Study Design. A cross-sectional survey was performed. Objective. To estimate the extent of low back pain as a public health problem. Summary of Background Data. Health surveys converge on very high estimates of low back pain in general populations, but few studies have included severity criteria in their definition and conclusions. Because it is unlikely that interventions will influence the prevalence of minimal and infrequent symptoms, greater attention should be paid to characteristics of low back pain that indicate some impact on the life of survey respondents. Methods. Two regions participated in the MONICA (MONitoring of trends and determinants in CArdiovascular disease) project in Switzerland. Participants randomly selected from the general population completed a standard self-administered questionnaire on cardiovascular risk factors. A special section on low back pain was added in the third (1992–1993) MONICA survey and completed by 3227 participants. Results. A regional difference found in the 12-month prevalence rate disappeared with the inclusion of severity criteria. Low back pain over more than seven cumulated days was reported among men by 20.2% (age range, 25–34 years) to 28.5% (age range, 65–74 years), respectively, among women by 31.1% to 38.5%. Similar rates of reduction in activity (professional, housekeeping, and leisure time) and medical consultation (conventional and nonconventional) motivated by low back pain characterized the two participating regions. The cumulative duration of pain was related to all the indicators showing the impact of low back pain on everyday life. Conclusions. Determining the cumulative duration of low back pain over the preceding year is a straightforward task, and a cutoff at 1 week seems appropriate for distinguishing between low- and high-impact low back pain.


Mozambique, like many other parts of the low-income world, faces perennial challenges with food security. With a rapidly growing population and arable land on the decline, sustainable agriculture is vital to managing the already depleted natural resources of Sub-Saharan Africa more effectively while increasing food security. Food security issues for subsistence farmers in most low-income countries are a product of endogenous (crop yields) and exogenous (currency fluctuations as many agricultural inputs are imported) factors. In Mozambique the value of the local currency, meticals, has decreased by approximately 50% since January 2015 compared to the U.S. dollar. While this makes exporting products out of Mozambique more attractive in a relative sense, it negatively effects those industries which rely on imported inputs such as animal feed and inorganic fertilizer. In response to this exogenous currency crisis, research was conducted in Nampula, Mozambique during the summer of 2016 on a method for implementing crop diversification to reduce the risk that accompanies the devaluation of the metical. This research was undertaken on a poultry operation which is heavily dependent on imported maize and soya. Similar to the market structure of the poultry industry in the United States, all birds are grown by individual out growers who typically also have small plots of land to farm. Objectives for the project included 1) perform on-site crop production evaluations, 2) determine profitability for various row crops, and 3) simulate alternative production practices to increase crop profitability. Of the crops grown (tomatoes, maize, and cabbage), maize required the least labor, lowest initial investment, and the highest probability of breaking even. This research concluded that if poultry producers in Mozambique who rely on imported feed grew maize simultaneously it would reduce the dependency on imported maize and reduce income variability associated with exogenous currency fluctuations. Implementing a program such as this could increase revenue streams as well as reduce variability, thereby enhancing regional food security. * Olivia C. Caillouet is a December 2016 Honors program graduate with a major in Horticulture, Landscape, and Turf Sciences and minor in Foundations of Sustainability. † Lawton L. Nalley, a faculty mentor, Associate Professor of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness. § Amy L. Farmer, a faculty mentor, University Professor in the Walton College of Business Department of Economics.


Even for well-established insect model systems, such as the yellow dung fly Scathophaga stercoraria (Linnaeus) (Diptera: Scathophagidae), there may be hidden systematic ambiguities that require clarification. Dung flies from the Afrotropical Region have been considered (i) as con-specific and not different from all the other Holarctic Scathophaga stercoraria; (ii) as a local and peculiar African subspecies of S. stercoraria (Scathophaga stercoraria soror Wiedemann), or (iii) as a separate valid species (Scathophaga soror Wiedemann). Our study represents an attempt, based on mitochondrial (COI, 12S, and 16S), nuclear (ITS2) as well as microsatellite markers, to clarify this problem. Results strongly suggest that S. soror is a separate taxon from S. stercoraria. Due to the importance of S. stercoraria as a model system for studies in ecology, behaviour and evolution, the systematic position of S. soror (relative to S. stercoraria) is not solely of interest for systematists, but for evolutionary ecologists as well.


One of the most striking phenomena of China's remarkable economic growth is that its huge volume of exports are becoming high-tech. China is now the world's largest Information and Communication Technology (ICT) exporter, having overtaken Japan and the European Union in 2003 and the United States in 2004. China's ICT industry is also the largest manufacturing sector within the Chinese economy. This book examines how China has attained this leading position and presents one of the first accounts of China's ICT development model with specific reference to the experiences of East Asian 'tigers'. It shows how the development of the industry was military-driven before 1978, and how subsequently Chinese policymakers, struggling with domestic market reform and challenged by trade liberalisation and globalisation, managed to push through ICT development strategies. Overall, it discusses the debates between policymakers as to the most appropriate economic development strategy for 'catching-up' and demonstrates how China moved away from the across-the-board protectionist and interventionist industrial policies pursued by many developing countries, but has not wholeheartedly followed the neo-liberal free trade and market polices favoured by the World Bank, WTO and IMF. By doing so, it sheds light on the limitations of China's strategies moving forward, and identifies policy lessons for other developing countries.


This paper explores the Federal Trade Commission's unilateral effects merger policy using a sample of 184 investigations undertaken between 1993 and mid-2010. A review of the files suggests that roughly half of the sample is evaluated with a dominant firm/monopoly model, while the rest of the cases require a more complex unilateral effects analysis. Deterministic modeling based on the number of significant rivals suggests that the four-to-three transaction in a market with impediments to entry represents the marginal merger challenge. Case specific facts explain deviations from this rule and suggest that critical diversion ratios fall into the 25-30 percent range. Share based indices (post-merger market share, change in the Herfindahl, or a share-based Gross Upward Pressure on Price variable) can be used, but require the definition of a market and do not predict outcomes as well as the significant rivals' model. An Appendix details the various reasons why the staff declined to apply a unilateral effects analysis to conclude a merger was likely to substantially lessen competition in a broader sample of differentiated products mergers.


STUDY OBJECTIVE--The aim was to explore the aetiological roles of smoking, occupational exposure, childhood respiratory illness, and atopy in persistent sputum production. DESIGN--This was a case-control study. Data were obtained using a questionnaire administered by two observers blind to the subjects' status. Information was sought on lifetime smoking, occupation, hospital admissions due to respiratory disease, and respiratory disease history. SETTING--Four general practices in south east England in 1990, with a total population of about 30,000. SUBJECTS--Cases were subjects aged 5 to 54 years with sputum production; one control was selected per case, matched by general practice, age, and sex, forming 210 matched pairs (88% response rate). MAIN RESULTS--Cigarette smoking remains an important cause of persistent sputum production: the odds ratio (95% confidence interval) for current smoking was 7.9 (3.6-20.4). A dose-response relationship was confirmed, with falling risk estimates after stopping smoking. The association of sputum production with occupational exposure to respiratory irritants, which was independent of smoking, was confined to men (odds ratio 2.4, 1.0-6.0) and largely attributable to very heavy exposure. Examination of the relationship with early respiratory disease suggested that much, though not all, was attributable to wheezing illnesses first manifest in childhood. CONCLUSIONS--Aetiological fractions derived from the results suggest that in the general population of south east England approximately 68% of all cases of persistent sputum production can be independently attributed to current cigarette smoking, 17% to heavy occupational exposure to respiratory irritants, and 13% to wheezing illnesses first manifest in early childhood.


This thesis consists of a curatorial essay and contemporary art exhibition entitled To Be Real, with works by Althea Thauberger, Helen Reed and Lars Laumann. These artists have approached subjects removed from the everyday (respectively, remote Italian villagers, Twin Peaks fans and an objectum-sexual woman). Through indexical media, documented research, interviews and amateur techniques, the works present a realist aesthetic, showing the subjects as seen and encountered first hand. My research investigated different theoretical approaches to realism in contemporary art and ethnography, particularly in relation to lens- based representation. The curatorial essay considers the parallels between these artistic practices and ethnographic realism, identifying a contradiction between the artists' factual approaches and the inconsistent and illusive realities they represent. I put forth the term incoherent real to express the tenuous balance these works hold between indexicality and theatricality, and the use of video to highlight the gaps between perception and experience.


Fast and unambiguous failure localization for shared risk link groups (SRLGs) with multiple links is essential for building a fully survivable and functional transparent all-optical mesh network. Monitoring trails (m-trails) have been proposed as an effective approach to achieve this goal. However, each m-trail traverses through each link by constantly taking a wavelength channel, causing a significant amount of resource consumption. In this paper, a novel framework of all-optical monitoring for SRLG failure localization is proposed. We investigate the feasibility of periodically launching optical bursts along each m-trail instead of assigning it a dedicated supervisory lightpath to probe the set of fiber segments along the m-trail, aiming to achieve a graceful compromise between resource consumption and failure localization latency. This paper defines the proposed framework and highlights the relevant issues regarding its feasibility. We provide theoretical justifications of the scheme. Asa proof of concept, we formulate the optimal burst scheduling problem via an integer linear program (ILP) and implement the method in networks of all possible SRLGs with up to d = 3 links. A heuristic method is also proposed and implemented for multiple-link SRLG failure localization, keeping all the assumptions the same as in the ILP method. Numerical results for small networks show that the scheme is able to localize single-link and multiple-link SRLG failures unambiguously with a very small amount of failure localization latency.


