Sustainable development is one of the most important issues that can be considered from different aspects and in different contexts including sustainable agriculture. This study aimed to investigate the main strategies related to sustainable development of rice production as an important agricultural product in Guilan Province using a SWOT analysis. To this end, different internal (strengths and weaknesses) and external (opportunities and threats) factors affecting rice production development were reviewed in the literature. Next, a questionnaire was designed based on the potential opportunities, threats, strengths and weaknesses in the literature and the initial interview of the experts; then, the experts were asked to determine the importance of factors on a five-point Likert type scale. The results showed that the rice production received the total scores of 2.14 and 2.24 for the External Factor Evaluation (EFE) matrix and the Internal Factor Evaluation (IFE) matrix, respectively, indicating the ineffectiveness of the industry's strategies. These scores mapped the position of rice production in Guilan Province. Finally, a number of strategies for sustainable development of rice crop were outlined in order to reduce the weaknesses, avoid the threats, improve the strengths, and grasp the opportunities for the rice production of Guilan Province.


The breed patterns in growth and distribution of muscle were studied using three breeds of beef cattle entering fattening phase. This study involved 23 grass-fed steer Brahman, 24 Hereford and 22 Brahman x Hereford crosses with a live weight range of 300 to 600 kgs. An allometric Huxley model was used to study the growth and distribution patterns of muscle tissue within wholesale cut.  There were several cuts in which the muscle growth coefficients were significantly different among breeds. Comparisons of muscle weight distribution at log natural of 75 kg side muscle + bone weight (4.313 kg) generally showed significant between-breed differences. Herefords tended to have more muscles in their wholesale cuts than Brahmans and/or Brahman x Hereford crosses, except the muscles in Tenderloin, Rib Set and Chuck. Brahmans had heavier Topside and Silverside than Herefords and Brahman x Hereford crosses and the differences were maintained at log natural of 114 kg side muscle + bone weight (4.733 kg).  At this heavier weight, there was a general tendency for Brahmans to have more muscle in their wholesale cuts than the Brahman x Hereford steers, except the muscle in Loin and Neck + Sticking.


Cicero (54 bc/2009) held that gratitude "is not only the greatest, but is also the parent of all the other virtues" (p. 80). For centuries philosophers (Hume, 1739–40/2007; Mather, 1732; Smith, 1759/2000) and writers (e.g., Dickens [1860–1861/1996], Great Expectations, and Shakespeare [1605/2005], King Lear) have seemed to agree with Cicero, at least considering gratitude as a virtue and treating ingratitude as a moral failing. Moreover, human beings are not alone in responding positively to those who have provided them with help (de Waal, 2006, 2010). Nonetheless, gratitude is clearly not something that is innate (Emmons & Shelton, 2002), and therefore, its development is worthy of study.


In order to evaluate the relationship between morphological characters in rice lines two populations at F3 generation were grown in research field of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resource University, Sari, Iran, during 2012. Statistical analysis on important agronomic traits showed that maximum standard deviation belonged to total grain number followed by filled grains per panicle and grain yield. Result of correlation analysis revealed positive and significant relation of grain yield per plant with panicle length, panicle per plant, total grain number and filled grains per panicle. Path coefficient analysis indicated that filled grains per panicle had highest direct effect on yield followed by panicle length, plant height, and panicle per plant. Panicle per plant had highest indirect effect on grain yield. This study revealed that selection based on filled grains per panicle, panicle length and panicle per plant will be highly effective for yield improvement in rice breeding programs


Our work investigates students' perception of collaborative expertise and the role of inquirybased learning in the context of team-based entrepreneurship education. Specifically, we examine students' perception of communication, division of work, shared goals, team conflicts and lead ership in their respective teams. In addition, we look at the role that experts play in constructing students' understanding and learning when engaging in entrepreneurial ventures. To that purpose we extracted the types of sources that teams used to validate their hypotheses about revenue streams, customer relationships, or value propositions. We are using a mixed-method approach to data collection through peer-reviews, business model canvases, and status reports. This paper reports results from a study implemented in a graduate-level entrepreneurship course with a focus on sustainability and energy. Results of the peer-reviews indicate that composite scores increased between the midpoint and the end of the course. Although, female students received higher evalu ations than male students, these differences were not statistically significant. The status reports and business model canvases revealed that teams utilize a range of first-hand and public sources such as expert interviews, publications and self-generated calculations to construct their business models. Finally, we found that teams engaged with experts from a variety of fields and job functions, ranging from fellow students to managers.


Jamming-resistant broadcast communication is crucial for many safety-critical applications such as emergency alert broadcasts or the dissemination of navigation signals in
 adversarial settings. Shared by these applications is the need for guaranteed authenticity and availability of messages which are broadcasted by base stations to a large and unknown number of
 (potentially untrusted) receivers. Common techniques to counter jamming attacks such as Direct-Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS) and Frequency Hopping are based on secrets that need to be
 shared between the sender and the receivers before the start of the communication. However, relying broadcast anti-jamming communication on either secret pairwise or group keys suffers from
 serious and sometimes even unsolvable scalability and keysetup problems or from weak jamming-resistance, respectively. In this work, we therefore propose a solution called Uncoordinated DSSS
 (UDSSS) that enables spread-spectrum anti-jamming broadcast communication without the requirement of shared secrets. It is applicable to broadcast scenarios in which receivers hold a
 certificate of the sender's public key, but do not share a secret key with it. UDSSS can handle an unlimited amount of receivers while being secure against malicious receivers. We analyze the
 security and latency of UDSSS and complete our work by an experimental evaluation on a prototype implementation.


During and after the Taiping Civil War (1851–64), the notion of the Other was implicated in the provocation and mediation of violence and, as a result, acquired a multitude of new meanings and manifestations. Focusing on the discourse surrounding the Taiping War, this article explores the multiple political, moral, and cultural implications embedded in the idea of otherness. Unpacking the propaganda discourse of both the Taiping rebels and the Qing government, the author investigates the making of the political enemy by opposing regimes. In particular, the construction of a religious and political enemy is vital to Taiping identity formation. The author focuses on marginal figures in historical and fictional accounts who traverse political boundaries and constitute a third category beyond demarcations of "us" and Other in Taiping propaganda and its Qing counterpart. In short stories, however, these figures are subject to moral judgment and thus subsumed under another form of normative narrative involving otherness. Only in the realm of fantasy and imagination are political and moral efforts to construct and modulate otherness finally called into question. This article explores the acute malleability of the Other during the violent and chaotic Taiping Civil War and in its aftermath.


Going against conventional marketing wisdom, Absolute Value reveals what really influences customers today and offers a new framework-the Influence Mix, a totally new way of thinking about consumer decision making and marketing, and about developing more effective business strategies. How people buy things has changed profoundly-yet the fundamental thinking about consumer decision-making and marketing has not. Most marketers still believe that they can shape consumers' perception and drive their behavior. In this provocative book, Stanford professor Itamar Simonson and bestselling author Emanuel Rosen show why current mantras are losing their relevance. When consumers base their decisions on reviews from other users, easily accessed expert opinions, price comparison apps, and other emerging technologies, everything changes. Absolute Value answers the pressing questions of how to influence customers in this new age. Simonson and Rosen point out the old-school marketing concepts that need to change and explain how a company should design its communication strategy, market research program, and segmentation strategy in the new environment. Filled with deep analysis, case studies, and cutting-edge research, this forward-looking book provides a totally new way of thinking about marketing.


Two sets of related experiments are presented here. In the first, measurements of shear Alfven waves are used to test the predictions of a variety of different electron collision operators, including several Krook collision operators as well as a Lorentz collision operator. New expressions for the collisional warm-plasma dielectric tensor resulting from the use of the fully-magnetized collisional Boltzmann equation are presented here. Theoretical predictions for the parallel phase velocity and damping as a function of perpendicular wave number k⊥ are derived from the dielectric tensor. Laboratory measurements of the parallel phase velocity and damping of shear Alfven waves were made to test these theoretical predictions in both the kinetic (vte ≫ vA) and inertial (vte ≪ vA) parameter regimes and at several wave frequencies (ω < ωci). Results show that in the inertial regime, the best match between measurements and theory occur when any of the Krook operators are used to describe electron collisions. In contrast, the best agreement in the kinetic regime is found when collisions are completely ignored. In the second set of experiments, whistler waves were launched and received by a pair of dipole antennas immersed in the plasma at two positions along the background magnetic field. According to warm-plasma theory, there is absorbtion of the whistler wave when ω = |ωce| = eB/me due to resonance with the electrons. The whistler frequency was swept from somewhat below up to the electron cyclotron frequency |ωce|. As the frequency was swept, the wave was resonantly absorbed by those parts of electron phase space density which were Doppler shifted into resonance. The transmission of the wave through the plasma was measured. This measurement of transmission can be converted into a measure of the parallel electron distribution function. This diagnostic is designed to attempt to measure modifications to the parallel electron distribution function due to interactions with inertial Alfven waves. 2 Abstract Approved: Thesis Supervisor Title and Department


Every year thousands of pilgrims travel to Brindavan, the village where Krishna is said to have lived as a child. There they witness a series of religious dramas called raslilas, whose central roles are performed by children. John Hawley provides a perspective on the mythology of Krishna as Hindus experience it today.


A spatial analytic methodology incorporating true locations is demonstrated using Monte Carlo simulations as a complement to current psychometric and quality of life indices for measuring community inclusion. Moran 'sl,a measure of spatial autocorrelation, is used to determine spatial dependencies in housing patterns for multiple variables, including family/friends involvement in future planning, home size, and earned income. Simulations revealed no significant spatial autocorrelation, which is a socially desirable result for housing locations for people with disabilities. Assessing the absence of clustering provides a promising methodology for measuring community inclusion.


