ACCENT-BASED IMPLICIT PREJUDICE: A NOVEL APPLICATION OF THE IMPLICIT ASSOCIATION TEST by Carolyn Chu In the present study, implicit attitudes toward accents were examined. The most common method used to study accent-based perceptions is by self-report questionnaires, which measure explicit attitudes. To my knowledge, no previous study has examined implicit accent-based attitudes. In the present investigation, auditory stimuli were used in a novel application of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) to measure implicit accent attitudes. Participants were randomly assigned to listen to a passage read in one of three foreign accents (Mexican, Chinese, or British) and the same passage in a Standard American accent. Participants also completed the Speech Dialect Attitudinal Scale, which measured explicit accent attitudes, and the IAT, which measured implicit attitudes toward the foreign accent relative to the Standard American accent. Implicit and explicit measures were counterbalanced. Results showed that participants had more favorable implicit attitudes for the Standard American accent than the Mexican accent and a mild preference for the Standard American accent compared to the Chinese and British accents. Implicit and explicit accent attitudes were largely uncorrelated. The examination of implicit attitudes in the current investigation complements previous accent research, which focused on explicit attitudes. Examining aspects of both implicit and explicit accent attitudes will lead to a more in-depth understanding of how accents affect individuals' perceptions, feelings, and judgments.


First published in 1801, Female Quixotism is a boisterous anti-romance and literary satire, in which Dorcas Sheldon (`Dorcasina') sets out to discover for herself the kind of passionate love affair portrayed in her favourite novels. Female Quixotism was written during a period of self-definition for the fledgeling American republic. Issues of class, gender, race and isolationism still relevant today are confronted in a manner unusual in other contemporary works, which frequently attacked romantic novels, even as they employed the sentimental and picaresque devices of the genre. Tenney uses literary references from Richardson, Sterne, and Milton, and, of course, Cervantes. However, it is as a tragi-comic parody of the limited choices available to women in a society founded on the principle that all men are created equal, that Tenney's Female Quixotism really stands apart from similar contemporary works.


Transketolase is a prominent thiamin diphosphate-dependent enzyme in sugar metabolism that catalyzes the reversible transfer of a 2-carbon dihydroxyethyl fragment between a donor ketose and an acceptor aldose. The X-ray structures of transketolase from E. coli in a covalent complex with donor ketoses d-xylulose 5-phosphate (X5P) and d-fructose 6-phosphate (F6P) at 1.47 A and 1.65 A resolution reveal significant strain in the tetrahedral cofactor-sugar adducts with a 25-30 degrees out-of-plane distortion of the C2-Calpha bond connecting the substrates' carbonyl with the C2 of the cofactor's thiazolium part. Both intermediates adopt very similar extended conformations in the active site with a perpendicular orientation of the scissile C2-C3 sugar bond relative to the thiazolium ring. The sugar-derived hydroxyl groups of the intermediates form conserved hydrogen bonds with one Asp side chain, with a cluster of His residues and with the N4' of the aminopyrimidine ring of the cofactor. The phosphate moiety is held in place by electrostatic and hydrogen-bonding interactions with Arg, His, and Ser side chains. With the exception of the thiazolium part of the cofactor, no structural changes are observable during intermediate formation indicating that the active site is poised for catalysis. DFT calculations on both X5P-thiamin and X5P-thiazolium models demonstrate that an out-of-plane distortion of the C2-Calpha bond is energetically more favorable than a coplanar bond. The X-ray structure with the acceptor aldose d-ribose 5-phosphate (R5P) noncovalently bound in the active site suggests that the sugar is present in multiple forms: in a strained ring-closed beta-d-furanose form in C2-exo conformation as well as in an extended acyclic aldehyde form, with the reactive C1 aldo function held close to Calpha of the presumably planar carbanion/enamine intermediate. The latter form of R5P may be viewed as a near attack conformation. The R5P binding site overlaps with those of the leaving group moieties of the covalent donor-cofactor adducts, demonstrating that R5P directly competes with the donor-derived products glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate and erythrose 4-phosphate, which are substrates of the reverse reaction, for the same docking site at the active site and reaction with the DHEThDP enamine.


Discovery of services and other named resources is expected to be a crucial feature for the usability of mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs). Different types of service discovery architectures are distinguished by the extent to which Service Coordinators (SCs) are implemented in the network. SCs are nodes that hold a central repository for the caching of service attributes and bindings of servers located in its neighborhood. This paper describes and investigates the performance of different architectures in terms of Service Availability, messaging overhead and latency. The architectures are analyzed and evaluated based on a large range of parameters. The paper also shows that in an on-demand MANET, where the service discovery mechanism will have a direct impact on the reactive routing protocol, the routing affects the results. It also demonstrates the benefits of combining the service discovery with route discovery, especially in on-demand MANETs where reactive routing protocols are being used.


We have developed an active optical imaging system capable of correcting optical wave-front errors in real time at frequencies in the kilohertz range. Wave-front errors due to atmospheric turbulence in the propagation path, as well as optical figure aberrations and wave-front errors due to mechanical and thermal changes may be compensated. The system used an ac shearing interferometer, a parallel analog data processor, and a monolithic piezoelectric active mirror arranged in a closed-loop configuration. This compensation system can be applied to apertures of any size; experimental results are shown for a system with 21 correction zones.


The objective of the research work presented in this thesis is to study scalable video transmission over peer-to-peer networks. In particular, we analyse how a credit-based approach and exploitation of social networking features can play a significant role in the design of such systems. Peer-to-peer systems are nowadays a valid alternative to the traditional client-server architecture for the distribution of multimedia content, as they transfer the workload from the service provider to the final user, with a subsequent reduction of management costs for the former. On the other hand, scalable video coding helps in dealing with network heterogeneity, since the content can be tailored to the characteristics or resources of the peers. First of all, we present a study that evaluates subjective video quality perceived by the final user under different transmission scenarios. We also propose a video chunk selection algorithm that maximises received video quality under different network conditions. Furthermore, challenges in building reliable peer-to-peer systems for multimedia streaming include optimisation of resource allocation and design mechanisms based on rewards and punishments that provide incentives for users to share their own resources. Our solution relies on a credit-based architecture, where peers do not interact with users that have proven to be malicious in the past. Finally, if peers are allowed to build a social network of trusted users, they can share the local information they have about the network and have a more complete understanding of the type of users they are interacting with. Therefore, in addition to a local credit, a social credit or social reputation is introduced. This thesis concludes with an overview of future developments of this research work.


Spatial issues are essential in new classes of complex software systems, such as pervasive, multi-agent, and selforganising ones. Understanding the basic mechanisms of spatial coordination is a fundamental issue for coordination models and languages in order to deal with such systems, governing situated interaction in the spatio-temporal fabric. Along this line, in this paper we make space-aware coordination media out of ReSpecT tuple centres, by introducing the few basic mechanisms and constructs that enable the ReSpecT language to face most of the main challenges of spatial coordination in complex software systems.


The Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) in collaboration with the Missouri Limestone Producers Association (MLPA) was interested in determining what effect a change in the Type 5 aggregate base gradation specification would have on the resilient modulus (M sub r) of said aggregate. The proposed change would lower the minimum allowable total percentage of material passing the #4 (4.75 mm mesh) sieve from 35% to 25%, and the #30 (0.600 mm mesh) sieve from 10% to 5%. The remainder of the gradation specification would remain unchanged. The rationale for this proposed change is that some aggregate producers believe the change could help lower their costs of producing a Type 5 aggregate base material. To investigate the proposed gradation specification change, an experimental gradation was devised which followed the lower bounds of the proposed gradation specification on the #4, #30, and #200 sieves, and approximated the as-delivered gradations of two aggregate formations previously tested for MoDOT on the 3/8, ½, ¾, and 1 in. sieves, making it a relatively open-graded material. Thus, two different aggregate sources were tested. In the previous study for MoDOT, two gradations were analyzed: as-delivered Type 5 materials, and gradations with elevated fines contents. Both gradations could be considered to be high-fines content materials, with minus #200 contents between 11 and 18%. As a result of changing the gradation to fit the lower proposed specification limits, the experimental gradation in the present study contained no minus #200 material, and had significantly more #4 retained material, but less #8 retained material. The resulting M sub r values in this study were greater than the results from the previous study for the same aggregates. Besides a change in gradation, the degrees of saturation for the proposed, more open-graded gradation were significantly lower than seen in the previous study for the same aggregate types.


We propose a hybrid method designed to solve a problem of dispatching and conflict-free routing of Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) in a Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS). This problem consists in the simultaneous assignment, scheduling and conflict-free routing of the vehicles. Our approach consists in a decomposition method where the master problem (scheduling) is modeled with Constraint Programming and the sub problem (conflict-free routing) with Mixed Integer Programming. Logic cuts are generated and used to prune optimal scheduling solutions whose routing plan exhibits conflicts. The hybrid method presented herein allowed to solve instances with up to six AGVs.


Ensuring taught fieldwork is a positive, generative, collective, and valuable experience for all participants requires considerations beyond course content. To guarantee safety and belonging, participants' identities (backgrounds and protected characteristics) must be considered as a part of fieldwork planning and implementation. Furthermore, getting fieldwork right is an important step in disrupting the ongoing cycle of exclusion of participants from marginalised demographics. This document aims to provide those involved in field teaching in Geography, Earth, and Environmental Sciences (GEES) disciplines with a brief overview about how identity affects experiences of taught fieldwork, as well as some general tips and a practical checklist for creating a safe learning environment for all staff, demonstrators, and students in the field.