Neoplatonism strongly influenced the development of Sufism. Neoplatonism, as developed by Plotinus conceives God to be the source and goal of everything. Islam qua institution is closed to all critical and philosophical thought, but Sufism enjoys a more liberal and critical approach. It is probable that the translations of Plotinus have provided the necessary philosophical ground for Sufism. An examination of both Sufism and Neoplatonism reveals close similarities with regard to the nature of God, the soul, the body, concepts such as goodness, evil and beauty, death and life, and creation. Islamic thought was influenced by Greek philosophy, especially the ideas of Aristotle and Plato. Sufism is a sect of Islam which has rather a different way of thought. "Sufi" is applied to Muslim mystics who, as a means of achieving union with Allah, adopted ascetic practices including wearing a garment made of coarse wool called "sf". The term "sufism" comes from "sf" meaning the person, who wears "sf". But in the course of time, sufi has come to designate all Muslim believers in mystic union. In the roots of sufi philosophy there are influences other than neoplatonist philosophy. Ascetic practices within the sufi philosophy are associated with Buddhism. The notion of purification (cleaning one' s soul from all evil things and trying to reach Nirvana and to become immortal in Nirvana) plays an important role in Buddhism. The same idea shows itself in the belief of "vuslat" (communion with God) in Sufi philosophy. Sufism was also influenced by Orpheus and related beliefs, and consequently by Pythagoras and his teachings, because Pythagoras was closely interested in Orpheus beliefs. Orpheus was a poet who lived in Anatolia in the 6th and 7th centuries BC. He was believed to have divine characteristics such as being able to influence wild animals with his music. He believed that the human soul can reach the highest level only by refining itself from all passions and worldly possessions. Soul travels from body to body in order to purify itself from its sins, disabilities, and guilts, and only after passing all these levels can it reach to its highest level, to its exalted spot. Pythagoras adopted Orpheus beliefs about soul, and integrated it with his own ideas. Later, the Neopythagoreans regarded Pythagoras as the source of divinely revealed knowledge. They accepted as truth whatever appealed to them in the writings of Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics The attempts to construct a religious philosophy on the basis of Greek thought and especially the theories of Pythagoras culminated in Neoplatonism. Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism, took Plato's theory of ideas and reinterpreted them from Protagoras' point of view. According to neoplatonism, God is conceived as the source and goal of everything; from him everything comes, to him all things return; he is the alpha and omega, the beginning, middle and end. Communion with God or absorption in God, therefore, is the real purpose of all our strivings, and religion the heart-beat of the universe. The principal doctrine of Plotinus stated that there is just one exalted God, that is a supreme power, the final cause , the cosmic force. God is the highest spiritual, and creative Being. Although the world proceeds from God, he did not create it; the universe is an emanation from God, an inevitable overflow of his infinite power or actuality. Plotinus employs several metaphors to suggest the meaning of emanation. God is a spring from which the spring flows without exhausting its infinite source; or, God is the sun from which the light radiates without loss to the sun. The absolute being (God) is higher than beauty, truth, goodness, consciousness, and will, for all these depend on him. The farther we are from the sun, the source of light, the nearer we are to darkness (matter). Beauty is in the structure of divine existence. Other types of existence such as matter and body are not beautiful in themselves, but rather they are beautiful as a reflection of God's beauty. Among all beings in the universe human beings are the closest to the divine essence because they have souls that strive to turn in the direction of pure thought. The truthfulness, beauty or goodness of a human being depend on its soul's actions within its body; the closer the soul of a human being gets to the source of light, the more it acquires the qualities such as truth, goodness, and beauty. Human beings reflect the appearance of God in themselves more than other life forms, and consequently they are the highest in the scale of being. There is no aspect of Sufi philosophy that is not influenced by neoplatonism. According to Sufi philosophy, Absolute being is also Absolute beauty, and since beauty tends toward manifestation Absolute being developed the phenomenal world. Human beings in this phenomenal world are the only ones that share a unity of essence with God, because they have souls. After a human being dies, his/her soul goes back to its source, to the Absolute being, while his/her body dissolves and decays. Since the soul makes a human being a person, one should practice the quiestic virtues such as poverty, austerity, humility, fortitude, and discipline; devote oneself to the ways of inwardness such as withdrawal, silence, solitariness, and self-examination; and keep in mind a constant awareness of God with faith and desire. This way, one can achieve a sense of direct communion with God which is the Absolute being behind the phenomenal world. f one follows these directions with sufficient perseverance, one will advance through the standard mystic stages of concentration, appreciation of the oneness of everything, epiphanies, i.e., sudden and unpredictable illumination, blissful ecstasy, sense of union with the Deity, sense of one's own nothingness, and sense of the nothingness beyond nothingness. Neoplatonism is the closest doctrine of thought to Sufi philosophy in terms of their system of belief. Now, let's compare these two doctrines more closely and describe the similarities between them in detail. In Sufism, the universe is just an appearance of God, and does not have an independent existence. To think of the universe and the God as being separate is to deny the "Oneness" and to suggest a "duality" between God and the universe. But in reality, the God and the universe are the "One" and the same thing such that God reflects himself as the universe. It is not possible to think of God and the universe as separate entities because God is not something outside the universe as Islam favors, but rather something within the universe. As seen above, this belief was initially suggested by neoplatonism. They both see the existence of the universe as an emanation from God. Sufism assumes that there is a union of God, universe and humans, and that human beings are an appearance of God; but God's appearance in the shape of a human being cannot be thought of any further than just an appearance.The reality is not a duality between God and humans, but rather a sameness, oneness between them. A person is a talking, thinking, acting God. This idea is beatifully expressed in Yunus Emre's following verse: I didn't know you were the eye inside of me You were a secret essence both in body and soul I asked you show me a symbol of you in this world Suddenly I realized you were the whole universe. This poem expresses the idea of the oneness of God-universe-human beings. It is possible that the belief of oneness of humans and God in sufism is carried from neoplatonism. In the trilogy of God-Universe-Humans, God has the highest position, second is the universe, and third is human beings. Even though humans rank last in the trilogy, they are very close to the God, and almost identical to him because of the soul they have. Sufism and neoplatonism share the same beliefs about the soul. According to neoplatonism, the soul is a divine essence, a substance, the source of all existence. The soul is the effect, image, or copy of pure thought, namely God. It is immortal, infinite, and separate from the body. The body is a cage where the soul is trapped, and it can be freed when the body dies. The soul, by its nature, always tends toward perfection, beauty, goodness and exaltation. In sufism the soul is treated similarly, and expressed as a divine essence in humans. The body, like soul, is also treated similarly in both sufism and neoplatonism. According to neoplatonism, the body is mortal, temporary, and not divine. The body tends not towards beauty and goodness, but towards ugliness and evil. What is beautiful, good, valuable and divine is not body, but the soul. The body tends towards temporary desires and wishes. The task of the soul is to purify the body from evil tendencies, and its deficiencies. The body is a cage for the soul. Sufism shares the same belief. The body is created from the earth, and will go back to the earth, and decay there. For this reason, the body is not important, and a person should not follow the desires of his/her body, but rather should turn from senuous life to thought, and through it, to God. For neoplatonism beauty means much more than mere symmetry. It involves a close relationship to the ideal reality; it is an appearance of God over the objects of the universe. Whatever the divine light shines on becomes beautiful. Sufism thinks exactly the same about beauty. In sufism, beauty is expressed with "cemal" meaning human face, the beauty of human face. What is really expressed in "cemal" (human face) is the appearance of divine light in the face of a human. Neoplatonism identified beauty with divine essence, and sufism adopted the same idea. This is beautifully expressed in the following verse from Husrev: Want to understand an example of the real essence of God Look at the face of a beautiful woman and there see the face of God. Realizing divine characteristics in human beauty might be an influence of neoplatonis


This paper is devoted to uniform versions of the Hanson-Wright inequality for a random vector $X \in \mathbb{R}^n$ with independent subgaussian components. The core technique of the paper is based on the entropy method combined with truncations of both gradients of functions of interest and of the coordinates of $X$ itself. Our results recover, in particular, the classic uniform bound of Talagrand (1996) for Rademacher chaoses and the more recent uniform result of Adamczak (2015), which holds under certain rather strong assumptions on the distribution of $X$. We provide several applications of our techniques: we establish a version of the standard Hanson-Wright inequality, which is tighter in some regimes. Extending our techniques we show a version of the dimension-free matrix Bernstein inequality that holds for random matrices with a subexponential spectral norm. We apply the derived inequality to the problem of covariance estimation with missing observations and prove an almost optimal high probability version of the recent result of Lounici (2014). Finally, we show a uniform Hanson-Wright type inequality in the Ising model under Dobrushin's condition. A closely related question was posed by Marton (2003).


Increased attention has recently been focused on emission of electro-magnetic radiation of pulse-width modulation (PWM) converters, which are commonly operated at a fixed frequency. This results in a peak in the current spectrum at the switching frequency, which directly affects the emission of radiation and indirectly affects the mechanical vibration and acoustic noise. We discuss a novel PWM method based on logistic chaotic map (LCB-PWM), in order to reduce the electro-magnetic interference (EMI) level of converters. Because the peak in the current spectrum at the switching frequency is widely spread to a large bandwidth, the EMI level is greatly decreased with LCB-PWM method. The simulation results show a reduction of the peak emission around the switching frequency up to 29 dB with this approach, without affecting driving performance.


We introduce a new method for prediction in case-control study designs, which is a simple extension of the work by van der Laan (2008). Case-control samples are biased since the proportion of cases in the sample is not the same as the population of interest. The case-control weighting for prediction proposed in this paper relies on knowledge of the true incidence probability P(Y=1) to eliminate the bias of the sampling design. In many practical settings, case-control weighting will outperform an existing method for prediction, intercept adjustment.