Verb compounding in Khoekhoe, a branch of the Khoe family, has been claimed to be directly related to similar constructions in the Tuu family. Compound verbs are also found in the other primary branch of Khoe, Kalahari Khoe. In this paper I argue that verb compounding in both Khoe branches is inherited from Proto-Khoe. More specifically, I claim that contrary to a widely held opinion the so-called 'juncture' – a marker typically found in compound verbs in Kalahari Khoe – has a cognate in Khoekhoe in the form of a specific tone change. This means that in the area of verb compounding the two branches are more similar and the Tuu substrate in Khoekhoe is weaker than appears to have been thought.


DNA methylation at the 5 position of cytosine is a well-characterized epigenetic modification that is important for essential cellular processes including stem cell proliferation and differentiation. 5-methylcytosine (5mC) can be oxidized by the Ten Eleven Translocation (TET) family of enzymes to 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC), which has been suggested as either an intermediate in DNA demethylation or as an independent epigenetic modification that directly regulates gene expression. Gene silencing and activation are important processes in embryonic stem cells (ESCs) and intestinal stem cells (ISCs) for their self-renewal and differentiation, but our understanding of the potential role of 5hmC and TET hydroxylases in these processes is still limited. Here, I generate genome-wide maps of the 5hmC mark in ISCs and their differentiated progeny and utilize Tet1-/mice model to investigate the role of TET1 in the intestinal epithelium. Genes with high levels of hydroxymethylation in ISCs are strongly enriched for developmental regulation functions. The Tet1-deficient postnatal intestine shows significantly reduced numbers of proliferative cells and decreased Wnt target genes expression, which correlates with lower 5hmC levels at their promoters. These data demonstrate that Tet1-mediated DNA hydroxymethylation is important for the self-renewal of the intestinal epithelium. To determine a novel role of 5hmC, we perform integrative analyses of various epigenomic sequencing datasets, and identify a group of distal transcription factor binding sites as putative silenced enhancers, which are lacking active histone marks and nascent transcription, but are nevertheless highly enriched for the 5hmC modification in ESCs. During lineage specification of ESCs, these silenced elements lose 5hmC and acquire the H3K4me1/2 histone marks and become active. I demonstrate that these elements function as enhancers when the 5hmC mark is removed by a reporter assays. These data suggest that 5hmC suppresses the activity of a specific subset of enhancers in ESCs. In summary, DNA hydroxymethylation contributes to both transcriptional activation and repression for epigenetic gene regulation in stem cells. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Cell & Molecular Biology First Advisor Klaus H. Kaestner This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: http://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1814


Iron deficiency chlorosis (FeDC) causes extensive reduction in yields of edi- ble dry beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) grown on high-pH and calcareous soils. Fifteen bean cultivars/lines differing in response to FeDC were grown 2 years (1988 and 1989) on a high-pH (8.0), calcareous (2.3% calcium carbonate equivalent in surface 20 cm), and low-Fe (2.2 mg Fe/kg) Typic Haplustolls silt loam in the field (central Nebraska) to determine the effects of FeDC on seed yield of cultivars/lin es sprayed with Fe. A significant interaction (P < 0.05) between cultivars/lines × Fe spray treatment was noted for visual FeDC ratings in 1988 only, and no significant interactions were noted for seed yield either year. Sprayed cultivars/lines generally produced higher yields than unsprayed ones. Overall increases were 47% in 1988 and 41% in 1989. Even though only slight FeDC was noted on some cultivars/lines receiving no Fe spray, seed yields were significantly increased when sprayed with Fe. Some cultivars/lines with moderate or moderately severe FeDC ratings did not show a significant increase in yield when sprayed with Fe, while other cultivars/lines did. Seed yield reductions for the cultivars/ lines per unit of FeDC rating (1 = green to 5 = severe chlorosis) were 915 kg·ha -1


Abstract This paper examines the long-run and short-run determinants of unleaded petrol price in Australia's capital cities using monthly data to find out whether prices respond asymmetrically to external shocks. Based on the cointegration test results and the estimated asymmetric short-run dynamic models, it is found that: (1) in the long-run petrol prices are mainly determined by Tapis crude oil and Singapore petrol prices; (2) there is some evidence of asymmetric price adjustments in the short-run since petrol price increases have been mostly passed on to the consumer faster than price decreases in four capital cities. More specifically, this paper provides convincing evidence in support of asymmetric price adjustments and the "rockets-and-feathers hypothesis" in Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney. One can thus argue that there are a significant degree of market inefficiency and/or collusion, requiring a closer government price monitoring and scrutiny. Abstract This paper examines the long-run and short-run determinants of unleaded petrol price in Australia's capital cities using monthly data to find out whether prices respond asymmetrically to external shocks. Based on the cointegration test results and the estimated asymmetric short-run dynamic models, it is found that: (1) in the long-run petrol prices are mainly determined by Tapis crude oil and Singapore petrol prices; (2) there is some evidence of asymmetric price adjustments in the short-run since petrol price increases have been mostly passed on to the consumer faster than price decreases in four capital cities. More specifically, this paper provides convincing evidence in support of asymmetric price adjustments and the "rockets-and-feathers hypothesis" in Adelaide, Brisbane Melbourne and Sydney. One can thus argue that there are a significant degree of market inefficiency and/or collusion, requiring a closer government price monitoring and scrutiny.


As the mobile appliance is applied to many ubiquitous services and the importance of the information stored in it is increased, the security issue to protect the information becomes one of the major concerns. However, most previous researches focused only on the communication security, not the storage security. Especially, a flash memory whose operational characteristics are different from those of HDD is used increasingly as a storage device for the mobile appliance because of its resistance to physical shock and lower power requirement. In this paper, we propose a flash memory management scheme targeted for guaranteeing the data integrity of the mobile storage. By maintaining the old data specified during the recovery window, we can recover the old data when the mobile appliance is attacked. Also, to reduce the storage requirement for the recovery, we restrict the number of versions to be copied, called Degree of Integrity (DoI). Especially, we consider both the reclaim efficiency and the wear leveling which is a unique characteristic of the flash memory. Based on the performance evaluation, we confirm that the proposed scheme can be acceptable to many applications as a flash memory management scheme for improving data integrity.


Although the biological roots of aggression have been the source of intense debate, the precise physiological mechanisms responsible for aggression remain poorly understood. In most species, aggression is more common in males than females; thus, gonadal hormones have been a focal point for research in this field. Although gonadal hormones have been shown to influence the expression of aggression, in many cases aggression can continue after castration, indicating that testicular steroids are not completely essential for the expression of aggression. Recently, the mammalian neuropeptide arginine vasopressin (AVP) has been implicated in aggression. AVP plays a particularly important role in social behavior in monogamous mammals, such as prairie voles (Microtus ochrogaster). In turn, the effects of social experiences may be mediated by neuropeptides, including AVP. For example, sexually naïve prairie voles are rarely aggressive. However, 24 h after the onset of mating, males of this species become significantly aggressive toward strangers. Likewise, in adult male prairie voles, central (intracerebroventricular) injections of AVP can significantly increase intermale aggression, suggesting a role for AVP in the expression of postcopulatory aggression in adult male prairie voles. In this paper, we demonstrate that early postnatal exposure to AVP can have long-lasting effects on the tendency to show aggression, producing levels of aggression in sexually naïve, adult male prairie voles that are comparable to those levels observed after mating. Females showed less aggression and were less responsive to exogenous AVP, but the capacity of an AVP V(1a) receptor antagonist to block female aggression also implicates AVP in the development of female aggression.


We have studied a new heterogeneous liquid-crystalline material where H-bonded polymer–azo-dye complexes are used as dopants to the liquid crystal (LC) bulk at a very low concentration. Double enhancement of the holographic gratings' diffraction efficiency occurred in the complex-doped LC compared to dye-doped LC. The grating formation/relaxation processes in complex-doped LC showed anomalies that were explained by the presence of polymer with H bonds. The gratings appeared to be formed due to a change of both the absorption coefficient and refractive index. Using such complexes as dopants gives perspectives for tuning and control of the LC properties, and for possible optical applications.


Honorable Mention at 2015 PROSE Awards! In this book, Dr. Michael Lawton shares his expertise and lessons learned from his years of dedication to vascular neurosurgery. He describes his take on AVMs in the preface as a battle and his book contains many take-home lessons. His presentation is enhanced by the spectacular intraoperative color images and illustrations drawn by Kenneth X. Probst. With no reservations, I highly recommend this book to all neurosurgeons. -- Doody's Enterprises, Inc. This sequel to Dr. Lawton's best-selling Seven Aneurysms focuses on microsurgical resection techniques for AVMs found in the lobes and deep regions of the brain. It categorizes the techniques into subtypes to simplify the broad spectrum of brain AVMs neurosurgeons may encounter. The book is organized into three sections: The Tenets, which establishes eight steps for AVM resection; The Seven Arteriovenous Malformations, which describes the anatomical terrain and surgical strategies for thirty-two AVM subtypes; and The Selection section, in which Dr. Lawton discusses what he believes to be the keys to successful AVM surgery: good patient selection and best application of multiple treatment modalities. Key Features: * Includes more than 700 spectacular full-color illustrations developed exclusively for this book* Creates a system for conceptualizing and approaching AVMs* Illustrates a stepwise process for AVM resection using strategic "battle plans" Summarizing the common AVMs encountered in practice, neurosurgeons and neurosurgical residents will find this hybrid atlas-text to be an essential part of their armamentarium.