Today's antisemitism is difficult to recognize because it does not come dressed in a Nazi uniform and it does not openly proclaim its hatred or fear of Jews. This book looks at the kind of antisemitism which is tolerated or which goes unacknowledged in apparently democratic spaces: trade unions, churches, left-wing and liberal politics, social gatherings of the chattering classes and the seminars and journals of radical intellectuals. It analyses how criticism of Israel can mushroom into antisemitism and it looks at struggles over how antisemitism is defined. It focuses on ways in which those who raise the issue of antisemitism are often accused of doing so in bad faith in an attempt to silence or smear. Hostility to Israel has become a signifier of identity, connected to opposition to imperialism, neo-liberalism and global capitalism; the 'community of the good' takes on toxic ways of imagining most living Jewish people.

Weaving together theoretical discussion with case study narrative in an engaging and interesting way, this book is a global study which is essential reading for scholars working in sociology, politics, Middle East studies, Israel studies, Jewish studies, philosophy, anthropology, journalism and history, as well as anyone interested in current affairs and politics.


This study aims to examine factors that affect a child's ability to recognize letters of the alphabet and distinguish several letters that have similar sounds and shape. By using alphabetical card (flashcard) researchers want to improve the ability of objects in recognizing and distinguish letters. This research uses a qualitative descriptive approach with case study research in action research design. Data collection techniques through observation, interviews, and documentation. Semi-structured interview used by researchers to obtain the completeness of the data and find out the problem in detail. The results obtained that the development of the alphabetical is increasing because of stimulus with a alphabetical card. With a child's card game it becomes more fun to recognize the alphabets and can directly play with the alphabetical card directly. In addition to recognizing the alphabets, with a child's alphabetical card can also explore his knowledge through the pictures, colors and shapes that existed in the letters. It indicates that subject has achieved good results in recognizing the alphabet, since from the beginning he has not been able to distinguish the present letters than subject can distinguish letters of similar shape. In addition, subject also able to know the initial letter of a word and can read it.


Purpose : Dysphotopsia including glare and haloes is the most common cause of dissatisfaction post cataract surgery with implantation of multifocal intraocular lenses (MIOLs). The aim of this prospective study was to determine the relationship between objective measure and subjective complaints which could be used to identify those most likely to experience post-operative problems. The normal range of subjective/objective grade (the glare effect ratio) was determined over a wide age range. Methods : Measurements were acquired monocularly and binocularly from 141 healthy participants (range 18 to 82 years). A bespoke halometer gave an objective measure by quantifying the extent of the glare area in 8 meridians. The C-Quant objectively assessed the amount of straylight falling on the retina using the compensation comparison method. Grading of subjective dysphotopsia was performed using simulated images (Photographic Images of Photic Phenomena plates). Results : Monocular glare areas (median: 4.87 cm2; range 1.97 to 20.87 cm2) were larger than the binocular glare areas (median: 3.77 cm2; range 1.64 to 12.11 cm2) with halometry (P < 0.001). Binocular glare area increased with age (r = 0.673, r2 = 0.453, P < 0.001). Objective findings explained only a small percentage of the variance in subjective measures; halometer glare area vs subjective complaints r = 0.287, r2 = 0.082, P < 0.001; C-Quant vs subjective complaints r = 0.228, r2 = 0.052, P = 0.007. The normal range for the glare effect ratio was calculated for both halometry (median: 0.77; range 0 – 2.52) and for C-Quant (median: 3.45; range 0 – 10.62). Conclusions : Binocular summation was evident with binocular halos being smaller than monocular halos, suggesting halometry should be performed binocularly. The lack of a strong relationship between subjective and objective measures highlights the difficulties in predicting a patient's likely subjective complaints from an objective measure alone. The normal range of the glare effect ratio could be used for screening purposes pre-refractive surgery, as individuals with the highest ratios may be the most likely to complain of subjective dysphotopsia symptoms. This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2016 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Seattle, Wash., May 1-5, 2016.


Partially ephemeral streams are complex objects that can still be used for water supply or irrigation of agricultural land. The problem of such streams is poorly studied, because the influence of various environmental factors complicates carrying out any experiments. Also it is not possible to make their full classification due to their very strong variability not only on a particular geographical belt, but also within separate areas of the river. All this undoubtedly complicates the task of the designers when designing the system. Creation of laboratory models, allowing us to evaluate the possibilities of a spring use for the purpose of water supply, is very promising. These watercourses have a large amount of suspended sediments, so it is not possible to use the standard scheme of water using of the coastal and fluvial water intake structures. It is proposed to organize the fight with the sediments in the flow chart of primary clarifiers, which will perform the function of settling suspensions, to facilitate the work of water treatment facilities. Also the creation of artificial prop is useful in order to achieve the required level of water in a watercourse for water organization. If under the bottom of the river there is underground water, and the permeability of the soil is good, it is possible to arrange the withdrawal of water through infiltration intakes, by setting the filter under the bottom of the watercourse with its connection to filter, from which the water will climb to submersible pumps. Additional filtration through the soil of the river bottom allows not using the scheme sumps, which significantly reduces the cost of epy incoming water treatment.


The rocks of St. John, which is located near the eastern end of the Greater Antilles and near the northeastern corner of the Caribbean plate, consist of Cretaceous basalt, andesite, keratophyre, their volcaniclastic and hypabyssal intrusive equivalents, and minor calcareous rocks and chert. These rocks were intruded by Tertiary mafic dikes and tonalitic plutons. The oldest rocks formed in an extensional oceanic environment characterized by abundant keratophyre and sheeted dikes. Subduction-related volcanism of the east-west-trending marine Greater Antilles volcanic arc, began on St. John near the transition between the Early and Late Cretaceous. South-directed compression, probably caused by the initial collision between the Greater Antilles arc of the Caribbean plate and the Bahama platform of the North American plate, deformed the Cretaceous strata into east-west-trending folds with axial-plane cleavage. Late Eocene tonalitic intrusions, part of the Greater Antilles arc magmatism, produced a contact aureole that is as much as two kilometers wide and that partly annealed the axial-plane cleavage. East-west compression, possibly related to the relative eastward transport of the Caribbean plate in response to the beginning of spreading at the Cayman Trough, produced long-wavelength, low-amplitude folds whose axes plunge gently north and warp the earlier folds. A broad north-plunging syncline-anticline pair occupies most of St. John. The last tectonic event affecting St. John is recorded by a series of post-late Eocene sinistral strike-slip faults related to the early stages of spreading at the Cayman Trough spreading center and sinistral strike-slip accommodation near the northern border of the Caribbean plate. Central St. John is occupied by a rhomb horst bounded by two of these sinistral faults. Unlike other parts of the Greater Antilles, evidence for recent tectonic movement has not been observed on St. John.


It is currently difficult and time-consuming to validate and manipulate data in web applications, so we have developed an editor and a parser to simplify these tasks. Our editor enables end-user programmers to create and debug reusable, flexible data formats without learning a complex new language. Our parser uses these formats to turn strings into structured objects and to report its level of confidence that each string is a valid instance of the format. End-user programmers can use our system to create validation code that takes a graduated response to slightly invalid data. We evaluate our system's expressiveness by defining formats for commonly-occurring web data. This work was funded in part by the National Science Foundation under ITR grant CCF-0325273 (via the EUSES Consortium) and by the National Science Foundation under ITR grants CCF-0438929 and CCF-0324861.


Abstract In-situ electrochemical nanoindentation was applied to study the effect of hydrogen on the mechanical properties of Fe-22Mn-0.6C TWIP steel at nanoscale. Distinctive behaviors in three defined grain orientations: (001), (101), and (111) were investigated in a sequence of air, hydrogen ingress, and hydrogen egress processes. The obvious pop-in load drop caused by introducing hydrogen was analyzed using the classical dislocation theory in combination with the "Defactant" model, wherein hydrogen-enhanced homogeneous dislocation nucleation through the reduction of dislocation line energy and stacking fault energy were proposed as the reasons. The dependence of pop-in behaviors on crystallographic orientations was also discussed. Tabor relation-based models were applied to analyze the nanohardness increment, which was related to the hydrogen-enhanced lattice friction and the hydrogen-reduced plastic zone size. The different recovery behaviors of pop-in load and nanohardness during hydrogen egress were assessed according to the different amounts of residual hydrogen in the corresponding affected zone.


In terms of the Integrated Development Planning (IDP) process in South Africa sectoral plans are being prepared as a forward planning mechanism to integrate land use, transportation planning and service delivery. The instruments used to align and integrate the process are the Spatial Development Framework (SDF) and Integrated Transport Plan (ITP) that, in the case of this paper, were prepared for the area of jurisdiction of the City of Tlokwe Local Municipality. The paper focuses on an assessment of the spatial components included in the SDF and the ITP so as to promote accessibility and movement of people, goods and services. The accessibility of the low-income residential areas is quantified and qualified based on an independent traffic survey case study related to all access routes in terms of predominant movement between origin and destination (residential nodes and places of work) within the urban structure of the study area. The findings presented in this paper are used to assess the nature and/or structuring components of the spatial system based on dominant land use and traffic movement patterns (inclusive of transportation infrastructure). The paper is concluded with some general recommendations that will be of value in the implementation of similar case studies in intermediate towns within national spatial systems and revision of the City Council of Tlokwe IDP, SDF and ITP.