The Andalshatten batholith (322 km 2 , >700 km 3 ) is a predominantly granodioritic high-K, calc-alkaline igneous body that was assembled in the mid-crust across four lithologically distinct nappes within the Helgeland Nappe Complex, central Norway. Extensive vertical and horizontal exposures of metamorphic screens and xenoliths within the batholith provide an unparalleled view of the nature of magma emplacement, host rock displacement, and batholith assembly, i.e., batholith tectonics. The mapped intrusion consists of at least five distinct lithologic phases, including schlieren-banded to gneissic granodiorite (11% of batholith area), coarse-crystalline to K-feldspar megacrystic granodiorite (69%), amphibole-bearing diorite (11%), tonalite (2%), and minor leucogranite. Contacts between phases are both sharp and/or gradational and are interpreted to reflect comagmatic behavior over the duration of crystallization of the phases separated by a given contact. New chemical abrasion–thermal ionization mass spectrometry 206 Pb/ 238 U zircon weighted mean ages of 442.67 ± 0.14 Ma and 441.53 ± 0.40 Ma for 2 samples of the voluminous megacrystic granodiorite from disparate localities indicate distinct periods of zircon crystallization separated by ∼1 Ma; titanite ages for these samples are 441.30 ± 0.21 Ma and 436.10 ± 2.80 Ma, respectively. No observable contacts were identified between these two lithologically similar localities. Of the mapped intrusion area, ∼8% (>24 km 2 ) comprises screens (kilometer scale) and xenoliths (subkilometer scale) of metamorphic rocks that reflect the skeletal framework of the host rock nappes into which the granodioritic magmas intruded. This ghost stratigraphy maintains broad continuity with host rock lithology and structural trends. The largest screens show no evidence of internal, emplacement-related ductile deformation, but appear to be rigidly rotated into subparallelism with the western host rock contact, presumably during subsequent magma injection into the batholith. In contrast, xenoliths underwent rotation, translation, and internal deformation in the magma. The scale dependence of synmagmatic deformation of screens and xenoliths is likely the result of smaller blocks becoming thermally equilibrated with the surrounding magma and thus deforming by ductile mechanisms in a magma with increasing yield strength due to crystallization. We interpret the Andalshatten batholith to have been assembled by at least five spatially distinct, elongate batches of magma over a minimum duration 600 ka to 1.7 Ma, including significant recharge events involving dioritic magmas. Local space for batholith assembly was accommodated by brittle and ductile deformation, including viscous flow of host rocks in a dynamothermal contact aureole. Viscous flow was facilitated by reactivation of existing structures (e.g., tightening of interlimb fold angles), recrystallization, and penetrative foliation development, resulting in near-field lateral and downward-directed displacement of host rocks along the western margin during batholith expansion and growth. Emplacement of dioritic magmas added heat and mass to the growing reservoir, enabling significant magnitudes of internal, hypersolidus flow, magmatic foliation development, mechanical mingling, and screen deformation. These observations and data sets are consistent with the hypothesis of multiple recharge events in a magma chamber that was partially molten over reasonably large spatial scales, thereby allowing screens and xenoliths to be incorporated and displaced and/or deformed.


Cdc25C is a member of the dual specific protein phosphatase family capable of dephosphorylating both phospho-Tyr and phospho-Ser/Thr residues. In vertebrates, there are three isoforms of the Cdc25 enzyme (Cdc25A, Cdc25B and Cdc25C). The N-terminal (regulatory domain) region of these three enzymes is highly divergent (~20-25% identity) while the C-terminal (catalytic domain) region is more conserved (~60% identity). The Cdc25C isoform is of particular importance because it dephosphorylates Cdc2, which is part of the Cdc2/Cyclin B complex, allowing the cell to transition into mitosis. We want to gain further insight into how Cdc25C interacts with its substrate Cdc2. One way to do this is to utilize the ability of E. coli to heterologously express recombinant Cdc25c. This will allow us to obtain large amounts of the protein for in vitro characterization. First, several E. coli cell lines were tested (each with unique properties; e.g. expression of toxic protein, expression of disulfide rich proteins) for their ability to overexpress Cdc25C. The cell line and expression condition having the highest yield of full-length protein was chosen and purified using a single immobilized metal affinity chromatography (IMAC) column that will bind a 6xHis affinity tag fused to the N-terminus of Cdc25C or a tandem approach that utilizes two affinity tags (an N-terminal 6xHis affinity tag and a C-terminal StrepII tag). The pure protein will then be subjected to a variety of chromatography techniques such as UV-Vis spectroscopy and circular dichrosim (CD) to characterize structural changes the protein undergoes when binding to its zinc cofactor. Site directed mutagenesis will be used to create mutations in the zinc binding region of Cdc25C and these proteins will also be characterized for their ability to bind or not to bind the zinc cofactor.


Larson et al. (1987) proposed a closed-form solution to describe the development of river delta coastlines owing to sediment supply from the river. This solution is for a beach of infinite extent adjacent to the river mouth. However, in reality, the beach length is always finite due to the existence of man-made structures or headlands. It is, therefore, useful to derive a new analytical solution to gain a better understanding of beach behavior under the effect of boundaries.


Sprint acceleration is a key physical attribute in baseball players that can be characterized by two phases: pure (PURE) and transitional (TRANS) acceleration. In a linear sprint, PURE occurs from the initiation of movement to approximately 15-meters; TRANS acceleration occurs from approximately 15-meters until an athlete reaches top velocity. Since baseball fields are clearly marked at 13.7m (foul-line) and 27.4m (1st base), acceleration can be determined in a sports-specific environment and these data may be helpful in characterizing player success. Purpose The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between anthropometrics, vertical, and broad jump ability to PURE and TRANS acceleration of junior college baseball players sprinting to first-base. Methods: Nineteen male junior college baseball players (19.6 ± 2.2y; 181.2 ± 6.9cm; 80.6 ± 11.7kg) volunteered as subjects. They performed tests of physical performance on three days, separated by one week. Initially, subject height and body mass (BM) were determined using a standard equipment. Percent fat (%Fat) was measured using skinfold calipers and a three-site equation. On a separate day, countermovement vertical jumps were performed on a force plate set to sample at 400 Hz. Vertical jump height (VJ), peak force (PF), peak power (PP), and relative power (PP rel) were determined from these data. Broad jump (BJ) distance was measured using a marked court and tape measure. During a third testing day, subjects performed linear sprints from the batter's box to first-base. Time was recorded at the foul-line and first-base using hand-held stop watches. Acceleration was computed between the two 13.7 meter intervals to first-base: home-plate to the foul-line (PURE) and foul-line to first-base (TRANS). Pearson's r were calculated between PURE and TRANS and the anthropometric and performance data. Alpha was set a p < 0.05 which equated to r = 0.44 for df = 18. Results: Of the tested variables, PURE was only associated with %Fat (r = -0.50), TRANS was significantly correlated with %Fat (r = -0.61), VJ (r = -0.50), and PP rel (r \=-0.51). Conclusion: These preliminary data indicate a primary determinant of pure acceleration to first-base is %Fat. VJ and PP relative to body mass are also associated with acceleration from the foul-line to first-base. Interesting, body mass was not related to acceleration in either phase. Therefore, strength and conditioning programs that reduce body fat and develop increased peak vertical power capabilities may be helpful in improving overall acceleration to first-base.


Thin-film interference has been observed in the transmittance of a filter consisting of 263.5-nm-thick magnesium with a 32.2-nm-thick aluminum layer on each side. The transmittance, measured by synchrotron radiation, has an oscillatory behavior in the 25-70-nm wavelength range. On the basis of the calculation of the transmittance, the oscillatory behavior results from interference associated with the relatively transmissive magnesium and aluminum layers and the reflection from the oxidized aluminum surface layers. The bandpass performance of magnesium and aluminum layers deposited on a silicon photodiode detector is presented.


Future Factory, based within Nottingham Trent University, in collaboration with the New Art Exchange, is proud to present The Redemptive Beauty of Life After Death, curated by Michael Forbes. The exhibition which takes place in The Bonington Gallery runs from 12 January until 17 February 2007.

Eight contemporary visual artists: Said Adrus, Robert Ball, Giles Corby, David Farrell, Michael Forbes, Mik Godley, Martin Godwin and Raksha Patel will comment on 'life after death' and the remaining visual legacy which gets incorporated into everyday life. We are presented a world where the body and soul no longer remains, where symbols leave footprints of the lives that have gone before.

The show includes a diverse range of subject matter: the removal of an Indian military grave in Woking, the humble pacemaker, the seductive attraction of second hand guns, Northern Ireland landscapes that hide horrors of the past, child mortality in relationship to poverty, Nazi secret bunkers built by slave labour, roadside floral memorials, isolated apocalyptic landscapes and coloured fountains representing the passage of blood through the human body.

The exhibition contradicts all perceptions of morbidity and celebrates the natural beauty that arises through life, whilst recognising the frailty of human existence.


Time series anonymization is an important problem. One prominent example of time series are energy consumption records, which might reveal details of the daily routine of a household. Existing privacy approaches for time series, e.g., from the field of trajectory anonymization, assume that every single value of a time series contains sensitive information and reduce the data quality very much. In contrast, we consider time series where it is combinations of tuples that represent personal information. We propose (n; l; k)-anonymity, geared to anonymization of time-series data with minimal information loss, assuming that an adversary may learn a few data points. We propose several heuristics to obtain (n; l; k)-anonymity, and we evaluate our approach both with synthetic and real data. Our experiments confirm that it is sufficient to modify time series only moderately in order to fulfill meaningful privacy requirements.


