"The paper provides one of the first empirical studies of the willingness to pay of renters and owner-occupiers for """"green buildings"""". We match publicly available information on the addresses of 15'000 apartments and single-family homes which have received the Swiss energy label """"Minergie"""" with two databases. The first database is provided by homegate.ch, the largest internet quotation service in Switzerland. We are able to match 1'500 Minergie rental apartments and to build a control group of around 11'000 newly built conventional (i.e. non-Minergie) apartments. The second database is provided by a large Swiss mortgage bank. It contains detailed information about the characteristics and price of 25'000 transactions of owner-occupied housing that occurred in the Zurich metropolitan region. We are able to recover 300 transactions of Minergie condominium apartments and single-family homes. For the buildings in the two samples located in the Zurich area we use a powerful GIS to subsequently match a large set of location characteristics. These include variables related to topography (aspect, orientation, view), accessibility (travel time to the CBD by car and public transportation, distances to local bus stops, distance to major roads), local amenities (road traffic noise, airport noise etc.) and various neighbourhood characteristics. We find that both Swiss owner-occupiers and renters are willing to pay a significant premium for green buildings. Minergie rentals command a premium of about five percent over conventional buildings n controlling for the quality and specific location of the apartments. The transaction price of Minergie condominiums is 3.5 percent higher, ceteris paribus, while single-family homes command a premium of about seven percent. In addition to these results we investigate the determinants of the spatial distribution of Minergie dwellings in Switzerland. We study where Minergie certified buildings cluster. By creating a measure of community environmentalism based on votes on four national referenda we are able to test several hypothesis regarding the demand for environmental goods. We conclude that income and """"cultural"""" (i.e. language) differences across communities account for the larger part of the variation in green building demand. The impact of political affiliation and demographic factors, although statistically significant, is less important."


Summary

For biodiversity conservation to be an effective and significant social investment, non-marketed values of biodiversity conservation and its associated opportunity costs should be evaluated in monetary terms.
In this study, we measured the willingness to pay (WTP) for bird abundance using a choice experiment (CE) based on the random utility model. We performed a cost–benefit analysis to identify the optimal proportion of broadleaved trees in conifer plantations on a volume basis to maximize the social benefits of bird conservation and wood production.
The results suggested that respondents to the CE were not satisfied with their current situation and preferred an increase in bird abundance. However, the estimated WTP indicated diminishing returns of bird conservation. More specifically, WTP first greatly increased before gradually experiencing decreasing marginal values, reaching its peak and finally decreasing slightly with increasing bird abundance.
Optimization analyses indicated that when the relationship between bird abundance and broadleaved tree proportion was convex, semi-natural plantations with nonzero broadleaved tree proportion (0·02–0·22) were always optimal options. When the relationship was linear, optimal broadleaved tree proportion ranged from 0 to 0·78 and was greatly affected by wood values. When the relationship was concave, there were only two optimal broadleaved tree proportions: a very high proportion (approximately 0·90) and the lowest possible proportion (0). When the convex and concave relationships approached the linear form, comparable benefits could be attained across broad ranges of broadleaved tree proportion both within and across the relationships. In such cases, it would be useful to increase the likelihood of a feasible land-use strategy of either land sparing or land sharing in order to be successful.
Synthesis and applications. It can be difficult to set quantitative targets in biodiversity conservation solely on an ecological basis, and social benefits of biodiversity conservation can create diminishing returns in many situations. The framework we propose shows how to reconcile resource production and biodiversity conservation in the real world.


A two-storey concrete wall-type structure is analyzed using three-dimensional nonlinear time-history analysis. Ground acceleration records of the magnitude 7.2 Kobe earthquake are used to simulate a scenario earthquake from the 67 km West Valley fault in Metro Manila. Ansys® software is used in the analysis to enable the modeling of concrete inelasticity: due to both concrete cracking and concrete crushing, using Solid65 concrete element. Using this element, smeared reinforcement is also introduced in the model. Results of simulation show that the failure mode is governed by tension cracks in the concrete adjacent to the corners of openings in the walls, especially in the absence of additional diagonal reinforcement thereat. It is also shown that concrete crushing failure is not critical for the structure analyzed, even in the absence of special boundary elements. Comparison of the result of simulation using different ground acceleration records scaled up to the same level shows that both stresses and deflections are higher for the record that has a predominant period of 0.34sec which is relatively nearer that of the natural period of structure of 0.15sec. The effect of frequency content of the input ground motion, which may be attributed to the soil condition, is evident in this study. There is a need for further research on more appropriate ground acceleration inputs for simulations like this study. The computational effort of about 10 hours using 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor and 2.49GB RAM for a 10-sec simulation at 0.01sec interval is too much for most engineering design offices. While the computational effort for a 16-sec simulation at 0.02 sec interval for a small structure as in this paper could be reduced from 8 hours to 2.5 hours using a much powerful HP Proliant ML150 G6 server with 2.26 GHz, 8-core processor and 48 GB RAM, this computer is still not the norm for ordinary engineering design office. Aside from considerable storage disk requirement, software commercially available to engineering design offices are typically less powerful; there is thus still a need for simplified analytical tools, e.g. 2-dimensional nonlinear static analysis by pushover. Keywords: Nonlinear Time-History Analysis, Concrete, Wall-Type Structure, Ground Acceleration


Thailand's plant protection regime presents a unique sui generis plant protection system, which is used as a model by several developing nations. The current Thai Plant Variety Protection (PVP) law has attracted some criticism, and whether or not farmers and breeders actually benefit from the system is in doubt. The questions this situation raises are: has Thailand adopted clear, coherent, and workable rules for plant variety protection in response to the needs of the nation? Is the introduction of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in agriculture via a PVP regime a desirable and contributory factor to the development of Thailand? More precisely, how might such an IPR regime be made compatible with Thailand's development needs, bearing in mind the obligations the country has accepted through its membership of the WTO and adherence to the TRIPS Agreement? This thesis attempts to address these questions. By highlighting the salient features of the Thai plant protection regime, this thesis addresses the major concerns of the rights of farmers, local communities, and plant breeders. It is suggested that the protection of plant varieties is vital to Thailand, considering the fact that agriculture represents a fundamental economic activity and the livelihood of a large section of the total population; therefore, introducing IPRs in agriculture via the PVP regime is critical to the development of agriculture in Thailand. Thus, a new developmental approach to the IP protection of plant varieties is desirable to ensure the unique needs of the nation, the validity of national legislation, and the long-term promotion of agricultural development and sustainability in Thailand. Thailand can provide a more coherent framework for plant variety protection by carefully calibrating the PVP provisions and establishing a coherent set of rules in the form of a new legislative framework. It is concluded that a number of possible elements are available from a variety of instruments that exist in international law, notably the TRIPS Agreement, the UPOV Convention, the CBD, and the ITPGRFA. Lastly, the proposed regulatory reforms suggest that Thailand's PVP provisions should be amended in three major areas, including (1) provisions for the rights of farmers and local societies, (2) legal protection for plant breeders' rights, and (3) institutional apparatus governing plant protection issues in Thailand.


Detailed stratigraphic and structural studies at Snow Lake pendant have established new evidence for the presence of uppermost Precambrian and Lower Cambrian miogeoclinal strata within the axial region of the Sierra Nevada batholith. Lithologic and stratigraphic data along with trace fossils, a distinctive Triassic overlap sequence (Fairview Valley Formation?), dikes probably related to the Jurassic Independence dike swarm, and structural history suggest that the older rocks of Snow Lake pendant correlate with the Stirling Quartzite, Wood Canyon Formation, Zabriskie Quartzite, and Carrara Formation in the western Mojave Desert and San Bernardino Mountains. This correlation implies approximately 500 km of dextral transport of the rocks of Snow Lake pendant along the proposed Mojave-Snow Lake fault. Movement on the fault probably took place after 148 Ma, the age of the Independence dike swarm, and prior to 110 Ma, the age of plutons in the central part of the Sierra Nevada batholith.


In this thesis I undertake one of the first critical examinations of Australian community archaeology, focussing on issues of control and power which are central to the community archaeology approach. In the past, archaeologists have driven archaeological inquiry, creating a situation where Indigenous communities rarely benefited directly from research. In response to this, community archaeology attempts to reorient the archaeological process to better suit the needs of Indigenous communities, thus moving towards greater Indigenous control. I argue that understanding relationships between archaeologists and Indigenous communities also requires consideration of the institutional frameworks under which research is undertaken and the relative access that archaeologists and Indigenous communities have to 'power resources'. In order to understand how community archaeology compares to more conventional approaches to heritage investigation, I compare a community archaeology project to a cultural heritage assessment and a processual research project all conducted in Waanyi country, northwest Queensland. I conceptualise my findings as being along a continuum of control. While the community archaeology project achieved more control for the Waanyi than the other projects, I also recognise the significant contributions that the other projects make towards achieving Indigenous control. Findings suggest that the issues surrounding community archaeology will continue to play a defining role in guiding Australian archaeology in the future. I conclude that archaeologists must continue to engage with issues of Indigenous control and that community archaeology is a suitable way to achieve this.


