In 2014, the United States Supreme Court held in Harris v. Quinn that a quasi-public employee cannot be compelled to pay even her fair share of collective bargaining costs associated with union representation, as such agency-shop provisions constitute compelled speech in contravention of the First Amendment. The decision was significant standing alone, as it directly affects personal assistants in the twenty-five states that are not, so-called, "right-to-work" states, and likely similarly applies to a vast number of other individuals who can be properly characterized as quasi-public. Perhaps more important is what Harris might mean for the larger world of public-sector unions, however. This Note posits that Harris was a sign that the Court may soon reconsider its previous holding in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, a 1977 decision that upheld fair-share provisions in the public sector notwithstanding the same First Amendment concerns at issue in Harris. Part II provides an overview of public-sector unions and the role organized labor plays in our country today. Part III discusses the facts in Harris, Justice Alito's majority opinion, and Justice Kagan and Co.'s dissent. Lastly, Part IV posits that the Court was correct in holding agency-shop provisions violate the First Amendment, but should have affirmatively overruled Abood to hold such provisions unlawful for quasi-public and public-sector employees alike. Nonetheless, Part IV also suggests that Harris' temporary restraint is in line with the Roberts Court's practice of "stealth overruling" — that is, chipping away at precedent so as to lay the foundation for a subsequent case to deal the fatal blow.It is clear today that the Note was correct in predicting the Court would provide itself an opportunity to overrule Abood and use Harris as support, as the Court indicated it would do so when it granted cert in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Ass'n. What is less clear, however, is whether the Note correctly predicted the coming demise of fair-share provisions with the Court now almost certainly split 4-4 on the issue and the next Justice holding the swing vote.


A conversation between Alina Galązka, Grzegorz Laszuk and Tomasza Plata, members of Komuna// Warszawa, one of the most interesting independent theatre companies in Poland, and creators of the most important interdisciplinary centre of performing arts, gathering young artists of the so-called post-theatre. The conversation focuses on their political attitude illustrated by the evolution of this group from an anarchist commune, operating in a small town in the field of political art, to a big-city alternative arts centre. The artists discuss the most significant curating projects which have enabled Komuna to enter the theatre mainstream and mark their place as an alternative production house functioning at the junction of theatre and performing arts. They also indicate difficulties related to the limitations of the theatre-funding system in Poland, which does not include such independent entities operating professionally, but without becoming a public-culture institution.


In this study, the production of ZnSt2 using sodium stearate and zinc sulfate in a precipitation process, and stearic acid and zinc oxide in a fusion process, was investigated with regard to product purity. In the fusion process, an increase in mixing rate decreased the induction time occurring at the beginning of the reaction. While the melting point of the zinc stearate prepared by the precipitation process was found to be about 122 °C by optical microscopy, it was slightly lower than 122 °C for zinc stearate produced by the fusion process. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) indicated onset of melting at 120 °C and 118 °C for samples prepared by precipitation and fusion processes, respectively. Characteristic peaks of ZnSt2 were present in XRD patterns of the products obtained by both processes. From SEM micrographs, it was seen that zinc stearate obtained by both processes had lamellar structure.


Imagine a future in which every purchase decision is as complex as choosing a mobile phone. What will ongoing service cost? Is it compatible with other devices you use? Can you move data and applications across devices? Can you switch providers? These are just some of the questions one must consider when a product is "tethered" or persistently linked to the seller. The Internet of Things, but more broadly, consumer products with embedded software, are already tethered.

While tethered products bring the benefits of connection, they also carry its pathologies. As sellers blend hardware and software—as well as product and service—tethers yoke the consumer to a continuous post-transaction relationship with the seller. The consequences of that dynamic will be felt both at the level of individual consumer harms and on the scale of broader, economy-wide effects These consumer and market-level harms, while distinct, reinforce and amplify one another in troubling ways.

Seller contracts have long sought to shape consumers' legal rights. But in a tethered environment, these rights may become non-existent as legal processes are replaced with automated technological enforcement. In such an environment, the consumer-seller relationship becomes extractive, more akin to consumers captive in an amusement park than to a competitive marketplace in which many sellers strive to offer the best product for the lowest price.

At the highest level, consumer protection law is concerned with promoting functioning free markets and insulating consumers from harms stemming from information asymmetries. We conclude by exploring legal options to reduce the pathologies of the tethered economy.


Vasodilation due to impaired vascular tone is common in liver failure. Vasoconstrictor drugs are almost always required during the anhepatic phase of a liver transplant to maintain blood pressure unless venovenous bypass is employed. Arginine‐vasopressin can be used as a vasoconstrictor instead of or in addition to norepinephrine for this purpose, but the effect of vasopressin on the portal vein pressure and flow in this setting is unknown. Portal vein pressure, portal vein blood flow, hemodynamic variables, and plasma vasopressin levels were measured in 16 patients during liver transplantation after ligation of the hepatic artery before and after a vasopressin infusion of 3.8 ± 1.1 units/hour. Measurements were performed on the native liver prior to caval clamping. After vasopressin infusion, the portal vein pressure decreased significantly from 24.0 ± 6.5 to 21.5 ± 7.4 mm Hg [mean ± standard deviation (SD), P = 0.006]. The portal vein blood flow also decreased (from 1.01 ± 0.53 to 0.76 ± 0.53 L/minute, mean ± SD, P < 0.0001), as did the portal vein blood flow to cardiac output ratio (from 0.14 ± 0.06 to 0.10 ± 0.07, mean ± SD, P < 0.0001). In conclusion, vasopressin significantly decreased portal vein pressure and flow of the native liver without decreasing cardiac output or intestinal perfusion in patients undergoing liver transplantations. Liver Transpl 14:1664–1670, 2008. © 2008 AASLD.


Background: Low back pain (LBP) is common among nurses. Yet, studies reported contradictory results about its prevalence. Objectives: The aim of this study was to systematically evaluate the prevalence of LBP among Iranian hospital nurses. Methods: This was a systematic review and meta-analysis. Online databases such as Scientific Information Database, MEDLINE (PubMed), Scopus, ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar were searched for studies on Iranian hospital nurses' LBP published in 2000–2017. A meta-analysis was performed using the random effects model via the Comprehensive Meta-analysis software. The heterogeneity of the studies was assessed using the Cochran's Q test and I2 statistic. Results: In total, 17 studies were included. The overall prevalence of LBP among Iranian hospital nurses was 64.8% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 59.6%–69.7%). The lowest and the highest LBP prevalence rates were, respectively, 46.2% (95% CI: 43.5%–49%), among nurses in Tehran and 89.1% (95% CI: 82.2%–93.6%) among nurses in Isfahan. Meta-regression analysis revealed that increase in the sample size and the publication year of the reviewed studies were associated, respectively, with statistically significant decrease and increase in the prevalence of LBP (P < 0.05). Conclusion: With an overall prevalence of 64.8%, LBP is highly prevalent among Iranian hospital nurses. Health policymakers and hospital managers need to provide nurses with necessary educations about LBP prevention and management and make necessary modifications to their workplace in order to create an ergonomically appropriate environment for their practice.


We are a supremely social species whose ecological success rests largely on our capacity for large-scale cooperation. This high degree of sociality is only possible against a background of immensely powerful inhibitions against performing acts of lethal violence against conspecifics. There are circumstances, however, in which acts of lethal violence are individually or collectively advantageous and attractive. To perform such acts, we must override our inhibitions. This essay argues that this tension causes us to be ambivalent about killing other human beings and that our being so is manifested in the widespread belief, found across cultures and historical epochs, that taking human life contaminates the killer and may pose a threat to the entire community, unless rituals of purification are performed to counteract it. Examples from the Hebrew Bible, the Greco-Roman world, medieval Europe, Africa, and Native America are examined to substantiate this claim. Premodern beliefs, moreover, about the consequences of killing are echoed in the symptoms of "moral injury" described by contemporary psychiatrists treating combat veterans, which suggests that, in defying or disabling our inhibitions against performing acts of lethal violence, we ultimately do violence to ourselves.


A fundamental issue in the network neutrality debate is the extent to which network operators should be allowed to discriminate among Internet packet streams to selectively block, adjust quality of service, or adjust prices. This paper first reviews technology now available for traffic discrimination. It then shows how network operators can use this technology in ways that would make the Internet less valuable to Internet users, and why a network operator would have financial incentive to do this if and only if it has sufficient market power. A particular concern is that network operators could use discrimination to extract oligopoly rents from upstream markets that are highly competitive. This paper also shows how network operators can use the very same technology to discriminate in ways that benefit Internet users, as well as the network operator.Thus, network neutrality supporters are right to fear unlimited discrimination in some cases, while network neutrality opponents are right to fear a policy that imposes strict limits on discrimination. From this, we argue that the network neutrality debate should be refocused on the search for a balanced policy, which is a policy that limits the more harmful discriminatory practices in markets where there is insufficient competition, with little interference to beneficial discrimination or innovation. We apply this balanced policy in a few controversial scenarios as examples. There has been too little attention on the possibility of a nuanced balanced policy, in part because the network neutrality debate is focusing on the wrong issues. This paper argues that the debate should shift towards the complex details of differentiating harmful discrimination from beneficial discrimination, and away from high-level secondary questions like whether discrimination is inherently just, who ought to pay for certain Internet services, how important general design principles are, what abstract rights and freedoms consumers and carriers deserve, or whether network operators can give their affiliates special treatment. Reality is more complex than these questions would imply, and none of them will serve as a basis for a sufficiently specific and effective policy.