This study investigated cetuximab added to definitive concurrent chemoradiation for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Previously untreated patients with stage II–IVa ESCC received cetuximab (400 mg/m2 per week in week 1, then 250 mg/m2 per week during weeks 2–8), paclitaxel (45 mg/m2 per week) and cisplatin (20 mg/m2 per week) in weeks 2–8 with 59.4 Gy radiotherapy. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) status in tumor specimens was assessed. Thirty‐one patients were enrolled and evaluated for toxicity. Of the 29 patients assessable for a response, 20 (69.0%) had a clinical complete response (CR). Over a median follow up of 23.6 months, disease progression was observed in seven patients. The 1‐ and 2‐year progression‐free survival (PFS) rates were 85.5% and 75.1%, respectively. The PFS was shorter for patients with lymphatic metastatic disease than for those with locally confined tumor; the 1‐year PFS rates were 78.7% and 92.3%, respectively (P = 0.038). Sixteen (55.2%) patients were immunohistochemically positive for EGFR. The patients with EGFR‐expressing tumor had a CR rate of 75.0% compared with 61.5% in those with negative EGFR expression (P = 0.024). The PFS for patients with EGFR‐expressing tumor was longer compared with the PFS of patients with negative EGFR (P = 0.133). The patients with prominent cetuximab‐induced rash (≥grade 2) had a better CR rate and PFS than those with no or grade 1 rash (P < 0.05). The rates of grades 3/4 esophagitis, hematological and dermatological toxicities were 9.7%, 29.0% and 16.1%, respectively. The regimen of definitive chemoradiation plus cetuximab achieved good clinical response and has an acceptable safety profile in Chinese ESCC patients.


Taiwan has gradually transformed from an authoritarian to a democratic society. The education system is moving from uniformity to diversity, from authoritarian centralization to deregulation and pluralism. Moral education is a reflection of, and influenced by, educational reform and social change, as this paper shows in describing the history of moral education in Taiwan. From 1949 to the 1980s, Taiwan's moral education consisted of ideological, nationalistic, political education and the teaching of a strict code of conduct. Since the late 1980s moral education has changed rapidly due to educational reforms. Political ideologies and traditional culture in moral education have gradually been phased out. Since August 2004, diversified and generalized moral education has replaced the special subject of moral education offered in school. Moral education in Taiwan faces great changes and new challenges. The paper concludes by suggesting some strategies, such as facilitating critical thinking, civic values and multiple teaching approaches, for the development of a new moral education suitable to modern democratic society in Taiwan.


Intermittent mining and processing of sulphide ore (pyrite–chalcopyrite) at the abandoned Mt Perry mine from the 1870s has resulted in numerousmine workings, waste dumps, a local drainage system contaminated by acid mine drainage (pH 3.3–4.5) and degradation of local soil and vegetation. Weatheringof sulphidic ore, oxidized waste material, tailings and slags (median of 32 samples: 0.65 ppm Au, 17 ppm Ag, 48 ppm As, 3090 ppm Cu, 3.5 wt% Fe, 138 ppm Mn, 19 ppm Mo, 55 ppm Pb, 39 ppm Zn) has led to the formation of secondary minerals (e.g. goethite, hematite, Cu carbonates, gypsum, jarosite, natrojarosite, chalcanthite) on waste materials, stream sediments and stream banks. Waters emanatingfrom underground workings and draining waste dumps have pH values as low as 3.3 and contain elevated contents of As, Cu, Fe, Zn and SO4. Dilution from uncontaminated tributaries and groundwaters causes decreasing Cu and Zn concentrations in stream waters, whereas Fe and As precipitate close to the mine site due to adsorption and coprecipitation processes. While much of the dissolved metal load derives from the mine site, Cu is also dissolved out of contaminated stream sediments. Soils in the mines area have elevated Cu and Fe values compared to background soils. The soils acquired their metal enrichments by hydromorphic dispersion from the dissolution of metal-rich particulates, transport of dust and physical erosion of metal-rich particulates from the dumps, and perhaps atmospheric fall-out from smelting plant emissions. Levels of Ag, As, Cu, Fe, and Zn in the fine fraction of stream sediments exceed background values by one to three orders of magnitude. This enrichment has been caused by physical erosion of metal-bearing minerals from abandoned ore and waste dumps and adsorption and coprecipitation of dissolved metals and metalloids in the stream bed. Areas disturbed by mining are characterized by lack of native vegetation, selective and non-selective bioaccumulation of metals and metalloids into plants (gold fern Pityrogramma austroamericana; hickory wattle Acacia aulococarpa; bunch speargrass Heteropogon contortus; wiregrass Aristida benthamii, A. caput-medusae), and partial recolonization by metal-tolerant plant species (gold fern; bunch speargrass; couch grass, Cynodon dactylon; swordsedge, Lepidosperma sp.).


This paper contains a general equilibrium model of an economy with incomplete markets (GEI) with money and default. The model is a simplified version of the real world consisting of a non-bank private sector, banks, a central bank, a government and a regulator. The model is used to analyse actions by policy-makers and to identify policy relevant empirical work. Key analytical results are: a financially fragile system need not collapse; efficiency can be improved with policy intervention; and a system with heterogeneous banks is more stable than one with homogeneous ones. Existence of monetary equilibria allows for positive default levels in equilibrium. It also characterises contagion and financial fragility as an equilibrium phenomenon. A definition of financial fragility is proposed. Financial fragility occurs when aggregate profitability of the banking sector declines and defaults in the non-bank and banking private sectors increase. Thus, equilibria with financial fragility require financial vulnerability in the banking sector and liquidity shortages in the non-bank private sector. The model will be used as a basis to carry out empirical work on the costs of financial instability, to quantify the effectiveness of particular regulatory tools such as capital requirements, and to identify trade-offs between increasing stability through action by authorities and the efficiency of the financial system.


Sports medicine clinicians and researchers should all be familiar with the concepts of false positives and false negatives. Research to test a hypothesis about a link between, say, a risk factor and a disease can potentially be wrong in either of two ways. The findings might falsely show a link when in reality one does not exist (a type I or α error), or they might fail to show a link when there really is one (a type II or β error).1 2 Hopefully most of the time, if studies are well conducted, the likelihood of both of these errors is reduced.

Similar errors in both directions can potentially occur in drug testing in sport, although the nature of false positives and false negatives is somewhat different from that in other clinical testing. The rigorous methods of collection and the use of "A" and "B" samples mean that many sources of potential laboratory error are minimised. The false positive and false negative phenomena in doping may be better referenced to the athlete's intent to cheat using performance-enhancing drugs. An athlete who takes a so-called "undetectable" anabolic steroid is a true "drug cheat", but one who might produce a "false-negative" drug test because the structure of the undetectable drug is not yet known by the testing authorities. By comparison, the athlete who inadvertently takes a banned drug (particularly one with minimal performance-enhancing potential) not to cheat, but to treat a legitimate medical condition, may test positive in a doping test. Such a result may be considered a "false positive" with respect to intent to cheat using a performance-enhancing drug, even though the testing process was accurate in finding the drug in the athlete's system.

Intent to cheat is so difficult to prove or disprove that WADA takes a pragmatic approach …


We all know that American business needs fixing, and there is no shortage of prescriptions: imitate the Japanese, or follow the example of successful firms, or practice right-sizing. But these approaches do not work very well, says Russell Ackoff, because they only attack the problem piecemeal--and it is the entire system of American business that is flawed. In this revolutionary new book by a widely respected business thinker and pioneer in the fields of operations research and systems thinking, Ackoff underscores the urgent need to overhaul the kinds of systems found in America, from our business schools to our boardrooms. And he shows how firms can break out of the mold--and leapfrog the competition in today's volatile economy. To give managers insight into the concept of organizations, Ackoff shows how they have been viewed since the Renaissance: first as machines, later as organisms, and today as social systems. As social systems, companies produce and distribute wealth and raise our standard of living. They are also responsible for facilitating and encouraging the development of the larger systems that contain them and all their stakeholders. The quality of worklife within an organization is key. Work has to be challenging and enjoyable if workers are to give it their full commitment, and Ackoff outlines major ways to achieve this goal. Along the way, Ackoff explodes a number of fashionable business notions. He asserts that firms that try to imitate successful competitors are doomed to play catch-up forever. He attacks the idea of continuous improvement, showing that it has failed to make quantum leaps in quality, and he demonstrates how to re-orient the pursuit of quality. After revealing the weakness in many current practices, Ackoff describes three organizational schemes that will lead to success. In the Circular Organization, a democratic hierarchy, everyone participates directly or indirectly in decisions that affect their work. In the Internal Market Economy, organizations treat their different parts like a collection of firms doing business with each other--which promotes cooperation and eliminates wasteful internal competition. And with the Multidimensional Organization, a company becomes so powerful and flexible that continuous adaptation can happen without reorganization. Ackoff caps off the book with an incisive critique of business schools, describing how they must be transformed to turn out the leaders we need for the competitive American organization of the 21st century. Enabling managers to understand the profound interrelationships in the American economy and to tap into them for success, The Democratic Corporation is a major work by an innovative thinker that is certain to cause ripples throughout the business community.