The fouling removal mechanism for plate heat exchanger (PHE) heat transfer surface controlled by shear stress is considered. The semi-empirical formula to predict asymptotic value of fouling thermal resistance velocity dependence based on heat and momentum transfer analogy is proposed. The correlation is in a good agreement with literature data and was checked for PHEs installed in District Heating systems of a number of cities in Ukraine. As a result the modified method for PHE heat transfer surface area calculation is proposed, which takes into account the influence of flow velocity and heat transfer enhancement in channels on fouling thermal resistance. The obtained correlation can also be used for estimation of fouling rate in process PHEs where one media is water, e.g. in distilleries, nitric and phosphoric acids, fertilizers productions.


This paper examines cross-national variance in the impact of public and commercial television on citizens' political knowledge level and whether and how that variance may be related to differences in the content of public television broadcast. Multilevel models are used to link micro-level information on citizen knowledge from the European Election Studies of 1999 and 2004 to macro-level information about media systems and how public television operates in different contexts that we compiled from a variety of information sources. We find that exposure to news programs on public and private television channels are both positively associated with political knowledge after stringent controls for possible shared determinants of news exposure and knowledge, but only among less interested citizens. While exposure to news on public television appears to have, on average, a more positive effect than exposure to news on private channels, the difference is not significant and varies greatly across contexts. Public television seems more effective in informing citizens in countries where public television is largely independent of commercial revenue and uses its public funding to provide a particularly large amount of news and information programs for a politically very heterogeneous audience. However, private television appears to have the advantage in countries characterized by the opposite characteristics and relatively lower levels of press freedom. The discussion relates our findings to debates about the virtues of public broadcasting


Australians have a remarkable affection for their sport, an affection which has endured for well over 150 years. They love the sports they play but, even more so, they love the sports they watch – both in large numbers at the grounds or via broadcast. This enduring love extends to all codes, particularly Australian rules and rugby league.

What binds Australians so closely to their AFL and NRL teams? Why do these institutions remain so popular – cherished, even – when levels of participation and interest in our churches and our politics have slipped considerably over recent decades?

The main reason is that the two football codes continue to offer a sense of shared identity to their followers, one that churches and political parties do not. When Australians identify with a football club, they enjoy a strong feeling of belonging outside of their families and their places of work (which, after all, are not voluntary in the way football is voluntary).


Premature cardiovascular (CV) death is the commonest cause of death in patients with end stage renal disease (ESRD), which includes those receiving or close to requiring renal replacement therapy. In ESRD patients, CV deaths are most commonly caused by cardiac arrhythmia and sudden cardiac death compared to the general population where myocardial ischaemia and infarction predominate. Higher CV disease burden is due to accumulation of "conventional" risk factors (e.g. hypertension, diabetes mellitus, smoking) and "novel" risk factors (e.g. oxidative stress, proteinuria, anaemia, inflammation) in ESRD patients. In addition, risk factors specific to patients with renal disease have been identified including alteration in left ventricular (LV) structure, called uraemic cardiomyopathy. These structural abnormalities are common in patients with ESRD (between 60-80% of subjects upon initiation of dialysis) and include left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH), systolic dysfunction (LVSD) and dilatation. These changes in LV structure confer adverse CV outcome in ESRD patients and have proven difficult to reverse.

Detection of these abnormalities is usually performed using echocardiography, however this technique is inaccurate in ESRD patients due to significant alterations in LV shape and geometric assumptions made during calculation of myocardial mass. Cardiovascular MRI (CMR) negates these assumptions and is the most accurate, reproducible and reliable method of assessing LV dimensions independent of intravascular volume, particularly in patients with altered myocardial architecture. Furthermore, maximal left atrial volume can be measured using CMR. The principle aims of the studies presented in this thesis were to elucidate prognostic and pathophysiological features of uraemic cardiomyopathy using CMR.
In a large study (n=246) of haemodialysis patients, the determinants of each LV abnormality of uraemic cardiomyopathy were identified from past clinical history, haemodialysis and blood parameters and other LV measurements. For LV changes, major determinants were clinical features associated with advanced renal disease, namely expansion of intravascular/ extracellular fluid compartment, abnormal bone mineral biochemistry and hypertension. Furthermore, presence of one LV abnormality was one of the strongest predictors of presence of another, perhaps indicating differing stages of uraemic cardiomyopathy development. In a subsequent prognostic study including these patients (n=446), presence of LVSD and LV dilatation on CMR were significantly associated with poorer all cause and CV mortality. Presence of LVH, which is by far the most common structural change, was associated with poorer cardiovascular survival only. In addition, presence of two or three abnormalities (commonly LVH with another abnormality) had a significantly poorer prognosis and independently predicted CV and all cause mortality. This has implications for therapeutic strategies which should aim to slow or reverse cardiac changes of ESRD and prevent progression from one cardiac abnormality to 2 or more. In a further study (n=201) investigating additional prognostic features of ESRD patients with LVH, maximal left atrial volume (LAV) was measured using the bi-plane area length method at end LV systole. Elevated LAV and presence of LVSD were significantly associated with poorer all cause survival and were independent predictors of death. The most likely causes of elevated LAV in ESRD patients are LV diastolic dysfunction and expanded extracellular compartment and may provide a target for therapeutic intervention.

The electrophysiological features of uraemic cardiomyopathy were assessed using microvolt T wave alternans (MTWA) which is a novel, non-invasive method of measuring small variations in surface electrocardiogram (ECG) T wave morphology and thus ventricular repolarisation. This technique has been used to stratify other cohorts at elevated risk of sudden cardiac death (such as ischaemic and non ischaemic cardiomyopathy, hypertensive LVH). A study presented in this thesis, compared MTWA results between ESRD (n=200) and hypertensive patients with LVH on echocardiography (n=30). Abnormal MTWA result was significantly more common in ESRD patients compared to hypertensive patients with LVH. Furthermore, abnormal MTWA result was significantly associated with myocardial abnormalities of uraemic cardiomyopathy and a history of macrovascular atheromatous disease in ESRD patients. Despite preservation of LV function on CMR, the frequency of abnormal MTWA result in ESRD patients was similar to previous studies in subjects with heart failure. 31Phosphorus magnetic resonance spectroscopy is a novel, non-invasive technique of estimating cardiac energetic status and high energy phosphate (HEP) metabolism in a myocardial area of interest and has previously been used to assess patients with global myocardial disease (dilated cardiomyopathy, hypertensive LVH). High energy phosphate metabolism was compared between patients with ESRD (n=53) and hypertensive LVH (n=30) and despite similar LV mass between both groups, PCr: ATP (an indicator of HEP metabolism) was significantly reduced in ESRD patients. These findings are most likely due to cardiac interstitial fibrosis and the alteration of tissue composition within the area of interest, and changes in metabolic function within cardiomyocytes of uraemic hearts. Finally, a small study (n=50) investigated the effect of successful renal transplantation on LV mass measured by CMR. On comparison of patients who remained on the renal transplant waiting list, there was no significant difference in LV mass in patients who received a renal transplant. It is likely that previous echocardiography studies that demonstrated significant regression of LVH, measured improvement in fluid control rather that actual reduction in myocardial mass.

Future studies investigating benefit of therapeutic intervention may require identification of individuals at higher CV risk and the results of studies presented in this thesis aim to provide information for selecting such ESRD patients. With these results in mind, further prospective studies will be able to carefully select groups of ESRD patients with differing left ventricular, left atrial, electrophysiological and biochemical properties to demonstrate survival benefit with interventional agents. In this way, future therapies for ESRD patients can be tailored to improve cardiovascular survival.


Brand identification has the potential of shaping individuals' attitudes, performance and commitment within learning and work contexts. We explore these effects, by incorporating elements of branded identification within gamified environments. We report a study with 44 employees, in which task performance and emotional outcomes are assessed in a real-world assembly scenario - namely, while performing a soldering task. Our results indicate that brand identification has a direct impact on individuals' attitude towards the task at hand: while instigating positive emotions, aversion and reactance also arise.


The weighting of gradient sample arguments for the creation of descriptors of image regions is studied. The descriptors are interpreted as binned and weighted argument kernel density estimates and thereby their defining attributes are identified as the binning rules and the weighting. The weighting is further studied and four different weighting strategies are analyzed. The naive constant weighting is argued to have a poor robustness to image perturbations. As an answer to this, the customary gradient magnitude weighting is motivated. However, the short-comings of this approach are pointed out and two novel weighting strategies are suggested. The first suggested weighting gives a system parameter determining a distinctiveness to robustness trade-off with the customary magnitude weighting being a special case of it. The second suggested weighting gives a similar robustness as the first one, but at a lower computational cost. Finally, the effects of the different weighting strategies are demonstrated with real imagery data and synthetic perturbations.


Nanostructures have been the great candidates for many engineering applications due to their unique physical properties, for example; high surface to volume ratio compared to bulk structures. Integration of distinct polymer systems to nanostructures of different shapes, i.e nanofibers, nanorods, nanotubes or nanospheres, has enabled researchers to obtain various functional surfaces with the characteristic advantages of these nanostructures. In this study, we separately present the hard-templated nanotube fabrication of single and coaxial stimuli responsive and conducting polymer for drug delivery and humidity sensors application. Nanotubes of stimuli responsive polymers, poly(methacrylic acid) p(MAA) , poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) p(NIPAAm) and poly(hydroxyethylmethacrlyate) p(HEMA), are achieved by initiated chemical vapor deposition (iCVD) technique whereas conducting polymer nanotubes, polyaniline (PANI), are fabricated via oxidative chemical vapor deposition (oCVD). The loadingrelease capacity and kinetics of single and coaxial stimuli responsive polymeric nanotubes are investigated by monitoring UV-VIS intensity change of model dye molecule, phloroglucinol (Phl). The sensor sensitivity of conducting polymeric nanotubes is studied by analyzing conductivity change of nanotubes under various humid conditions. Furthermore, iCVD and oCVD polymers, which are respectively pHEMA and PANI in this thesis, are combined for coaxial nanotube fabrication in order to enhance the sensitivity of humidity sensors.