Foundations of European Politics introduces important tools of social science and comparative analysis. The first part of the book acts as an introduction to the topic, looking at democratic politics and multilevel politics in Europe. The second part moves on to citizens and voters, considering issues related to ideology and voting decisions. Part III looks at elections and introduces electoral systems and direct democracy, representation, political parties, and party competition. The next part is about government and policy. The last part looks at the rule of law, democracy, and backsliding.


This article highlights the strategic challenges of creating value with residuals through residual material reclamation practices based on the experiences of 12 Canadian facilities. The study is grounded in managerial discourse and connotations from an interpretative approach. In all, 56 managers from 12 selected industrial facilities implementing the residual material reclamation practices participated in the study. In addition, three managers from three distinct companies that provided residuals support services to the selected facilities and a government official responsible for the development of industrial ecology activities were also interviewed. The analysis of data followed the guidelines of the grounded theory approach of Strauss and Corbin. The in-depth interviews disclose that reclamation of residual materials is associated with hyper-flexibility. This means residual material reclamation is an atypical and stochastic industrial activity with challenges across functional areas. Four types of challenges are identified: materials management, marketing/sales, environmental and human resource strategic challenges.


The purpose of this paper is the examination of the issue of emotional intelligence and job satisfaction, concerning a sample of bank employees in the Greek banking sector. Particularly, this paper examines the concept of emotional intelligence and job satisfaction and investigates the application of emotional intelligence based on variables, such as the gender of employees, age, educational level and their previous experience in the Greek banking sector.In order to satisfy the main objective set above, a conducting quantitative research was designed, based on a questionnaire with closed-ended questions. In combination with the questionnaire methodology some useful statistical tests and models were used such us Cronbach's Alpha, Kolmogorov-Smirnov's test of normality, Spearman's rho correlation and the simple linear regression model.The main conclusion of this paper is that gender, age, marital status and job position, representing a portion of the demographic characteristics of the examined sample, affects the levels of emotional intelligence of employees in the banking sector. Additionally, emotional intelligence seems to exert an influence on the everyday life of workers and modulates the levels of professional satisfaction.


With the use of the cranking formula, the coordinate-dependent mass parameters of the kinetic-energy operator in fission processes and heavy-ion collisions are calculated in the two-center oscillator model. It is shown that the reduced mass and also the classical moment of inertia are obtained for large separations of the fragments. For small separations, however, the mass parameter for the motion of the centers of mass of the fragments is larger than the reduced mass by an order of magnitude.


Scanning thermal microscopy (SThM) uses micromachined thermal sensors integrated in a force sensing cantilever with a nanoscale tip that can be highly useful for exploration of thermal management of nanoscale semiconductor devices as well as mapping of surface and subsurface properties of related materials. Whereas SThM is capable to image externally generated heat with nanoscale resolution, its ability to map and measure thermal conductivity of materials has been mainly limited to polymers or similar materials possessing low thermal conductivity in the range from 0.1 to 1 W m−1 K−1, with lateral resolution on the order of 1 μm. In this paper, we use linked experimental and theoretical approaches to analyse thermal performance and sensitivity of the micromachined SThM probes in order to expand their applicability to a broader range of nanostructures from polymers to semiconductors and metals. We develop physical models of interlinked thermal and electrical phenomena in these probes and their interaction with the sample on the mesoscopic length scale of few tens of nm and then validate these models using experimental measurements of the real probes, which provided the basis for analysing SThM performance in exploration of nanostructures. Our study then highlights critical features of these probes, namely, the geometrical location of the thermal sensor with respect to the probe apex, thermal conductance of the probe to the support base, heat conduction to the surrounding gas, and the thermal conductivity of tip material adjacent to the apex. It furthermore allows us to propose a novel design of the SThM probe that incorporates a multiwall carbon nanotube or similar high thermal conductivity graphene sheet material with longitudinal dimensions on micrometre length scale positioned near the probe apex that can provide contact areas with the sample on the order of few tens of nm. The new sensor is predicted to provide greatly improved spatial resolution to thermal properties of nanostructures as well as to expand the sensitivity of the SThM probe to materials with heat conductivity values up to 100–1000 W m−1 K−1.


The theme of this year's International Test Conference, "stressing the fundamentals," has two aspects. First, over the past 40 years, the test community has developed several fundamental concepts, including fault models, automatic test-pattern generation (ATPG), and DFT. In addition, fundamental techniques such as functional test, scan, burn-in, and I_DDQ test are key to modern test technology. Emphasizing these techniques is important as circuits become denser, faster,and more dificult to test. These same trends, though, also lead to a second type of stress: Advances in circuit technology are pushing these fundamental approaches toward their limits. The articles in this special ITC section explore this idea of stressing the fundamentals from various angles.


Don't mind me while I drive through your neighborhood taking photo's of your house, gathering your emails, passwords and other private information from your wifi network. It's nothing personal, I'm doing it to everyone, in every street, in over 30 countries. Perhaps you can also excuse me while I give access to data you and your friends shared with me and each other, to individuals and companies I have no relation to or control over at all, and while leaking your data, again it's nothing personal, I'm doing it to 87 million others, you probably won't mind me showing you and 126 million others some political disinformation, there's an election coming and I could really use the money. It's not as if we don't know each other, I've been following your every move online for years now, and it's no secret that I'm worth hundreds of billions because I sell access to you, promising my customers influence over your voting and purchasing behavior. I've got power. Monopolies are rare lol. If all this makes you uncomfortable, you can always cut ties with me and everyone you work and communicate online with, but what would that solve? Your friends are totally oversharing…


Summary and Conclusions
1.
A total of 1997 normal looking eggs of Schistosoma mansoni, representing 63 different fresh stool samples from a single patient, were isolated in rain water, each to a vial, and studied in respect to hatchability and in respect to the longevity and infectivity of the liberated miracidia.
2.
The data on hatching demonstrate the following:
a.
Hatchability varied markedly from day to day, but the overall average was high, 83.6 per cent.
b.
Hatching was spread over a relatively long time. Sixty-five per cent of the eggs that hatched did so during the first 8 hours in water; an additional 24 per cent hatched during the next 16 hours. Of the rest, 9.5 per cent hatched on the second, and 1.5 per cent on the third day.
c.
Light acted as a definite stimulus to hatching.
3.
Mortality among groups of miracidia held for different hour-intervals increased with advancing age. At nine hours, it reached 100 per cent.
4.
Only one out of a batch of 112 miracidia attained a life span of eight hours and forty-two minutes. The average span of life was five to six hours. Further trials using river water gave practically the same results. The life expectancy of the miracidium of S. mansoni is therefore much shorter than previously supposed.
5.
About three-fourths of the miracidia which came in contact with the snail immediately after hatching succeeded in accomplishing penetration. Infectivity remained about the same, irrespective of age, for as long as the larvae retained their vitality. Among those miracidia which failed to penetrate, some did so after repeated attacks while others remained indifferent to the snail throughout.
6.
The proportion of miracidia which ultimately accomplished penetration (the overall infectivity rate) was found to be about two-thirds among those larvae that came in contact with the snail within two hours of free life. It gradually decreased to zero within eight to nine hours of free life.
7.
The present study strongly suggests that even limited water pollution may bring about ample infection of snails.


A so-called "Design Process Investigation toolbox" (DPI toolbox), has been developed. It is a set of computational tools that simulate spatial-structural design processes. Its objectives are to study spatial-structural design processes and to support the involved actors. Two case-studies are presented which demonstrate how to: (1) study the influence of transformation methods on design instances and (2) study the influence of transformation methods on the behavior of other transformation methods. It was found that in design instances with the same type of structural elements the influence of a specifically varied transformation method is more explicit; while, when different types are present this influence is more undetermined. It was also found that the use of two specifically different structural modification methods have little influence on the sub-sequential spatial transformation method.