Child Development in Educational Settings provides a comprehensive introduction to traditional and contemporary theories of development and learning in the contexts of early childhood and primary education. Drawing upon the experiences and perspectives of children, families, educators and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander scholars, Marilyn Fleer provides insights into significant theories and approaches, including cultural-historical, constructivist, social constructivist, maturational and ecological systems. The book features four major case studies, which are revisited throughout, to examine how learning and development can be re-imagined within socially, culturally and linguistically diverse communities. This approach enables readers to use theories to analyse and measure learning and development in planning and curriculum, and to feel empowered to enact change in their educational settings. Written in an engaging and accessible style, Child Development in Educational Settings is an essential resource for pre-service teachers and professionals alike.


Community evolution is the highlight in the field of complex network. The current typical tracking community algorithms largely focus on adopting the traditional similarity functional measurements to capture the similarity between communities at temporal snapshots. However, it doesn't take into account the actions accumulated with the events and the effects of community members in evolutionary networks. Meanwhile, different communities use traditional tracking methods with a simple similarity function, and as a result, many analogous communities cannot be effectively extracted in the network. To address these shortcomings, in this paper, we propose a much more powerful similarity function to catch and evaluate communities or groups in a successive time frame. We implement a community tracking method in our new function on the basis of previous research, in which we improve accuracy in network structure by taking the diversity corresponding to the active node in network-evolution into consideration. Finally, we find an interesting phenomenon and give a new method to weigh out the relationships involving active nodes within community evolution over time frames. Eventually, the performance of our algorithm is measured by applying it to real datasets and it is tested on tracking community structure and assessing the experimental results that inhibit active nodes extracted from the community. The experimental results show that our algorithm can effectively keep track of community structure and outperform other algorithms.


Healthy brain functioning depends on efficient communication of information between brain regions, forming complex networks. By quantifying synchronisation between brain regions, a functionally connected brain network can be articulated. In neurodevelopmental disorders, where diagnosis is based on measures of behaviour and tasks, a measure of the underlying biological mechanisms holds promise as a potential clinical tool. Graph theory provides a tool for investigating the neural correlates of neuropsychiatric disorders, where there is disruption of efficient communication within and between brain networks. This research aimed to use recent conceptualisation of graph theory, along with measures of behaviour and cognitive functioning, to increase understanding of the neurobiological risk factors of atypical development. Using magnetoencephalography to investigate frequency-specific temporal dynamics at rest, the research aimed to identify potential biological markers derived from sensor-level whole-brain functional connectivity. Whilst graph theory has proved valuable for insight into network efficiency, its application is hampered by two limitations. First, its measures have hardly been validated in MEG studies, and second, graph measures have been shown to depend on methodological assumptions that restrict direct network comparisons. The first experimental study (Chapter 3) addressed the first limitation by examining the reproducibility of graph-based functional connectivity and network parameters in healthy adult volunteers. Subsequent chapters addressed the second limitation through adapted minimum spanning tree (a network analysis approach that allows for unbiased group comparisons) along with graph network tools that had been shown in Chapter 3 to be highly reproducible. Network topologies were modelled in healthy development (Chapter 4), and atypical neurodevelopment (Chapters 5 and 6). The results provided support to the proposition that measures of network organisation, derived from sensor-space MEG data, offer insights helping to unravel the biological basis of typical brain maturation and neurodevelopmental conditions, with the possibility of future clinical utility.


Despite the attempts to promote the inclusion of pregnant women into clinical research, this group is still widely excluded. An analysis of the "vulnerability of pregnant women" that questions deeply internalized stereotypes is necessary for finding the right balance in the protection of pregnant women as research participants. Criticism of the traditional account of vulnerability will lead to an alternative that focuses on situations rather than groups and on the obligations of responsible parties. The paper adds to the current general discussion of vulnerability and at the same time addresses the specific problem of drug treatment during pregnancy.


Anxiety disorders are among the most common psychiatric diseases and contribute to the development of other psychiatric conditions, such as major depression, leading to a high impairment of daily life quality. Although it is obvious that the physiological architecture of neuronal networks and its modifications are essential for the ability of the brain to process incoming information and to control highly organized behaviour, the mechanisms underlying anxiety disorders still remain poorly understood.
We focused our attention on two brain structures, which are strongly involved in emotional responses of mammals, namely the hippocampus and the amygdala. Both structures belong to the limbic system and play fundamental roles in information processing. Recent findings indicate that alterations in neuronal network properties of these two brain areas critically contribute to the development of such disorders. To potentially uncover changes in neuronal network features associated with abnormal anxiety, we performed experiments in a well-established animal model of extremes in trait anxiety, the high vs. low anxiety-related behaviour (HAB/LAB) mice. HAB mice exposed to an enriched environment (HAB E.E.) and stressed LAB mice (LAB Str.) were also used in the present study. HAB E.E. animals showed decreased anxiety compared to standard HABs, whereas LAB Str. animals displayed an increase in anxiety levels compared to standard LABs. Anxiety levels were measured by means of the elevated plus maze. For our investigations, we employed classical electrophysiological techniques and high-speed voltage-sensitive dye imaging (VSDI) in acute hippocampal (dorsal & ventral) and amygdalar brain slices.
Field potential recordings revealed that HAB animals exhibit weaker long-term potentiation at CA3-CA1 synapses (CA1 LTP) in the dorsal hippocampus and an increased LTP in the ventral hippocampus compared to LAB and control CD1 mice. These observations could support the idea of an exacerbated activation of the "emotional" (ventral) hippocampus concomitantly with a decreased activity in the "cognitive" (dorsal) hippocampus, findings that have also been made in patients suffering from anxiety disorders.
To examine whether neuronal activity propagation through the amygdala differs between HAB, HAB E.E., LAB and LAB Str. mice, we used a quantitative VSDI approach. Our results demonstrate that HAB animals exhibit stronger neuronal activity propagation through the amygdala compared to LAB mice. This indicates that differences in anxiety levels may correlate with the effectiveness of neuronal activity flow through the amygdalar network. Our study also provides strong evidence that environmentally induced shifts in trait anxiety are associated with changes in intrinsic amygdalar network properties.
To summarize, HAB animals showed increased "excitability" in the ventral hippocampus and in the amygdalar network, both structures known to be involved in the control of emotional states and in the stress response in mammals. In addition, the differences in amygdalar network activity were rescued by environmental conditions (enriched environment). Dysregulation of these structures could lead to the "pathologic anxiety-like" behaviour, which can be observed in HAB animals.


Today's competitive market requires engineers to produce reliable light weight products at low cost. This can be achieved by more effective use of computer aided engineering tools during early stages of the design process.A research programme has been undertaken to investigate the data requirements of integrating commercially available software packages (finite element analysis and fatigue life evaluation) to evaluate the integrity and durability of engineering components at the conceptual design stage.A real engineering component, in the form of a steering arm, supplied by a European truck manufacturer was used as a basis for the investigation. This is a typical vehicle component, in which, under service loading conditions, a multiaxial state of stress occurs.A geometric model of the component was created using the Prime "MEDUSA" software suite. The model was used to locate the boundary co-ordinates necessary for the development of a PAFEC Finite Element model. By imposing the conditions experienced during the service, the critical areas of the component were identified by analysing the F.E. model and a detailed description of the elastic stress/strain fields were also established. These were incorporated in an energy density approach and Neuber's uniaxial analysis to predict total local elastic/plastic strains at these critical- locations. These were compared with strain gauge measurements. The calculated results were used to plot a number of load/local strain calibration curves for the development of a load history, suitable for experimental fatigue life assessment.Fatigue crack initiation tests were performed on the steering arm using a computer controlled DARTEC multiaxial fatigue testing machine. Fatigue life assessment based on full service loading was carried out using a software package based on the critical location approach. A comparison of computerised, experimental and actual test circuit fatigue lives has been made.The work enabled a specification to be produced for the integration of the two items of software. This integrated software was developed by third parties and used to produce a computerised life map of the steering arm.


International migration is a defining problem of our time, and central to this problem are the ethical intuitions that dominate thinking on migration and its governance. This Article challenges existing approaches to one particularly contentious form of international migration, as an important first step towards a novel and more ethical way of approaching problems of the movement of people across national borders.

The prevailing doctrine of state sovereignty under international law today is that it entails the right to exclude non-nationals, with only limited exceptions. Whatever the scope of these exceptions, so-called economic migrants—those whose movement is motivated primarily by a desire for a better life—are beyond them. Whereas international refugee law and international human rights law impose restrictions on states' right to exclude non-nationals whose lives are endangered by the risk of certain forms of persecution in their countries of origin, no similar protections exist for economic migrants. International legal theorists have not fundamentally challenged this formulation of state sovereignty, which justifies the largely unfettered right to exclude economic migrants.

This Article looks to the history and legacy of the European colonial project to challenge this status quo. It argues for a different theory of sovereignty that makes clear why, in fact, economic migrants of a certain kind have compelling claims to national admission and inclusion in countries that today unethically insist on a right to exclude these migrants. The European colonial project involved the out-migration of at least 62 million Europeans to colonies across the world between the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century alone. It also involved movement in the reverse direction of human and natural resources, overwhelmingly for the benefit of Europe and Europeans. This Article details how global interconnection and political subordination initiated over the course of this history generates a theory of sovereignty that obligates former colonial powers to open their borders to former colonial subjects. Insofar as certain forms of international migration today are responsive to political subordination rooted in colonial and neocolonial structures, a different conceptualization of such migration is necessary, one that engages economic migrants as political agents exercising equality rights when they engage in "de-colonial" migration.