METRIC REPRESENTATIONS OF NETWORKS Santiago Segarra Alejandro Ribeiro The goal of this thesis is to analyze networks by first projecting them onto structured metric-like spaces – governed by a generalized triangle inequality – and then leveraging this structure to facilitate the analysis. Networks encode relationships between pairs of nodes, however, the relationship between two nodes can be independent of the other ones and need not be defined for every pair. This is not true for metric spaces, where the triangle inequality imposes conditions that must be satisfied by triads of distances and these must be defined for every pair of nodes. In general terms, this additional structure facilitates the analysis and algorithm design in metric spaces. In deriving metric projections for networks, an axiomatic approach is pursued where we encode as axioms intuitively desirable properties and then seek for admissible projections satisfying these axioms. Although small variations are introduced throughout the thesis, the axioms of projection – a network that already has the desired metric structure must remain unchanged – and transformation – when reducing dissimilarities in a network the projected distances cannot increase – shape all of the axiomatic constructions considered. Notwithstanding their apparent weakness, the aforementioned axioms serve as a solid foundation for the theory of metric representations of networks. We begin by focusing on hierarchical clustering of asymmetric networks, which can be framed as a network projection problem onto ultrametric spaces. We show that the set of admissible methods is infinite but bounded in a well-defined sense and state additional desirable properties to further winnow the admissibility landscape. Algorithms for the clustering methods developed are also derived and implemented. We then shift focus to projections onto generalized q-metric spaces, a parametric family containing among others the (regular) metric and ultrametric spaces. A uniqueness result is shown for the projection of symmetric networks whereas for asymmetric networks we prove that all admissible projections are contained between two extreme methods. Furthermore, projections are illustrated via their implementation for efficient search and data visualization. Lastly, our analysis is extended to encompass projections of dioid spaces, natural algebraic generalizations of weighted networks.


"The Product Manager's Desk Reference is outstandingin covering the breadth of the tasks and thoughtprocesses involved in product and innovation management." -George Castellion, SSC Associates "Every product manager will greatly benefit from having this reference manual in their office as they live through the exciting twists and turns of product management." -David Anderson, Managing Director, B2B Channels, United Airlines "An excellent tool for beginners and experts alike. Steven Haines's practical experience and knowledge shine through at every step." -David Rosshirt, Director of Product Management, First Data International "From now on, this book will stand as an important reference point for all product management teams." -Mark Elliott, Vice President Product Management, Smiths Detection "The Product Manager's Desk Reference is the book all product managers have been waiting for. It is concise, to the point, and comprehensive." -Carol-Ann Matignon-Berlioz, Vice President Product Management, Fair Isaac "A must-have for every product manager, this book contains a wealth of information, advice and practical tools that will lead to success for both the Product Manager and the organizations they serve." -Jeff Anderson, Senior Vice President Product Management, Franklin Covey "Steven Haines covers this multifaceted topic in a systemic manner that makes the book easy to navigate. His groundbreaking proposal that Product Management become a formal disciple is an accurate reflection of the acute need for these skills in the business community." -Dan O'Day, Senior Director Product Management, Thomson Reuters About the Book Whether a business sells tangible goods or services, product management holds a critical position in the organization's pursuit of profits. Because traditional departmental roles continually evolve, and because the business climate is so competitive, the job of product manager has become exceedingly critical-yet it remainsvery complex. The Product Manager's Desk Reference is the first book to lay down a comprehensive body of knowledge for thiscritical function, and it is the only book that can effectively guide product managers so that they can establish and build a successfulcareer in product management. Here, product management expert and practitioner Steven Haines clearly illustrates the entire product life cycle, from beginning to end. This outstanding work is packed with an array of best practices and helpful hints which are critical to the efficient management of products. The Product Manager's Desk Reference is punctuated with useful diagrams, tables,and templates and will help you: Create a master plan of record for your product Formulate actionable strategies Incorporate market data into important decisions Set the stage for creating innovative products Optimize existing products and product portfolios Apply financial techniques to manage product profitability The Product Manager's Desk Reference embodieseverything "Product Management." It is a comprehensive, versatile, must-have resource for anyone who works in any company, in any industry, who seeks to successfully and profitably market and manage products and services.


In this note, a longstanding indeterminacy in the solution of self-similar mixing layers is resolved. Here, it is shown that the boundary condition that offers the largest set of self-similar solutions is the specification of the vertical velocity at infinity, which also quantifies the value of the stream function there and the net inflow/outflow at infinity. This is referred to as the entrainment boundary condition. Other conditions that have been suggested to close the problem yield a subset of solutions and thus represent a loss of generality. The entrainment boundary condition determines the spatial growth rate and the spreading parameter for a given mixing layer, which were previously thought to be determined through experiment and empirical matching to a linearized version of the problem. These statements are validated using existing experimental data.


The potential dissociation between muscle strength and size has led to interest in the ability to assess muscle quality across the lifespan. Objectives: We examined the association between echo intensity and specific tension in middle-school boys. Approach: Twenty-five boys participated in this study. Sixteen (mean  ±  SD age  =  12  ±  1 years) engaged in a 16-week after-school strength and conditioning program. Nine boys (12  ±  1 years) served as controls. The program involved two 90 min sessions per week of lower-body speed, power, and resistance training. Before and after the intervention, ultrasound imaging was used to quantify vastus lateralis and rectus femoris echo intensity. Main results: Specific tension was calculated as voluntary isometric peak torque divided by dual energy x-ray absorptiometry-derived thigh lean mass (Nm kg−1). The pretest echo intensity and specific tension data were not significantly correlated (r  =  0.040, p  =  0.850). Training resulted in a small mean increase in specific tension (change  =  1.93 Nm kg−1; d  =  0.42). The echo intensity values were not affected by training or maturation (training change  =  −1.13 arbitrary units (A.U.); control  =  0.00 A.U.). Both variables showed no interaction and no group or time main effects. The echo intensity and specific tension change scores were not correlated for all subjects (r  =  −0.080, p  =  0.705) or groups (training r  =  −0.095, p  =  0.727; control r  =  −0.004, p  =  0.992). Significance: In middle-school boys, a relationship between echo intensity and the ratio of muscle strength relative to lean mass does not exist.


This is the first attempt of its kind made to analyse the evolution of the urban pattern of Southeast Asia as a whole during the 19th and 20th centuries. The main objective of this study is to collect sufficient information and data to fill in the "gaps" in our knowledge of the development of Southeast Asian cities. It empliasizes the influence of political and socio-economic changes on the growth of urban centres both in space and time. The study brings out the essential character of the Southeast Asian cities, i.e. it shows their growth, their decay and the different stages reached in the process of urban evolution. Chapter I outlines the general characteristics of the region which have direct or indirect influence upon urban development in the past as well as present. Chapter II addresses itself to the historical development of urban settlements in the early centuries. Emphasis is placed on the genesis of sacred-capital cities on mainland Southeast Asia as well as port-cities in the maritime part of the region. The development of early colonial cities in the Philippines and Indonesia is also examined. Urban development in the last 160 years was largely the result of a long interplay of colonial economic forces. Chapter III is devoted to an analysis of the drastic political and socio-economic changes which took place in the 19th century and how they generated the new urban network in the region. The 20th century witnessed the rapid spread of towns and cities over the surface of Southeast Asia. Chapter IV examines the changing pattern and the factors which led to this unprecedented urban growth. Chapter V focusses upon the development of metropolises in the region. With the aid of maps, their growth patterns are examined and characteristics described. Within the framework of the rank-size rule, the city-size distribution of each country is examined and its hierarchal characteristics analysed. The future urban pattern is being formed by today's process of growth. The concluding chapter looks at the problems facing Southeast Asian cities. Some suggestions are raised for a national urban policy and for a more positive approach to urban and regional planning in the region.


Since 1982, in order to raise the global technology competitiveness, the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) in Taiwan, ROC, has offered about five hundred million US dollars each year to support applied research in technology development through a program called "Science and Technology Projects (STP)". This research reports an operational model called IPRCE (Input-Process-Result-Channel-Effect) for management and performance evaluation. To achieve operational effectiveness and efficiency of the STP, this research conducts three forums among members of industry, government, Legislative Yuan, and academia. In the first forum, the evaluation criteria and items in IPRCE are evaluated and approved. In the second forum, the weighting system for IPRCE criteria is determined for reference in actual STP evaluation. From the weights of the five stages in IPRCE, it is found that the professionals focus on the effectiveness rather than efficiency. In the third forum, the processes of STP operation are investigated thoroughly and comprehensive suggestions induced. According to the suggestions of professionals, the MOEA plans to do some milestone changes: 1. to change proposal operation from bottom-up to top-down, 2. to open the STP to industries, 3. to reduce the proposing process from 18 months to 6 months.


Objectives The main aim of this study was to compare two days of continuous monitored capillary blood glucose (CGM) responses to sitting and standing in normally desk-based workers. Design, setting and participants This open repeated-measures study took place in a real office environment, during normal working hours and subsequent CGM overnight measures in 10 participants aged 21–61 years (8 female). Main outcomes Postprandial (lunch) measures of: CGM, accelerometer movement counts (MC) heart rate, energy expenditure (EE) and overnight CGM following one afternoon of normal sitting work compared with one afternoon of the same work performed at a standing desk. Results Area-under-the-curve analysis revealed an attenuated blood glucose excursion by 43% (p=0.022) following 185 min of standing (143, 95% CI 5.09 to 281.46 mmol/L min) compared to sitting work (326; 95% CI 228 to 425 mmol/L min). Compared to sitting, EE during an afternoon of standing work was 174 kcals greater (0.83 kcals/min; p=0.028). The accelerometer MC showed no differences between the afternoons of seated versus standing work; reported differences were thus a function of the standing work and not from additional physical movements around the office. Conclusions This is the first known 'office-based' study to provide CGM measures that add some of the needed mechanistic information to the existing evidence-base on why avoiding sedentary behaviour at work could lead to a reduced risk of cardiometabolic diseases.