There is an increasing concern about the preservation of genetic identity of conventional maize (Zea mays L.) and of distance required to segregate non-genetically modified (non-GM) from GM grain production since the introduction of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) and other transgenic events into commercial hybrids. Field experiments were conducted at three sites in Ottawa, Canada, for 3 yr to determine (i) the extent of cross-fertilization of a maize genotype by foreign pollen of neighboring hybrids and (ii) the practical distance required to isolate conventional maize hybrids from neighboring GM maize fields. At each site, yellow-kernel Bt maize was planted in the center (27 by 27 m) of a field surrounded in all directions by the distance equivalent to 24 or 48 rows (37 m) of white-kernel maize, and a 200-m non-maize crop was maintained in all directions. Phenology and weather conditions were closely monitored during the tasseling and silking period. At maturity, a thorough examination on the cross-fertilization was conducted in the white maize population. Our results showed that the rate of cross-fertilization in maize was dependent upon the distance from the pollen source, wind direction and synchronization of silking and pollen shedding of the two genotypes involved. Up to 82% out-cross was measured in the first row adjacent to the Bt maize. The level of out-cross was <1% beyond the 37th border row (28 m) downwind and the 13th row (10 m) upwind in all site-years. An exponential decline model was fitted well (P < 0.01) to the cross-fertilization data as a function of distance from the yellow maize pollen source with R 2 up to 0.64. Our data suggested that it is possible to produce non-GM maize grains by removing the outside rows of non-GM maize plants (about 30 m) neighboring the GM maize field in concern if the acceptance level is set at ≤1% out-cross. The generally recommended 200-m distance between two genotypes (inbreds, populations, hybrids, and wild relatives) appears to be appropriate for Bt or other GM maize, as well.


Since the discovery of genetic inheritance by Mendel (1890) and the identified role of DNA in cell division (Crick/Watson 1950), scientists have worked to advance stem cell technologies to treat and cure human disease. The broad techniques of therapeutic cloning are gene therapy, stem cells growth and pharmacogenetics together constitute a complex and demanding science. Each involves the alternating and growth of new cells including the use of human embryos undifferentiated cells and a potential to grow into any organ and tissue type. This work explores the national context in which stem cell science is advancing in a case study between the UK and China using National Systems of Innovation (NSI) as a theoretical structure. NSI is defined by the literature, which includes economic performance, political and legislative structure, research investment, and societal values (Freeman 1997; Fagerberg 2004). Using ethnographic and statistical analysis, it compares the effect each National System of Innovation is having on the advance of therapeutic cloning. Diabetes is chosen as the clinical model because of its global prevalence, affecting over 200m people (BHF 2004) and accounting for 9% of mortality (WHO 2002). and the prediction that it will become the world's most major non- communicable cause of death by 2025 (Atlas 2004).During this study, China experienced unprecedented economic growth underpinned by strong research investment, which is now three times the size of that in the UK (Wilsden 2006). It has a permissive social culture for stem cell research (Mann 2003), having adapted much of the European legislation (Salter 2007) with much of its research led by doctors, enabling a quicker advance of stem cell therapies to the clinic (Prescott). The UK is, in comparison, a global leader in stem cell science, having a prestigious record of achievements including the final mapping of the human genome (Goodfellow 2001), the cloning of Dolly the Sheep (PHGU 2002), and being first to legislate for such embryo research (HFA 1990). The UK's economic performance is also strong during this study, but well behind that of China, and neither does it enjoy the relaxed ethical stance of the Chinese structure. This is evidenced in its research investment, which has fallen as a proportion of GDP from 2.24 in 1990 to 1.78 in 2005 (National Statistics 2007), whereas China has increased from 0.7 to 1.31 (Wilsdon 2006).There is evidence in the literature of the importance of innovation to economic growth (OECDa 2004) and the relationship of this to GDP performance. This research explores the impact the National System of Innovation is having on the advance of stem cell research in the UK and China, using diabetes as a clinical model.


This paper reports an evaluation of a counselling service that was introduced into 20 general practices within Bradford City Primary Care Trust. Clinical Outcomes in Routine Evaluation (CORE) Assessment and End of Therapy forms were used to record referral and attendance information along with problems identified and demographic information about clients. There was a large disparity in the number of referrals across practices illustrating a range of influences on take-up of the service. Levels of attrition from referral for counselling to commencing were relatively high (188 invitations: 89 took up counselling). A longitudinal evaluation of outcomes was conducted using the CORE outcome measure and the SF-36 Health Survey Questionnaire. Data was collected at the beginning of counselling, at six months and at 12 months follow-up. We found some indication of positive change relating to severity of problems and ability to engage in social activities. However, evaluators should be aware that high attrition rates can create problems in achieving statistical reliability in contexts where overall population numbers are relatively small and/or the time for data collection is relatively short. In light of the recent growth of counselling within primary care, and the need to evaluate these services, the issues encountered in setting up this counselling service, and in seeking to evaluate it, may be instructive to others. Focus groups with counsellors and practice staff explored the benefits and problems in providing the service within practices.


Throughout the 2003 school year, my ninth grade global history students followed the media's coverage of the escalating crisis between the United States and Iraq. In early March of that year, as the media's coverage intensified, students brought a multitude of questions and concerns into the classroom. Rather than simply answer these questions, I saw the unfolding events as a "teachable moment" and planned a project to analyze how the media depict significant events. I decided that our classroom project would center on the U.S.-Iraqi conflict. In an effort to minimize any influence of my own opinions, the project would not deal with whether the war was "right" or "wrong" Instead, we would investigate the local media's coverage. My primary goal was to approach the coverage by drawing from a critical constructivist model. White asserts that such a model can be implemented by "modeling and applying, reflecting, involving students actively, and developing a community of learners." This project would also draw upon National Council for the Social Studies curriculum standards as students explored the relationships between power, authority, and governance (NCSS strand VI). More specifically, this project would focus on "the conditions, actions, and motivations that contribute to conflict and cooperation within and among nations." (2) A Critical Model for Analyzing the Media To fully grasp the political, social, and economic forces that have shaped the United States relationship with Iraq through to March of 2003, students needed to be exposed to much more than the slogans that were being transmitted in the newspapers, on the radio, and on television. To illustrate, just days before the United States fired missiles at Baghdad, MSNBC started "Countdown: Iraq," an electronic ticker counting down the hours Saddam Hussein had to comply with George W. Bush's ultimatum to leave Iraq. Throughout the days leading up to the war, CNN's slogan "Showdown: Iraq," generally preceded each half-hour segment of its twenty-four hour coverage of the conflict. Other news outlets also ran similar slogans such as NBC's "Target Iraq," CBS'S "America at War," and ABC'S "War in Iraq." The media neatly packaged the war as a commodity to be consumed rather than a complex historical event to be studied, reflected upon, and actively scrutinized. Indeed, the mass media can be a powerful educational force as it provides constant information and ideas, reinforces values, shapes expectations, and conveys models for appropriate action. (3) Hepburn outlines how media analysis can be used as a heuristic to arouse student interest, identify propaganda, learn the difference between fact and opinion, explore marketing techniques, and encourage parents to become involved in their child's schoolwork. (4) Studying how various media outlets depict major events allows social studies teachers to encourage authentic historical inquiry. By analyzing the construction of print and broadcast media, students can develop their own knowledge and opinions on controversial events. Tillman, in an effort to help students understand the circumstances surrounding the Bosnian War, created a three-day unit where his eighth grade geography students analyzed video footage of an hour-long ABC News special. (5) The model I used to analyze the media consists of four parts: 1. teaching students the political, social, and economic context in which an historical event takes place, 2. identifying the various groups of people whose lives are linked to the conflict, 3. analyzing newspaper and television news broadcasts devoted to covering that particular event, and 4. writing formal evaluations on bow the media covered an event. I have used this strategy within my global history course to teach about the Hutu-Tutsi conflict that resulted in genocide in Rwanda (1994), the ongoing conflict between India and Pakistan, the student protests in Chinas Tiananmen Square (1989), and the conflict between the Sandinistas and Contras during Nicaragua's civil war (1985-1990). …


In mobile multimedia networks, different traffic classes require various levels of quality of service (QoS). In this paper, we propose a cross-layer design to provide diverse QoS provisions for integrated realtime/non-realtime traffic by jointly taking into account the physical layer, data link layer, and application layer. Specifically, at the physical layer, adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) is employed to cope with the time-varying nature of fading channels whereas impairments due to queuing effects are considered at the data link layer. At the application layer, realtime and non-realtime traffic are classified into high and low priority classes, respectively, with strict priority levels. The cross-layer scheme is characterized as a discrete Markov modulated Poisson process. Solving the steady state probability of this Markov model readily enables us to investigate several important performance metrics such as packet drop rate due to buffer overflow and packet error rate due to transmission errors and network impairments. Our proposed cross-layer design is verified by comparing the analytical results with Monte-Carlo simulations. Furthermore, it has been shown that the proposed cross-layer design can flexibly guarantee QoS requirements for each traffic class.