This report describes the geotechnical engineering aspects of a seismic vulnerability analysis of the Alaskan Way Viaduct in Seattle, Washington. The Alaskan Way Viaduct is an approximately 40-year-old, two-level, reinforced concrete structure that carries some 86,000 vehicles per day along the Seattle waterfront. Subsurface data from previous investigations for construction of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and other structures in the general area were collected and interpreted. The existing subsurface data were supplemented by additional borings, cone penetration test soundings, shear wave velocity tests, and laboratory tests. The existing and supplemental subsurface data were then combined to form a model of the subsurface conditions along the length of the Viaduct. A probabilistic seismic hazard analysis was performed to develop design-level ground motions for use in the seismic vulnerability analysis. These ground motions were used as input for site-specific ground response analyses that predicted the nature of ground shaking along the length of the Viaduct. The ground response analyses also predicted cyclic loading levels that were used in subsequent liquefaction analyses. Foundation stiffness and damping characteristics of the existing foundations were analyzed for use in analyses of the dynamic response of the Alaskan Way Viaduct superstructure. The subsurface investigations revealed evidence of potentially liquefiable soils along the majority of the length of the Alaskan Way Viaduct. Review of historical documents verified that the soils were deposited in a manner that has produced liquefiable soils in other parts of the U.S. and the world, and that liquefaction has been observed near the Alaskan Way Viaduct in past earthquakes. A detailed liquefaction hazard evaluation that considered issues of susceptibility, initiation, and effects was conducted. The evaluation indicated that widespread liquefaction would be caused by the design-level ground motions. This liquefaction could cause bearing failure of the pile foundations that support the Viaduct. It could also produce significant post-earthquake settlement and lateral movement that could cause severe damage or collapse of the Viaduct.


Abstract At 4% of diets, dried whey (when added to a 28% protein corn-soybean meal diet) caused increases in weight gain, nitrogen retention, protein digestibility and fat digestibility and improved feed conversion of poults to 4 weeks of age. From 4 to 8 weeks of age, poults gained weight and utilized feed similarly, regardless of the presence or absence of dried whey in the diets. Dried brewers' yeast did not affect weight gain, feed efficiency, nitrogen retention or protein digestibility. Feather meal, replacing a portion of the soybean meal in a 28% corn-soybean meal diet supplemented with methionine and lysine, was a good protein source for turkey poults between 4 and 8 weeks of age. In this period, diets with up to 10% feather meal promoted as good weight gain, feed conversion, nitrogen retention, protein digestibility and fat digestibility as did the corn-soybean meal diets. Additions of dried whey or dried brewers' yeast to the diets during this period did not alter these responses. For poults between 1 and 4 weeks of age, feather meal in the diet at 5% was used efficiently in the presence of 4 to 5% of whey. Feather meal caused reduced weight, poor feed conversion, decreased nitrogen retention, and reduced protein and fat digestibility when included in the diet at more than 5%.


Shifting rats to a protein-free, carbohydrate-rich diet, although not starvation, resulted in the appearance of mRNA for, and activity of, 3-phosphoglycerate dehydrogenase (3-PGDH) in liver as well as in a marked decrease in plasma cystine concentration. Refeeding with protein caused a 50% decrease in the mRNA in 8 h and its complete disappearance within 24 h, followed by a slower disappearance of the enzymic activity. Intraperitoneal administration of cysteine or methionine to protein-starved rats decreased the mRNA by 50-60% after 8 h. However, the repeated administration of cysteine failed to cause the complete disappearance of this mRNA in 24 h. In hepatocytes in primary culture, cysteine plus methionine and glucagon had, independently, an approx. 4-fold inhibitory effect on the abundance of the 3-PGDH mRNA and caused its almost complete disappearance when tested together. Insulin had an approx. 2-fold stimulatory effect, which was antagonized by cysteine plus methionine but was still apparent in the presence of glucagon. Nuclear run-on experiments and analysis of the stability of the mRNA with 5,6-dichlorobenzimidazole riboside, an inhibitor of RNA polymerase II, suggested that the effect of cysteine plus methionine was due to destabilization of the mRNA, whereas the effect of glucagon was exerted on transcription. Cysteine, but not methionine, inhibited the accumulation of 3-PGDH mRNA in FTO2B hepatoma cells. In conclusion, the dietary control of the expression of the 3-PGDH gene in liver seems to involve the negative effects of cysteine and glucagon and the positive effect of insulin.


Abstract Objective To explore sexual sensation seeking (SSS) among an ethnically-diverse sample of first-year college students and their hookup behaviors. Participants 1,480 first-year college students who hooked up in the last 30 days were recruited from four universities in 2016. Methods Students completed an online survey before completing an online STI and alcohol prevention intervention. Results Male and sexual minority students had significantly higher SSS scores compared to female and heterosexual students respectively. Students with higher SSS scores were less likely to report condom use at last vaginal and anal hookup, more likely to hookup under the influence of alcohol and participate in a wide range of sexual behaviors. There were no significant mean differences in SSS scores by level of intoxication during their last hookup. Conclusion These findings highlight the role of SSS in predicting sexual risk behaviors of first-year college students and the overall low SSS scores among this sample.


The analysis of state-of-the-art regional climate projections indicates a number of robust changes of the climate of the European Alps by the end of this century. Among these are a temperature increase in all seasons and at all elevations and a significant decrease in natural snow cover. Precipitation changes, however, are more subtle and subject to larger uncertainties. While annual precipitation sums are projected to remain rather constant until the end of the century, winter precipitation is projected to increase. Summer precipitation changes will most likely be negative, but increases are possible as well and are covered by the model uncertainty range. Precipitation extremes are expected to intensify in all seasons. The projected changes by the end of the century considerably depend on the greenhouse-gas scenario assumed, with the high-end RCP8.5 scenario being associated with the most prominent changes. Until the middle of the 21st century, however, it is projected that climate change in the Alpine area will only slightly depend on the specific emission scenario.
 These results indicate that harmful weather events in the Alpine area are likely to intensify in future. This particularly refers to extreme precipitation events, which can trigger flash floods and gravitational mass movements (debris flows, landslides) and lead to substantial damage. Convective precipitation extremes (thunderstorms) are additionally a threat to agriculture, forestry, and infrastructure, since they are often associated with strong wind gusts that cause windbreak in forests and with hail that causes damage in agriculture and infrastructure. Less spectacular but still very relevant is the effect of soil erosion on inclined arable land, caused by heavy precipitation. At the same time rising temperatures lead to longer vegetation periods, increased evapotranspiration, and subsequently to higher risk of droughts in the drier valleys of the Alps. Earlier snowmelt is expected to lead to a seasonal runoff shift in many catchments and the projected strong decrease of the natural snow cover will have an impact on tourism and, last but not least, on the cultural identity of many inhabitants of the Alpine area.


With the evolution of mobile phone sensing and wireless networking technologies, mobile crowd sensing (MCS) has become a promising paradigm for large-scale sensing applications. MCS is a type of multi-participant sensing that has been widely used by many sensing applications because of its inherent capabilities, e.g., high mobility, scalability, and cost effectiveness. This paper reviews the existing works of MCS and clarifies the operability of MCS in sensing applications. With wide use and operability of MCS, MCS's industrial applications are investigated based on the clarifications of: 1) the evolution of industrial sensing and 2) the benefits MCS can provide to current industrial sensing. As a feasible industrial sensing paradigm, MCS opens up a new field that provides a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective solution for addressing sensing problems in industrial spaces.


Background: In recent decades, several Western countries have experienced a large increase in childlessness. Relatively little is known about the profiles of childless women in Italy, and virtually nothing about childless men. Objective: The aim of this paper is to address this gap by identifying typical life course trajectories of childless women and men in Italy from a gender perspective and in a cross-cohort comparison. Methods: In order to identify typical patterns I adopted a holistic perspective, applying sequence analysis to data on partnership, employment, and education for a sample of childless women and men derived from the 2009 Italian Family and Social Subjects survey. Results: Six profiles each were identified for childless women and men, which illustrate the marked heterogeneity of the childless universe. Four out of the six were similar for both genders. Importantly, the life course of the childless evolved across cohorts, with an increasing proportion of employed women and single men in the youngest generations. Contribution: This work sheds light on differences in childlessness in Italy by gender and generation. It confirms the role of factors such as not having a partner, and adds new empirical findings such as the pattern of disadvantaged, less-educated women and that of highly educated men with a history of unstable employment.


Animal data on delayed-reward conditioning experiments shows a striking property — the data for different time intervals collapses into a single curve when the data is scaled by the time interval. This is called the scalar property of interval timing. Here a simple model of a neural clock is presented and shown to give rise to the scalar property. The model is an accumulator consisting of noisy, linear spiking neurons. It is analytically tractable and contains only three parameters. When coupled with reinforcement learning it simulates peak procedure experiments, producing both the scalar property and the pattern of single trial covariances.


Purpose: To develop a database of realistic animal SPECT simulations.Simulations were performed using a wholebody mouse model testing several realistic preclinical situations and compared against real small animal imaging acquisitions. Methods: The GATE Monte Carlo toolkit was used for modeling a small animal SPECT system. The camera has a hexagonal parallel hole collimator and a ∼1.6 mm spatial resolution.The 4D digital MOBY phantom was used in order to model mouse anatomy and activity distribution.Planar and SPECT scans for the biodistribution of the commonly used 99mTc based radiopharmaceuticals (MIBI, MDP and HMPAO) were modeled. Resulting simulated data were reconstructed using the QSPECT opensource software for SPECT reconstruction with a 10% energy window. Results: Simulations were executed in the GateLab grid resulting to: a) MDP bone scan biodistribution (anterior posterior planar images), b) Whole body mouse Sestamibi biodistribution, c) 99mTc HMPAO (whole body scan), d) 2 scans for HMPAO biokinetics within the brain (mouse and rat), and e) 99mTc radiolabled magnetic nanoparticles imaging with the MOBY phantom (the activity distribution was extracted from real data). Quantitative analysis was performed in several regions of interest. Simulated results were compared against real data and theoretical values available in the literature.The HMPAO brain biokinetics of both the mouse and rat brains were compared in order to investigate the impact of the brain size on detecting various brain structures.In the mouse model the brain was observed as a single entity, while in the case of the rat brain model structures were distinguished. Conclusion: GATE provides precise physics modeling based on the Geant4 code, while the 4D MOBY phantom can produce realistic imaging data, against which other imaging systems, reconstruction and correction techniques can be compared and standardized. To our knowledge this is the first small animal SPECT database with corresponding imaging data of realistic preclinical situations.