Offers suggestions for making classroom and teaching practice more effective for bilingual and bidialectical pupils. Case studies are used, which give voice to student and practising teacher perspectives which are often unheard. This book will help teachers develop practice that combats actual exclusion and the symbolic exclusion that some multicultured students experience.


Several theories of aging (e.g., activity theory, continuity theory) have guided leisure and aging research over the past several decades. Most of these theories originated in the fields of psychology or sociology and have been applied by leisure scholars. Recently, Innovation Theory of Successful Aging was postulated to specifically explore leisure in retirement (Nimrod & Kleiber, 2007). Unlike previous theories which suggest that older adults either maintain similar leisure patterns or cease participation, innovation theory indicates that older adults seek out new leisure opportunities in later life in order to reinvent or preserve a sense of self (Nimrod, 2008). Similarly, it suggests that adopting new leisure activities in retirement can promote personal growth in later life. However, Nimrod and Kleiber suggest that because the theory is at "a formative stage," (p. 18) additional research is necessary to refine it. Therefore, in this presentation, we will explore the relevance of Innovation Theory for Canadian baby boomers transitioning to retirement. We utilized a multi-author blog to understand baby boomers' experiences of leisure as they transitioned to retirement. Participants included twenty-five adults who were planning to retire within five years or who had recently retired. Participants blogged about leisure and retirement for three two-week sessions over several months, followed by in-person focus groups, which were digitally recorded and transcribed verbatim. While participants were invited to write about topics of their choosing, guiding questions were provided as a starting point for discussion. Questions included: What did you do with your free time today? Were any of these activities new? What do these activities mean to you? Data were analyzed following Charmaz's (2014) initial, focused, and selective coding. Participants valued leisure throughout the retirement transition as it helped them embrace the challenges and joys of this new life phase. Pre-retirement participants viewed leisure as an escape from work related stress and looked forward to increased free time to pursue both new and long-held interests. Retirees had more time to invest in pursuit of lifelong activities and discovering new activities that upheld lifelong values (e.g., a participant who valued physical activity took up crossfit). Along with pursuing new and former leisure, participants described both developing new social relationships and rekindling old ones. A minority of participants struggled to identify meaningful opportunities to replace feelings of accomplishment found in the workplace. The findings indicate that innovation theory may be relevant in explaining leisure engagement amongst baby boomers transitioning to retirement. Participants pursued activities that were meaningful and contributed to a sense of well-being in retirement such as personal growth, health and well-being, and time with loved ones. Thus, their leisure choices contributed to both self-reinvention innovation and self-preservation innovation (Nimrod & Hutchinson, 2010; Nimrod & Kleiber, 2007). Research suggests that baby boomers are markedly different from previous generations and may have more inclination to adopt new leisure activities in later life (Pruchno, 2012). Additional research is needed to explore leisure innovation beyond the initial transition as baby boomers begin to settle into retirement.


In 1991, Edelsbrunner and Tan gave an O(n2) algorithm for finding the MinMax Length triangulation of a set of points in the plane, but stated the complexity of finding a MaxMin Edge Length Triangulation (MELT) as a natural open problem. We resolve this long-standing problem by showing that computing a MELT is NP-complete. Moreover, we prove that (unless P=NP), there is no polynomial-time approximation algorithm that can approximate MELT within any polynomial factor.

While this may be taken as conclusive evidence from a theoretical point of view that the problem is hopelessly intractable, it still makes sense to consider powerful optimization methods, such as integer programming (IP), in order to obtain provably optimal solutions for intances of non-trivial size. A straightforward IP based on pairwise disjointness of the Θ(n2) segments between the n points has Θ(n4) constraints, making this IP hopelessly intractable from a practical point of view, even for relatively small n. The main algorithm engineering twist of this paper is to demonstrate how the combination of geometric insights with refined methods of combinatorial optimization can still help to put together an exact method capable of computing optimal MELT solutions for planar point sets up to n = 200. Our key idea is to exploit specific geometric properties in combination with more compact IP formulations, such that we are able to drastically reduce the IPs. On the practical side, we combine two of the most powerful software packages for the individual components: CGAL for carrying out the geometric computations, and CPLEX for solving the IPs. In addition, we discuss specific analytic aspects of the speedup for random point sets.


Abstract Objective Drivers with dementia will at some stage need to stop driving. The timing of driving retirement is informed by the advice of health practitioners, however many find this task complex and challenging as they feel unprepared or lack confidence, having limited training and education on dementia and driving. Few opportunities exist for Australian health practitioners to advance learning about dementia and driving. This study evaluated the impact of a Dementia and Driving Education Module on practitioner self-perceived knowledge, confidence, and competence in supporting people living with dementia with decisions about driving. Methods A single group, pretest-posttest survey was conducted for this study. Health practitioners were recruited over 19 months via email and invited to attend a face-to-face dementia and driving workshop. The workshop comprised of a two-hour Dementia and Driving Education Module including seven learning activities incorporating six vignettes, five self-reflections, one case study and a paper copy of a dementia and driving decision aid. Participants completed a survey prior to, immediately after and six weeks post completion of the education module. Results A total of 240 health practitioners, from over six disciplines, took part in one of eleven workshops delivered via face-to-face and online across five states of Australia. Significant increases occurred in all outcome measures of perceived knowledge, confidence and competence between baseline and immediately post-education module survey responses and between baseline and six weeks post-survey responses. Conclusions The Dementia and Driving Education Module and accompanying decision aid demonstrate an efficacious solution for a diverse range of health practitioners to enhance their knowledge, confidence, and competence in supporting people living with dementia with driving retirement decisions.


Chemical processes at the interfaces often differ kinetically and mechanistically from the bulk counterparts, partly due to the concentration inhomogeneity of different chemicals at the interfaces. The fractionation of chemicals at the interfaces not only determines their interfacial concentrations, but also affects the physicochemical properties of the interfaces. In this thesis, three sets of chemicals/interfaces with important environmental implications are studied: (1) anion fractionation at the gas–liquid microdroplet interfaces, (2) fractionation of perfluoroalkyl surfactants and matrix components at the bubble–water interface in ultrasonically irradiated solutions, and (3) ion fractionation across the ice–water interface during the freeze–thaw cycle of electrolyte solutions.

The relative anion affinity for the air–water interface, as measured by Electrospray Mass Spectrometry (ES–MS), is exponentially correlated with ionic radius. The affinities respond differently to different additives, suggesting that specific anion effects are due to different energy levels of physical interactions. Relative anion affinities at the air–methanol interfaces are almost identical to those at the air–water interface, suggesting that surface structure is not the primary driving force for interfacial anion fractionation.

Perfluoroalkyl carboxylates and sulfonates can be transferred from the ocean to marine aerosols due to their high affinity for the air–water interface, but transfer to gas phase is unlikely as they remain deprotonated in aqueous phase because of their low pKa. Organic matrix components may reduce the sonochemical kinetics of Perfluorooctanesulfonate (PFOS) and Perfluorooctanoate (PFOA) by competitive adsorption onto the bubble–water interface or by lowering the interfacial temperatures. Inorganic anions, but not cations, may significantly enhance or reduce the sonochemical kinetics of PFOS and PFOA. The specific anion effects following the Hofmeister series are likely related to anions' partitioning to and interaction with the bubble–water interface.

Time–resolved confocal fluorescence microscopy of freezing electrolyte solutions reveals that the thickness of interstitial liquid films depends non–monotonically on electrolyte concentration. It also confirms that selective incorporation of cations (anions) into the ice lattice decreases (increases) the pH of the interstitial liquid films. Since the magnitude of pH change during freezing is smaller than during the subsequent thawing process, it is likely to be limited by the seepage of proton or hydroxide slowly produced via water dissociation.


Author(s): Kendall, Alissa; Harvey, John; Butt, Ali A.; Lozano, Mark T.; Saboori, Arash; Kim, Changmo | Abstract: Local governments have steadily increased their initiative to address global climate change, and many present their proposed strategies through climate action plans (CAPs). This study conducts a literature review on current local approaches to greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction strategies by assessing CAPs in California and presents common strategies in the transportation sector along with useful tools. One identified limitation of many CAPs is the omission of quantitative economic cost and emissions data for decision-making on the basis of cost-effectiveness. Therefore, this study proposes a framework for comparing strategies based on their life cycle emissions mitigation potential and costs. The results data can be presented in a marginal abatement cost curve (MACC) to allow for side-by-side comparison of considered strategies. Researchers partnered with Yolo and Unincorporated Los Angeles Counties to analyze 7 strategies in the transportation and energy sectors (five and two, respectively). A MACC was subsequently developed for each county. Applying the life cycle approach revealed strategies that had net cost savings over their life cycle, indicating there are opportunities for reducing emissions and costs. The MACC also revealed that some emissions reduction strategies in fact increased emissions on a life cycle basis. Applying the MACC framework to two case study jurisdictions illustrated both the feasibility and challenges of including quantitative analysis in their decision-making process. An additional barrier to using the MACC framework in the context of CAPs, is the mismatch between a life cycle and annual accounting basis for GHG emissions. Future work could explore more efficient data collection, alternative scopes of emissions for reporting, and environmental justice concerns.View the NCST Project Webpage