In this paper we address the problem of detecting and localizing objects that can be both seen and heard, e.g., people. This may be solved within the framework of data clustering. We propose a new multimodal clustering algorithm based on a Gaussian mixture model, where one of the modalities (visual data) is used to supervise the clustering process. This is made possible by mapping both modalities into the same metric space. To this end, we fully exploit the geometric and physical properties of an audio-visual sensor based on binocular vision and binaural hearing. We propose an EM algorithm that is theoretically well justified, intuitive, and extremely efficient from a computational point of view. This efficiency makes the method implementable on advanced platforms such as humanoid robots. We describe in detail tests and experiments performed with publicly available data sets that yield very interesting results.


Declines in populations of amphibians have been occurring more dramatically over the past 25 years. The declines have various causes. One of the possible causes of amphibian declines is pesticides. Copper sulfate is commonly used as a fungicide in vineyards and gardens in Turkey. In this study, our purpose was to explain the morphologically and histologically acute toxic effects of copper sulfate on Bufo viridis tadpoles. B. viridis tadpoles at Gosner stage 21 were exposed to different concentrations (0.01, 0.05, and 0.1 mg/L) of copper sulfate for 120 h. The LC50 value of copper sulfate was calculated as 0.058 mg/L. Morphological measurements indicated that copper sulfate concentrations of 0.05 and 0.1 mg/L caused poor larval development and growth. Edema was observed in the histological sections, especially on the cross-sections passing from the head (>=0.01 mg/L CuSO4). Furthermore, hepatocellular degeneration in the liver, deformation of gastrointestinal epithelial cells, and deformation and anomalies in somite formations were all observed (>=0.01 mg/L CuSO4). Reduced reaction to stimuli, loss of equilibrium, and shortening of swimming distance were observed in the tadpoles of the 0.05 and 0.1 mg/L CuSO4 treatment groups.


An incomplete hypercube possesses virtually every advantage of complete hypercubes, including simple deadlock-free routing, a small diameter, bounded link traffic density, a good support of parallel algorithms, and so on. It is natural to reconfigure a faulty hypercube into a maximum incomplete cube so as to lower potential performance degradation, because a hypercube so reconfigured often results in a much larger system than what is attainable according to any conventional reconfiguration scheme which identifies only complete subcubes. A maximum incomplete subcube involves one maximum complete subcube, plus certain smaller complete subcubes, and, thus, may accommodate multiple jobs of different sizes simultaneously, delivering a higher performance level. This paper proposes an efficient approach for identifying all the maximum incomplete subcubes present in a faulty hypercube. The proposed approach is on the basis of manipulating Boolean expressions, with the search space reduced considerably by taking advantage of the basic properties of faulty hypercubes during expression manipulation. It is distributed, in that every healthy node executes the same identification algorithm independently, at the same time, it is confirmed by fault simulation that our approach indeed gives rise to significantly larger reconfigured systems and requires short execution times.


The study will focus on the current financial crisis and its impact on the growth, trade and employment in emerging market economies (EMEs) namely China and India. The emerging market economies are characterized as transitional, which means that they are in the process of moving from a closed to an open market economy. It is said that by adoption of neoliberal policies, the economy will suppose to lead to a better economic performance levels, as well as transparency and efficiency in the capital market. The proponents of the 'neoliberal economic policies' always maintained that it is working and as a consequence, for example, the Indian economy is growing at high rates, the stock market is booming, foreign reserve is at a comfortably high level. The 'free trade' policy is making availability of a variety of goods unimaginable earlier as a mark of the benefits of globalization. The 'invisible hand' of the market, tries to pretend that market operates in isolation. On the basis most recent available data and studies the author has examined the impact of financial crisis on the economic growth and various sectors of the economies in China and India. Finally, the author finds the argument that China emerging as the alterative engine of growth for the world economy is too ambitious. Some have suggested that a 'decoupled Asia' through its own growth and expanding domestic demands would ensure higher imports demands for its growing economies and thus limit the economic slowdown in the developed economies. But this is unlikely due to: the US, EU and Japan together account for more than half of China's exports, and as recession deepens, it is bound to affect export sector and overall economic activity in China.


An accurate perception of the distance between an object and a nearby surface can increase a viewer's sense of presence in an immersive environment, particularly when a user is performing actions that affect or are affected by this distance. Two experiments were conducted examining the effectiveness of stereoscopic viewing, shadows, and interreflections at conveying this distance information. Subjects performed simple tasks based on the perception of the distance between a fixed virtual table and an approaching block in a virtual environment. In the first experiment, subjects lowered a virtual block to a virtual table. For this task, both stereoscopic viewing and shadows had statistically significant effects on subject performance. In the second experiment, subjects mechanically reported the perceived distance between a virtual block and virtual table. For this task, viewing condition, shadows, and interreflections were shown to be statistically significant distance cues.


This paper seeks to examine, from a human rights perspective, the degree of protection of the right to strike under Article 11 ECHR. Chapter One examines whether Article 11 ECHR offers any possibility for reading into its provisions a general right to strike. It will scrutinise the initial reluctance of the ECtHR to proceed to such an interpretation, and thus to adequately safeguard the right at issue. Chapter Two discusses the course through which the initial despair preceded the subsequent hope of the Demir and Baykara judgement while considering the case's impacts on the protection of the right to strike. Chapter Three critically examines the decision in the RMT v. UK case, in which the ECtHR appeared to misplace any optimism its previous jurisprudence had generated. It will focus on the UK's problematic pre-industrial notices which are necessary for the workers in escaping tortious liability, and on the classification, by the Court, of a secondary action as an ''accessory'', rather than a core aspect of trade unions' activity. Chapter Four at first refers to the importance of the right to strike as a human right. It is argued that its enhanced protection can result in the promotion of human rights for both those taking part in the industrial action and those who are not formally engaged in the dispute. Finally, it discusses why the ECHR constitutes the 'safest' route through which individuals and trade unions can challenge breaches vis a vis the right to strike. For full text, please click  here


[1] A 1/2° resolution global ocean general circulation model is used to investigate the processes controlling sea surface cooling in the wake of tropical cyclones (TCs). Wind forcing related to more than 3000 TCs occurring during the 1978–2007 period is blended with the CORE II interannual forcing, using an idealized TC wind pattern with observed magnitude and track. The amplitude and spatial characteristics of the TC-induced cooling are consistent with satellite observations, with an average cooling of � 1°C that typically extends over 5 radii of maximum wind. A Wind power index (WPi) is used to discriminate cooling processes under TCs with high-energy transfer to the upper ocean (strong and/or slow cyclones) from the others (weak and/or fast cyclones). Surface heat fluxes contribute to � 50 to 80% of the cooling for weak WPi as well as away from the cyclone track. Within 200 km of the track, mixing-induced cooling increases linearly with WPi, explaining � 30% of the cooling for weak WPis and up to � 80% for large ones. Mixing-induced cooling is strongly modulated by pre-storm oceanic conditions. For a given WPi, vertical processes can induce up to 8 times more cooling for shallow mixed layer and steep temperature stratification than for a deep mixed layer. Vertical mixing is the main source of rightward bias of the cold wake for weak and moderate WPi, but along-track advection becomes the main contributor to the asymmetry for the largest WPis.


The United States Supreme Court's conservative majority has taken the Court's election jurisprudence on a pro-partisanship turn which gives political actors freer range to pass laws and enact policies that can help entrench politicians (particularly Republicans) in power and insulate them from political competition. The trend on the Supreme Court is unmistakable whether it reflects the Court majority's cynical view that American politics is "sordid, partisan and unfair" or more crassly a self-interested reality of Republican-appointed Justices doing the bidding of the Republican Party.

This Article focuses not on the majority's motivations but instead upon three subtle doctrinal tools the Court has developed to further the pro-partisanship turn and allow Republican party entrenchment. These doctrinal tools take the Court much farther than it went in Rucho v. Common Cause, the Supreme Court decision holding that federal courts cannot consider constitutional claims against partisan gerrymandering. Indeed, this doctrinal subtlety has allowed much of this pro-partisanship turn to remain unnoticed in the broader legal community. The results nonetheless may block nonpartisan election reform and depress minority voting rights, especially in the "race or party" racial gerrymandering cases in which courts hold predominant racial motivations in redistricting are impermissible but predominant partisan motivations are permissible. Analysis of these subtle doctrinal moves not only lays bare a profound shift in the Court's election law cases that likely will hurt minority voting rights; it also illustrates the power of Supreme Court Justices to move doctrine subtly while avoiding controversy that would accompany more forthright judicial declarations.

First, Chief Justice John Roberts, sometimes in majority opinions for the Court, has exhibited what appears to be a false naivete about what social scientists and, by extension, courts, can know about voters' political behavior. From calling political science tests of partisan gerrymandering "sociological gobbledygook" to misrepresenting the plaintiffs' arguments in the 2019 Rucho partisan gerrymandering case as a call for proportional representation to proclaiming in the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder case killing off a key part of the Voting Rights Act that "things have changed in the South," Roberts has consistently ignored or belittled social science evidence about voting behavior in ways that give political actors freer rein to enact laws and policies in their self-interest.