Flavonoids are a class of secondary metabolites in plants that are involved in many important functions. Various flavonoid compounds have also been reported to be beneficial for human health. Bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus L.) is the characteristic field layer species in boreal forests and the fruits of bilberry are rich in anthocyanin pigments, a subclass of flavonoids. In the present work, flavonoid biosynthesis was examined in different tissues of bilberry. The focus was on the developing fruits of wild type and natural color mutants of bilberry, and on effect of solar radiation on flavonoid biosynthesis in bilberry leaves. For the isolation of RNA for gene expression analysis, a method was optimized for different tissues of bilberry. The cDNA fragments of five genes from the flavonoid pathway, coding phenylalanine ammonia-lyase, chalcone synthase, flavanone 3-hydroxylase, dihydroflavanol 4reductase and anthocyanidin synthase, were isolated from bilberry using polymerase chain reaction technique, sequenced, and labelled with dioxigenin-dUTP label. These homologous, bilberry-specific probes were used for determining the expression of the flavonoid pathway genes in bilberry fruits, flowers and leaves with a modified non-radioactive method developed in the course of the study. The anthocyanins, catechins, proanthocyanidins, flavonols and hydroxycinnamic acids in fruits, leaves and different fractions of bilberry were identified and quantified with high-performance liquid chromatography combined with a diode array detector and mass spectrometer. The results demonstrate a correlation between anthocyanin accumulation and expression of the flavonoid pathway genes during the ripening of berries. A correlation between flavonol and anthocyanin biosynthesis was detected in bilberry and also in previous literature collected from flavonol and anthocyanin analyses from other fruits. Accordingly, models for the connection between flavonol and anthocyanin synthesis in fruit species were suggested. Activation of the expression of flavonoid pathway genes and accumulation of flavonoids and hydroxycinnamic acids was detected in leaves growing under direct solar radiation, compared to the shadow leaves of the same plants. Based on the results, it is suggested that cyanidin of anthocyanins and flavonol quercetin play a predominant role in the defence against high solar radiation in Vaccinium leaves. The results give new information about the biosynthesis of flavonoids in bilberry at the gene level, in addition to the information of the composition and content of flavonoids during fruit development and in different parts of the bilberry plant. Also, new information was obtained of the roles of flavonoids in protecting plants from excess solar radiation.


Firefighting Research and Coordination Act - Amends the Federal Fire Prevention and Control Act of 1974 to direct the Administrator of the United States Fire Administration (Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)) to: (1) develop new, and utilize existing, measurement techniques and testing methodologies for evaluating new firefighting technologies; (2) evaluate the compatibility of new equipment and technology with existing technology; and (3) support the development of new standards through national voluntary consensus standards organizations for new firefighting technologies based on specified techniques and methodologies.Directs the Administrator to: (1) provide technical assistance and training to State and local fire service officials to establish nationwide and State mutual aid systems for dealing with national emergencies; and (2) develop and make model mutual aid plans for both intrastate and interstate assistance available to State and local fire service officials.Requires the Director of FEMA to revise FEMA's Federal Response Plan to incorporate plans for responding to terrorist attacks, particularly in urban areas.Authorizes the Superintendent of the National Academy for Fire Prevention and Control to train fire service personnel in: (1) strategies for building collapse rescue; (2) the use of technology in response to fires; (3) response, tactics, and strategies for dealing with terrorist-caused national catastrophes; (4) use of and familiarity with the national plan; (5) leadership and strategic skills, including integrated management systems operations and integrated response; (6) strategies and tactics for fighting forest fires; (7) integration of terrorism response agencies into the national terrorism incident response system; and (8) response tactics and strategies for fighting fires at U.S. ports, including fires on the water and aboard vessels.


This book deals with industrial renewal in Finland during the period 1945-98. One of the most recent trends in the advanced economies has been an accelerating rate of innovations and technological change. Previously, innovation was often generated through a series of discrete steps in research, development, and production. Today, innovation is increasingly generated in networks where value is generated through productive working relationships or collaboration. By analysing the underlying factors of the origins of innovations, development processes, characteristics of innovations, market situations and the characteristics of the firms, this study describes the technical development and the industrial renewal of the Finnish economy from the point of view of industrial innovations. By help of systematically collected data on domestic innovations for the period 1945-98, this study leads us to the origins of Finnish industrial innovations, to those circumstances and situations, where new ideas and products have originated. The results show that there are large variations in innovation activities of companies and characteristics of innovations during different phases of economic development (Less)


Constraints of typography have led to the physical segregation of diagrammatic treatments of information from the linear alphanumerics that have dominated scientific communication. Information Design Journal reflects these constraints. The segregated and subordinated status of graphics is metaphorically compared here to the cultural roles of women and minorities. Aspects of graphics treated include the retardation of their intellectual development and influence; their relegation to relatively tangential, simplistic and ornamental functions; and prevalent suspicions regarding their deceptiveness. However, technology now makes it possible to reintegrate graphics into the mainstream of intellectual communication.


In Hungarian Jews in the Age of Genocide , Ferenc Laczo offers a pioneering intellectual history of how a major European Jewish community responded to its exceptional drama during the age of persecution and the unprecedented tragedy in its immediate aftermath.


This study examines the effect of tourism development on energy consumption, CO2 and economic growth in China over the period from 1981 to 2010. An extension of ARIMA model was performed to investigate the relationship between variables. Two principle test results emerge from this study. First, increases on visitors may largely give rise to GDP. On the other hand, increase on tourism receipts may result in greater energy consumption and CO2 emission to some extent as compared to number of visitors. However, the amount of effects from either tourism receipts or number of visitors to energy consumption and CO2 emission are limited. From an energy conservation and economic growth point of view, the results support the hypothesis of tourism-led economic growth in the China economy with relatively limited increase of energy consumption and CO2 emission.


Traditional Unix tools operate on sequences of characters, bytes, fields, lines, and files. However, modern practitioners often want to manipulate files in terms of a variety of language-specific constructs--C functions, Cisco IOS interface blocks, and XML elements, to name a few. These language-specific structures quite often lie beyond the regular languages upon which Unix text-processing tools can practically compute. In this paper, we propose eXtended Unix text-processing tools (xutools) and present implementations that enable practitioners to extract (xugrep), count (xuwc), and compare (xudiff) texts in terms of language-specific structures. We motivate, design, and evaluate our tools around real-world use cases from network and system administrators, security consultants, and software engineers from a variety of domains including the power grid, healthcare, and education.


The driving force behind deep networks is their ability to compactly represent rich classes of functions. The primary notion for formally reasoning about this phenomenon is expressive efficiency, which refers to a situation where one network must grow unfeasibly large in order to realize (or approximate) functions of another. To date, expressive efficiency analyses focused on the architectural feature of depth, showing that deep networks are representationally superior to shallow ones. In this paper we study the expressive efficiency brought forth by connectivity, motivated by the observation that modern networks interconnect their layers in elaborate ways. We focus on dilated convolutional networks, a family of deep models delivering state of the art performance in sequence processing tasks. By introducing and analyzing the concept of mixed tensor decompositions, we prove that interconnecting dilated convolutional networks can lead to expressive efficiency. In particular, we show that even a single connection between intermediate layers can already lead to an almost quadratic gap, which in large-scale settings typically makes the difference between a model that is practical and one that is not. Empirical evaluation demonstrates how the expressive efficiency of connectivity, similarly to that of depth, translates into gains in accuracy. This leads us to believe that expressive efficiency may serve a key role in the development of new tools for deep network design.


Approaches for forecasting wildfire suppression costs in advance of a wildfire season are demonstrated for two lead times: fall and spring of the current fiscal year (Oct. 1–Sept. 30). Model functional forms are derived from aggregate expressions of a least cost plus net value change model. Empirical estimates of these models are used to generate advance-of-season forecasts. Cost forecasts involve estimation of suppression cost equations by geographical region based on a time series of historical data (1977–2006) of costs, a time trend, and climate variables, forecasts of the next season's suppression costs, by region and in total across all regions, and generation of suppression cost forecast probability distributions by region and in aggregate. The forecasts are also evaluated historically for their goodness of fit using cross-validation techniques. The two lead time forecast models are compared with the 10-year moving average of suppression costs, currently used as a budget request formula by the US Forest Service. Results show that the spring forecast of suppression costs is statistically no better than the fall forecast for predicting the coming season's costs. However, both the spring and fall forecasts significantly outperform the 10-year moving average, reducing forecast errors by approximately 60%. FOR. SCI. 54(4):381–396.


The Cold War initiated not only rapid weaponization campaigns within the United States and the Soviet Union, but launched a space race between the ideological opponents. The Soviet Union claimed an early victory by becoming the first nation to launch a satellite into space. Despite the United States' rough start, the country triumphed during its Apollo Program to become the leader in space. Treaties and international norms emerged throughout this time to prevent these technologically raging nations from weaponizing the expansive environment of outer space, but the resulting protections against national ownership of space limited incentives for future deep space travel. As the U.S. Space Shuttle program came to an end in 2011, the United States forfeit its capabilities to transport humans to the International Space Station. This apparent abandonment of outer space, however, began to reveal the seminal role of the commercial space industry and its revolutionary technologies. This article traces the transition from the Cold War-era space race to today's robust public-private expansion into space. It highlights the foundational importance of international cooperation to protect the interests of private companies, and presents a model of cooperative succession between space agencies and companies to send humans to Mars. Acknowledgements I thank Professor Steven Knapp for his continual support, constant conversation and encouragement. And for his comments and correspondence, I thank Professor John J. Klein. This article is available in Journal of Strategic Security: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/jss/vol13/ iss3/4


When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) determined that greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus; sage-grouse) did not warrant listing under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 2015, the agency recognized a coordinated eff ort of private landowners, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and state and federal agencies that eff ectively reduced threats to the species. This eff ort exemplifi ed an alternative model to species conservation that relies on voluntary conservation of private landowners to preclude government regulation. Through an in-depth case study of private landowners' voluntary sagegrouse conservation eff orts in Lake County, Oregon, we explored features of these voluntary arrangements that motivate participating private landowners whose livelihoods depend on livestock production. Using in-depth, semi-structured interviews, we explored how private and public actors implemented sage-grouse conservation, landowners' production and conservation goals, and perceived foundations for participation. Qualitative analysis of interviews and documentation found that private landowner participation in voluntary arrangements was motivated by well-funded program off erings that were largely aligned with production goals and gave them a sense of control over their economic futures in the context of a potential ESA listing of sage-grouse. Subscription to these programs was largely facilitated by landowner and agency leadership operating as intermediaries. By aligning voluntary conservation off erings with economic and cultural contexts (e.g., using trusted intermediaries to deliver resources to landowners), voluntary arrangements may alleviate reliance on regulatory protections for species conservation where conservation and rural livelihoods intersect.