An experiment was conducted during the dry seasons in western Hararghe Zone, Eastern Ethiopia at the Haramaya University Chiro Campus to determine the effect of maize stover as soil mulch on yield of Arabica coffee. Five levels of maize stover as soil mulch at a rate of: 0t/ha, 2t/ha, 4t/ha, 6t/ha and 8t/ha were applied in randomized complete block design with four replications from 2008 to 2011. Yield data was recorded during specific phenological stage of the plant. Result from the analysis of variance from the application of maize stover as soil mulch over years showed the presence of significant difference among treatments on bean yield of Arabica coffee. The highest bean yield (1070 kg/ha) and the lowest bean yield (520 kg/ha) were noted at 8 tons/ha and 0 ton/ha, respectively. Similarly, the pooled analysis of variance over seasons corroborated that the effect of maize stover as a soil mulch at a rate of 6t/ha and 8t/ha showed the presence of no significant difference on bean yield of coffee (p<0.05). The result of the present study also elucidated that, the unmulched control plots had the lowest coffee bean yield. While application of 8 tons/ha of maize stover as a soil mulch significantly increased coffee yield both in 2010 and 2011 cropping seasons. Therefore, on the basis of these results, it can be concluded that applying maize stover as soil mulch during the dry seasons at west Hararghe can help to sustain Arabica coffee production. Thus, it is recommended that application of 8tons/ha maize stover as soil mulch can significantly increase the yield of Arabica coffee and sustains its productivity over years.


This editorial provides a new policy going forward, and reaffirms a key policy issue for journal article reporting standards to Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (JCCP). JCCP will now require all clinical trials presenting analyses of primary outcomes to be registered. By clinical trials, the author means those studies designed to examine the efficacy or effectiveness of a treatment or preventive intervention. The editorial team will be carefully screening articles for conformity to JARS/MARS guidelines, and articles may be rejected if guidelines are not followed. Although these policies will require more effort on the part of authors (and the editorial team), the author believes they reflect the best practice in clinical science and that they will have a positive effect not just on the journal but also on the field and public we ultimately serve. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).


THE COMPLEX ISSUE OF TRANSFORMATION IN EASTERN EUROPE When considering the phenomenal modalities of the transformations in Eastern Europe (EE) in general and the failure of the economic models applied in the region in particular, it becomes obvious that two areas have been underestimated by theory of transformation. First, little attention has been paid to the broader socio-cultural environment in post-communist countries. Second, the problem of hastily applied and unadjusted (neo-) liberal models has not been examined conclusively. Both areas are of course interrelated and connected to the issue of continuity and discontinuity in the Eastern European transformations. In this context, the problem of the inability of the political domain to create necessary conditions for a functioning standard market mechanism ought to be the focus of comprehensive assessment of transforming economies. Modern political comparatists seem to know one or two things about political and policy requirements regarding development of capitalism; however, even if this is the case, what they know is often tentative and pertaining to the Western experience only. They have been divided over requirements and implications of capitalist formation processes elsewhere, particularly when dealing with conceptualization of this problematic in transforming post-communist societies. Not only we deal in the latter case with the fact that the assumed original and "natural" course and order of capitalist economic development had been once reversed or diverted in the region and had to be created or recreated, but also with the fact that this (re-) birth of liberal democracy and market have been hampered by the surviving obstinate legacies of the collapsed communist monopolist rule (state socialism). As a result, in EE we have faced the complex and interrelated processes enfolding simultaneously without any proven blueprint or precedent, to which some refer to as the multifaceted transformation.(1) Accordingly, most students of Eastern Europe have agreed on that the economic and political aspects of transition/transformation have been very closely interrelated; though the modes of this relationship are so far rather underestimated in the theoretical and analytical work. The purpose of this paper is to investigate some aspects of the specific dynamism between the economic and the political spheres--by bringing to attention some inadequacies in the attempts to graft liberal (or "neo-liberal") models of capitalism (that have been the end-results of many decades of unique evolution in the Western societies) on societies with distinct cultural characteristics and existing in a different historical era. PARADOXES OF INHERENT CONDITIONS IN EASTERN EUROPEAN TRANSFORMATION At the centre of an analytical assessment of the dynamics of the transformation processes is the dilemma of continuity versus discontinuity; continuity as embodied in the legacies of communist rule and discontinuity as a deliberate effort to reorganize the system from the previous "communist" one. In an "ideal" model of post-communist transformation, reform discontinuities ought to take into full account the nature and the scale of continuities, especially those on the social and cultural levels (however not limited to these spheres only)--which has very rarely been the case. Multiple and simultaneous transitions in post-communist Eastern Europe have also meant more or less parallel beginnings of the political and economic transitions. Nevertheless, political transition (understood here as the change of the regime) has been completed faster that economic transition. According to Balcerowicz, this asymmetry "produces a historically new sequence: mass democracy l(or at least political pluralism, i.e., some degree of legal political competition) first, and market capitalism later."(2) Although this may not apply to all post-communist states to the same degree, most of them have been affected by a set of tensions within this asymmetry. …


Interpretations of women in the antebellum period have long dwelt upon the notion of public versus private gender spheres. As part of the ongoing reevaluation of the prehistory of the women's movement, Carolyn Lawes challenges this paradigm and the primacy of class motivation. She studies the women of antebellum Worcester, Massachusetts, discovering that whatever their economic background, women there publicly worked to remake and improve their community in their own image. Lawes analyzes the organized social activism of the mostly middle-class, urban, white women of Worcester and finds that they were at the center of community life and leadership. Drawing on rich local history collections, Lawes weaves together information from city and state documents, court cases, medical records, church collections, newspapers, and diaries and letters to create a portrait of a group of women for whom constant personal and social change was the norm. Throughout "Women and Reform in a New England Community," conventional women make seemingly unconventional choices. A wealthy Worcester matron helped spark a women-led rebellion against ministerial authority in the town's orthodox Calvinist church. Similarly, a close look at the town's sewing circles reveals that they were vehicles for political exchange as well as social gatherings that included men but intentionally restricted them to a subordinate role. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the women of Worcester had taken up explicitly political and social causes, such as an orphan asylum they founded, funded, and directed. Lawes argues that economic and personal instability rather than a desire for social control motivated women, even relatively privileged ones, into social activism. She concludes that the local activism of the women of Worcester stimulated, and was stimulated by, their interest in the first two national women's rights conventions, held in Worcester in 1850 and 1851. Far from being marginalized from the vital economic, social, and political issues of their day, the women of this antebellum New England community insisted upon being active and ongoing participants in the debates and decisions of their society and nation.


Of Monsoons and Megadroughts The Asian monsoon is the weather system that has the greatest effect on the greatest number of people in the world. Naturally then, knowing better how climate change might affect the monsoon is tremendously important. One obstacle that prevents a better understanding of future behavior is a poor knowledge of its past. Cook et al. (p. 486; see the Perspective by Wahl and Morrill) help to fill this gap with a 700-year reconstruction of the monsoon from tree-ring data obtained throughout Asia. The reconstruction chronicles monsoon failures and megadroughts, as well as patterns of precipitation, and can thus be compared with other relevant climate records to allow links with sea-surface temperatures to be better understood. Tree-ring data from more than 300 locations provide a 700-year-long record of monsoon variability throughout Asia. The Asian monsoon system affects more than half of humanity worldwide, yet the dynamical processes that govern its complex spatiotemporal variability are not sufficiently understood to model and predict its behavior, due in part to inadequate long-term climate observations. Here we present the Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas (MADA), a seasonally resolved gridded spatial reconstruction of Asian monsoon drought and pluvials over the past millennium, derived from a network of tree-ring chronologies. MADA provides the spatiotemporal details of known historic monsoon failures and reveals the occurrence, severity, and fingerprint of previously unknown monsoon megadroughts and their close linkages to large-scale patterns of tropical Indo-Pacific sea surface temperatures. MADA thus provides a long-term context for recent monsoon variability that is critically needed for climate modeling, prediction, and attribution.


Natural and anthropogenic disturbances influence ecological succession and impact the carbon cycle. Understanding disturbance effects and ecosystem recovery is essential to carbon modeling. We hypothesized that (1) species‐specific disturbances impact the carbon cycle differently from nonspecific disturbances. In particular, disturbances that target early‐successional species will lead to higher carbon uptake by the postrecovery, middle‐ and late‐successional community and (2) disturbances that affect the midsuccessional deciduous species have more intense and long‐lasting impacts on carbon uptake than disturbances of similar intensity that only affect the early‐successional species. To test these hypotheses, we employed a series of simulations conducted with the Ecosystem Demography model version 2 to evaluate the sensitivity of a temperate mixed‐deciduous forest to disturbance intensity and type. Our simulation scenarios included a control (undisturbed) case, a uniform disturbance case where we removed 30% of all trees regardless of their successional status, five cases where only early‐successional deciduous trees were removed with increasing disturbance intensity (30%, 70%, 85%, and 100%), and four cases of midsuccessional disturbances with increasing intensity (70%, 85%, and 100%). Our results indicate that disturbances affecting the midsuccessional deciduous trees led to larger decreases in carbon uptake as well as longer recovery times when compared to disturbances that exclusively targeted the early‐successional deciduous trees at comparable intensities. Moreover, disturbances affecting 30% to 100% of early‐successional deciduous trees resulted in an increased carbon uptake, beginning 6 years after the disturbance and sustained through the end of the 100 year simulation.