Second, the Court's new burden-shifting "presumption of good faith" has put a large thumb on the scale in favor of legislative self-interest and against findings of minority vote dilution. Coupling the Supreme Court's 2018 voting rights decision in Abbott v. Perez with Rucho, lower courts must assume good faith even when self-interested legislators and other political actors enact laws or policies which preserve their own power. The Court has expanded the realm of good faith to include some self-interested actions, such as what the Court in Rucho called "constitutional political gerrymandering."

Third, the Court has allowed government actors to reenact laws or policies only slightly different from laws or policies that lower courts have found to be discriminatory by coming up with new, nondiscriminatory reasons to support them. As in Abbott, the courts allow such "animus laundering" to remove the apparent discriminatory taint of the original action while letting the government enact substantially the same policies without penalty. A recent Fifth Circuit case on Texas's voter identification law provides a classic example of animus laundering. Further, the Supreme Court's recent Department of Commerce case concerning inclusion of a citizenship question on the 2020 census case shows the length to which many of the Justices are willing to go to ignore evidence of discriminatory intent and pretext and provide a cleansing of discriminatory taint.

These three Supreme Court tools—willful ignorance of political reality, the presumption of legislative good faith, and animus laundering—give self-interested government actors the ability to make partisan gerrymandering, racial gerrymandering, restrictive election laws, and minority vote dilution easier. Further, as explained in Part V, the combination of the presumption of good faith and animus laundering provides a path for the Court to get out of the difficult "race or party" box in the racial gerrymandering cases by having courts recast racial agendas as partisan agendas, and then treating the partisan agendas as constitutionally permissible.


HIV remains an important public health issue throughout the world. In Côte d'Ivoire, a high burden of HIV is observed in men who have sex with men (MSM).

 We assessed the acceptability of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) among men who have sex with men (MSM) in Bouaké, Côte d'Ivoire.

 We conducted and analysed four focus groups with 31 HIV-negative MSM and eight in-depth individual interviews with participants recruited from the focus groups.

 Four MSM (13%) were aware of PrEP before participating in the study. All the participants were interested in taking PrEP if available: 19 (61.3%) would prefer the daily regimen and 12 (38.7%) would opt for the on-demand regimen. Many advantages of PrEP were mentioned: protection in case of a condom break, protection in case of high-risk sexual behaviour, self-reliance, decreasing HIV fear and ease of use. Barriers to the use of PrEP included: it does not protect against other Sexually Transmitted Tnfections (STIs), taking a pill regularly is necessary, the size of the pill, possibility of side effects, the cost and accessibility. Six participants (19.3%) admitted that they would use condoms less if they take PrEP.

 Findings indicate that PrEP is acceptable within the MSM community. Implementation should be done rapidly, and PrEP should be part of a global prevention program which includes counselling, STI screening and promotion of safe sex practices. Health authorities should consider PrEP for all high-risk groups to avoid worsening stigmatization by targeting MSM only.


Fiduciary duty is arguably the single most important aspect of our corporate law system. It consists of two distinct sub-duties — a duty of care and a duty of loyalty — and it applies to all directors and corporate officers. Yet, under extant law, the duty only applies vertically, in the relationship between directors and corporate officers and the firm. At present, there exists no horizontal fiduciary duty: directors and corporate officers owe no fiduciary duty to each other. Consequently, if one of them fails her peers, they cannot seek direct legal recourse against her even when they stand to suffer significant reputational and financial losses. This state of affairs is undesirable not only from a fairness perspective, but also from an efficiency standpoint as it raises governance costs for firms and may undermine their ability to attract skillful officers and directors.

In this Essay, we call for the introduction of a horizontal fiduciary duty among directors and corporate officers. The proposed duty would complement, rather than replace, the fiduciary duty that corporate officers owe the corporation and the shareholders. We argue that the institution of a horizontal fiduciary duty would (1) lead to improved decisionmaking and information sharing on boards; (2) enable board members to vindicate themselves in situations in which another board member is the one to breach the fiduciary duty; (3) attract more capable individuals to serve as directors; and (4) improve corporate management and governance.


Royalty stacking, the most recent incarnation of the complements problem identified in the early 1800s by French engineer Augustine Cournot, has received considerable attention. The potential for royalty stacking within standard setting efforts arises from the fact that downstream manufacturing companies can face multiple upstream gatekeepers, each of whom must grant a license to their "essential" patents before the downstream firms can legally commercialize the standard. Some authors have claimed that in high-tech industries - which are frequently characterized by cumulative innovation, dispersed ownership of patents, and cooperative standard setting efforts - the cost of obtaining all necessary licenses is too high, such that innovation has been thwarted and consumers have been harmed. In this paper, we assess the case for royalty stacking within standards and find the evidentiary support weak at best. We note that the relevant question is not whether royalty stacking is possible, as the theoretical arguments behind it have withstood the test of time, but whether it is common enough and costly enough in actuality to warrant policy changes. The available evidence suggests not, implying that any policy changes aimed at solving royalty stacking are likely to cause more (unintended) harm than they cure.


High-resolution fluid simulations are computationally expensive, so many post-processing methods have been proposed to add turbulent details to low-resolution flows. Guiding methods are one promising approach for adding naturalistic, detailed motions as a post-process, but can be inefficient. Thus, we propose a novel, efficient method that formulates fluid guidance as a minimization problem in stream function space. Input flows are first converted into stream functions, and a high resolution flow is then computed via optimization. The resulting problem sizes are much smaller than previous approaches, resulting in faster computation times. Additionally, our method does not require an expensive pressure projection, but still preserves mass. The method is both easy to implement and easy to control, as the user can control the degree of guiding with a single, intuitive parameter. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our method across various examples.


> One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child.
>
> Carl Jung
Do you remember the feeling


To the Editor: Although tick-borne rickettsioses are widespread globally, few reports document their presence in Central America (1). Serosurveys detected rickettsial antibodies in humans in Central America in 1971 in Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama (2,3). An outbreak of rickettsial illness was reported to have occurred in Costa Rica in 1974, where 2 case clusters affected 6 of 15 family members (4). A rickettsial organism was isolated from a patient who died in Panama in 1950 (5), and more recently Rickettsia rickettsii was confirmed in a fatal case in Panama (6). We report a patient with serologic evidence of rickettsiosis after a tick bite sustained during travel in Honduras.

A 51-year-old man sought medical evaluation after returning from travel to Roatan, Honduras, where he was bitten by a tick in the lower abdomen. He reported erythema and induration at the site of the tick bite with associated central necrosis. He described an illness with headache, fever, weakness, dizziness, abdominal discomfort, diarrhea, flu-like symptoms, and respiratory symptoms affecting him 1–2 weeks after the tick bite. He was evaluated while still traveling and received multiple diagnoses, including malaria, respiratory infection, and parasites, and was given chloroquine, primaquine, penicillin, and mebendazole. His condition improved. He returned to the United States 2 months after the tick bite.

His travel history included Thailand, Jamaica, Aruba, the Bahamas, Belize, Germany, Spain, Hungary, the Netherlands, and New Zealand. The patient recalled removing ticks from his body as a child in Maryland but had no associated illness. He denied any recent tick bite other than the one in Honduras, where he had close contact with a horse and dogs and was frequently outdoors.

Results of his physical examination were unremarkable; routine laboratory studies showed values within reference ranges. No antibodies to Borrelia burgdorferi or Plasmodium spp. were detected.

Serologic analysis for rickettsia, performed by a commercial laboratory (Focus Diagnostics, Cypress, CA, USA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Atlanta, GA, USA), showed elevated titers (Table). The patient took doxycycline (100 mg 2×/d) for 10 days and subjectively improved.

Table

Rickettsia spp. serologic titers for a man who returned from Honduras, 2005*

On the basis of infections documented in the Americas, R. rickettsii, R. africae, and other less well-known rickettsial pathogens such as R. parkeri or R. massiliae (1) are possible etiologic agents in our case. The most common human-biting tick in Central America is Amblyomma cajennense, which is a known vector of R. rickettsii. Serosurveys have suggested the presence of R. rickettsii infection in the Yucatan (7), and PCR has confirmed a case of R. rickettsii in that region (8). Rhipicephalus sanguineus, the vector of R. conorii (boutonneuse fever) in the Mediterranean, is also found in Mexico, but to date no transmission of R. conorii has been documented in the Americas. R. sanguineus was implicated in a cluster of human Rocky Mountain spotted fever cases in the United States in 2002–2004 (9).

Our patient had not traveled to the areas of the Caribbean where transmission of R. africae has been documented, but he had lived in areas of the United States with potential transmission of rickettsial infections. R. parkeri is a newly recognized pathogen in the Americas (10). Its vectors (A. maculatum and A. triste) are found in parts of North, Central, and South America. The illness caused by R. parkeri appears to be less severe than Rocky Mountain spotted fever and could be consistent with our patient's illness. Because antibodies against R. parkeri and R. rickettsii cross-react, serologic analysis is of little use for differentiating these 2 organisms.