The Early Proterozoic Ungava orogen contains evidence for the development of a longlived (>80 m.y.) and presumably wide ocean that was subsequently destroyed during plate convergence leading to arc-continent collision. A magmatic arc was built on 2.00 Ga oceanic crust above a north-dipping subduction zone between about 1.90 and 1.86 Ga. Development of a south-verging continental thrust belt containing units associated with prior rifting of the Archean Superior province basement probably records impingement of the upper plate against the underthrust continental margin at ca. 1.87 Ga. Subduction of the Superior province continental crust is inferred to have led to a reversal in subduction polarity. A younger, south-dipping subduction zone is suggested by a suite of 1.85-1.83 Ga quartz diorite to granite plutons that intrude the upper- plate oceanic crust and the older arc. The arc-continent collision resulted in a minimum of 65 km of tectonic overlap of the composite arc9s plutonic core on the autochthonous footwall basement.


The literature is briefly summarized as to immunologic modifications caused by the human acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), immunocompetence at various nutritional states of vitamin E, and the immunoenhancing properties of vitamin E. The abnormalities of immune components present in AIDS are similar to those that are stimulated or restored by intake of high doses of vitamin E. Dietary supplementation of vitamin E with an adequate nutrition support or concomitant use of this vitamin with current drug therapies [For example, Zidovudine (AZT)] may increase the therapeutic efficiency of drugs and enhance immune resistance to opportunistic infections associated with AIDS. Supplementation with vitamin E may also decrease the progression of the disease to AIDS. Unlike many pharmacological agents which are toxic at low levels, vitamin E is non-toxic over a wide range of intakes. A moderately high dose may be used to target and stimulate some specific immune cells destroyed by HIV infection. However, further interdisciplinary studies are much needed to relate various levels of intake of this vitamin as a supplement to clinical outcomes during HIV infection and establish the role for this vitamin in human immunity during AIDS.


This book explores the image and identity of emigre painters, sculptors and graphic artists from Nazi Germany in Britain between 1933 and 1945. It focuses on a neglected field of Exile Studies, that of exiled artists in Britain. Methodologies used in this study have been developed by Exile Studies and History of Art, but also by Postcolonialism, scholars of which usually apply their ideas to the Afro-Asian emigration of the second part of the twentieth century. Thus this study represents methodologically a new way of looking at the emigration from Nazi Germany. Identity and Image is divided into five chapters: After an introductory Chapter One (historiography of the topic, methodology of the study, structure of the book), Chapter Two establishes socio-political patterns of emigration and provides an historical framework for Chapters Three and Four, which concentrate on the image and identity of the refugee artist, the former based on written sources and the latter on visual material. In detail, Chapter Three analyses the British image of the refugee artists and their works on the one hand and the emigres' self-representations on the other, the latter exemplified by refugee organisations (the Free German League of Culture/Freier Deutscher Kulturbund, the Austrian Centre, the Anglo-Sudeten Club and the Czech Institute) and institutions founded by emigre artists (Jack Bilbo's Modern Art Gallery and Arthur Segal's Painting School). Chapter Four examines the works produced in internment and those exhibited and produced for the refugee organisations discussed in Chapter Three. Chapter Five discusses the results of this study in the light of three postcolonial concepts: diaspora communities, the notion of home and the gendered identity of the refugee. The appendix lists all painters, sculptors and graphic artists from Nazi Germany in Britain with biographical details. Apart from visual and written sources discussed for the first time, there are two major results of the study: First, although the artists were united as refugees, this unity did not lead to a unity in art - 'refugee art' is a construction put forward by the British press and the refugee organisations, particularly the Free German League of Culture. Second, contrary to claims that modern art was international and formed a universal unity that 'transgressed' nationality, neither the West/Europe nor modernism form unities; instead, in the 1930s and 1940s, cultures in Europe constructed conceptions of other European cultures on the basis of nation-state identities.


Abstract We define a canonical line bundle over the slit tangent bundle of a manifold, and define a Lagrangian section to be a homogeneous section of this line bundle. When a regularity condition is satisfied the Lagrangian section gives rise to local Finsler functions. For each such section we demonstrate how to construct a canonically parametrized family of geodesics, such that the geodesics of the local Finsler functions are reparametrizations.


Corporate accountability is never far from the front page and Harvard Business School trains many future business leaders. But how does HBS formally and informally ensure its members embrace proper business standards? Relying on his first-hand faculty experience, Michel Anteby takes readers inside HBS in order to draw vivid parallels between the socialization of faculty and of students.In an era when many organizations are focused on principles of responsibility, HBS has long tried to promote better business standards. Anteby's rich account reveals the surprising role of silence in HBS's process of codifying morals and values. As he describes, specifics are often left unspoken; for example, teaching notes given to faculty provide much guidance on how to teach but are largely silent on what to teach. Manufacturing Morals demonstrates how faculty and students are exposed to a system that operates on open-ended directives that require significant decision-making on the part of those involved, with little overt guidance from the hierarchy. Anteby suggests that this model — which tolerates moral complexity — is perhaps one of the few that can adapt and endure over time.Manufacturing Morals is a perceptive must-read for anyone looking for insight into the moral decision-making of today's business leaders and those influenced by and working for them.


The recycling of vesicle membrane fused during exocytosis is essential to maintaining neurotransmission. The GTPase dynamin is involved in pinching off membrane to complete endocytosis and can be inhibited by dynasore resulting in activity-dependent depletion of release-competent synaptic vesicles. In rat brainstem slices, we examined the effects of dynasore on three different modes of glutamate release–spontaneous, evoked, and asynchronous release–at solitary tract (ST) inputs to neurons in the nucleus of the solitary tract (NTS). Intermittent bursts of stimuli to the ST interspersed with pauses in stimulation allowed examination of these three modes in each neuron continuously. Application of 100 μM dynasore rapidly increased the spontaneous EPSC (sEPSC) frequency which was followed by inhibition of both ST-evoked EPSCs (ST-EPSC) as well as asynchronous EPSCs. The onset of ST-EPSC failures was not accompanied by amplitude reduction–a pattern more consistent with conduction block than reduced probability of vesicle release. Neither result suggested that dynasore interrupted endocytosis. The dynasore response profile resembled intense presynaptic TRPV1 activation. The TRPV1 antagonist capsazepine failed to prevent dynasore increases in sEPSC frequency but did prevent the block of the ST-EPSC. In contrast, the TRPV1 antagonist JNJ 17203212 prevented both actions of dynasore in neurons with TRPV1-expressing ST inputs. In a neuron lacking TRPV1-expressing ST inputs, however, dynasore promptly increased sEPSC rate followed by block of ST-evoked EPSCs. Together our results suggest that dynasore actions on ST-NTS transmission are TRPV1-independent and changes in glutamatergic transmission are not consistent with changes in vesicle recycling and endocytosis.


The knowledge of the supramolecular structure of a polar oil that contains a bio-based extractant is necessary for a deep understanding of solubilization processes of polar species in oils. This study focuses on a ternary system containing the polyglyceryl-3-diisostearate (PG3DS), a bio-based extractant in cosmetic formulation, methyl esters (ME-Cn) as model diluent and water. The realms of existence of monophasic regions were determined in the ternary phase diagrams varying the chain lengths, Cn, of the diluent between 7 and 14 carbons. We provide for the first time fundamental information on the impact of the water content and of the organic diluent on the miscibility and aggregation properties of PG3DS in MEs. The structure of reverse PG3DS aggregates in the monophasic region were accessed by combining small and wide angle X-ray scattering (SWAXS) experiments and molecular dynamics simulation.


In 1993, most Canadians believed that big government deficits were permanent and that the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) was in such deep trouble that younger Canadians would never collect a retirement pension. They believed too that Canada's politicians were incapable of dealing with either problem. Yet by 1998, both were essentially solved. While the deficit battles have been recounted many times, the story of the reform that rescued the CPP has gone almost entirely untold. In Fixing the Future, Bruce Little explains the CPP overhaul and shows why it stands as one of Canada's most significant public policy success stories, in part because it demanded an almost unparalleled degree of federal-provincial co-operation. Providing an overview of the CPP's entire history from its beginning in 1965, Little pulls together published, and new unpublished, material relating to the CPP reform, and interviews over fifty politicians, government officials, and others who were deeply involved in the reforms for their recollections, insights, and observations. A superbly told history of one of Canada's most important public policy issues, Fixing the Future will be of interest to political scientists, historians, economists, and anyone concerned about their retirement.