We provide evidence that the occurrence of an international migration episode is associated with a variation in the living arrangements of the household members left behind. The migration of a married Mexican man typically induces his spouse and children to join the household of the wife's parents, a pattern that is at odds with the prevailing patrilocal norm. This change in living arrangements, which involves the extended family of the migrant, has two relevant implications for the analysis of the effects of paternal migration and remittances on the children left behind. First, it can give rise to an important heterogeneity in the effects of interest, which has not been explored in the migration literature. Second, it leads to attrition in longitudinal household surveys that is non-random with respect to potential outcomes.


Today all organizations around the world are trying to optimize the business process in the global market upon continuous improvement and total quality management in order to survive in a competitive market. Since there are huge costs to implement all tools and techniques of total quality management and it is not economical for any organization to apply all. Nine Total Quality Management's Critical Techniques (TQM's CTs) have been presented to implement in automotive industry. Each technique has a special application but on the other hand, some of them can be used for an assimilation objective and also some of them can be applied for more than one objective. The main objective of this study has been based on both internal and external customer satisfaction. In order to achieve the main objective, six significant criteria as decision making parameters have been proposed. The study has ranked the TQM's CTs as alternatives regarding to each criterion through one of the best and widely used decision making methods that is called Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) in ten selected Malaysia automotive companies. It has also determined an overall ranking of implementation of TQM's CTs with respect to all criteria and by considering their performance weight. The results of overall ranking of TQM's CTs are listed as follows: (1) Advanced Product Quality Planning Process (APQP); (2) Quality Function Deployment (QFD); (3) Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA); (4) Production Part Approval Process (PPAP); (5) Statistical Process Control (SPC); (6) Measurement Systems Analysis (MSA); (7) Management and Planning (MP) tools; (8) Kaizen; (9) 5S.
It has also been found the weight of relationship of TQM's CTs. For example, FMEA and SPC, QFD and APQP, QFD and FMEA, and 5S and Kaizen have highest relationship rather than other critical techniques of TQM.
Finally, an integrated implementation framework of the TQM's CTs with respect to their both relationship and performance weight has been suggested to create awareness and to guide quality planning managers to have an effective implementation of theses critical techniques of TQM.


Vast amounts of publicly licensed classical music resources are housed within many different repositories on the Web encompassing richly diverse facets of information—including bibliographical and biographical data, digitized images of music notation, music score encodings, audiovisual performance recordings, derived feature data, scholarly commentaries, and listener reactions. While these varied perspectives ought to contribute to greater holistic understanding of the music objects under consideration, in practice, such repositories are typically minimally connected. The TROMPA project aims to improve this situation by interconnecting and enriching public-domain music repositories. This is achieved, on the one hand, by the application of automated, cutting-edge Music Information Retrieval techniques, and on the other, by the development of contribution mechanisms enabling users to integrate their expertise. Information within established repositories is interrelated with data generated by the project within a data infrastructure whose design is guided by the FAIR principles of data management and stewardship: making music information Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. We provide an overview of challenges of description, identification, representation, contribution, and reliability toward applying the FAIR principles to music information, and outline TROMPA's implementational approach to overcoming these challenges. This approach applies a graph-based data infrastructure to interrelate information hosted in different repositories on the Web within a unifying data model (a 'knowledge graph'). Connections are generated across different representations of music content beyond the catalogue level, for instance connecting note elements within score encodings to corresponding moments in performance time-lines. Contributions of user data are supported via privacy-first mechanisms that retain control of such data with the contributing user. Provenance information is captured throughout, supporting reproducibility and re-use of the data both within and outside the context of the project.


This article describes Compaq QUICKSOURCE, an electronic problem-solving and information system for Compaq's line of networked printers. A major goal in designing this system was to empower Compaq's customers with expert system technology, allowing them to solve advanced network printer problems entirely on their own. This process minimizes customer down time; reduces the number of telephone calls to the Compaq Customer-Support Center (resulting in monetary savings); improves customer satisfaction; and, perhaps most importantly, differentiates Compaq printers in the market-place by providing the best and most technologically advanced customer-support facility. This approach also represents a reengineering of Compaq's customer-support strategy and implementation. In its first-generation system, SMART, the objective was to provide expert knowledge to Compaq's help-desk operation to better and more quickly answer customer calls and problems. QUICKSOURCE is a second-generation system in that the customer-support function is put directly in the hands of the consumers (an example of knowledge publishing). As a result, its design presented a number of different and challenging issues. Because the product would be used by a diverse and heterogeneous set of users, a significant amount of human factors research and analysis was performed as part of system design and implementation. The analysis also dictated certain decisions about the organization and design of the expert system component. Since September 1992, Compaq has shipped more than 3000 copies of QUICKSOURCE.


The occurrence of equatorial density depletions in the nightside F region ionosphere has been investigated by using observations gathered by the polar-orbiting Dynamics Explorer 2 satellite from August 1981 to February 1983. A variety of electric field/plasma drift patterns were observed within these depletions, including updrafting, downdrafting, bifurcating, converging, subsonic, and supersonic flows. The depletions, 116 events in total, are distributed over two groups: group I (eveningside depletions) consists of the events in the 1900–2300 MLT sector, and group II (morningside depletions) are the events in the 2300–0600 MLT sector. A statistical analysis reveals clear differences in the density depletion occurrence rates between the two groups. Magnetic activity appears to suppress the generation of eveningside depletions with a delay of 2–3 hours. In the morningside the probability of observing depletions increases instantly with increasing magnetic activity; yet the best correlation is found with a 2-hour delay. This indicates that in the premidnight sector the substorm-induced dynamo and prompt penetration electric fields induce westward electric fields in the equatorial ionosphere 2 hours after the onset in the auroral region. In the postmidnight sector, high-latitude ionospheric disturbances induce instantly equatorial eastward electric fields that move the F layer to higher altitudes, where it can become unstable to the Rayleigh-Taylor instability. Eveningside depletions were observed at all longitudes except those over the Pacific Ocean, while the morningside depletions occurred mostly over the Pacific and Atlantic-African sectors.


Combined spinal‐epidural and single‐shot spinal anaesthesia are both used for caesarean section. It has been claimed in individual trials that combined spinal‐epidural is associated with higher sensory spread and greater cardiovascular stability. We set out to gather all available evidence. We performed: a systematic literature search to identify randomised controlled trials comparing combined spinal‐epidural with spinal anaesthesia for caesarean section: conventional meta‐analysis; trial‐sequential analysis; and assessment of trial quality using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) system. Fifteen trials with high heterogeneity, including 1015 patients, were analysed. There was no significant difference between combined spinal‐epidural and spinal anaesthesia for our primary outcomes maximum sensory height and vasopressor use (mg ephedrine equivalents). However, trial‐sequential analysis suggested insufficient data and the GRADE scores showed 'very low' quality of evidence for these outcomes. The secondary outcomes hypotension, time for sensory block to recede to the level of T10, and the combined outcome of nausea and vomiting, did not differ significantly between the interventions. The block times were statistically significantly longer for combined spinal‐epidural in individual trials, but only one trial showed a clinically meaningful difference (11 min). Based on this analysis, and taking into consideration all comparisons irrespective of whether drugs had been applied via the epidural route, there is not enough evidence to postulate any advantage compared with the spinal technique. Future analyses and studies need to examine the potential advantages of the combined spinal‐epidural technique by using the epidural route intra‐ and/or postoperatively.


It has been nearly 30 years since Vietnam shifted to a multidirectional foreign policy that places greater emphasis on cultivating friends and engaging with the international community. Vietnam has moved from being an isolated country, largely dependent on Soviet aid, to a country that bolsters its standing in bilateral and multilateral forums whilst reaping the economic benefits of greater integration into the global economy. Since the start of the 21st century, China's more assertive posture, along with an increasingly complex, interdependent and multipolar world, has provided Vietnam with a host of problems. This article formulates a definition for a multidirectional foreign policy using Vietnam as a case study and argues that multidirectionalism allows Vietnam to reap economic benefits whilst safeguarding against uncertainty. Furthermore, the article tracks the three principal mechanisms through which Vietnam implements its multidirectional foreign policy: strategic and comprehensive partnerships, trade agreements, and multilateralism.


Objective: While memory tests are designed to measure the ability to store and retrieve information, other non-memory cognitive abilities are required to perform these tasks. Demographic factors also impact memory test performance. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of non-memory cognitive abilities and demographic variables on memory test performance in a clinical sample. Method: Participants were 105 patients (54.3% female), average age = 46.83 (14.38), average education = 13.83 (2.36), who completed neuropsychological evaluation. Stepwise regression analyses were conducted to determine which non-memory cognitive abilities and demographic factors accounted for the most unique variance in performance on commonly used memory tests. Results: Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System Trails Switching accounted for 22-33% of the variance in trials of the California Verbal Learning Test-II. Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, Fourth Edition (WAIS-IV) Matrix Reasoning subtest accounted for 11-12% of the variance in Logical Memory I and II from the Wechsler Memory Scale, Fourth Edition (WMS-IV). WAIS-IV Block Design accounted for 24% of the variance in WMS-IV Visual Reproduction I and II and 25-29% of the variance in the recall trials of the Rey Complex Figure Test. Conclusions: Non-memory cognitive abilities have a stronger influence on memory test performance than demographic factors. In particular, executive functions are most strongly associated with auditory-verbal memory performance, while visual-spatial/construction abilities are most strongly associated with visual-graphic memory performance. When interpreting memory test performance, it is important to be cognizant of these non-memory cognitive influences.