The history and serologic findings for our patient suggest a recent tick-borne rickettsiosis, most likely acquired in Honduras. However, we can neither confirm that infection was recent nor confirm the species. The history of a tick bite and description of the skin lesion are consistent with an eschar, but no physical evidence of the tick or eschar remained at the time of evaluation. Diagnosis of rickettsial infection can be confirmed by demonstrating at least a 4-fold increase in titers between acute-phase and convalescent-phase serum samples, by identification of rickettsiae in an acute-phase serum or tissue sample, or by culture. Use of an immunofluorescent antibody assay alone does not identify the specific agent causing spotted fever.

Because our patient was examined 2 months after the exposure, options for making a diagnosis were limited. Extensive serologic cross-reactivity exists among the rickettsial species, which precludes the determination of species in our case. Although antibodies to rickettsiae can be long-lived, the extremely high levels of immunoglobulin (Ig) G and IgM suggest a recent rickettsial infection in our patient. Testing was unavailable for other rickettsiae (e.g., R. parkeri, R. massiliae).

Our patient likely had rickettsial infection acquired in Honduras. We present this case to alert clinicians to consider the diagnosis of rickettsial infections in the Americas, even if infections have not been previously documented in a specific country or region. Because rickettsial infections can be severe and are treatable, the clinician should consider rickettsial infections in returned travelers with compatible clinical findings. Our case also demonstrates the potential role of travelers as sentinels of emerging infectious diseases.


Reliable, fast and low-complexity signal acquisition plays a key role in satellite navigation. Prior to tracking or data demodulation, the user must achieve coarse synchronization with the respective signal's code-phase and Doppler frequency. For navigation signals of the current generation (e.g. E1 OS, L1C), this task is cumbersome in terms of computation time and complexity due to their long spreading code, which is why coarse/acquisition (C/A) signals with short codes and low data rates are having a renaissance in signal design for future global navigation satellite systems (GNSS). Due to their potentially short time to acquisition and low demand on hardware resources, they are an attractive option both from a mass-market and high-performance user's perspective.
However, short spreading codes cannot be assumed to be mutually orthogonal. When multiple satellite signals are received, multiple access interference (MAI) will act as an additional source of noise. From a signal design point of view, a tradeoff between shorter and shorter codes and acquisition reliability needs to be achieved. Acquisition reliability is measured in terms of the receiver operating characteristic (ROC): the ROC curve is obtained by plotting the global detection probability versus the global false alarm probability at various detection thresholds. In [1], this has been done on a per-bin basis for individual search cells, but not yet for the complete search space of code-phase bins and Doppler bins. The contribution of this work is twofold. Firstly, we derive the global ROC by extending our previous work form [1] to the full search space. Secondly, the new ROC model is used to minimize the spreading code length under a reliability constraint.
The first part of the work deals with the global ROC model. When considering the complete search space, one needs to account for the fact that C/A signals act as very strong MAI on some few Doppler bins, but as very weak MAI on most Doppler bins. This phenomenon has sometimes been referred to as "Doppler-crossings", and is due to the fact that a C/A signal repeats a short code many times before a new data bit is transmitted. Repeating a code many times leads to a signal power spectral density that exhibits spectral lines; these spectral may align when the difference between the search bin's Doppler frequency and the interferer's Doppler frequency is an integer multiple of the code rate. It has been demonstrated that the conventional spectral separation coefficient (SSC) is not suited to model Doppler-crossings, but modified versions have been proposed [2], [3]. Using this constellation-dependent SSC for each interfering satellite, we derive a probability density function for the MAI's effective noise floor I_0 (in units of Watts per Hertz) affecting each search bin. Finally, the ROC is derived as follows. Since MAI is modelled in terms of its white noise equivalent, we can assume that each search bin output follows a chi-square distribution when conditioned on the MAI noise floor I_0. This conditional ROC is then marginalized over the distribution of I_0 to obtain the actual ROC.
In the second part of the work, the actual tradeoff between spreading code length and reliability is described. We aim to minimize the spreading code length, while ensuring that the acquisition performance is not eaten up by the increase of MAI; therefore, we perform a constrained minimization. The reliability constraint is that the ROC contain operating points with acceptable false alarm/detection performance. Starting from a reliable initial spreading code length (e.g. 1023 chips), we calculate the ROC with the previously described method. While the constraint is satisfied, the spreading code length is decreased by a fixed stepsize and the ROC is calculated again. This process terminates as soon as the reliability constraint is violated. The last spreading code length which satisfied the constraint is the optimal short code length.
The proposed methodology offers a systematic way for acquisition optimization from a GNSS signal design point of view. Preliminary simulation results suggest that reasonable short code lengths are on the order of 300, depending on the application scenarios. Such a signal can help to dramatically improve the time to acquisition and acquisition complexity.

[1] C. Enneking, F. Antreich, M. Appel, A. L. F. de Almeida, "Pure Pilot Signals for GNSS: How Short Can We Choose Spreading Codes?", Proceedings of the 2019 International Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation, Reston, Virginia, January 2019, pp. 925-935.
[2] C. Enneking, F. Antreich, L. Krieger and A. L. F. de Almeida, "Gaussian Approximations for Intra- and Intersystem Interference in RNSS", IEEE Communications Letters (Early Access), Oct. 2018.
[3] C. J. Hegarty, "A Simple Model for C/A Code Self-Interference", Proceedings of the 27th International Technical Meeting of the ION Satellite Division, ION GNSS+ 2014, Tampa, Florida, September 8-12, 2014.


An Incentive Theory of Matching This paper presents a theory explaining the labor market matching process through microeconomic incentives. There are heterogeneous variations in the characteristics of workers and jobs, and firms face adjustment costs in responding to these variations. Matches and separations are described through firms' job offer and firing decisions and workers' job acceptance and quit decisions. This approach obviates the need for a matching function. On this theoretical basis, we argue that the matching function is vulnerable to the Lucas critique. Our calibrated model for the U.S. economy can account for important empirical regularities that the conventional matching model cannot. JEL Classification: E24, E32, J63, J64


Research shows that teachers' grading is influenced by non-achievement factors in addition to official criteria, such as knowledge and skills. Some grading criteria are internalised by the teacher, who is sometimes unable to verbalise the criteria used and refers to what is called a 'gut feeling'. Therefore, transparency, validity and reliability are problematic. The aim of this study was to explore which criteria physical education teachers consider important when grading. Such an exploration makes it possible to discuss how the verbalised criteria and the value they are given by the teachers can be understood. Four Year 9 teachers at different Swedish compulsory schools were interviewed using Kelly's Repertory Grid technique. Among the verbalised criteria, four themes were identified: motivation, knowledge and skills, self-confidence and interaction with others. The teachers sometimes had difficulties predicting which criteria had relevance to the grades given, and the criteria considered important by the teachers were not always reflected in the grade. The verbalised criteria revealed teachers using grades to encourage such student behaviours that helped them to handle the classroom situation and to facilitate students learning. To become cognisant of and develop their grading, methods to verbalise their individual grading criteria were needed, and Kelly's Repertory Grid technique is one possible option. The results provide discussion points about reasons for the way teachers are grading.


The rocks at Chimney Mountain provide a rare glimpse into primary intrusive relations and exceptionally well-preserved pre-Shawinigan metasedimentary rocks in the Adirondack Highlands despite a strong Ottawan thermal overprint. A near vertical contact between granite (ca. 1172 Ma) and a shallowly dipping and structurally intact sequence of quartzose to calc-silicate metasedimentary rocks is exposed on the southern flank of Chimney Mountain in the Central Adirondacks. The contact is marked by foliation truncation and a metasomatic aureole with randomly orientated porphyroblasts of enstatite rimmed by anthophyllite (max. 5 cm) and phlogopite (max. 2 cm), and a zone of granular, quartz-rich rock. The granite is non- to weakly foliated and has a shallow, north-plunging, mineral lineation as do the metasedimentary rocks. Zircons separated from a diopside-bearing quartzite (82% SiO 2 ; 0.75 m thick) are of variable size (up to 400 μm), equant, and contain, on average, >1000 ppm uranium. Scanning electron microscope investigation indicates that there is little variation in a uniformly dark cathodoluminescence response, no discernible cores or rims, few inclusions, and partially faceted to round morphologies. Zircon U-Pb sensitive high-resolution ion microprobe (SHRIMP II) ages of 1042 ± 4 Ma and 1073 ± 15 Ma are coincident with Ottawan metamorphic ages from the Adirondack Highlands. Zircons from the intrusive granite yield large cores with typical anorthosite-mangerite-charnockite-granite (AMCG) ages (ca. 1171.6 ± 6.3 Ma) and sparse, thin younger rims (ca. 1060–1090 Ma) readily distinguishable by cathodoluminescence. Despite the younger zircon ages, the metasedimentary rocks and their fabric must predate the crosscutting granite. The thermal effect of the Ottawan event was likely enhanced by volatile fluxing and resulted in recrystallization and resetting of zircons in the metasedimentary rocks. However, it had limited effects on zircons in the granite and produced only thin metamorphic rims emphasizing the importance of local geochemical conditions to the response of zircon to metamorphism. Elzevirian or Shawinigan fabrics are preserved as the dominant foliation; the lineation and folding is likely late (post-1170 Ma) Shawinigan or Ottawan (ca. 1050 Ma). Titanites from the same metasedimentary sequence yield a range of 238 U/ 206 Pb ages from 969 to 1077 Ma, with a maximum probability age of 1035 Ma, similar to other titanites in the Adirondack Highlands. Ottawan paleotemperatures, estimated by zirconium in titanite thermometry, range from 787 to 818 °C.