Zircon (ZrSiO 4 ), hafnon (HfSiO 4 ) and five intermediate compositions were synthesized from a Pb silicate melt. The resulting crystals were 20–300 µm in size and displayed sector and growth zoning. Raman spectra were acquired at locations in the sample for which preceding electron microprobe (EMP) analyses revealed sufficient compositional homogeneity. The dataset documents shifts of Raman bands with changing composition. In this study, bands that have previously not been reported were found for the intermediate compositions and for pure hafnon, in particular at wavenumbers less than 200 cm −1 . For these external modes, the dataset provides new insight into the compositional dependence of their frequencies. Density-functional theory calculations support the observations and are used for a detailed interpretation of the spectra. The pitfalls of the EMP analysis along the zircon–hafnon join are highlighted.


Topography is expected to record tectonic, climatic, and rock strength controls on long-term denudation rates in active margins. We test this hypothesis in the Sierra San Pedro Martir, Mexico—the footwall of the normal-faulted, western margin of the Gulf of California rift system—by relating topographic metrics with 10 Be-derived catchment-averaged denudation rates. Denudation rates and topographic metrics record along-strike gradients in rock uplift relative to base level that increase asymmetrically from fault tips to maxima within the northern half of the range. Surface uplift of an Eocene erosional surface and slope-break knickpoints found at increasingly higher elevations in the northern segments of the Sierra San Pedro Martir fault system suggest that range asymmetry is due to a recent northward acceleration in the rate of rock uplift relative to base level. By characterizing the relationship between channel steepness and cosmogenic denudation rates, we extrapolate millennial-scale denudation rates to million-year time scales and estimate ages for the transient increase in rock uplift rates and the initial onset of normal faulting. We infer that the Sierra San Pedro Martir fault system initiated during the middle Miocene (ca. 16–14 Ma) in the center of the range and ca. 12–8 Ma near the fault tips. Recent increases in rock uplift rates during the late Pliocene (ca. 3–2 Ma) coincide with lithospheric rupture in the Delfin basins to the east and represent a westward migration of strain from hanging-wall detachments to the Sierra San Pedro Martir fault system. Age estimates are consistent with independent geologic constraints and show that pairing of carefully selected cosmogenic denudation rates with topographic analysis can be used to extract tectonic signals from topography over million-year time scales.


Abstract Increasing demands for higher efficiency and strict environmental regulations for process industries have led to the development of sophisticated control technologies and smart sensors. However, improved control mechanisms and better sensors have not been able to eliminate abnormal operating conditions. As a result operator interventions are routinely required. Alarms are at the forefront of the safety system in a plant to indicate the need for such interventions. The main purposes of an alarm is to warn of a possible critical condition and to seek the attention of an operator and thus to prevent, control and mitigate the effects of an abnormal situation. However, on many occasions, alarms have been reported as a contributor to abnormal events and the single variable based alarm system design has been identified as a main reason for that. In this article, we present a systems approach to design, analyze and prioritize alarms. By a system, we refer to a set of variables within a process. An alarm is activated based on the risk associated with the state of the variables in a system. The objectives are to integrate risk estimation with alarm design and to reduce the number of alarms. First, the process variables are grouped to be represented by a number of systems. Alarms are then assigned to each system instead of individual variables. From the measured value of the variables, the risk associated within the individual system is estimated. Also from the relationships among the variables, future risk associated with each system is evaluated. Finally, the overall risk for a particular system is obtained from the current and predicted risk and comparing the overall risk with a predefined threshold value, a decision regarding alarm activation is taken. Once a set of alarms are activated, they are prioritized based on their severity. Also for the analysis of an alarm, the risk associated with individual variables under a system is analyzed and, finally, proper operator action is suggested to mitigate the abnormal situation.


Radio equipped mobile devices have enjoyed tremendous growth in the past few years. We observe that in the near future it might be possible to build a network that routes delay-tolerant packets by harnessing user mobility and the pervasive availability of wireless devices. Such a delay-tolerant network could be used to supplement wireless infrastructure or provide service where none is available. Since mobile devices in a delay-tolerant network forward packets to nearby users, the devices can use short-range radio, which potentially reduces device power consumption and radio contention. The design of a user mobility based delay-tolerant network raises two key challenges: determining the connectivity of such a network, and determining the latency characteristics and replication requirements of routing algorithms in such a network. To determine realistic contact patterns, we collected user mobility data by conducting two user studies. We outfitted groups of students with instrumented wireless-enabled PDAs that logged pairwise contacts between study participants over a period of several weeks. Experiments conducted on these traces show that it is possible to form a delay-tolerant network based on human mobility. The network has good connectivity, so that routes exist between almost all study participants via some multi-hop path. Moreover, it is possible to effectively route packets with modest replication


Just when Tongan Democratic Party leader 'Akilisi Pohiva stumped the public by saying he admired Fiji's Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama because "he has been able to make things happen and take development to the people," the Government of Tonga's Minister for Lands, Lord Ma'afu, came right out of the blue and trumped him (Tonga Daily News, 2014a, 2014b).  Ma'afu topped Pohiva at causing public bamboozlement.
By this, Pohiva was the progenitor of Tonga's thirty year old pro-democracy movement.  Why would he over romanticise about the former military commodore Frank Bainimarama, the hard-line originator of Fiji's third coup to take place in a period of twenty eight years?  Pohiva's swinging politics from democracy in Tonga to an overthrow of democracy in Fiji baffled readers (Naidu, 2014; Graue, 2014).  But Ma'afu took centre stage as the show stopper.
Momentarily, people were gobsmacked and did not know what to make of him.  Was Tonga's Minister for Lands and Survey who was a senior noble in the Tu'ivakano cabinet courting mischief or dead serious?  Fiji's permanent secretary for foreign affairs Amena Yauvoli was certain, we "would just have to wait for the Tongan government's proposal" (Tonga Daily News, 2014a).  But as Tongan journalist Kalafi Moala put it, "they will be waiting for a very long time" on that geopolitical front (Moala, 2014).
This essay explores the geopolitical storymaking about Tonga and Fiji instigated by Tonga Daily News publishing online that Lord Ma'afu had said, "In good faith I will propose to the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Fiji that they can have Minerva Reef and we get Lau in return" (Tonga Daily News, 2014a).  The very thought of drawing up a new map instantly ignited outrage from Fijian readers.  How then, might Tonga and Fiji's argument over ownership of the Minerva Reefs play out this time around?  Could the region's geopolitical atlas ever be imagined differently when its cartography was permanently cemented to the era of Western European colonial empire?  When the media fooled people to believe Lord Ma'afu wanted the Lau Islands for the Minerva Reefs, what did this signal about how news sites can manoeuver shock advertising and manipulate what politicians say to up their ratings?


Referring constitutes such an essential scholarly activity across disciplines that it has been regarded by Unsworth (2000) as one of the scholarly primitives. In Classics, in particular, the references to passages of the ancient texts—the so-called canonical citations (or references )—play a prominent role. The potential of these citations, however, has not been fully exploited to date, despite the attention that they have recently received in the field of Digital Humanities. In this paper I discuss two aspects of making such citations computable. Firstly, I illustrate how they can be extracted from text by using Natural Language Pro-cessing techniques, especially Named Entity Recognition. Secondly, I discuss the creation of a three-level citation network to formalise the web of relations between texts that canonical references implicitly constitute. As I outline in the conclusive section of this paper, the possible uses of the extracted citation network include the development of search applications and recommender systems for bibliography; the enhancement of digital environments to read primary sources with links to related secondary literature and the application of these network to the study of intertextuality and text reception.


In the administrative state, how should expert opinions be aggregated and used? If a panel of experts is unanimous on a question of fact, causation, or prediction, can an administrative agency rationally disagree, and on what grounds? If experts are split into a majority view and a minority view, must the agency follow the majority? Should reviewing courts limit agency discretion to select among the conflicting views of experts, or to depart from expert consensus?I argue that voting by expert panels is likely, on average, to be an epistemically superior mechanism for determining facts and causation, and for making predictions, than is the substantive judgment of agency heads in rulemaking or adjudication. Nose-counting of expert panels should generally be an acceptable basis for decision under the arbitrary and capricious or substantial evidence tests. Moreover, agencies should be obliged to follow the (super)majority view of an expert panel, even if the agency's own judgment is to the contrary, unless the agency can give an epistemically valid reason for rejecting the panel majority's view.


An LDPC code is proposed for flash memories based on rank modulation. In contrast to previous approaches, this enables the use of long ECCs with fixed-length modulation codes. For ECC design, the rank modulation scheme is treated as part of an equivalent channel. A probabilistic model of the equivalent channel is derived and a simple high-SNR approximation is given. LDPC codes over integer rings and finite fields are designed for the approximate channel and a low-complexity symbol-flipping verification-based (SFVB) message-passing decoding algorithm is proposed to take advantage of the channel structure. Density evolution (DE) is used to calculate decoding thresholds and simulations are used to compare the low-complexity decoder with sum-product decoding.


Embedding knowledge graphs (KGs) into continuous vector spaces is a focus of current research. Early works performed this task via simple models developed over KG triples. Recent attempts focused on either designing more complicated triple scoring models, or incorporating extra information beyond triples. This paper, by contrast, investigates the potential of using very simple constraints to improve KG embedding. We examine non-negativity constraints on entity representations and approximate entailment constraints on relation representations. The former help to learn compact and interpretable representations for entities. The latter further encode regularities of logical entailment between relations into their distributed representations. These constraints impose prior beliefs upon the structure of the embedding space, without negative impacts on efficiency or scalability. Evaluation on WordNet, Freebase, and DBpedia shows that our approach is simple yet surprisingly effective, significantly and consistently outperforming competitive baselines. The constraints imposed indeed improve model interpretability, leading to a substantially increased structuring of the embedding space. Code and data are available at https://github.com/iieir-km/ComplEx-NNE_AER.