The subject of this thesis is the n-tuple net.work (RAMnet). The major advantage of RAMnets is their speed and the simplicity with which they can be implemented in parallel hardware. On the other hand, this method is not a universal approximator and the training procedure does not involve the minimisation of a cost function. Hence RAMnets are potentially sub-optimal. It is important to understand the source of this sub-optimality and to develop the analytical tools that allow us to quantify the generalisation cost of using this model for any given data. We view RAMnets as classifiers and function approximators and try to determine how critical their lack of' universality and optimality is. In order to understand better the inherent. restrictions of the model, we review RAMnets showing their relationship to a number of well established general models such as: Associative Memories, Kamerva's Sparse Distributed Memory, Radial Basis Functions, General Regression Networks and Bayesian Classifiers. We then benchmark binary RAMnet. model against 23 other algorithms using real-world data from the StatLog Project. This large scale experimental study indicates that RAMnets are often capable of delivering results which are competitive with those obtained by more sophisticated, computationally expensive rnodels. The Frequency Weighted version is also benchmarked and shown to perform worse than the binary RAMnet for large values of the tuple size n. We demonstrate that the main issues in the Frequency Weighted RAMnets is adequate probability estimation and propose Good-Turing estimates in place of the more commonly used :Maximum Likelihood estimates. Having established the viability of the method numerically, we focus on providillg an analytical framework that allows us to quantify the generalisation cost of RAMnets for a given datasetL. For the classification network we provide a semi-quantitative argument which is based on the notion of Tuple distance. It gives a good indication of whether the network will fail for the given data. A rigorous Bayesian framework with Gaussian process prior assumptions is given for the regression n-tuple net. We show how to calculate the generalisation cost of this net and verify the results numerically for one dimensional noisy interpolation problems. We conclude that the n-tuple method of classification based on memorisation of random features can be a powerful alternative to slower cost driven models. The speed of the method is at the expense of its optimality. RAMnets will fail for certain datasets but the cases when they do so are relatively easy to determine with the analytical tools we provide.


Christopher Cartmill, successful New York playwright, director, and actor, disregarded Thomas Wolfe's famous advice that "You can't go home again," and returned to his home in Nebraska to research and write a play. His subject was Chief Standing Bear, a Ponca Indian who in 1879 sued the United States government and won. The turmoil that enveloped Cartmill and renewed his bond with home, in the broadest meaning of that word, is gracefully retold in The Nebraska Dispatches. Standing Bear was chief of the Ponca Indians living along the Niobrara River in Northern Nebraska in the mid 1800s, when the US government moved many of the Indian tribes to the Oklahoma territory. Standing Bear's son died in Oklahoma, having first requested burial in Nebraska with his ancestors. To honor his son's wish, Standing Bear returned to Nebraska, where he was arrested and incarcerated. He declared he was being held illegally, and sued the US government for a writ of habeas corpus. The Court agreed with the chief and he was freed to quietly live out his life in Nebraska. The Nebraska Dispatches is far more than just the story of Standing Bear, although that alone would make for an interesting tale. Cartmill also tells his own story, of his return to his roots and reconciliation with place and history. The story's pace and drama builds as Cartmill meets the people of Nebraska and hears their stories. Flowing throughout is the undercurrent of anger and bitterness that irresolutely defines the relationship between the Plains Indians and their white neighbors. Cartmill is forced to confront the idea that stories matter. History is not abstract, but about actual people and events that have consequences yet today. As Susan Cloud Horse, an Omaha Indian, tells him: "First of all, I'm going to tell you this again: by what you're doing you're stirring up five hundred years of anger, pain, and shame." The Nebraska Dispatches refrains from bravado or overstatement; nevertheless, it is an intense and dynamic book. Cartmill is expert at relating his own story and just enough information about the Poncas, Standing Bear, and other Plains Indians. He intertwines these sagas to make them part of a larger story of America and how Americans connect to home. In the end, Cartmill proves Wolfe wrong. Not only can one go home again, but there can be much to be learned from the experience. JOHN MICHAEL SENGER (December 19, 2010)


For more than two decades, Mars has been of great interest for scientific exploration, using orbiting spacecrafts or landers. Orbiters like "Mars Express" cover large areas and give images of the surface with a resolution limited to several meters. Rovers missions, like "Pathfinder" or "MER", offer the ability to maneuver to scientifically interesting sites, perform analysis of soil and rock composition, but are limited in range to the immediate surroundings of the landing site. There is a strategic gap for systems that would combine high-resolution imagery and extensive coverage. This gap can be addressed by micro-airplanes that will give more accurate images than satellites, thanks to their proximity to the ground (about 0.5 to 2 km) and cover much larger areas than rovers without being limited by terrain roughness. This paper presents a feasibility study and the first design of a very lightweight solar powered airplane for Mars exploration. Called Sky-Sailor, it was investigated in an ESA definition study within the framework of the Startiger technology program.


This paper was presented at the 2019

International
Conference of Artificial Intelligence &Technology-Enhanced
Language

Learning,
in Shanghai in October.I briefly outline (I had 30 minutes) the importance of feedback for learning outcomes, the challenges in researching and defining what we mean by feedback, a few models of feedback, how students react to feedback, and give an overview of technology systems I have discovered that support and improve feedback to students and instructors.


Facilities Management (FM) uses different approaches and has distinctive priorities in very particular country. There are widely divergent interpretations of the FM concept as it is used in various countries. FM is generally understood in the similar way, but it may use different strategies. There is as yet no consistent definition of the scope of FM activities. The study reported here concerns one general question: why are FM definitions different? We investigate how the historical backgrounds of different countries influence the development of FM, and reveal how the individual law system, psychology and business environment affects FM in various countries.


This paper considers per worker household, private corporate and public sector savings and investment, foreign capital inflows and economic growth for India in a multivariate setting for the period 1950-2001. The analysis, uses FIML to estimate the long run cointegrating equilibriums and short run Granger causing dynamics for the non-stationary time series data, which includes endogenously detected structural breaks in 1989 and 1993, consistent with the recent period of financial reforms in India. The estimates do not support the commonly accepted Solow and endogenous models of economic growth. The popular view that increases in savings are a necessary condition for economic growth is supported with the detected strong direct links from per worker household and private corporate savings to output in the long run and sectoral per worker savings to investment links in both the short and long run. This implies the need to encourage savings, which is being realised with the estimated significantly higher growth rates in household and private corporate per worker savings during deregulation in the late 1980s and early 1990s. However, the link from investment to output is missing. Despite extensive analysis, per worker private corporate and household sector investment are not found to affect output in the short run or long run as required by the Solow and endogenous growth models. Indeed household investment, being the largest sector for gross domestic capital formation, does not appear to have any influence on other variables. Per worker public investment is found to adversely affect output per worker in the short and long run, contradicting Barro's hypothesis of the benefits of the public provision of capital. These findings, plus the estimated reductions in the rates of growth in sectoral per worker investment during the 1990s, are worrying. The lack of empirical validation of commonly accepted growth theories is p roblematic for policy formulation and further research on the role of investment in the post-reform Indian economy is required.


Cetacea are secondarily aquatic amniotes that underwent their land-to-sea transition during the Eocene. Primitive forms, called archaeocetes, include five families with distinct degrees of adaptation to an aquatic life, swimming mode and abilities that remain difficult to estimate. The lifestyle of early cetaceans is investigated by analysis of microanatomical features in postcranial elements of archaeocetes. We document the internal structure of long bones, ribs and vertebrae in fifteen specimens belonging to the three more derived archaeocete families — Remingtonocetidae, Protocetidae, and Basilosauridae — using microtomography and virtual thin-sectioning. This enables us to discuss the osseous specializations observed in these taxa and to comment on their possible swimming behavior. All these taxa display bone mass increase (BMI) in their ribs, which lack an open medullary cavity, and in their femora, whereas their vertebrae are essentially spongious. Humeri and femora show opposite trends in microanatomical specialization in the progressive independence of cetaceans from a terrestrial environment. Humeri change from very compact to spongious, which is in accordance with the progressive loss of propulsive role for the forelimbs, which were used instead for steering and stabilizing. Conversely, hind-limbs in basilosaurids became strongly reduced with no involvement in locomotion but display strong osteosclerosis in the femora. Our study confirms that Remingtonocetidae and Protocetidae were almost exclusively aquatic in locomotion for the taxa sampled, which probably were shallow water suspended swimmers. Basilosaurids display osseous specializations similar to those of modern cetaceans and are considered more active open-sea swimmers. This study highlights the strong need for homologous sections in comparative microanatomical studies, and the importance of combining information from several bones of the same taxon for improved functional interpretation.


Robert Wistrich's latest work, From Ambivalence to Betrayal, defines Zionism as a national liberation movement. Marx pre-dated Zionism but the analytical tools he bequeathed to his ideological successors predisposed them to sneer at the concept of Jewish national self-determination as a petty-bourgeois folly. Consequently, Kautsky, Luxemburg, Lenin and Trotsky all derided Zionism, and yet Wistrich accuses none of these icons of the Old Left of being overtly anti-Semitic: catastrophically wrongheaded, yes; but anti-Semitic, no. Wistrich has far less sympathy for the anti-Zionist Left of today. Its impenitent pro-Palestinian and pro-terrorist stance marks yet another chapter in the longest hatred of all: anti-Semitism.