The BFT consensus algorithm provides 100% security rather than probability, but it has not been widely used due to its high resource consumption and low consensus efficiency. The blockchain community has also been optimized on the basis of traditional Byzantine fault tolerance, trying to actually apply the BFT protocol to the consensus layer of the blockchain. In this paper, we propose Loop-Grouping Tree and TEE BFT (LgTTBFT), a simple and efficient Byzantine fault tolerant consensus strategy. At the heart of LgTTBFT is a new tree topology (LgTree) and Trusted Execution Environment (TEE). We constructed a structured network and multireconstructed multi-way tree structure LgTree as the node organization structure of the network layer of the blockchain system. Compared with MinBFT and Ethereum, it provides a simpler network structure and more efficient routing efficiency. The special tree structure also performs well in terms of load balancing and stability. The use of TEE has greatly improved system efficiency from both the number of replicas and the communication process: reduce the minimum number of replicas from 3f +1 to 2f +1, The communication phase of the consensus process is reduced from three phases of PBFT to two phases, and the communication complexity of the PREPARE phase is reduced from O(n) to O(n). Experiments have shown that the combination of structured network and trusted execution environment provides better throughput and latency.


Truths and Half Truths is aimed at economic and social science academics and students who are interested in the dynamics of China's institutional development and societal transformation. Covering the complexity of the social, economic, and governance reforms behind the economic miracles achieved by China since its reform in 1978, and particularly in the past twenty years, this book provides much needed insight and critical thinking on major aspects of China's reform. Topics include employment, environment, anti-poverty; urbanization and rural development; education, corruption, political regime and media. Readers will be able to re-evaluate the costs and benefits of China's modernization from a point-of-view of sustainability. © 2011 Woodhead Publishing Limited. All rights reserved.


Factor V leiden is an inherited disorder of blood clotting causing hypercoagulability and can often lead to retinal vein occlusions. This purpose of this case report is to present a spontaneous sub-hyaloid macular hemorrhage and impending retinal vein occlusion in a young woman found to be positive for factor V leiden. She was treated with YAG laser to open the posterior hyaloid face. This led to complete resolution of the hemorrhage with return of 6/6 visual acuity. We conclude that YAG laser treatment is an affective treatment in spontaneous sub-hyaloid macular hemorrhage in a positive factor V leiden patient. This is the first case study of spontaneous macular hemorrhage in a patient with such a mutation. This report also demonstrates the efficacy of YAG laser for premacular hemorrhage, which produces a rapid resolution and improvement in visual acuity.


The role of dopamine in monitoring negative action outcomes and feedback-based learning was tested in a neuroimaging study in humans grouped according to the dopamine D2 receptor gene polymorphism DRD2-TAQ-IA. In a probabilistic learning task, A1-allele carriers with reduced dopamine D2 receptor densities learned to avoid actions with negative consequences less efficiently. Their posterior medial frontal cortex (pMFC), involved in feedback monitoring, responded less to negative feedback than others' did. Dynamically changing interactions between pMFC and hippocampus found to underlie feedback-based learning were reduced in A1-allele carriers. This demonstrates that learning from errors requires dopaminergic signaling. Dopamine D2 receptor reduction seems to decrease sensitivity to negative action consequences, which may explain an increased risk of developing addictive behaviors in A1-allele carriers.


Phylogenetic trees are widely used to study the relationships among living species and genes. In their Perspective, [ Baum et al. ][1] discuss how it has become apparent that trees are commonly misunderstood, leading to confusion about the concept of common ancestry. Although challenging, tree thinking should be taught as an element of evolution training at all levels.

 [1]: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/310/5750/979


The Industrial Revolution paved the way for industrialisation, economic growth and innovation, and resulted in the availability of an increased range of goods and services, improved life expectancy, and many other benefits. However, the rapid development has come at a cost which has not yet been settled.

The earth's natural resources are being used at a rate that cannot be sustained by the natural ecosystem and, according to the Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK government in 2009, we are heading for a "perfect storm" where a growing world population will demand yet more resources from an earth which simply cannot sustain demand.


ABSTRACT The construction method for chains of disasters or events is still one of the core scientific questions in studying the common rules of disaster's evolution. Especially when dealing with the complexity and diversity of disasters, it is critical to make a further investigation on reducing the dependency of prior knowledge and supporting the comprehensive chains of disasters. This paper tries to propose a novel approach, through collecting the big scholar and social news data with disaster-related keywords, analysing the strength of their relationships with the co-word analysis method, and constructing a complex network of all defined disaster types, in order to finally intelligently extract the unique disaster chain of a specific disaster type. Google Scholar, Baidu Scholar and Sina News search engines are employed to acquire the needed data, and the respectively obtained disaster chains are compared with each other to show the robustness of our proposed approach. The achieved disaster chains are also compared with the ones concluded from existing research methods, and the very reasonable result is demonstrated. There is a great potential to apply this novel method in disaster management domain to find more secrets about disasters.


To successfully navigate their habitats, many mammals use a combination of two mechanisms, path integration and calibration using landmarks, which together enable them to estimate their location and orientation, or pose. In large natural environments, both these mechanisms are characterized by uncertainty: the path integration process is subject to the accumulation of error, while landmark calibration is limited by perceptual ambiguity. It remains unclear how animals form coherent spatial representations in the presence of such uncertainty. Navigation research using robots has determined that uncertainty can be effectively addressed by maintaining multiple probabilistic estimates of a robot's pose. Here we show how conjunctive grid cells in dorsocaudal medial entorhinal cortex (dMEC) may maintain multiple estimates of pose using a brain-based robot navigation system known as RatSLAM. Based both on rodent spatially-responsive cells and functional engineering principles, the cells at the core of the RatSLAM computational model have similar characteristics to rodent grid cells, which we demonstrate by replicating the seminal Moser experiments. We apply the RatSLAM model to a new experimental paradigm designed to examine the responses of a robot or animal in the presence of perceptual ambiguity. Our computational approach enables us to observe short-term population coding of multiple location hypotheses, a phenomenon which would not be easily observable in rodent recordings. We present behavioral and neural evidence demonstrating that the conjunctive grid cells maintain and propagate multiple estimates of pose, enabling the correct pose estimate to be resolved over time even without uniquely identifying cues. While recent research has focused on the grid-like firing characteristics, accuracy and representational capacity of grid cells, our results identify a possible critical and unique role for conjunctive grid cells in filtering sensory uncertainty. We anticipate our study to be a starting point for animal experiments that test navigation in perceptually ambiguous environments.


Diagnostic reasoning is a key component of many professions. To improve students' diagnostic reasoning skills, educational psychologists analyse and give feedback on epistemic activities used by these students while diagnosing, in particular, hypothesis generation, evidence generation, evidence evaluation, and drawing conclusions. However, this manual analysis is highly time-consuming. We aim to enable the large-scale adoption of diagnostic reasoning analysis and feedback by automating the epistemic activity identification. We create the first corpus for this task, comprising diagnostic reasoning selfexplanations of students from two domains annotated with epistemic activities. Based on insights from the corpus creation and the task's characteristics, we discuss three challenges for the automatic identification of epistemic activities using AI methods: the correct identification of epistemic activity spans, the reliable distinction of similar epistemic activities, and the detection of overlapping epistemic activities. We propose a separate performance metric for each challenge and thus provide an evaluation framework for future research. Indeed, our evaluation of various state-of-the-art recurrent neural network architectures reveals that current techniques fail to address some of these challenges.


Microcredits are important for dissemination of entrepreneurship and especially for development of rural areas as well as for promoting women's socio-economic status and increasing their and their families' welfare. The expected benefits of microcredit application depend on the fact that it is given to women have entrepreneurial personality traits. The aim of this study is to determine whether women using micro-credits have entrepreneurial personality characteristics. For this reason, the women using microcredit for at least one year, women participating entrepreneurial activities by their own possibilities and housewives in the Sirnak province were included in the research. A total of 159 women (53 women from each group) were interviewed face to face. The obtained data have been evaluated by using the Discriminant Analysis. Results of the analysis showed that women using micro-credit are similar to entrepreneurial women only in terms of autonomy. Autonomy average of entrepreneur women and women using micro-credit was higher than housewives. It has been found that women who use micro-credits are similar to housewives in terms of uncertainty, achievement and dominance. The mean achievement and dominance of women using micro-credits and housewives are lower than those of entrepreneurial women; the uncertainty tolerance was found to be higher.


Intensive changes in the structure of the grid due to the penetration of new technologies, coupled with changing societal needs are outpacing the capabilities of traditional grid control systems. The gap is widening at an accelerating rate with the biggest impacts occurring at the distribution level due to the widespread adoption of diverse distribution-connected energy resources (DER) . This paper outlines the emerging distribution grid control environment, defines the new distribution control problem, and provides a distribution control reference model. The reference model offers a schematic representation of the problem domain to inform development of system architecture and control solutions for the high-DER electric system.