Guidance and counselling in the context of learning is an area that is growing rapidly and attracting a lot of interest within the field of education. This reader presents a range of different perspectives - those of the user, practitioner, professional, manager, policy-maker and academic. By offering these various tales, the book aims to encourage a more beneficial interchange of dialogue between the people involved, whether they be in the role of the counsellor or the counselled. Written for a new module on the Open University's MA in Education - E839


The rapid adoption of smartphones along with a growing habit for using these devices as alarm clocks presents an opportunity to use this device as a sleep detector. This adds value to UbiComp and personal informatics in terms of user context and new performance data to collect and visualize, and it benefits healthcare as sleep is correlated with many health issues. To assess this opportunity, we collected one month of phone sensor and sleep diary entries from 27 people who have a variety of sleep contexts. We used this data to construct models that detect sleep and wake states, daily sleep quality, and global sleep quality. Our system classifies sleep state with 93.06% accuracy, daily sleep quality with 83.97% accuracy, and overall sleep quality with 81.48% accuracy. Individual models performed better than generally trained models, where the individual models require 3 days of ground truth data and 3 weeks of ground truth data to perform well on detecting sleep and sleep quality, respectively. Finally, the features of noise and movement were useful to infer sleep quality.


safefood has carried out a survey of MSG use in Chinese, Indian and Thai restaurants and take-away outlets in Cork and Belfast. Both standard dishes of food typically expected to contain added MSG and MSG-free options were purchased and analysed for total free glutamate.
It was clear from the standard dish samples that the use of MSG varied considerably from one premises to another. The number of premises that used excessive amounts of MSG was very low. In other premises, there was no difference in the free glutamate content between the standard and MSG-free options suggesting that MSG was used in very small amounts or not at all, but also that, even where MSG is not used, you can still get free glutamate from other ingredients.
Chinese dishes, especially those that were sauce based, contained the highest concentrations of free glutamate while Indian and Thai dishes had much lower concentrations. However, the MSG-free option always had much lower free glutamate levels indicating that a request for an MSG-free meal can be accommodated.
Customers should bear in mind that even an MSG-free dish option could still contain free glutamate from other ingredients and this may well include MSG or other glutamate-based food additives in some of the processed ingredients. Restaurant staff were not always aware of this or why MSG is used in the first place. However, since free glutamate was detected in all the ethnic cuisine tested, it is in their interests to advise customers that (a) they don't add MSG to their dishes or, where it is added, this step can be omitted, and (b) their dishes may contain free glutamate from other ingredients.


bjectives: Studies have shown that mental health problems at an early age can lead to greater impairment in adult life. Epidemiological evidence on the prevalence and incidence of mental health disorders is fundamental for planning mental health services. However, these data are lacking in Saudi Arabia. The current study examined the prevalence of mental health problems in Saudi children and adolescents living in a selected community in Riyadh City. Methods: This two-stage epidemiological study used the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) to screen all eligible participants for the presence of a possible psychiatric disorder. The screening was followed by the use of a structured psychiatric interview (MINI-Kid), which was administered to a subsample to confirm the presence or absence of psychiatric disorders. Results: In the first stage, N= 924 participants were screened with n=226 receiving follow-up interviews. The overall prevalence of any psychiatric disorder was 36.3% (39.2% for children and 34.1% for adolescents). For the overall sample, behavioral disorders were more common than emotional disorders (25.7% vs. 21.7%). The most common specific disorders were oppositional defiant disorder (15.9%), attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (8.4%), general anxiety disorder (7.8%) and separation anxiety (7.8%). Only having internet in the house and the mother's education were predictors of having psychiatric illness among the adolescents, but these were not predictors among the children. Conclusion: The rate of psychiatric disorders among Saudi children and adolescents is within the wide range reported by international studies, but is associated with specific social predictive factors.


Government capital formation raises a number of issues important to national economic well-being, yet the U.S., unlike most advanced countries, does not account for capital in its formal budget documents. We estimate depreciation of government capital using a methodology developed by Hulten and Wykoff which is based on used asset price data. We estimate a federal government net nonresidential capital stock of over $800 billion in 1984, more than 20% higher than estimated by the BEA. We also find much larger net federal investment since World War II than the BEA. The behavior of military and civilian structures and equipment is also examined.We analyze the potential importance of these results for measuring the net national savings rate, national wealth, the trend in government capital formation relative to private capital formation, and the relationship between net investment and deficits.


A wireless sensor network consists of a large quantity of small, low-cost sensor nodes that are limited in terms of memory, available energy and processing capacity. Generally, these sensor nodes are distributed in space to obtain physical parameters such as temperature, humidity, vibration or light conditions, and transmit the measured values to a central entity. The measurements are tagged with the corresponding location of the nodes in the network and the time of sampling, to enable a view on the value distribution in space and time later on. Positioning of wireless sensor nodes without dedicated hardware is an open research question. Especially in the domain of embedded networked sensors, many applications rely on spatial information to relate collected data to the location of its origin. As a first step towards localization, an estimation of the distance between two nodes is often carried out to determine their positions. So far, the majority of approaches therefore explore physical properties of radio signals such as the strength of a received signal or its trip time. However, this is problematic since either the complexity on the software or on the hardware side is not adequate for embedded systems, or the approaches lack the required accuracy. In this paper we present the WDNI algorithm (Weighted Density of Node Intersection) to determine the distance between two nodes, relying solely on the investigation of local node densities. To evaluate the accuracy of this algorithm, we ran extensive simulations and experimented with different testbed setups using real sensor nodes, and finally compared WDNI to a range-free distance estimation algorithm based the analysis of RSSI values.


Matrix product vectors form the appropriate framework to study and classify one-dimensional quantum systems. In this work, we develop the structure theory of matrix product unitary operators (MPUs) which appear e.g. in the description of time evolutions of one-dimensional systems. We prove that all MPUs have a strict causal cone, making them quantum cellular automata (QCAs), and derive a canonical form for MPUs which relates different MPU representations of the same unitary through a local gauge. We use this canonical form to prove an index theorem for MPUs which gives the precise conditions under which two MPUs are adiabatically connected, providing an alternative derivation to that of (Gross et al 2012 Commun. Math. Phys. 310 419) for QCAs. We also discuss the effect of symmetries on the MPU classification. In particular, we characterize the tensors corresponding to MPU that are invariant under conjugation, time reversal, or transposition. In the first case, we give a full characterization of all equivalence classes. Finally, we give several examples of MPU possessing different symmetries.


The Panel on Genetically Modified Organisms of the European Food Safety Authority (GMO Panel) previously assessed the three single events combined to produce a three-event stack cotton 281-24-236 9 3006-210-23 9 MON 88913 and did not identify safety concerns. In this opinion, the GMO Panel assesses only the three-event stack cotton. No new data on the single events, leading to modification of the original conclusions on their safety, were identified. The combination of cotton events 281-24-236, 3006-210-23 and MON 88913 in the three-event stack cotton did not give rise to issues – based on the molecular, agronomic, phenotypic or compositional characteristics – regarding food and feed safety and nutrition. The combination of the newly expressed proteins in the threeevent stack cotton did not raise concerns for human and animal health. Considering the introduced traits and the outcome of the comparative analysis, the routes of exposure and limited exposure levels, the GMO Panel concludes that this three-event stack cotton would not raise safety concerns in case of accidental release of viable cottonseeds into the environment. The post-market environmental monitoring plans provided by the applicant are in line with the scope of the three-event stack cotton. No post-market monitoring of food/feed derived from the three-event stack cotton is considered necessary. The GMO Panel concludes that the three-event stack cotton is as safe and as nutritious as its conventional counterpart in the context of its scope.


The concern for and the debate on "objectivity" in the scientific study of religions led scholars to advocate two major approaches known as "History of Religion" and "Phenomenology of Religion." Both approaches are claimed to be "descriptive" and "value-free" as they stringently enforce the principle of epoche or distanciation to ensure objectivity. However, there are scholars who argue that objectivity (be it "descriptive" or "value-free") is ontologically questionable and epistemologically impossible. It is a selfdefeating concept and a myth. They argue that objectivity is principally and directly concerned with "the object" under investigation regardless of the types of approach used.


In this work, we consider a general form of noisy compressive sensing (CS) when there is uncertainty in the measurement matrix as well as in the measurements. Matrix uncertainty is motivated by practical cases in which there are imperfections or unknown calibration parameters in the signal acquisition hardware. While previous work has focused on analyzing and extending classical CS algorithms like the LASSO and Dantzig selector for this problem setting, we propose a new algorithm whose goal is either minimization of mean-squared error or maximization of posterior probability in the presence of these uncertainties. In particular, we extend the Approximate Message Passing (AMP) approach originally proposed by Donoho, Maleki, and Montanari, and recently generalized by Rangan, to the case of probabilistic uncertainties in the elements of the measurement matrix. Empirically, we show that our approach performs near oracle bounds. We then show that our matrix-uncertain AMP can be applied in an alternating fashion to learn both the unknown measurement matrix and signal vector. We also present a simple analysis showing that, for suitably large systems, it suffices to treat uniform matrix uncertainty as additive white Gaussian noise.