Abstract. We present the seasonal cycle and interannual variability of the surface energy balance (SEB) in the ablation zone of the west Greenland ice sheet, using seven years (September 2003–August 2010) of hourly observations from three automatic weather stations (AWS). The AWS are situated along the 67° N latitude circle at elevations of 490 m a.s.l. (S5), 1020 m a.s.l. (S6) and 1520 m a.s.l. (S9) at distances of 6, 38 and 88 km from the ice sheet margin. The hourly AWS data are fed into a model that calculates all SEB components and melt rate; the model allows for shortwave radiation penetration in ice and time-varying surface momentum roughness. Snow depth is prescribed from albedo and sonic height ranger observations. Modelled and observed surface temperatures for non-melting conditions agree very well, with RMSE's of 0.97–1.26 K. Modelled and observed ice melt rates at the two lowest sites also show very good agreement, both for total cumulative and 10-day cumulated amounts. Melt frequencies and melt rates at the AWS sites are discussed. Although absorbed shortwave radiation is the most important energy source for melt at all three sites, interannual melt variability at the lowest site is driven mainly by variability in the turbulent flux of sensible heat. This is explained by the quasi-constant summer albedo in the lower ablation zone, limiting the influence of the melt-albedo feedback, and the proximity of the snow free tundra, which heats up considerably in summer.


Purpose The lung is one of the most common sites of breast cancer metastasis. While metastatic seeding is often accompanied by a dormancy-promoting mesenchymal to epithelial reverting transitions (MErT), we aimed to determine whether lung epithelial cells can impart this phenotype on aggressive breast cancer cells. Methods Co-culture experiments of normal lung epithelial cell lines (SAEC, NHBE or BEAS-2B) and breast cancer cell lines (MCF-7 or MDA-MB-231) were conducted. Flow cytometry analysis, immunofluorescence staining for E-cadherin or Ki-67 and senescence associated beta-galactosidase assays assessed breast cancer cell outgrowth and phenotype. Results Co-culture of the breast cancer cells with the normal lung cells had different effects on the epithelial and mesenchymal carcinoma cells. The epithelial MCF-7 cells were increased in number but still clustered even if in a slightly more mesenchymal-spindle morphology. On the other hand, the mesenchymal MDA-MB-231 cells survived but did not progressively grow out in co-culture. These aggressive carcinoma cells underwent an epithelial shift as indicated by cuboidal morphology and increased E-cadherin. Disruption of E-cadherin expressed in MDA-MB-231 using shRNA prevented this phenotypic reversion in co-culture. Lung cells limited cancer cell growth kinetics as noted by both (1) some of the cells becoming larger and positive for senescence markers/negative for proliferation marker Ki-67, and (2) Ki-67 positive cells significantly decreasing in MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 cells after co-culture. Conclusions Our data indicate that normal lung epithelial cells can drive an epithelial phenotype and suppress the growth kinetics of breast cancer cells coincident with changing their phenotypes.


Reading activities in the classroom and workplace occur predominantly on paper. Since existing electronic devices do not support these reading activities as well as paper, users have difficulty taking full advantage of the affordances of electronic documents. This dissertation makes three main contributions toward supporting active reading electronically. The first contribution is a comprehensive set of active reading requirements, drawn from three decades of research into reading processes. These requirements explain why existing devices are inadequate for supporting active reading activities.
The second contribution is a multi-slate reading system that more completely supports the active reading requirements above. Researchers believe the suitability of paper for active reading is largely due to the fact it distributes content across different sheets of paper, which are capable of displaying information as well as capturing input. The multi-slate approach draws inspiration from the independent reading and writing surfaces that paper provides, to blend the beneficial features of e-book readers, tablets, PCs, and tabletop computers.
The development of the multi-slate system began with the Dual-Display E-book, which used two screens to provide richer navigation capabilities than a single-screen device. Following the success of the Dual-Display E-book, the United Slates, a general-purpose reading system consisting of an extensible number of slates, was created. The United Slates consisted of custom slate hardware, specialized interactions that enabled the slates to be used cooperatively, and a cloud-based infrastructure that robustly integrated the slates with users' existing computing devices and workflow.
The third contribution is a series of evaluations that characterized reading with multiple slates. A laboratory study with 12 participants compared the relative merits of paper and electronic reading surfaces. One month long in-situ deployments of the United Slates with graduate students in the humanities found the multi-slate configuration to be highly effective for reading. The United Slates system delivered desirable paper-like qualities that included enhanced reading engagement, ease of navigation, and peace-of-mind while also providing superior electronic functionality. The positive feedback suggests that the multi-slate configuration is a desirable method for supporting active reading activities.


Over the last decade, the demand to evaluate the impact of any given research study, the credentials of a researcher, and the influence that any single research unit or agency has on the world of research has constantly grown. Many tools have been developed and applied to evaluate the level of innovation, originality and continuity of a single researcher in an objective way. As a consequence, there are comparisons of the performances of different research agencies. Some of these tools, which often provide the result as an 'index', are briefly described in this study. However, it is clearly evident that the evaluations provided by these instruments do not always correspond to the real impact of the research, nor are they unique. Indeed, the same index computed using similar criteria on different databases gives different scores, which can lead to confusion and contradictions. In this contribution, the principal anomalies, problems and failures of these evaluation schemes are described. The most evident of these arise from the nature of the evaluation, which being automated, cannot establish the role of any single researcher in papers of 'pooled' research, and cannot recognize similar or duplicated papers by the same researcher(s) in more than one journal. The 'selecting' effects that these evaluation indices can have on the research are then discussed. Indeed, in an attempt to obtain the highest possible scores in terms of citations, there is a tendency of the single scholar to avoid studies that deal with small areas, or with scientific problems that do not have a broad interest or provide applicative results. In all of these cases, an article describing such studies will in all likelihood appear in a 'minor journal' (one with a low impact factor). As a consequence, this will provide a low citation index, will not significantly contribute to the authors' H-index, and/or will only be published as a report. Moreover, a discussion on the role that these evaluation indices can have in the world of research is presented. Particular attention is paid to the consequences in the field of the geoethics, where scientific, technological, methodological and socio-cultural aspects need to be considered in a different order to that expected in a pure meritocracy.


This article considers some methodological problems that arose while studying the street protest movement in Russia in 2011–2012. This research was conducted from December 2011 on by the Independent Research Initiative NII mitingov, whose members interviewed participants of street actions such as demonstrations, marches, and street camps. The article engages with a number of key issues in research on mass-scale street activism. The "double engagement" position of the researcher and research group, who must negotiate their positionalities between academic and activist logics, is discussed and problematized. I also discuss whether in situ interviewing during a protest is an acceptable methodology. Additionally, the article problematizes media interpretations of the social make-up and the political homogeneity of protestors, which have formed the "instantaneous" horizon of meaning for subsequent sociological inquiries; considers questions of the legality of street actions and the apposite issue of demonstrators' compliance with the law; lays the groundwork for an analytical model of the emotional dynamics of the protest, where anger and irony emerge not as instances of spontaneous affect on the part of participants but rather as parts of a sequence generated through practices of virtual communication. Finally, I briefly consider the possibilities for further analysis of street activism, including its less evident social consequences beyond the domain of electoral practices. In Russian, extended summary in English.


The dichotomy between explicit and implicit memory systems or memory processes seems to be prominent in cognitive psychology literature. Recently it was discussed that this dichotomy is due to different measurement methods (Buchner & Jansen-Osmann 2006; Reder, Park & Kieffaber 2009) and does not provide directly evidence for two different processes or even systems. Graf and Schacter (1985) used the term "implicit memory" for describing a situation where a task performance is influenced by a prior experience without the necessity of becoming aware of that prior experience. In this sense, "implicit body memory" does not mean in any case unconsciousness. From a cognitive psychology point of view, it means that implicit measurements are used. In "classical" memory tasks implicit memory measurements are category production, word identification or word fragmentation. But what are the explicit and implicit measurements of body memory? It is the goal of this chapter to propose new insights in different measurements of body memory analogous to "classical" memory research.


Writing provides a means for personal reflection, thinking, creativity, meaning-making and sharing, as well as complementing other modes of communication in a world of multimodal texts. While writing in the digital age has become increasingly fast-paced and exposed to global scrutiny, being able to write efficiently with correct spelling, grammar and punctuation remains a critical part of being a literate writer. This article uses data from 819 Australian primary school students to explore the relationship between three language conventions, namely spelling, grammar and punctuation as measured by the National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) Language Conventions Test, and the quality of written composition, as measured by the NAPLAN Writing Test. Results indicate that spelling, grammar and punctuation jointly predict written composition achievement with spelling as the main predictor. Implications for the educational practice of writing in the contemporary context are discussed, emphasising the importance of spelling in relation to writing and how instruction in spelling, during senior primary school, appears to be critical for written composition improvement.