INTRODUCTION Dissent is a defining characteristic of democratic society. One need only recall how freedom to dissent was denied to student protesters in Beijing's 1989 Tiananmen Square, or to the millions of victims who died in Stalinist gulags because their political or religious convictions were labeled non-compliant with the Soviet dictator's policies for his socialist enterprise. Indeed, American constitutional experts point with satisfaction to the fact that the citizen's capacity to dissent, to proclaim variance with the government's declared positions or practice, underscores the Bill of Rights, the Constitution's first ten Amendments. Those rights originated, so to speak, as the price tag for the Thirteen Colonies' ratification of the Constitution itself. The Constitution's seven articles were regarded as lacking provision to safeguard the right of the ordinary citizen to conscientiously oppose governmental action. The nation's founding citizenry retained acute awareness of how they and their ancestral forebears fared poorly at the hands of autocratic European political regimes. Not so in America, they determined. It was dissent from a tyrannical George III, as embodied in the Declaration of Independence (1776), which enabled the genesis of a distinct American republic. And it was a principle of dissent, as reflected in the aforementioned Bill of Rights (1791), which promised to preserve that republic's integrity of civil attitude, its equity in institutional processes and its resolve to solidify the bases for each person's fundamental liberty. (See McKay, 2000, 47-69.) Among the many contexts in which the current role of dissent is seriously valued and assiduously studied, there are two which appear at first glance to exist in striking contrast. On the one hand, there is the example of corporate structures. The formal academic discipline of organizational communications devotes considerable attention to assessing the influence of dissent upon board room decision making, directorship protocol, supervisory activity and such dynamics as participant morale, loyalty, productivity, accountability, sense of ownership, etc.. A second example derives from the judiciary. Appeals Court judges and Supreme Court justices are entitled to dissent in whole or in part with a majority's prevailing opinion. Unlike that majority's determination, a 'holding' of the court which enjoys subsequent binding authority, the dissent in any given instance has no inherent merit beyond the simple articulation of a contrary stance. But judicial dissent has become a crucial element of the American legal system. Extensive tomes have been penned which attempt to analyze the purported patterns of predictable cues which are said to describe justices' voting behavior. The total impact of such efforts; however, falls far short of an exact science. (See M. G. Hall & P. Brace, 1999.) Still, they attest to the fact that judicial dissent deserves not only scholarly respect, but a recognition that such dissent represents both a necessary latitude in legal reasoning and an alternative response to legal sources. Without either, jurisprudence would surely desiccate. ESSAY OBJECTIVE The literature on dissent provided by organizational research is vast. Similarly, as prior stated, modern legal theorists have yielded a no less impressive bibliography. But what is significant is that no known study addresses the issue as to whether there may be parallelism between the view of dissent espoused by these very different and yet very important spheres of inquiry. The intention of this essay is to examine this uncharted theme. It is the author's position that previous research on judicial dissent has entirely declined to consider implications of justices' dissent from the perspective of what is revealed about the specific nature of dissent expressed in the juridic setting. Because of that avoidance, there is a lack of opportunity for scholars to evaluate the legal species of dissent in terms of whether it is or is not compatible with characteristics of dissent put forth by communications' scholarship. …


Economists have expended considerable effort to develop economically meaningful definitions of the somewhat elusive concept of "sustainability." We relate such a definition of sustainability to well known concepts from neoclassical economics, in particular, potential Pareto improvements (in the Kaldor-Hicks sense) and inter-personal compensation. In the inter-temporal realm, we find that dynamic efficiency is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a notion of sustainability that has normative standing as a goal for public policy. We define sustainability as dynamic efficiency plus intergenerational equity. Further, we argue that it is not unreasonable for economists to focus on the efficiency element, leaving equity considerations to the political process. The analogy to the relationship between potential Pareto improvements and (intragenerational) transfers can facilitate discussions about sustainability, both within the economics community and as part of an interdisciplinary discourse, and makes the basic concepts easier to operationalize.


Companies from Korea have become leading actors in the rapidly growing global online game market, being a knowledge and creativity intensive industry. The development of the industry raises a number of questions of the internationalisation process of companies in the intersection of creative- and technology-intensive industries. Co-evolution with user groups also requires interpretation and linkages to knowledge of local user preferences, creating additional challenges in the internationalisation strategy, through the product-service interaction. This paper explores the internationalisation efforts of the Korean online game industry through a case study of the country's leading online game company.


This paper is, in part, an account of a personal journey; I approached the study of Ancrene Wisse from a training in modern literature and philosophy via study of feminist critical study. How was a late twentieth century feminist agnostic to deal with a thirteenth century text written initially for the guidance of three sisters who were leading a religious life in solitude? How could I give a modern lay person's reading of a medieval religious text?In order to formulate an approach to a coherent reading, I had first to clarify the terms that would be used. The two major problems encountered, those of definition and anachronism, were, I realized, interlinked. Terms I was dealing with, such as "spirituality" and "lay," had to be understood in the historical context in which they (or their Middle English/Latin equivalent) were used, while other terms, most notably "misogyny," were anachronistic and as such had no historical context.While it may not always be possible to follow the exhortation of John Bossy that "a historian writing about an earlier period should not use a key word, such as religio, except in the sense it had in the period about which he is writing,"(1) it is often useful to look at the way key terms were used in the period in question. Jacques Le Goff points out that "Every idea is embodied in words, and every word reflects some reality. The history of words is history itself."(2)An investigation of terms used can provide an insight into the text being read. What is meant by "text," is, of course, also problematic especially when, as with Ancrene Wisse, the original version is no longer extant and the versions that do exist exhibit variations. It is a modern prejudice that the "original" version, or that which most closely conveys the author's intentions, is the "best" in some quasi-moral sense. Bella Millett, herself in the final stages of preparing an edition of Ancrene Wisse, is not attempting to produce a "reconstructed definitive authorial version," but rather to come to terms with mouvance, that is, the "textual instability or fluidity." She points out that:Editors have been preoccupied with the loss of "une authenticite perdue" the hypothetical perfection of the completed work as it left the author's hands, rather than coming to terms with the "une authorite generalisee" of medieval vernacular works which might be revised and rewritten indefinitely, both by their original authors and by others.(3)The variability and complexity of Ancrene Wisse needs to be kept in mind in any reading of it. Readers also needs to be clear about the sort of category in which they are placing it in any reading. Categories tend to be supplied by the departmentalized structure of academic studies, a structure which can be at best unhelpful and at worst damaging. There has recently been a move towards cross-disciplinary study, but in the case of reading a medieval work such as Ancrene Wisse, the desire to compartmentalize, or put things in boxes and label them so they can be more easily handled, remains. What sort of thing is Ancrene Wisse? Into what sort of box can it be put? Is it to be studied as literature or as history? Is it misogynistic? Is it mystical?Ancrene Wisse has traditionally been studied by English students as an example of early Middle English prose, as literature that is, but now many historians turn to it for evidence of anchoritic lifestyles in the Middle Ages. In his 1997 study of the current state of Ancrene Wisse group studies, Roger Dahood points out that the study of Ancrene Wisse and its associated works is on the rise among historians and literary critics with particular interests in the roles of women in late twelfth and early thirteenth century English society.(4) But what would it mean to study Ancrene Wisse as literature?When this author was first studying literature at university in the late 1970s, literature departments were still under the influence of New Criticism. …


A role for green niches has risen to prominence in the environment and innovation literature. The role of idealistic enthusiasts in the creation of sustainability initiatives in niches is widely recognized. The importance of tensions in incumbent socio-technical regimes is acknowledged to provide niches with development opportunities. However, the literature currently gives insufficient consideration to the processes by which niches and regimes interact and are interdependent. This paper addresses this by considering socio-technical translations between niches and regimes. It does so by analysing niche-regime interactions in the areas of food and housing and the development of eco-housing and organic food in the UK. Three kinds of translations are identified that affect the sustainabilities practiced in niches and regimes, and which do not all flow from green niche to incumbent regime.


Background: Colorectal cancer (CRC) follows a protracted stepwise progression, from benign adenomas to malignant adenocarcinomas. If detected early, 90% of deaths are preventable. However, CRC is asymptomatic in its early-stage and arises sporadically within the population. Therefore, CRC screening is a public health priority. Summary: Faecal immunochemical test (FIT) is gradually replacing guaiac faecal occult blood test and is now the most commonly used screening tool for CRC screening program globally. However, FIT is still limited by the haemoglobin degradation and the intermittent bleeding patterns, so that one in four CRC cases are still diagnosed in a late stage, leading to poor prognosis. A multi-target stool DNA test (Cologuard, a combination of NDRG4 and BMP3 DNA methylation, KRAS mutations, and haemoglobin) and a plasma SEPT9 DNA methylation test (Epi proColon) are non-invasive tools also approved by the US FDA, but those screening approaches are not cost-effective, and the detection accuracies remain unsatisfactory. In addition to the approved tests, faecal-/blood-based microRNA and CRC-related gut microbiome screening markers are under development, with work ongoing to find the best combination of molecular biomarkers which maximise the screening sensitivity and specificity. Key Message: Maximising the detection accuracy with a cost-effective approach for non-invasive CRC screening is urgently needed to further reduce the incidence of CRC and associated mortality rates.


Like other fragile sub-Saharan African countries, Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone are seeking to harness their natural resource potential in the context of ambitious development strategies. This study investigates options for scaling up public investment and expanding social safety nets in a general equilibrium setting. First, it assesses the macro-fiscal implications of alternative fiscal rules for public investment, and, second, it explicitly accounts for redistribution through direct cash transfers. Results show that a sustainable non-resource deficit target is robust to the high uncertainty of resources output and prices, while delivering growth benefits through higher public investment. The scaling-up magnitudes, however, depend on the size of projected resource revenue and absorptive capacity. Adding a social transfer raises private consumption, suggesting that a fraction of the resource revenue could be used to expand safety nets.