This text provides a systematic introduction to the issues involved in planning, developing, and managing effective language programs.The paperback edition provides a systematic introduction to the issues involved in developing, managing, and evaluating effective second and foreign language programs and teaching materials. Key stages in the curriculum development process are examined, including situation analysis, needs analysis, goal setting, syllabus design, materials development and adaptation, teaching and teacher support, and evaluation. Discussion activities throughout the book enable it to be used as a reference text for teachers and administrators.


Amavata, is firstly introduced as an independent disease in Madhav Nidana . It is a disease of Madhyam roga marga as it affects Sandhi and Hridya marma . Though Ama and Vata are the two main predominant pathogenic factors but the disease also represents Tridoshic vitiation. The affliction of joints by Vata dosha in association with Ama shows that both play equal role of Dosha and Dushya in the causation of this disease. This study includes evaluate the effect of Trial drugs Punarnavadi churna with Anupana of Rasna Saptak Qwatha and Eranda taila on the signs and symptoms of Amavata and also to evaluate the effect of trial drug with a standard drug Singhanada Guggulu on the signs and symptoms of Amavata . In short we can say that, Amavata is the resultant of improper digestion or partially digestion of the food particles due to hypofunction of Gatharagni and also due to accumulation of mala in the body and it is also considered as Pratham doshadusti . It may be considered as partially or incomplete metabolized Dathu in case of Dhatvagni mandata . This study might be helpful in breakdown Samprapti of Amavata roga and give right way to patient of Amavata .


ABSTRACT The suspension of operations during lockdowns facilitated a new perspective on performance: the absent came to appear as a determining factor of not only the pandemic, but became evident as constitutive of late modern theater cultures. Based on a description of the lockdown performance A Room of Our Own (2021) by the feminist collective Swoosh Lieu, it is shown how contemporary practice is relocating performance within its entanglement with the social spaces of reproduction. Emphasizing the realities of exclusion that the performing arts rest upon, the paper argues against a theory of performance as an enclosed event of participation based on an idealized idea of the social as a homogeneous microcosm. It calls instead for an empirics of assembly, and more generally to question a thinking of performance along the lines of interaction and communication. Adopting Karen Barad's concept of posthuman performativity to Theater Studies, it foregrounds the mediating function of performance in its articulation of the world and proposes to reconceptualize theater as an epistemological apparatus to invigorate a strong program of theater studies that refocuses on the socio-political real of theatricality.


Web page classification is important to many tasks in information retrieval and web mining. However, applying traditional textual classifiers on web data often produces unsatisfying results. Fortunately, hyperlink information provides important clues to the categorization of a web page. In this paper, an improved method is proposed to enhance web page classification by utilizing the class information from neighboring pages in the link graph. The categories represented by four kinds of neighbors (parents, children, siblings and spouses) are combined to help with the page in question. In experiments to study the effect of these factors on our algorithm, we find that the method proposed is able to boost the classification accuracy of common textual classifiers from around 70% to more than 90% on a large dataset of pages from the Open Directory Project, and outperforms existing algorithms. Unlike prior techniques, our approach utilizes same-host links and can improve classification accuracy even when neighboring pages are unlabeled. Finally, while all neighbor types can contribute, sibling pages are found to be the most important.


We demonstrate that vertically aligned carbon nanotubes can be synthesized directly on tantalum substrate via waterassisted chemical vapor deposition and evaluate their properties as electrochemical capacitors. The mean diameter of the carbon nanotubes was 7.1 ± 1.5 nm, and 70% of them had double walls. The intensity ratio of G-band to D-band in Raman spectra was as high as 5, indicating good quality of the carbon nanotubes. Owing to the alignment and low equivalent series resistance, the carbon nanotube based supercapacitors showed good rate performance. Rectangular shape of cyclic voltammogram was maintained even at the scan rate of > 1 V/s in 1 M sulfuric acid aqueous solution. Specific capacitance was well-retained (~94%) even when the discharging current density dramatically increased up to 145 A/g. Consequently, specific power as high as 60 kW/kg was obtained from as-grown carbon nanotubes in aqueous solution. Maximum specific energy of ~20 Wh/kg was obtained when carbon nanotubes were electrochemically oxidized and operated in organic solution. Demonstration of direct synthesis of carbon nanotubes on tantalum current collectors and their applications as supercapacitors could be an invaluable basis for fabrication of high performance carbon nanotube supercapacitors.


Myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) promote tumour progression by contributing to angiogenesis, immunosuppression, and immunotherapy resistance. Although recent studies have shown that microRNAs (miRNAs) can promote the expansion of MDSCs in the tumour environment, the mechanisms involved in this process are largely unknown. Here, we report that microRNA 449c (miR-449c) expression was upregulated in myeloid progenitor cells upon activation of CXCR2 under tumour conditions. MiR-449c upregulation increased the generation of monocytic MDSCs (mo-MDSCs). The increased expression of miR-449c could target STAT6 mRNA in myeloid progenitor cells to shift the differentiation balance of myeloid progenitor cells and lead to an enhancement of the mo-MDSCs population in the tumour environment. Thus, our results demonstrate that the miR-449c/STAT6 axis is involved in the expansion of mo-MDSCs from myeloid progenitor cells upon activation of CXCR2, and thus, inhibition of miR-449c/STAT6 signalling may help to attenuate tumour progression.


We present data on the occurrence of the invasive ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi in Norway after the initial observations made in 2005. Our data comes from several net sampling investigations conducted along the Norwegian coast in 2008– 2014, as well as beach seine bycatch from the south coast (September–October 2005–2014). In 2008–2010, M. leidyi occurred in moderate abundances (≤0.56 lobate ind m) during autumn, with northernmost observations from Trondheimsfjord. Mnemiopsis leidyi was not observed in 2011–2012 and was scarce in 2013, but in 2014 it was again abundant along the south and west coasts. While temperature and salinity conditions along the Norwegian south coast and its fjords are sufficient for survival and reproduction by M. leidyi, temperature may limit egg production rates. Biological factors including food limitation as well as competition and predation by native gelatinous predators can also constrain populations. Mnemiopsis leidyi populations in Norway are likely to exhibit source–sink dynamics, with advective losses and suboptimal conditions preventing overwintering in large areas along the coast. The presence of M. leidyi in the southern North Sea, coupled with the cyclonic circulation pattern, suggests that outbreaks may nevertheless be expected in years with favourable conditions and/or significant inflow from the southern North Sea. Climate change could enhance reproduction of M. leidyi in Norway and protected inner fjords may offer a suitable habitat for establishment of local populations in the future.


The Orangutan Facial Action Coding System (OrangFACS) is an observational tool for identifying and coding facial expressions in Orangutans. It has been adapted from the original FACS system created by Ekman and Friesen (1978).

 Since the original version FACS has been successfully adapted for several primate species, such as Chimpanzees (Vick et al., 2007), Macaques, (Parr et al., 2010) and Gibbons (Waller et al., in prep.; Burrows et al., 2011). The extensive similarities in facial musculature between humans and other primates are what makes these adaptations possible and were crucial in the develpoment of OrangFACS.

The resulting OrangFACS Manual is an objective and reliable tool which is freely available to the scientific community. OrangFACS increases potential for the study of communication, emotion and inter-species comparisons.


Through a reading of J. M. Coetzee's novel Disgrace this paper discusses the contemporary genre of reading literature in terms of an "ethics of perception." In the fourteen years since its publication the novel has elicited a rich body of commentary and criticism with an ethical edge, often focusing on the unfolding vision or stunted but developing perceptiveness of its uneasy protagonist David Lurie. This path of criticism is paradigmatic of a broader interest in studying literary works as paths to moral philosophical illumination. I discuss how the novel yields to this kind of reading, but also how this path of reading is complicated by its various other features, above all, a plurality of values that may be hard to reconcile and a Christian perspective of grace which is played against the novels secular, intellectual perspective on perceptiveness. I argue that reading Disgrace in terms of any pre-given ethical formula, however compelling, may be problematic considering the nature of Coetzee's authorship.


The role of thyroid hormone on brain development is dramatically illustrated by "cretinism," a severe mental retardation due to iodine deficiency and maternal hypothyroidism during gestation. In the last decades, the molecular bases of the cellular action of thyroid hormone in the nervous tissue have been at least partially elucidated, and the emerged picture is much more complex than expected. In this article, the main mechanisms determining thyroid hormone availability, nuclear and membrane receptor occupancy and downstream action, gene expression, and nongenomic mechanism are reviewed, focusing on myelination and myelin turnover.


Human adipose tissue has an important protein secretory function. Cytokines, hormones, prohormones and enzymes are secreted from fat cells and act in an endocrine or paracrine fashion. The production of several of these proteins is affected by obesity; normally there is an increase in the obese state. Protein production is, as a metabolic activity, subject to regional variations. In particular, the production of leptin, angiotensinogen, interleukin-6 and plasmin activator inhibitor-1 differs between subcutaneous and visceral adipose tissue sites, but no regional differences have been reported in the production of tumour necrosis factor alpha. It is possible that regional variations in protein production by adipose tissue are of importance in some of the endocrine and metabolic disturbances seen in various forms of obesity, such as visceral and upper-body obesity.


Palladium (Pd)‐based catalysts hold promise as an alternative water treatment technology for nitrate (NO3), but practical application requires a flow‐through reactor that efficiently delivers hydrogen (H2) from gas to water. A trickle bed reactor (TBR) packed with a 0.1 percent by weight (wt%) Pd–0.01 wt% In/γ‐Al2O3 (indium and porous aluminum oxide) catalyst was evaluated to address this challenge. Catalytic activity generally increased with H2 superficial velocity (0.65–29.6 m/h) and liquid (deionized water) superficial velocities from 14.8 to 26.6 m/h before decreasing at 38.5 m/h. This decrease corresponded to a change in flow regime and suggests that optimal TBR performance occurs at the transition from pulse to bubble flow. An optimal TBR activity of 19.5 ± 1.3 mg NO3/min‐g Pd was obtained; this is only ~18% of the batch reactor activity as a result of H2 mass transfer limitations, but three to 15 times greater than activities obtained with previous flow‐through reactors. Catalyst deactivation occurred in the TBR after 41 days of operation, motivating the need for improved fouling mitigation strategies.