In August, 2008, the ABA Journal featured an article entitled: "The 25 Greatest Legal Movies." A panel of experts, described in the article as "12 prominent lawyers who teach film or are connected to the business" selected "the best movies ever made about lawyers and the law." This distinguished panel ranked its twenty-five top legal movies, choosing To Kill a Mockingbird as its number one legal movie. The panel also selected twenty-five films as "honorable mentions," which were listed in alphabetical order. In my opinion, however, the real greatest legal movie of all time was not selected as the winner. It was not ranked in the top twenty-five. It was not included in the twenty-five honorable mentions so that it would rank in the top fifty. I would wager that it was not even considered by the panel as a candidate for inclusion as a "legal" movie. In this article, I discuss the movie that should have been ranked first. I compare my choice with the experts' choice, describing similarities and differences between the two movies. In To Kill a Mockingbird, an African American man is wrongfully accused of raping a white woman. Despite the best efforts of his attorney, he is convicted of that crime. Prejudice prevails over justice. In the movie I have chosen, another victim of prejudice is able to succeed due to the best efforts of his attorney. Justice prevails over prejudice. That difference convinces me that the movie I have selected is truly the greatest legal movie of all time.


The purpose of this study was to investigate differences in lower limb muscle activation patterns for females wearing shoes with different heel heights during Sit to Stand Task (STS). Ten female participants with no prior history of neurological disorders participated in this study. Surface electromyography (sEMG) characteristics were recorded for four different heel heights (ranging from 4cm to 10cm) while performing the STS task. Signal processing analysis suggests that muscle activities increases on elevated heel heights, which may induce muscle imbalance for frequent STS tasks. In addition, results of muscle utilisation (percentage) for different heel heights suggest that lower limb muscles tend to compensate in order to maintain postural balance.


In this research we have developed a 3D city model of Princeton University campus for the Campus as Lab (CAL) program using openly available 3D data. The sources include the official open data portal from the United States Geological Survey, OpenStreetMap and Google Maps. The 3D city model is used as a tool for visualizing and analyzing multidisciplinary data to enhance the communication of research between different disciplines. We demonstrate the 3D model's capabilities through a use case where we investigate the viability of powering a golf cart for short commutes across the campus with a Photovoltaic panel. We visualized environmental and transportation data. The two sets of data are solar irradiation and the travel behavior of the golf cart. Through the use case, we show that the 3D model is useful for conducting research that requires data from different disciplines. Our longterm goal is to establish the use of the 3D city model as a tool for the documentation, visualization and communication of research results in the context of the CAL program.


Aim: To review the intravitreal treatment alternatives used as an adjunctive therapy in Coats' disease. Context: The goal of therapy in Coats' disease is essentially to obliterate all retinal nonperfused areas and ablate retinal vascular abnormalities in order to provide subretinal fluid resolution and regression of hard exudates whenever feasible. However, both anti-VEGFs and steroids are also administered intravitreally to improve the anatomic and functional outcome in cases with Coats' disease by many clinicians nowadays. Methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted in July 2015 to obtain all manuscripts related to Coats' disease and particularly manuscripts on intravitreal injections were evaluated. Conclusions: The role of adjunctive intravitreal therapy whether with anti-VEGFs or steroids is still not well-established in Coats' disease due to small number of studies previously published. Intravitreal pharmacotherapy may find a niche in the treatment armamentarium of Coats' disease in the very near future.


This paper considers the question "What are good child outcomes?" from the perspectives of developmental psychology, economics, and sociology. Section 1 of the paper examines good child outcomes as characteristics of stage-salient tasks of development. Section 2 emphasizes the acquisition of "human capital," the development of productive traits such as cognitive ability, educational achievement, practical risk-taking, delayed gratification, and occupational decision-making. This section discusses critical constructs such as delayed gratification, risk tolerance, and career construction. Section 3 deals with social capacity, the ability to interact positively in intimate relationships and demonstrate positive concern and caring in a larger social arena. This section discusses central social relationships and suggests markers of successful devc1cpment at each stage. Section 4 discusses points of overlap among the three perspectives. Drawing upon the three perspectives, this section suggests that good child outcomes would include the presence of: trust; security; exploration and self-regulation; competent language use; cognitive development and general knowledge; physical well-being and motor development; social problem-solving skills; personal identity; connections with parents and friends; empathy and caring; reading and math skills; the ability to delay gratification; the ability to take practical risks and develop an occupation choice; motivation toward entrepreneurship; the extension of attachments from family members to others; concern for other social groups; and volunteer efforts on behalf of others. The paper concludes by suggesting that identifying positive goals for children with significantly alter the nature of discussions about children and families and have implications for data collection. Contains 91 references. (KB) ******************************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ********************************************************************************


"We are neural beings," states Berkeley cognitive scientist George Lakoff. "Our brains take their input from the rest of our bodies. What our bodies are like and how they function in the world thus structures the very concepts we can use to think. We cannot think just anything only what our embodied brains permit." His new book Philosophy In The Flesh, coauthored by Mark Johnson, makes the following points: "The mind is inherently embodied. Thought is mostly unconscious. Abstract concepts are largely metaphorical." Lakoff believes that new empirical evidence concerning these finding of cognitive science have taken us over the epistemological divide: we are in a new place and our philosophical assumptions are all up for grabs. He and Johnson write: "When taken together and considered in detail, these three findings from the science of the mind are inconsistent with central parts of Western philosophy, and require a thorough rethinking of the most popular current approaches, namely, Anglo-American analytic philosophy and postmodernist philosophy." According to Lakoff, metaphor appears to be a neural mechanism that allows us to adapt the neural systems used in sensory-motor activity to create forms of abstract reason. "If this is correct, as it seems to be," he says, "our sensory-motor systems thus limit the abstract reasoning that we can perform. Anything we can think or understand is shaped by, made possible by, and limited by our bodies, brains, and our embodied interactions in the world. This is what we have to theorize with." He then raises the interesting question: "Is it adequate to understand the world scientifically? -JB


The purpose of this thesis is to explore the different Internet tools in a marketing strategy, which can be used within a tour operator in Sweden. The question is why did they choose these specifics Internet tools and how do they use it. Further, this project aims to contribute to the development of new knowledge regarding the online marketing strategies in the outbound tourism market.


Interactive visual analytics is an effective approach for the timely analysis of data. Users who are already engaged in interactive data analysis prefer staying in the visualization environment for unavoidable data cleaning and preparation tasks to preserve their analytic flow. This has led visualization environments to include simple data preparation functions such as scalar parsing, pattern matching and categorical binning. One common scalar parsing task is extracting date and time data from string representations. Several relational database management systems (RDBMSs) include date parsing "mini-languages" to cover the wide range of possible formats, but analysis of user data from one visualization system shows that the parsing language syntax can be difficult for users to master. In this paper, we present two algorithms for automatically deriving date formats from a column of data with minimal user disruption, one based on minimal entropy representations and another based on natural language processing techniques. Both have accuracies of over 95% on a large corpus of date columns extracted from an online data repository. One of the methods is also fast enough to produce results within the user's perceptual threshold. Moreover, we were able to avoid prohibitively expensive manual verification by using the algorithms to cross-check each other at scale.


This research aims were to produce and study properties of fiber boards from oil palm empty fruit bunch fibers mixed with Water hyacinth fiber, by using 13% adhesive substances comprising urea formaldehyde (UF) and polymeric diphenylmethane diisocyanate (PMDI) resins. The boards had a density of 400, 600 and 900 kg m–3 and a thickness of 15 mm. Physical and mechanical properties tests were performed according to industry standards, TIS 876-2547, ASTM D 1037-1999 and ASTM D 256-2006a. The physical properties investigated were moisture content, water absorption and thickness swelling of the plates. The results revealed that plates with high density had low moisture content, low water absorption and low thickness swelling. PMDI resin provided the best adhesive quality. For the mechanical properties investigation, modulus of rupture, modulus of elasticity, the tensile strength perpendicular to the surface, impact strength, the nail and screws holding power were covered. It was found that the higher density they had, the better mechanical properties they owned. The PMDI-based boards with 900 kg m–3 density achieved the best mechanical properties. They can highly possibly be used instead of wood.