Despite the prevalence of active governmental policy devised to foster firms and industries in various countries, the link between industrial policy (IP) and competitive advantage has received scant attention in Strategic Management. I propose a model where IP influences the accumulation and churning of resources and capabilities which can be flexible or specialized. I also introduce the concept of support-adjusted sustainable competitive advantage (SASCA), which occurs if a firm's observed economic performance is superior to the expected performance of competitors had they received the same array of policies. In my framework, SASCA is created by the interplay of three factors: external integration, geographical specificity, and policy-making capability. Thus, the model enhances our understanding of the determinants of competitive advantage in a context of governmental intervention.


Nowadays, in order to successfully run their business, companies are facing the challenge of processing ever increasing amounts of data coming from digital repositories, enterprise applications, sensors networks and mobile devices. Although a wide range of technical solutions are available to deal with those Big Data, many companies fail to deploy them because of management challenges and a lack of process maturity. This paper focuses on those aspects and reports about lessons learned when deploying a series of Big Data pilots in different domains. We provide feedback and some practical guidelines on how to organise and manage a project based on available methodologies, covering topics like requirements gathering, data understanding, iterative project execution, maturity stages, etc.


Existing action calculi provide rich, declarative formalisms for reasoning about actions. BDI-based programming languages like AgentSpeak, on the other hand, are procedural and geared towards practical applications of cognitive agents. In this paper, we close the gap between these two lines of research by integrating action calculi and AgentSpeak programs. Specifically, we develop a new and purely declarative semantics for AgentSpeak, which paves the way for combining this language with any suitable action calculus in a strictly modular fashion. As the main technical result, we prove that the new declarative semantics is correct wrt. the standard operational semantics for AgentSpeak. This provides the basis for a modular integration of a BDI-based agent programming language with sophisticated methods for reasoning about actions.


The concept of constructing a solar space station from autonomous satellites connected by information and energy channels is proposed. Some of the satellites of this system carry laser channels for transmitting energy to the earth, while others act as photoconverters of solar energy into electric energy, followed by transmission to a radiator satellite by a noncontact magnetic-resonance method.


The goal of this book is to teach you to think like a computer scientist. This way of thinking combines some of the best features of mathematics, engineering, and natural science. Like mathematicians, computer scientists use formal languages to denote ideas (specifically computations). Like engineers, they design things, assembling components into systems and evaluating tradeoffs among alternatives. Like scientists, they observe the behavior of complex systems, form hypotheses, and test predictions. The single most important skill for a computer scientist is problem solving. Problem solving means the ability to formulate problems, think creatively about solutions, and express a solution clearly and accurately. As it turns out, the process of learning to program is an excellent opportunity to practice problem-solving skills. Thats why this chapter is called, The way of the program. On one level, you will be learning to program, a useful skill by itself. On another level, you will use programming as a means to an end. As we go along, that end will become clearer.


Peer-to-peer (P2P) architectures are popular for tasks such as collaborative download, VoIP telephony, and backup. To maximize performance in the face of widely variable storage capacities and bandwidths, such systems typically need to shift work from poor nodes to richer ones. Similar requirements are seen in today's large data centers, where machines may have widely variable configurations, loads, and performance. In this paper, we consider the slicing problem, which involves partitioning the participating nodes into k subsets using a one-dimensional attribute, and updating the partition as the set of nodes and their associated attributes change. The mechanism thus facilitates the development of adaptive systems. We begin by motivating this problem statement and reviewing prior work. Existing algorithms are shown to have problems with convergence, manifesting as inaccurate slice assignments, and to adapt slowly as conditions change. Our protocol, Sliver, has provably rapid convergence, is robust under stress and is simple to implement. We present both theoretical and experimental evaluations of the protocol.


This paper establishes an experimental methodology for developing a Dalit Feminist Standpoint Theory through the analysis of Baby Kamble's The Prisons We Broke and Urmila Pawar's The Weave of My Life. Exploration suggests an outline method to attain a standpoint and represents the more significant issues of marginalization of Dalit women, their subjectivity, their lack of voice as reflected in the Dalit Movement, Dalit Literature, Indian feminism, and in their everyday lives. This study claims that Dalit women writers have a potent standpoint as an 'outsider within,' and argues that their triply oppressed caste, class, and gender identity allows for diverse perspectives that appraise one another and helps readers gain an understanding of their condition as women and Dalit subjects. Thus, Dalit women create this new knowledge that subverts dominant androcentric knowledge construction. This study marks an awakening of consciousness, an approach to social change, Dalit women's activism, and empowerment. Most of all, this exploration may help other marginalized groups of people or sociologists by putting greater trust in the creative potential of their narratives and cultural biographies.


Several parameters have been proposed to assess the physiologic significance of coronary lesions invasively. The purpose of the present study is to determine the effect of heart rate and percentage area stenosis on Fractional Flow Reserve (FFR), which is the ratio of mean pressure distal to stenosis over the mean proximal (aortic) pressure and Pressure Drop Coefficient (CDP), ratio of trans-stenotic pressure gradient to distal dynamic pressure. In-vivo experiments were performed on three Yorkshire pigs, to achieve the objective. It was found that increase in heart rate does have a significant effect on the coronary diagnostic parameters with increase in area stenosis.Copyright © 2009 by ASME


Analogous to the beneficial impact that mobility has on the throughput of unicast networks, this paper establishes that mobility can provide a similar gain in the order-wise growth-rate of the throughput for multicast networks. This paper considers an all-mobile multicast network, and characterizes its multicast capacity scaling. The scaling result shows that the growth-rate of the throughput in the all-mobile multicast network is order-wise higher compared to the all-static multicast network. Further, the paper considers a static-mobile hybrid multicast network, and establishes that, if there are sufficient number of mobile nodes (that is order-wise smaller than the total number of nodes) in the network, then mobile nodes can enhance the order behavior of the multicast throughput.


We study communication over atmospheric turbulence channels based on LDPC-coded signaling using multidimensional orbital angular momentum (OAM) signal constellations. Multidimensional signal constellation is obtained as the N-dimensional Cartesian product of a one-dimensional signal constellation originating from non-negative pulse-amplitude modulation. This scheme represents an energy efficient alternative, since a larger number of bits per symbol can be transmitted using a given bandwidth. We evaluate the performance of this scheme by determining conditional symbol probability density functions (PDFs) from numerical propagation data. Two cases are considered: (i) when conditional PDFs are known on the receiver side, and (ii) when conditional PDFs are not known and Gaussian approximation is used instead. We show that the OAM modulation is more sensitive to atmospheric turbulence as the number of dimensions increases. We also describe several applications of interest ranging from indoor wireless communications to intersatellite communications.


Background DNase I is an enzyme which cuts duplex DNA at a rate that depends strongly upon its chromatin environment. In combination with high-throughput sequencing (HTS) technology, it can be used to infer genome-wide landscapes of open chromatin regions. Using this technology, systematic identification of hundreds of thousands of DNase I hypersensitive sites (DHS) per cell type has been possible, and this in turn has helped to precisely delineate genomic regulatory compartments. However, to date there has been relatively little investigation into possible biases affecting this data. Results We report a significant degree of sequence preference spanning sites cut by DNase I in a number of published data sets. The two major protocols in current use each show a different pattern, but for a given protocol the pattern of sequence specificity seems to be quite consistent. The patterns are substantially different from biases seen in other types of HTS data sets, and in some cases the most constrained position lies outside the sequenced fragment, implying that this constraint must relate to the digestion process rather than events occurring during library preparation or sequencing. Conclusions DNase I is a sequence-specific enzyme, with a specificity that may depend on experimental conditions. This sequence specificity is not taken into account by existing pipelines for identifying open chromatin regions. Care must be taken when interpreting DNase I results, especially when looking at the precise locations of the reads. Future studies may be able to improve the sensitivity and precision of chromatin state measurement by compensating for sequence bias.


The nutritional status of the population is one of the important factors determining the quality and productivity of the population, which in turn affects national productivity. in the long term, good nutritional status contributes to the intelligence and health of the population. Consequently, programmes directed at improving the nutritional status of the population will undoubtedly be a high priority in the national development scheme of any country, developed or developing. Food fortification, i.e., the addition of nutrients to specific foods based on the dietary habits and nutritional status of the target population, is one of the most popular nutritional interventions for improving the population's nutritional status. for food-fortification programmes to be successful, their technical aspects need to be carefully assessed. These include the nutritional justification for food fortification, the acceptability of the fortified food product to consumers (both cost and taste), and any technical or analytical limitation to compliance with food regulations and labeling requirements. Important technical aspects of developing effective food-fortification programmes are the choice of food carrier, nutrient interactions, bioavailability of nutrients, stability of nutrients added under anticipated conditions of storage and processing (food preparation at the household level), and safety. A good fortified product should not cause nutrition imbalance, and excessive intake of nutrients should not have adverse effects. to provide better information for the consumer, the concept of overage should be introduced. Overage is the use of kinetic data on nutrient stability to calculate the amount of added nutrient so that the anticipated level of the nutrient at the end of the product's shelf life is in accordance with the level indicated on the label.