Cut-back of a sea-cliff at Hannant Inlet in remote South-West Tasmania has exposed Oligocene clays buried under Late Pleistocene "colluvium"
from which abundant wood fragments protrude. The two units are separated by a transitional interval defined by mixed Oligocene and
Pleistocene microfloras. Microfloras preserved in situ in the clay provide a link between floras in Tasmania and other Southern Hemisphere
landmasses following onset of major glaciation in East Antarctica during the Eocene-Oligocene transition (c. 34 Ma). The Late Pleistocene
"colluvium" preserves abundant fossil pollen of the shrub conifer genus Pherosphaera (al. Microstrobos ). Assuming the parent plants had the
same upper subalpine-alpine ecology as living Pherosphaera hookeriana , the microflora provides evidence for cold, wet conditions in the
Port Davey lowlands during a low sea-level stand. The same data highlight the failure of Pherosphaera to regain its Pleistocene distribution
during the Postglacial period. Our data are inconclusive whether Late Pleistocene conditions in Hannant Inlet were periglacial, i.e., the
Oligocene sediments were turbated by freeze-thaw processes, or have been reworked by fluvial processes into the Pleistocene "colluvium".
Nevertheless, the inferred cold-climate is consistent with the former hypothesis. The sequence is sealed under cross-bedded coarse quartzite
gravels of presumed Last Glacial Stage age.


Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is a vector-borne neglected tropical disease caused by over 15 species of the intracellular Leishmania parasite. This skin infection is the most common and widely distributed form of leishmaniasis, with an estimated 0.7-1.2 million new cases annually, mainly in the Middle East and Latin America. CL is rarely fatal, but the ulcerative skin lesions often leave lifelong scars, disfigurement, and social stigma. Current treatment of CL is far from optimal. The pentavalent antimonials remain the standard of care since their discovery in the 1940s, but typically require three weeks of painful, toxic injections into the lesions. An alternative therapeutic option is liposomal amphotericin B, but cure rates are variable, access is problematic and invasive drug administration is required. Basic research tools that could accelerate the successful discovery and development of much needed new drugs are currently limited. This thesis aims to provide a coherent set of R&D methodologies to evaluate (i) the penetration of drugs into the infected skin lesions (pharmacokinetics, PK), (ii) the ability to kill the causative Leishmania parasites (pharmacodynamics, PD) and (iii) the interaction between PK and PD (PK/PD) parameters. In chapter 3.1, the limitations of the current in vitro models to predict in vivo drug activity were confirmed. Additionally, combination therapy of standard antileishmanial drugs with chloroquine was found unlikely to be a successful new treatment strategy for CL. In chapter 3.2, we demonstrated a clear relationship between PK and PD parameters for the standard liposomal amphotericin B formulation AmBisome in a mouse model of CL, providing a PK/PD basis for the rational design of better clinical dose regimens. In chapter 3.3, we compared the in vivo effects of AmBisome with Fungisome, an alternative liposomal amphotericin B formulation on the market in India. Fungisome was less efficacious than AmBisome due to lower drug accumulation in skin lesions and had a narrower therapeutic index in the treatment of murine CL. In chapter 3.4, we showed that the CL infection and associated local skin inflammation has a profound effect on the PK of AmBisome and can contribute to its variable therapeutic efficacy against Old and New World Leishmania species. The increased vascular permeability of the dermal capillaries might be exploited for enhanced delivery of small (< 500 Da) oral drugs to the infected skin. Finally, in chapter 3.5, we evaluated a new drug candidate from the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative (DNDI) for visceral leishmaniasis. Our PK and PD data, based on innovative skin microdialysis and qPCR techniques, support the further preclinical development of the nitroimidazole DNDI-0690 as a promising new oral treatment for CL. Overall, the strategies, lessons and research tools provided in this PhD thesis could contribute to the development of safe, effective, affordable and patient-friendly new drugs for the treatment of CL.


South Kordofan in located in the heart of the Sudan. During the long running civil conflict with the south, which ended with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) which was signed in January 2005, the state was at the hub of the worst civil conflicts in the country. The starting point is thus one where protracted effects of conflict and gross under-provision of basic services had resulted in widespread poverty and underdevelopment. Hence both South Kordofan's recovery from the conflict and its future prosperity are key aspects of the potential associated with peace in the country. Agriculture and natural resources are the main sources of livelihood for its 2.2 million inhabitants. At the same time, conflicts over natural resource, in particular land, were historically a major source of conflict. During much of the period of investigation for this report in 2007, implementation of the relevant CPA commitments was slow, in terms of establishing the relevant institutional arrangements and improving the fiscal situation of the state. The study suggests that among the primary constraints to economic recovery and growth in South Kordofan are its thin revenue base, inadequate federal transfers, and weak institutions. Public investment in the infrastructure and basic services needed to frame growth has been minimal. External development assistance was also limited during the period. As a result, access to infrastructure and markets was limited, which in turn also inhibited private sector activity. This report attempts to diagnose existing constraints and prospects for growth in people's incomes in South Kordofan. Given the breadth and depth of difficulties facing the state, the author focuses on identifying the key areas of reform, or binding constraints, to growth. The author find a combination of extremely low social returns, the prevalence of government and market failures, the weak investment climate and the limited access to finance to be the primary constraints. In turn the author suggests that policy reforms directed to improving governance, improving investment climate, and pro-poor public investment are priorities.


This paper offers some initial insights into the first large-scale and multilingual corpus of WhatsApp messages for linguistic research and the related research project "What's up, Swit-zerland?". Data was gathered in Switzerland in the summer of 2014 and will be made availa-ble to the academic public online at the end of the project (end of 2018). This article presents facts and figures about the corpus and the participants' demographic data as well as an over-view of (the lack of) existing linguistic research in the field and the research intended in the SNSF-funded research project.


In this paper removal of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and its fractions by chemical coagulation was studied. Raw water was collected from the Red River (Manitoba, Canada). This source water has a DOC concentration ranging from 8 to 12 mg L −1 and total hardness of about 400 mg L −1 CaCO 3 , which represents a typical surface water quality of the Canadian Prairie. Four coagulants were tested at different pH levels: alum, ferric sulfate, ferric chloride and titanium sulfate. Coagulation effectiveness was evaluated by removal of DOC, DOC fractions, specific UV absorbance (SUVA), and trihalomethane formation potential (THMFP) of the coagulated water. The water DOC was separated into six fractions based on hydrophobicity and acid base functionality: hydrophobic acid (HPOA), hydrophobic base (HPOB), hydrophobic neutral (HPON), hydrophilic acid (HPIA), hydrophilic base (HPIB), and hydrophilic neutral (HPIN). Results showed that ferric sulfate had the highest total DOC removal of 66% while ferric chloride had the lowest DOC reduction of 54%. Although the THMFP was found to be lowered significantly with all four coagulants the ferric chloride showed the greatest THMFP reduction. Fractionation results found a significant reduction in the HPOA fraction for all coagulants with 91% for ferric chloride as the highest removal value. Poor removal of hydrophilic fractions was found for all coagulants. The result of this study showed that total DOC reduction cannot guarantee THMFP reduction and coagulation should be optimized to remove DOC fractions which form most THMs.


This study is aimed at developing a novel computational framework that seamlessly incorporates the feedback forcing model and adaptive mesh refinement mesh refinement (AMR) techniques in the immersed-boundary (IB) lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) approach, so that challenging problems, including the interactions between flowing fluids and moving objects, can be numerically investigated. Owing to the feedback forcing based IB model, the advantages, such as simple mechanics principle, explicit interpolations, and inherent satisfaction of no-slip boundary condition for solid surfaces are fully exhibited. Additionally, the "bubble' function is employed in the local mesh refinement process, so that the solution of second order accuracy at newly generated nodes can be obtained only by the spatial interpolation but no temporal interpolation. Focusing on both steady and unsteady flow around a single cylinder and bi-cylinders, a number of test cases performed in this study have demonstrated the usefulness and effectiveness of the present AMR IB-LBM approach.


Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) interferometric data offer the opportunity to measure temperate glacier surface topography and displacement. The increase of the resolution provided by the most recent SAR systems has some critical implications. For instance, a reliable estimate of the phase gradient can only be achieved by using interferogram local frequencies. In this paper, an original two-step method for estimating local frequencies is proposed. The 2-D phase signal is considered to have two deterministic components corresponding to low-resolution (LR) fringes and high-resolution (HR) patterns due to the local microrelief, respectively. The first step of the proposed algorithm consists in the LR phase flattening. In the second step, the local HR frequencies are estimated from the phase 2-D autocorrelation function computed on adaptive neighborhoods. This neighborhood is the set of connected pixels belonging to the same HR spatial feature and respecting the ldquolocal stationarityrdquo hypothesis. Results with both simulated TerraSAR-X interferograms and real airborne E-SAR images are presented to illustrate the potential of the proposed method.