Earlier studies on income inequality and crime have typically used total income or total earnings. However, it is quite likely that it is changes in permanent rather than in transitory income that affects crime rates. The purpose of this paper is therefore to disentangle the two effects by, first, estimating region-specific inequality in permanent and transitory income and, second, estimating crime equations with the two separate income components as explanatory variables. The results indicate that it is important to separate the two effects; while an increase in the inequality in permanent income yields a positive and significant effect on total crimes and three different property crimes, an increase in the inequality in transitory income has no significant effect on any type of crime. Using a traditional, aggregate, measure of income yields mainly insignificant effects on crime.


Distributed digital control systems provide alternatives to conventional, centralised digital control systems. Typically, a modern distributed control system will comprise a multi-processor or network of processors, a communications network, an associated set of sensors and actuators, and the systems and applications software. This thesis addresses the problem of how to design robust decentralised control systems, such as those used to control event-driven, real-time processes in time-critical environments. Emphasis is placed on studying the dynamical behaviour of a system and identifying ways of partitioning the system so that it may be controlled in a distributed manner. A structural partitioning technique is adopted which makes use of natural physical sub-processes in the system, which are then mapped into the software processes to control the system. However, communications are required between the processes because of the disjoint nature of the distributed (i.e. partitioned) state of the physical system. The structural partitioning technique, and recent developments in the theory of potential controllability and observability of a system, are the basis for the design of controllers. In particular, the method is used to derive a decentralised estimate of the state vector for a continuous-time system. The work is also extended to derive a distributed estimate for a discrete-time system. Emphasis is also given to the role of communications in the distributed control of processes and to the partitioning technique necessary to design distributed and decentralised systems with resilient structures. A method is presented for the systematic identification of necessary communications for distributed control. It is also shwon that the structural partitions can be used directly in the design of software fault tolerant concurrent controllers. In particular, the structural partition can be used to identify the boundary of the conversation which can be used to protect a specific part of the system. In addition, for certain classes of system, the partitions can be used to identify processes which may be dynamically reconfigured in the event of a fault. These methods should be of use in the design of robust distributed systems.


Topology control protocol aims to efficiently adjust the network topology of wireless networks in a self-adaptive fashion to improve the performance and scalability of networks. This is especially essential to large-scale multihop wireless networks (e.g., wireless sensor networks). Fault-tolerant topology control has been studied recently. In order to achieve both sparseness (i.e., the number of links is linear with the number of nodes) and fault tolerance (i.e., can survive certain level of node/link failures), different geometric topologies were proposed and used as the underlying network topologies for wireless networks. However, most of the existing topology control algorithms can only be applied to two-dimensional (2D) networks where all nodes are distributed in a 2D plane. In practice, wireless networks may be deployed in three-dimensional (3D) space, such as under water wireless sensor networks in ocean or mobile ad hoc networks among space shuttles in space. This article seeks to investigate self-organizing fault-tolerant topology control protocols for large-scale 3D wireless networks. Our new protocols not only guarantee k-connectivity of the network, but also ensure the bounded node degree and constant power stretch factor even under k−1 node failures. All of our proposed protocols are localized algorithms, which only use one-hop neighbor information and constant messages with small time complexity. Thus, it is easy to update the topology efficiently and self-adaptively for large-scale dynamic networks. Our simulation confirms our theoretical proofs for all proposed 3D topologies.


Metamorphosed basic volcanic rocks of Permo-Triassic age occur in several distinct geological formations on Timor. Some are found in para-autochthonous units, which have been correlated with similar sequences on the Australian continental shelf; and some occur in apparently allochthonous units, which have been correlated with similar sequences in Malaya and Sumatra. Analyses of the relatively immobile elements, particularly Ti, Zr, Y, Nb, P and the rare earths, from both units revealed that the basalts vary from tholeiitic to mildly alkaline but are all consistent with emplacement in a rift-valley or ocean-floor setting. No difference was detected between the units based on basalt geochemistry, no calc-alkaline basalts similar to those reported in Malaya and Sumatra were found. and the basaltic suites are regionally distributed so as to cross-cut boundaries between the para-autochthonous and allochthonous units. The geochemistry is consistent with the evolution of all the Permo-Triassic units now on Timor as a part of the Australian continental margin but requires revision of detailed interpretations in order to be compatible with an exotic origin for the 'allochthonous' units.


This study describes the design and fabrication of transparent atom chips for atomic physics experiments. A fabrication process was developed to define the wire patterns on a transparent glass substrate to create the desired magnetic field for atom trapping experiments. An area on the chip was reserved for the optical access, so that the laser light can penetrate directly through the glass substrate for the laser cooling process. Furthermore, since the thermal conductivity of the glass substrate is poorer than other common materials for atom chip substrate, for example silicon, silicon carbide, aluminum nitride. Thus, heat dissipation copper blocks are designed on the front and back of the glass substrate to improve the electrical current conduction. The testing results showed that a maximum burnout current of 2 A was measured from the wire pattern (with a width of 100 μm and a height of 20 μm) without any heat dissipation design and it can increase to 2.5 A with a heat dissipation design on the front side of the atom chips. Therefore, heat dissipation copper blocks were designed and fabricated on the back of the glass substrate just under the wire patterns which increases the maximum burnout current to 4.5 A. Moreover, a maximum burnout current of 6 A was achieved when the entire backside glass substrate was recessed and a thicker copper block was electroplated, which meets most requirements of atomic physics experiments.


Immigration and its relationship with crime have long been discussed and researched in a variety of manners. There has been focus on a wide spectrum of research questions concerning the issue, such as public perceptions, immigrant perceptions, crime rates and immigration trends. The present article considers the crime rates in the areas of the UK with the highest concentrations of first-generation immigrants. The areas were gathered using census data and crime rates from police recorded statistics. The first-generation immigrants were categorised by their area of origin: Europe, Africa and Asia. Quantitative analysis showed that the areas containing the highest concentration of first-generation immigrants saw a drop in crime compared to the areas with the second highest concentration. Results also showed that certain immigrant groups combined in high concentrations make for lower crime rates. Such findings suggest that there may be a cultural aspect at play, and begs further research.


A multi-parameter fusion algorithm (MPFA) for auto-focus (AF) is discussed. The image sharpness evaluation algorithm (ISEA) and zoom tracking method (ZTM) are combined for AF. The zoom motor position (z) and background complexity (c) are regarded as the main parameters of this algorithm. A priority table depending on z and c is proposed. Modified ISEA or ZTM is adopted according to the priority table value. The hardware implementation of the MPFA on Texas Instruments' Davinci digital signal processor is also provided. Results show that the proposed scheme provides faster focusing compared with the conventional approaches.


Regularization plays an important role in generalization of deep learning. In this paper, we study the generalization power of an unbiased regularizor for training algorithms in deep learning. We focus on training methods called Locally Regularized Stochastic Gradient Descent (LRSGD). An LRSGD leverages a proximal type penalty in gradient descent steps to regularize SGD in training. We show that by carefully choosing relevant parameters, LRSGD generalizes better than SGD. Our thorough theoretical analysis is supported by experimental evidence. It advances our theoretical understanding of deep learning and provides new perspectives on designing training algorithms. The code is available at https://github.com/huiqu18/LRSGD.


This paper presents an extension of our previous work which proposes a new speaker representation for speaker verification. In this modeling, a new low-dimensional speaker- and channel-dependent space is defined using a simple factor analysis. This space is named the total variability space because it models both speaker and channel variabilities. Two speaker verification systems are proposed which use this new representation. The first system is a support vector machine-based system that uses the cosine kernel to estimate the similarity between the input data. The second system directly uses the cosine similarity as the final decision score. We tested three channel compensation techniques in the total variability space, which are within-class covariance normalization (WCCN), linear discriminate analysis (LDA), and nuisance attribute projection (NAP). We found that the best results are obtained when LDA is followed by WCCN. We achieved an equal error rate (EER) of 1.12% and MinDCF of 0.0094 using the cosine distance scoring on the male English trials of the core condition of the NIST 2008 Speaker Recognition Evaluation dataset. We also obtained 4% absolute EER improvement for both-gender trials on the 10 s-10 s condition compared to the classical joint factor analysis scoring.


In late April 2018, Iran's Judiciary announced a much anticipated ban on the popular messaging application, Telegram. The filtering order instructed all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Iran and the Telecommunications Ministry to block access to content on the Telegram network. The ban went into effect despite the record breaking popularity of Telegram, which was used by an estimated 40 million Iranians.
Iranian users rushed to apply circumvention tools to stay connected to Telegram despite the concerted efforts of different political bodies to diminish attention to the app. Much of the state's effort centered on migrating Telegram users to domestically developed alternatives. However, users expressed serious concerns about the security of state-sanctioned applications, and considered them to be facilitating state surveillance.
This research bulletin analyzes the aftermath of the Telegram ban in Iran and presents detailed data on the performance of Psiphon, one of the most widely used circumvention tools among Iranians. The bulletin concludes by reviewing the overarching Internet policies in Iran behind the Telegram ban. In addition, it presents the challenges that arise from the implementation of these policies, both to users and circumvention tool providers, especially as increasingly aggressive network interference becomes the norm.