest that factors shaping phenology in relatively aseasonal forests operate in idiosyncratic ways at the species level.


In keeping with the previous IPCC assessments, this chapter considers sustainable development (SD) and equity as matters of policy relevance for climate change decision makers. The chapter examines the ways in which climate change is in fact inextricably linked with SD and equity, and it does so with the aim of drawing policy-relevant conclusions regarding equitable and sustainable responses to climate change.

In one direction, the link is self-evident: an effective climate response is necessary for equitable and sustainable development to occur. The disruptions that climate change would cause in the absence of an effective societal response are sufficiently severe (see Working Group (WG) I and II contributions to the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5)) to severely compromise development, even taking into account future societies' ability to adapt (Shalizi and Lecocq, 2010). Nor is this development likely to be equitable, as an increasingly inhospitable climate will most seriously undermine the future prospects of those nations, communities, and individuals that are in greatest need of development. Without an effective response to climate change, including both timely mitigation and proactive adaptation, development can be neither sustainable nor equitable.

In recent years, the academic community has come increasingly to appreciate the extent to which SD and equity are also needed as frameworks for assessing and prioritizing climate responses: given the strong tradeoffs and synergies between the options for a climate response and SD, the design of an effective climate response must accord with the objectives for development and equity and exploit the synergies. A climate strategy that does not do so runs the risk either of being ineffective for lack of consensus and earnest implementation or of jeopardizing SD just as would unabated climate change. Therefore, a shift toward more equitable and sustainable modes of development may provide the only context in which an effective climate response can be realized.

The scientific community is coming to understand that climate change is but one example of how humankind is pressing up against its planetary limits (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005; Rockstrom et al., 2009a). Technical measures can certainly help in the near-term to alleviate climate change. However, the comprehensive and durable strategies society needs are those that recognize that climate change shares its root causes with other dimensions of the global sustainability crisis, and that without addressing these root causes, robust solutions may not be accessible.

This chapter, and many parts of this report, uncovers ways in which a broader agenda of SD and equity may support and enable an effective societal response to the climate challenge, by establishing the basis by which mitigative and adaptive capacity can be built and sustained. In examining this perspective, this chapter focuses on several broad themes.