***30th Anniversary Edition*** Cover note: Each copy of the anniversary edition of The Blind Watchmaker features a unique biomorph. No two covers are exactly alike. Acclaimed as the most influential work on evolution written in the last hundred years, The Blind Watchmaker offers an inspiring and accessible introduction to one of the most important scientific discoveries of all time. A brilliant and controversial book which demonstrates that evolution by natural selection - the unconscious, automatic, blind yet essentially non-random process discovered by Darwin - is the only answer to the biggest question of all: why do we exist?


Previous studies found out that people with disabilities (PWD) do not travel like the peoplewithout disabilities due to lack in information and promotion towards the PWD. Visualcommunication is a concept the tourist destinations use to make the destinations more real tothe visitors by using pictures and videos, which is a concept Swedish websites and disabilityfriendlywebsites in Sweden are missing towards PWD. This research limited to the peoplewith mobility impairments (PWMI) in Swedish disability organizations (HSO).This research examined the influence of the visual communication in two ways: Firstly asimproved information by pictures and videos to the PWMI. Secondly as promotion towardsthe PWMI by using PWMI in the pictures and videos.An online survey with questionnaire was sent to PWMI in different organizations in Sweden,in total were there 212 valid questionnaires collected from the PWMI.The main results found out that PWMI used Internet the most for finding information to thetrips, then it would make sense to improve information on the Internet. Further the researchrevealed visual communication on the Internet would relieve the information search a lot forthe PWMI in all tourism sectors, accommodation the most. Since the information weredifficult to find in all sectors. Therefore, the majority of the PWMI had to look how adaptedthe destinations were and had to call / e-mail to have sufficient information about thedestinations. Improved information with visual communication would also influence thePWMI to travel more.The PWMI perceived the marketing towards the PWMI as very poor in all the tourismsectors. By promoting PWMI in the pictures and videos, the majority of the PWMI would domore tourism activities. The research found out activities as: guided tours, nature activities,sun and sea trips, city sightseeing and adventurous activities interesting for the PWMI. Theseactivities should the PWMI perform in the promotions towards the PWMI.This approach would influence the PWMI feeling more welcome to the destination and also totravel more by feeling more welcome to the destinations.


A patient with previous L3-4 posterior lumbar interbody fusion, pedicle screws instrumentation and L3-4 decompression, was scheduled for left total hip arthroplasty. Two years ago, due to poor landmarks palpation, the patient experienced a failed lumbar puncture after multiple attempts before herniorrhaphy. His plain radiography showed bilateral partial laminectomy at L3-4 level, and between L3 and L4, two posterior pedicle screws connected by metal rods on both sides. This time, we used ultrasound to locate L4-5 interlaminar space in paramedian sagittal oblique view and identified the spine midline by transverse interlaminar view before puncture. According to this information, L4-5 puncture point was verified and the combined spinal-epidural anesthesia was performed in a paramedian approach. After withdrawing clear cerebral spinal fluid, 15 mg hyperbaric bupivicaine was injected into intrathecal space. An epidural catheter was then inserted into the epidural space. The sensory block level was fixed at T10 to S within 10 minutes. Intraoperatively, the patient received 10 mL 2% (mass fraction) lidocaine through the epidural catheter in total. The surgery was uneventful. No neurologic complication was observed after the surgery. This case report demonstrates that ultRASound imaging can provide useful information for neuraxial needle placement and can be a valuable tool in managing patients with anatomical change around the spine.


Greater precipitation use efficiency (PUE) and economic returns by increasing cropping frequency through the addition of summer crops to the dryland winter wheat-fallow (WF) cropping system have been reported in the semiarid Central Great Plains of USA. However, due to the highly variable nature of precipitation and uncertain water availability, selection of a crop with assured positive net returns to add to the system to increase cropping frequency is a challenge in the absence of reliable seasonal precipitation forecasts. The objective of this study was to evaluate long-term yields and net returns of several potential summer crops at various soil water contents at planting to assess their potential use in increasing dryland cropping frequency. Three grain crops [corn (Zea mays L.), canola (Brassica napus), and proso millet (Panicum miliaceum L.)] and two forage crops [foxtail millet (Setaria italica L. Beauv.) and spring triticale (X Triticosecale rimpaui Wittm.)] for which the Root Zone Water Quality Model (RZWQM2) had been calibrated at Akron, CO and/or Sidney, NE, were selected for investigation through modeling. The calibrated model was used to simulate yield responses of the crops to 25, 50, 75 and 100% of plant available water (PAW) in the soil profile at planting using recorded weather data from Akron, CO and Sidney, NE (1948-2008). Average costs of production and 10-yr average commodity prices for northeast Colorado were used to calculate net returns for each of the crops at the varying PAW levels. All crops showed significant (p < 0.05) simulated yield increases in response to increasing initial PAW levels when those changes occurred in the entire 0–180 cm soil profile. The two forage crops gave greater net returns than the three grain crops for all initial PAW levels when calculated with 10-yr average prices received. Among the grain crops, proso millet was slightly more profitable than corn at Akron, while corn was the least profitable crop at Sidney. Using current commodity prices (13 September 2011) resulted in proso millet being the least profitable crop at Sidney, while corn was the most profitable grain crop at Akron and showed net returns that were similar to those found for the forage crops. The results of this study may guide the selection of a springor summer-planted crop and help farmers assess risk as they contemplate intensifying the WF system by using a measure or estimate of PAW at planting. Published by Elsevier B.V.


The next generation radar systems have high performance demands on the signal processing chain. Among these are advanced image creating sensor systems in which complex calculations are to be performed on huge sets of data in realtime. Massively Parallel Processor Arrays (MPPAs) are gaining attention to cope with the computational requirements of complex radar signal processing by exploiting the massive parallelism inherent in the algorithms in an energy efficient manner. In this paper, we evaluate two such massively parallel architectures, namely, Ambric and Epiphany, by implementing a significantly large case study of autofocus criterion calculation, which is a key component in future synthetic aperture radar systems. The implementation results from the two case studies are compared on the basis of achieved performance, energy efficiency, and programmability.


Extremely long distance control, hardly reachable actuator/target and costly network development  are some concerns within a distance control system. Such control is computer control for advertisements placed in tricky areas as locations over the bridge, at a junction, etc. The provider usually performs system inactivation in order to save energy. But until now, it is still difficult to find a system that can be turned on and off in remote manner. That is why the distant control using telephone can be the best alternative solution. Not only can the telephone be used in wide range of area, but also easily operated. The developed circuit in this research uses dual tone multiple frequency (DTMF). It is operated by pressing telephone button as control input for microcontroller. The microcontroller processes the input and controls the computer via relay and serial port. The result of experiment shows that the developed application is able to shut down and turn on computer as well as to apply software remotely.


Mode-locked fiber lasers are currently undergoing a significant evolution towards higher pulse energies and shorter pulse durations. A key enabler in this progress has been the discovery of novel saturable absorbers (SA) such as carbon nanotubes (CNT) and graphene. The exceptional properties of CNTs as SA have been extensively studied in recent years. Graphene, a one atom thick planar sheet of carbon atoms arranged into a hexagonal lattice, has been recently proposed as an alternative to CNTs in several photonics applications. Here, we propose a method for the integration of graphene into a fiber ferrule using an optical deposition technique, which has been also employed for the deposition of CNT directly on the core of a fiber edge and in tapered fibers. We investigate and compare the optical properties of CNT-SA and graphene-SA fabricated by this optical deposition technique. Soliton-like, mode-locked lasing is confirmed using an erbium doped optical fiber in an all-fiber ring cavity laser configuration.


Molecules drift along temperature gradients, an effect called thermophoresis, the Soret effect, or thermodiffusion. In liquids, its theoretical foundation is the subject of a long-standing debate. By using an all-optical microfluidic fluorescence method, we present experimental results for DNA and polystyrene beads over a large range of particle sizes, salt concentrations, and temperatures. The data support a unifying theory based on solvation entropy. Stated in simple terms, the Soret coefficient is given by the negative solvation entropy, divided by kT. The theory predicts the thermodiffusion of polystyrene beads and DNA without any free parameters. We assume a local thermodynamic equilibrium of the solvent molecules around the molecule. This assumption is fulfilled for moderate temperature gradients below a fluctuation criterion. For both DNA and polystyrene beads, thermophoretic motion changes sign at lower temperatures. This thermophilicity toward lower temperatures is attributed to an increasing positive entropy of hydration, whereas the generally dominating thermophobicity is explained by the negative entropy of ionic shielding. The understanding of thermodiffusion sets the stage for detailed probing of solvation properties of colloids and biomolecules. For example, we successfully determine the effective charge of DNA and beads over a size range that is not accessible with electrophoresis.


BACKGROUND
Accelerometer-derived total activity count is a measure of total physical activity (PA) volume. The purpose of this study was to develop age- and gender-specific percentiles for daily total activity counts (TAC), minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA), and minutes of light physical activity (LPA) in U.S. adults.

METHODS
Waist-worn accelerometer data from the 2003-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were used for this analysis. The sample included adults ≥ 20 years with ≥ 10 hours accelerometer wear time on ≥ 4 days (N = 6093). MVPA and LPA were defined as the number of 1-minute epochs with counts ≥ 2020 and 100 to 2019, respectively. TAC represented the activity counts acquired daily. TAC, MVPA, and LPA were averaged across valid days to produce a daily mean.

RESULTS
Males in the 50th percentile accumulated 288 140 TAC/day, with 357 and 22 minutes/day spent in LPA and MVPA, respectively. The median for females was 235 741 TAC/ day, with 349 and 12 minutes/day spent in LPA and MVPA, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS
Population-referenced TAC percentiles reflect the total volume of PA, expressed relative to other adults. This is a different approach to accelerometer data reduction that complements the current method of looking at time spent in intensity subcategories.