Despite increasing scepticism about the conventional growth model, the topic of destabilisation of socio-economic regimes has not yet captured scholarly interest. This paper addresses this gap and serves a twofold purpose. First, it develops an analytical framework for studying discursive regime destabilisation based on previous research by Turnheim and colleagues. The framework is novel as it allows for: (1) structured analysis of framing interactions between niche and regime actors; (2) visualised mapping of discursive actors; and (3) identification of phases of discursive destabilisation. Second, the paper contributes to the literature on an ongoing practice of socio-economic transformations by applying the framework to a case study of a social movement organisation, "Economy for the Common Good" (ECG), that seeks to advance socio-economic transition. The suggested framework was useful for analysing the ECG. First, it demonstrated that niche actors employed mostly motivational and prognostic frames supporting the alternative economic approach, while the regime diffused mostly diagnostic frames focusing on the perceived negative aspects of the niche. Second, by applying the framework, we identified three relevant destabilisation phases in this socio-economic transformation process: Blindness and Denial, Incremental Responses to Problems and Increasing Doubts and Diversification. We argue that the framing of the niche affects different actor groups differently: while representatives of high authorities remained in the first phase of destabilisation, regional authorities and private companies already appeared at the second and third phases.


A design of multiconverter unified power quality conditioner to improve the power quality issues is presents in this paper. Modified SRF theory and fuzzy logic controller technique are incorporated in this modelling. This newly designed controller is connected to a source in order to compensate voltage and current in the two feeders. The expanded concept of UPQC is multi converter-UPQC; this system has two series voltage source converter (VSC) and one shunt VSC connected back to back. In the proposed system, the power can be conveyed from one feeder to another in order to mitigate the voltage sag, swell, interruption and transient response of the system. The control strategies of multi converter-UPQC are designed based on the modified synchronous reference frame theory with fuzzy logic controller. The transient response of the fuzzy logic controller in dc-link voltage controller will be very fast. The relevant simulation and compensation performance analysis of multi converter-UPQC with fuzzy logic controller is performed using MATLAB/Simulink software.


The present investigation focuses on reducing the cost of wet processing of silk fabric by saving energy and time through simultaneous degumming/dyeing of silk fibers followed by recovery of sericin from the dye effluent as a colored powder. Among other tried methods, degumming of silk with boiling water through three consecutive baths, 1 h each, was found to be the superior method for sericin extraction technically and economically. Degumming/ dyeing processes of silk were carried out concurrently using acid dyeing bath for the last degumming cycle. The colour strength values of the simultaneously degummed and dyed fibres are comparable with those fibres degummed and dyed consecutively. The obtained colored sericin powder was precipitated by adjusting the pH value of degumming effluent. The particle size of sericin powder was conducted using transmission electron microscopy. Scanning electron microscopic investigation of raw silk and degummed one was studied. The chemical composition of the said powder, raw silk and degummed silk was monitored by elemental analysis, and amino acid analysis. The molecular mass of the obtained sericin was determined using gel filtration system. The tensile properties of the degummed silk were evaluated compared with the raw silk.


Background: It has been suggested that the perinatal period is a period of increased risk for the development and/or exacerbation of OCD and that postpartum OCD (ppOCD) presents a distinct clinical picture. This raises the possibility that ppOCD might be a distinct subtype of OCD. This review examines this contention. Method: A search using Ovid (Medline, PsycINFO and Embase), EBSCO, Cochrane Library, Web of Science (ISI), Pubmed databases and Google Scholar was carried out using the key words: "obsessive compulsive disorder" (and derivatives), "perinatal", "pregnancy", "postnatal", "postpartum", "mothers" (and derivatives), "anxiety disorders" and "subtypes." These articles and their references were reviewed. Results: The majority of studies reviewed were retrospective, which makes it impossible to infer causality. Two prospective studies found a higher incidence of OCD in the postpartum period. These were carried out in Turkey and Brazil and, as such, may be limited in their applicability to other cultural groups. Conclusion: The concept of ppOCD as a specific subtype has not been robustly demonstrated. The evidence that OCD is more prevalent in the postpartum period is mixed. The evidence that OCD in the postpartum period presents a distinctive clinical picture with specific symptomatology and course is more compelling. In view of the impact of culture and religion on the expression of OCD, collaborative, international, prospective studies that take into account the methodological and definitional issues raised in this review are necessary to provide clarification.


Background Social anxiety disorder is a highly prevalent and burdensome condition. Persons with social anxiety frequently avoid seeking physician support and rarely receive treatment. Social anxiety symptoms are frequently underreported and underrecognized, creating a barrier to the accurate assessment of these symptoms. Consequently, more research is needed to identify passive biomarkers of social anxiety symptom severity. Digital phenotyping, the use of passive sensor data to inform health care decisions, offers a possible method of addressing this assessment barrier. Objective This study aims to determine whether passive sensor data acquired from smartphone data can accurately predict social anxiety symptom severity using a publicly available dataset. Methods In this study, participants (n=59) completed self-report assessments of their social anxiety symptom severity, depressive symptom severity, positive affect, and negative affect. Next, participants installed an app, which passively collected data about their movement (accelerometers) and social contact (incoming and outgoing calls and texts) over 2 weeks. Afterward, these passive sensor data were used to form digital biomarkers, which were paired with machine learning models to predict participants' social anxiety symptom severity. Results The results suggested that these passive sensor data could be utilized to accurately predict participants' social anxiety symptom severity (r=0.702 between predicted and observed symptom severity) and demonstrated discriminant validity between depression, negative affect, and positive affect. Conclusions These results suggest that smartphone sensor data may be utilized to accurately detect social anxiety symptom severity and discriminate social anxiety symptom severity from depressive symptoms, negative affect, and positive affect.


During high-speed machining (HSM), the microstructure of materials evolves with significant plastic deformation process under high strain rate and high temperature, which affects chip formation and material fracture mechanisms, as well as surface integrity. The development of models and simulation methods for grain refinement in machining process is of great importance. There are few models which are developed to predict the evolution of the grain refinement of HSM in mesoscale with sufficient accuracy. In this work, a cellular automata (CA) method with discontinuous (dDRX) and continuous (cDRX) dynamic recrystallization (DRX) mechanisms is applied to simulate the grain refinement and to predict the microstructure morphology during machining oxygen-free high-conductivity (OFHC) copper. The process of grain evolution is simulated with the initial conditions of strain, strain rate, and temperature obtained by finite element (FE) simulation. The evolution of dislocation density, grain deformation, grain refinement, and growth are also simulated. Moreover, cutting tests under high cutting speeds (from 750 m/min to 3000 m/min) are carried out and the microstructure of chips is observed by electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD). The results show a grain refinement during HSM, which could be due to the occurrence of DDR and cDRX. High temperature will promote grain recovery and growth, while high strain rate will significantly cause a high density of dislocations and grain refinement. Therefore, HSM contributes to the fine equiaxed grain structure in deformed chips and the grain morphology after HSM can be simulated successfully by the CA model developed in this work.


This short essay proposes a theoretical model for regulating the short-term rental market, which is typified by online markets such as Airbnb.com. The basic mechanism proposed here is a "transferable sharing right" (TSR), which is modeled on existing transferable development rights regimes. The proposed TSR regime would provide cities a means of regulating short-term rentals while also charging a fee equal to externalities and lost city revenue resulting from short-term rentals. Further, TSRs could be used to re-invest in neighborhoods where short-term rentals occur or to drive economic development to neighborhoods where cities seek to encourage tourism.


Hydrothermal circulation within oceanic basement can have a profound influence on temperatures in the upper crust, including those close to the subduction thrust and in the overlying plate. Heat flow evidence for hydrothermal circulation in the volcanic basement of incoming plates includes: (1) values that are well below conductive predictions due to the advection of heat into the ocean, and (2) variability about conductive predictions that cannot be explained by variations in seafloor relief or thermal conductivity. In this review we summarize evidence for hydrothermal circulation in subducting oceanic basement from the Nankai, Costa Rica, south-central Chile, Haida Gwaii, and Cascadia margins and explore its influence on plate boundary temperatures. Models of these systems using a high Nusselt number proxy for hydrothermal circulation are used to illustrate the influence of this process on seafloor observations and thermal conditions at depth. We show that at these subduction zones, patterns of seafloor heat flow are best explained by thermal models that include the influence of hydrothermal circulation.


PETROVA, D., V. VELIKOVA and D. GERDJIKOV, 2006. Recent state of phytoplankton community in the Varna Bay. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci.,12: 247-260 Varna Bay is one of the hot spots along the Bulgarian Black Sea coastal zone. Its ecological state is strongly influenced by the connection with the Varna lake. Along the lake coast are located many sources of pollution such as rivers, ports, chemical industry. In the Black Sea, as a semi-enclosed basin with a large river discharge, the phytoplankton community manifests naturally predetermined high level of productivity and blooms have never been something extraordinary, especially in coastal waters. However, during the period of progressive eutrophication (1970s, 1980s) the microalgae in the Black Sea was too repeatedly referred to an "eutrophic plankton culture" and "marine seaweeds". In the 1990s signs of relaxation in the frequency and magnitude of phytoplankton blooms were reported. Results of 26 cruises in this period of the studies are reported. The horizontal and vertical distrubution of phytoplankton, species composition, seasonal dynamics of density and biomass of microalgaes are discussed in this paper. A good half carried out within the Project "Nutrient management in the Danube basin and its impact on the Black Sea" (DANUBS-EVK1-CT2000-00051). Since 1995 decreasing tendency of phytoplankton biomass was observed in the Bulgarian Black Sea. In 1998 2003 this tendency was confirmed and the level of algal biomass was lower even the comparison with previous period 1991 1997. These periods was characterized by moderate diversity of phytoplankton with predomination of a few Bacillariophyceae and Dinophyceae species Skeletonema costatum, Cerataulina pelagica, Chaetoceros socialis, Emiliania huxleyi, etc. The maximal algal biomasses was created in spring and summer.