Purpose - The study aims to investigate the comparatively under-researched relationship between ownership structure and capital structure in an emerging market. It is also one of the first studies to apply both single and reduced-form equation methods using a panel data approach. Findings - The results demonstrate that Jordanian firms follow the same determinants of capital structure as occur in developed markets, namely: profitability, firm size, growth rate, market-to-book ratio, asset structure and liquidity. In addition, institutional ownership structure is found to be determined by: assets structure, business risk (BR), growth opportunities and firm size. Finally, the results reveal that assets tangibility, firm size, growth opportunities and BR are considered to be joint determinants of ownership structure and capital structure. Practical implications - The practical implication of the study is that investors and managers should consider both capital structure and ownership structure when they take their investment decisions. Originality/value - This is the first study of the interaction between institutional ownership and capital structure in Jordan where there are differences, as regards institutional and financial structures, relative to those in developed markets.


Epoxides are raw materials for a broad range of products, from pharmaceuticals to plastics and paints to adhesives. The production of epoxides often uses peracids including peracetic acid and m-chloroperbenzoic acid in batch reactions. The employment of peracids is not an environmentally friendly synthetic procedure since equivalent amounts of acid wastes are produced. Hence, there is a strong need for cleaner catalytic epoxidation methods that employ safer oxidants and produces little waste. There have been considerable amount of research efforts on developing stable heterogeneous catalysts for epoxidation by immobilisation of catalytically active metal species on organic or inorganic materials such as polymers, ion-exchange resins, alumina; zeolite and silica. Polymers have gained attention as suitable supports for transition metal catalysts as they are inert, nontoxic, insoluble and often recyclable. In this work, we report a new process which is considered to be clean as it employs an efficient and selective Polystyrene 2-(aminomethyl) pyridine supported molybdenum complex, i.e. Ps.AMP.Mo as a catalyst for epoxidation of 4-vinyl-1-cyclohexene. The process uses environmentally benign tert-butyl hydroperoxide (TBHP) as a terminal oxidant. Experiments have been carried out to study the effect of reaction temperature, catalyst loading and feed molar ratio of alkene to TBHP on the conversion of TBHP to 4-vinyl-1-cyclohexene 1,2-epoxide for optimisation of reaction conditions in a batch reactor. The long term stability of the heterogeneous catalyst has been evaluated by recycling a sample of the catalyst several times in batch experiments. The extent of Mo leaching from the polymer supported catalyst has been investigated by isolating any residue from reaction supernatant studies after removal of the heterogeneous catalyst and using the residue as potential catalyst for epoxidation reaction. Furthermore, the efficiency of the heterogeneous catalyst for continuous epoxidation studies have been assessed using a FlowSyn continuous flow reactor by studying the effect of reaction temperature, feed molar ratio of alkene to TBHP and feed flow rate on the conversion of the oxidant and the yield of epoxide. The continuous flow epoxidation using FlowSyn reactor has shown considerable time savings, high reproducibility and selectivity along with remarkable improvements in catalyst stability compared to reactions carried out in a batch reactor.


Abstract The colony of Brazilian free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) at Carlsbad Cavern, New Mexico, is a well-known example of this highly gregarious and conspicuous species in North America. For nearly a century researchers have tried to estimate the size of this colony, but different census methods and lack of repeatability have resulted in questionable estimates that have given rise to poorly understood but highly popularized, long-term population trends for this migratory species. In this study we present accurate seasonal estimates of colony size based on a recently developed census method—thermal infrared imaging and computer vision analysis. The size of the colony was estimated several times monthly from March through October 2005. Our estimates range from 67,602 to 793,838 bats, values that are orders of magnitude lower than the largest historic estimates. Consecutive estimates of nightly emergences show fluctuations of as many as 291,000 individuals, indicating that colony composition is considerably more dynamic than previously thought. Our results, combined with a quantitative analysis of emergence behavior, question the validity of early historic estimates that millions of bats once roosted in this cave and suggest that the long-term pattern of decline reported for this species might not be as severe as currently thought.


The aim of this study was to assess the effect of acupressure, applied at P6 (Neiguan) acupuncture point, on chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting in patients with acute myeloblastic leukemia. This was a randomized controlled trial conducted on patients with myeloblastic leukemia. A total of 90 patients, who received the same chemotherapy regimen and antiemetic therapy, were included in the study as 30 patients in the control group, 30 patients in the band group, and 30 patients in the pressure group. Although acupressure was applied by placing wristbands at P6 acupuncture point of both wrists in patients of the band group for totally 4 days, acupressure was applied with the use of finger pressure in patients of the pressure group for totally 4 days. No intervention was made in patients of the control group other than the routine antiemetic therapy. The data of the study were collected by using a questionnaire and nausea-vomiting chart. Severity of nausea-vomiting was assessed by using the visual analog scale on this chart. It was determined that the acupressure band applied to the patients included in the study reduced number and severity of nausea-vomiting (P < .05); however, the acupressure applied with pressure did not affect number and severity of nausea-vomiting (P > .05). It was found that the acupressure band was effective for reducing the chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting.


I. INTRODUCTION II. GREENHOUSE REDUCTION BY THE NUMBERS: SCIENCE VS. POLICY III. A BRIEF SURVEY OF CLEAN AIR ACT REGULATION TO DATE FOR GREENHOUSE GASES: VAST POTENTIAL BUT LITTLE PROGRESS A. Mobile Sources of Pollution 1. Section 202 Standards for Automobiles and for Medium- and Heavy-Duty Trucks 2. Section 231 Standards for Aircraft and Section 213 Standards for Other Mobile Sources B. Stationary Sources of Pollution 1. New Source Performance Standards 2. New Source Review IV. CRITERIA AIR POLLUTANT DESIGNATION, NATIONAL AMBIENT AIR QUALITY STANDARDS, AND STATE IMPLEMENTATION PLANS FOR GREENHOUSE GASES A. The NAAQS Process B. Benefits of a NAAQS for Greenhouse Gases C. Challenges and Criticisms Related to a Greenhouse Gas NAAQS 1. The Section 111(d) Trade-off.... 2. NAAQS Attainment for a Globally WellMixed Gas 3. Allocating State Reductions under a Greenhouse Gas NAAQS 4. Fear of Political Backlash V. CONCLUSION I. INTRODUCTION Dangerous climate change is upon us. Reports of stronger storms, longer droughts, heat waves, crop failures, melting sea ice, and species declines are now ubiquitous. These and other impacts of climate change are certain to worsen in the coming years. As NASA's James Hansen and his colleagues warned in 2008, atmospheric carbon dioxide (C[O.sub.2]) levels are already unsafe. Without deep and rapid emission reductions, changes to the Earth's climate and ecosystems will render our planet unrecognizable: If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that C[O.sub.2] will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm [parts per million] to at most 350 ppm, but likely less than that. (1) Despite similarly urgent warnings from scientists around the world, greenhouse gas emissions continue largely unabated. At the end of 2011, atmospheric C[O.sub.2] was at 390 ppm and rising. (2) The 2008 election of Barack Obama, who pledged to reduce greenhouse emissions, created expectations that the United States government would finally heed scientific warnings about the urgency of climate change. However, any sense of momentum towards meaningfully addressing the climate crisis stalled with the defeat of economy-wide climate legislation in the 111th Congress, the concurrent failure of international climate negotiations in Copenhagen in late 2009, and the 2010 election of a new Congress openly hostile to any form of greenhouse regulation. Consequently, the leading effort to tackle greenhouse emissions on a national level has been the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) nascent regulation of C[O.sub.2] and other greenhouse gases as "pollutants" under the forty-year-old Clean Air Act (CAA or Act). Despite legal challenges and legislative attacks by greenhouse polluters and their defenders in Congress, the EPA's implementation of several provisions of the CAA is now underway. Greenhouse gas-limiting rules for automobiles are finally in place, and emissions limitations now apply to C[O.sub.2] from some of the largest smokestack sources. Nevertheless, the EPA's efforts to date have failed to reduce the United States' overall greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, under provisions for regulating tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks, total annual C[O.sub.2] emissions from the vehicle sector will still increase beyond current levels. Similarly, new greenhouse gas-constrained permits for coal-fired power plants have provided little or no C[O.sub.2] reductions. In short, while the EPA's early greenhouse gas regulations will reduce the rate at which United States greenhouse gas emissions would rise absent such regulation, they have not yet reduced or even stabilized emissions at current levels, much less reduced them to the degree recommended by scientists to avert dangerous climate change. …


The unidirectional solidification of a dilute alloy (tin-bismuth) in a two-dimensional rectangular cavity is investigated. A uniform computational grid is employed. A vorticity-vector potential representation is used for the governing equations for the velocity field. The interface compatibility conditions for vorticity and vector potential are developed and discussed. The energy equation is solved for the temperature field, while the species equation is solved for the solute distribution. The constitutive equations are solved using a true transient method. The solution scheme incorporates an Alternating Direction Implicit (ADI) approximation for the vorticity while the conjugate gradient method is employed for the vector potential equation. The results obtained from the numerical simulations compare very well with experimental results for directional solidification in the literature in terms of the propagation of the solidification front as well as the free convection flow patterns in the liquid.


In this paper, we develop an estimator for the vertical flux of horizontal momentum with arbitrary beam pointing, applicable to the case of arbitrary but fixed beam pointing with systems such as the Poker Flat Incoherent Scatter Radar (PFISR). This method uses information from all available beams to resolve the variances of the wind field in addition to the vertical flux of both meridional and zonal momentum, targeted for high-frequency wave motions. The estimator utilises the full covariance of the distributed measurements, which provides a significant reduction in errors over the direct extension of previously developed techniques and allows for the calculation of an error covariance matrix of the estimated quantities. We find that for the PFISR experiment, we can construct an unbiased and robust estimator of the momentum flux if sufficient and proper beam orientations are chosen, which can in the future be optimized for the expected frequency distribution of momentumcontaining scales. However, there is a potential trade-off between biases and standard errors introduced with the new approach, which must be taken into account when assessing the momentum fluxes. We apply the estimator to PFISR measurements on 23 April 2008 and 21 December 2007, from 60–85 km altitude, and show expected results as compared to mean winds and in relation to the measured vertical velocity variances.


In The Strategic President, I argued that presidential power is not the power to persuade. Presidents cannot reshape the contours of the political landscape to pave the way for change by establishing an agenda and persuading the public, Congress, and others to support their policies. Instead, successful presidents facilitate change by recognizing opportunities in their environments and fashioning strategies and tactics to exploit them. These conclusions lead us to predict that governing strategies dependent on persuasion will fail. The Obama administration provides an excellent test for these predictions, because it adopted two governing strategies highly dependent upon persuasion: going public and bipartisanship in Congress. In this paper, I analyze the prospects of these strategies for governing adopted by the Obama White House. I find that Barack Obama is only the latest in a long line of presidents who have not been able to transform the political landscape through their efforts at persuasion. When he succeeded in achieving major change, it was by mobilizing those predisposed to support him and driving legislation through Congress on a party-line vote. Moreover, it is entirely possible that the president's failure to understand the nature of presidential power has undermined his ability to govern in the remainder of his term.


Key Points • Despite the many potential health risks associated with foods, in practice the degree of risk associated with the modern food supply is extremely low. • By far the most important hazards of significance are those from biological agents: pathogenic bacteria, viruses, fungi and a few toxic seafoods. • Trends to larger-scale production, longer distribution chains in the food supply, increased eating away from the home and the emergence of new pathogens means foodborne illness continues to be a significant public health issue. • The assessment of the safety of food additives is led internationally by JECFA, but each individual country still develops and determines their own local regulations and food standards. • The ADI is defined as the amount of a chemical that might be ingested daily, even over a lifetime, without appreciable risk to the consumer • Genetically modified foods, novel foods and nano-materials pose new challenges for traditional safety assessment processes but, as the food supply becomes increasing global, food regulations about food safety are becoming more harmonized internationally.


The six chapters of this study approach the work of Cornelis Vreeswijk from different perspectives with an emphasis on the motifs, poetic technique, and intertextuality of individual songs amd Iyrical texts. Vreeswijks s work is interpreted in the context of contemporary history and debate, the cultural tradition to which it belongs and important events in the author's life. The first chapter focuses on Vreeswijk's role as a commentator on the societal development of the 60's and early 70's and connects him with the black humour of that time. Chaptor 2 deals with Vreeswijk's relationship to the complex clown tradition and to Mikhail Bakthin s notion of the carnivalesque. From 1970Ohe voice of a tragi comical clown predominates in Vreeswijk's songs. This clown is made to bear a resemblance to the public image of Vreeswijk himself as a musician and offensive Bohemian. The third chapter discusses the outsider motif in Vreeswijk's texts. His songs portray society's outsiders but also allude to the ideas and motifs in the works of Albert Camus, Colin Wilson, Norman Mailer and Gunnar Ekelof Chapter 4 concentrates on a conspicuous motif in Vreeswijk's poetry. that of an isolated, gloomy speaker meditating on life, death and transcendence. This motif is related to the long tradition of representations of melancholy. Chapter 5 deals with Vreeswijk's love songs and his relationship to the poetry of Evert Taube. Vreeswijk satirizes Taube's romantic naivety though some of his texts should be seen as loving parodies of Taube's chivalric pose. The last chapter concentrates on Vreeswijk's work in the 1980's when he often took it upon himself to warn and protest against the evils in society. It also discusses Vreeswijk's relationship to the blues genre. From the very beginning he had made use of the blues genre in an original way, combining it with other traditions. (Less)


The extracellular matrix of the optic nerve head is altered in both human glaucoma and in experimental primate models of this disease. However, the relationship of this change to glaucomatous optic nerve degeneration is unknown. This report describes similar matrix alterations in rats with unilateral elevated intraocular pressure. Brown Norway rats received episcleral vein injections of hypertonic saline to produce prolonged elevations of intraocular pressure. After up to 6 months of pressure elevation, optic nerve head sections from the rats were evaluated by light microscopic immunohistochemistry using antibodies to collagens I, III, IV and VI, laminin, elastin and chondroitin and dermatan sulfate proteoglycans. In experimental eyes with 11 days or more of pressure elevation, depositions of collagen IV, collagen VI and laminin were found within regions of the optic nerve head that, in normal eyes, are occupied solely by nerve bundles. Collagen I and III deposition appeared to be more dependent on the level and duration of the pressure rise. Eyes with lower mean intraocular pressures showed deposits of interstitial collagens primarily at the level of the sclera, while eyes with higher mean pressure elevations had depositions in the neck regions as well. Chondroitin and dermatan sulfate proteoglycans were deposited in a pattern similar to that of collagen I. No extracellular matrix deposition was seen in the orbital optic nerve in any experimental eye. These extracellular matrix changes in rats replicate previous findings in human glaucomatous eyes and monkey eyes with experimentally elevated pressures. They also suggest a sequence of extracellular matrix protein deposition in response to pressure elevation. The optic nerve head deposition of matrix materials in response to elevated intraocular pressures may affect the susceptibility of remaining axons to pressure by changing the physical properties of their support tissues, by affecting the support functions of astrocytes and by changing the microenvironment of injured axons. This model may be useful for studying these and other aspects of the process of axonal injury resulting from elevated intraocular pressure.


The profession of athletic training has opened its doors to women, who now slightly outnumber men in the profession (Shingles, 2001; WATC, 1997, 2005). Unfortunately, this representation does not carry over into positions of high rank. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the lived experiences of female head athletic trainers in NCAA Division I (IA football) institutions to focus on the issues of barriers to advancement and their ability to overcome them. Using Hakim's "preference theory" as a lens, this interpretive qualitative investigation utilized semi-structured, open-ended interviews to learn how participants advanced in the field of athletic training to the position of head athletic trainer. The study identified family division of labor and the discrimination from the "old boy's club" found in other studies. However, it also showed low aspiration as equally strong a barrier to advancement and demonstrated how low aspiration then affects the intentionality of one's career path. The participants identified three reasons for their low aspiration: First, an aversion to working in football, a traditional role for many head athletic trainers; second, an overall dislike of the duties of head athletic trainer; and, third, a stated reluctance to be in a leadership position. Unique to this study was the identification of personal attributes which balanced the barriers and aided the women in the advancement. All expressed a strong work ethic; they received and internalized encouragement from others; and, finally, they saw a challenge and an opportunity for personal and professional growth in the head athletic trainer position. In most cases, they began to see the position as something other than traditional, and one they could change and improve. This re-visioning of the position played an integral part in their willingness to advance. Missing from the support these athletic training leaders identified was active professional mentoring. They did not benefit from formal or informal career advancement advice from supervisors or peers. With low aspirations, low intentionality, and no career mentoring, these female head athletic trainers highlight the strong need for active preparation for advancement in the profession for both men and women.


Amphibians are declining worldwide, and one cause of this is infectious disease emergence. Mass mortalities caused by a virus or a group of viruses belonging to the genus Ranavirus have occurred in wild common frogs Rana temporaria in England since the 1980s, and ranaviral disease is widespread in amphibians in North America and Canada, where it can also cause mass die‐offs. Although there have been numerous reports of Ranavirus‐associated mass mortality events, no study has yet evaluated the long‐term impacts of this disease. This study follows up archived records of English common frog mortalities likely caused by Ranavirus. There is a preliminary indication that common frog populations can respond differently to the emergence of disease: emergence may be transient, catastrophic, or persistent with recurrent mortality events. We subsequently focused on populations that had recurring mortality events (n=18), and we report median declines of 81% in the number of adult frogs in these populations from 1996 to 2008. Comparable uninfected populations (n=16) showed no change in population size over the same time period. Regressions show that larger frog populations may be more likely to experience larger declines than smaller populations, and linear models show that percentage population size change is significantly correlated with disease status, but that habitat age (a possible proxy for environmental quality) has no significant effect on population size change. Our results provide the first evidence of long‐term localized population declines of an amphibian species which appear to be best explained by the presence of Ranavirus infection.


Rhenania, a German direct mail-order company, turned its catalog mailing practices around within one year and consequently moved up in market position from number 5 to number 2. A dynamic multilevel modeling (DMLM) approach uses elasticities to determine the optimal frequency of catalog mailings, a customer-segmentation approach allows for optimization of mailings, and a recency, frequency, monetary-value (RFM) segmentation in combination with a chi-square automatic interaction detection (CHAID) algorithm determines when customers should receive a reactivation package--as opposed to a catalog--to optimize mailing efficiency further. The DMLM approach was so effective that Rhenania acquired two competitors (one a subdivision of Springer Verlag).


The impact of oil industry on agricultural development in Nigeria is addressed in this research work. The backward/forward relationships measure the level of impact that the oil industry has brought to the economic development of the Nigerian Economy. We therefore present the review of related literature in the perception and area of oil in the Nigerian economy, accessing the impact of oil industry in Nigerian economy, and the way forward in the 21st century. First, a general look into how crude oil is formed is presented. Second, we outlined the history of crude oil in Nigeria, from discovery, exploration to current development of the oil sector. Third, we looked at the impacts of oil boom in Nigeria on her economy and environment alongside the efforts made so far by the Nigerian government in regulating the oil sector and possibly diversifying Nigerian economy. Lastly, we presented an outlook into possible strategies to address various problems outlined in this review concerning oil development impacts with emphasis on Nigerian agricultural sector.


Machine vision plays an important role in automated assembly. However, present vision systems are not adequate for robot control in an assembly environment where individual components have sizes in the range of 1 to 100 micrometers, since current systems do not provide sufficient resolution in the whole workspace when they are fixed, and they are too bulky to be brought close enough to the components. A small-size 3D vision system is expected to provide two decisive advantages: high accuracy and high flexibility. The presented work aims to develop a 3D vision sensor easily embedded in a micro-assembly robot. The paper starts by a screening of 3D sensing methods, performed in order to identify the best candidates for miniaturization, and that results in the selection of the multifocus principle (which elegantly avoids the depth of field problem encountered for example in stereo vision). Here, depth is measured by determination of sharpness maxima in a stack of images acquired at different elevations. Then, it presents a preliminary system configuration, that delivers images of a 1300×1000 micrometers field of view with lateral resolution better than 5 micrometers and vertical resolution better than 20 micrometers. Finally, future steps in development of a real-time embedded multifocus sensor are presented, with a discussion of the most critical tradeoffs.


We introduce a computational toolset, named GROmars, to obtain and compare time-averaged density maps from molecular dynamics simulations. GROmars efficiently computes density maps by fast multi-Gaussian spreading of atomic densities onto a three-dimensional grid. It complements existing map-based tools by enabling spatial inspection of atomic average localization during the simulations. Most importantly, it allows the comparison between computed and reference maps (e.g., experimental) through calculation of difference maps and local and time-resolved global correlation. These comparison operations proved useful to quantitatively contrast perturbed and control simulation data sets and to examine howmuch biomolecular systems resemble both synthetic and experimental density maps. This was especially advantageous for multimolecule systems in which standard comparisons like RMSDs are difficult to compute. In addition, GROmars incorporates absolute and relative spatial free-energy estimates to provide an energetic picture of atomistic localization. This is an open-sourceGROMACSbased toolset, thus allowing for static or dynamic selection of atoms or even coarse-grained beads for the density calculation. Furthermore, masking of regions was implemented to speed up calculations and to facilitate the comparison with experimental maps. Beyond map comparison, GROmars provides a straightforward method to detect solvent cavities and average charge distribution in biomolecular systems.We employed all these functionalities to inspect the localization of lipid and water molecules in aquaporin systems, the binding of cholesterol to the G protein coupled chemokine receptor type 4, and the identification of permeation pathways through the dermicidin antimicrobial channel. Based on these examples, we anticipate a high applicability of GROmars for the analysis of molecular dynamics simulations and their comparison with experimentally determined densities.


Regional trade in South America since independence has long been much smaller than would be expected if geography were the only constraint on trade. Several potential explanations exist: low technological and demand complementarities; low productivity; high natural and policy barriers to trade. Focusing on the latter explanations, policy makers have long advocated a South American/Southern Cone Free Trade Area–proposed as early as 1889. Would reductions in trade costs have been sufficient to significantly raise trade, or was trade low for other reasons? We study bilateral trade between 1910 and 1950, when large external shocks altered global supply and demand. These shocks help us show that intra-regional trade could have been boosted with reductions in trade costs. South American regional trade could have benefitted from more benign trade policy or better infrastructure. Regional trade in textiles, which took off from the 1930s, supports our argument that trade improved when trade costs fell.


We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) to measure neural changes associated with training configural processing in congenital prosopagnosia, a condition in which face identification abilities are not properly developed in the absence of brain injury or visual problems. We designed a task that required discriminating faces by their spatial configuration and, after extensive training, prosopagnosic MZ significantly improved at face identification. Event-related potential results revealed that although the N170 was not selective for faces before training, its selectivity after training was normal. fMRI demonstrated increased functional connectivity between ventral occipital temporal face-selective regions (right occipital face area and right fusiform face area) that accompanied improvement in face recognition. Several other regions showed fMRI activity changes with training; the majority of these regions increased connectivity with face-selective regions. Together, the neural mechanisms associated with face recognition improvements involved strengthening early face-selective mechanisms and increased coordination between face-selective and nonselective regions, particularly in the right hemisphere.


A histamine-sensitive adenylate cyclase presenting characteristics very similar to typical H2-receptors has recently been demonstrated in cell-free brain preparations, whereas the stimulation of cyclic AMP accumulation elicited by histamine in cerebral slices has been postulated to involve both H1- and H2-receptors. We have reinvestigated the pharmacological properties of histamine receptors mediating the stimulation of cyclic AMP in guinea-pig hippocampal slices by determining the relative potencies of several agonists and the apparent affinities of antagonists. Metiamide, a H2-blocker, antagonizes in a competitive manner the stimulation elicited by histamine (or 2-thiazolylethylamine, a predominantly H1-agonist) with a pA2 value of 6, corresponding to an interaction with a single population of typical H2-receptors. The relative potencies of two H2-agonists (dimaprit and 4-methylhistamine) are consistent with this view. However other data suggest the involvement of an heterogeneous population of histamine receptors. First, the relative potencies of two H1-agonists (2-thiazolylethylamine and 2-methylhistamine) in hippocampal slices are intermediate between corresponding values on homogeneous populations of H1- and H2-receptors, respectively. Furthermore in the presence of moderate concentrations (5 nM to 0.1 µM) of mepyramine, an H1-antagonist, the response to histamine is modified in a complex fashion: the responses to histamine in low concentrations remain unaltered whereas those to the amine in concentrations above 10 µM are competitively antagonized. Analysis of these data by Schild plot or by a computer program reveals two components in the response to histamine: a first one (insensitive to mepyramine) with an EC50 of 6µM and a second one with an EC50 of 14 µM for the amine (antagonized by mepyramine with a pA2 of 8.2). The participation of each component to the maximal response is approximately 50%. In addition, a series of H1-antagonists inhibit the response to 100 µM histamine with apparent KB 5 toward the second component which appear to be in the same range as those toward typical H1-receptors. Furthermore the supramaximal response to dimaprit, a pure H2-agonist, is progressively elevated in the presence of 2-thiazolylethylamine, a predominantly H1-agonist, in increasing concentrations. In these conditions the relative potency of 2-thiazolylethylamine becomes comparable with the value for typical H1-receptors. This additive response is blocked by 0.1 µM mepyramine while the response to dimaprit alone is not affected. It is concluded that the response to histamine in brain slices involves the stimulation of both typical H2-receptors and receptors closely similar to (or identical with) H1-receptors, which appear to be activated in a sequential manner.


To design future networks that are worthy of societys trust, we must put the discipline of computer networking on a much stronger foundation. This book rises above the considerable minutiae of todays networking technologies to emphasize the long-standing mathematical underpinnings of the field. Professor Jennifer Rexford, Department of Computer Science, Princeton University This book is exactly the one I have been waiting for the last couple of years. Recently, I decided most students were already very familiar with the way the net works but were not being taught the fundamentalsthe math. This book contains the knowledge for people who will create and understand future communications systems." Professor Jon Crowcroft, The Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge The Essential Mathematical Principles Required to Design, Implement, or Evaluate Advanced Computer Networks Students, researchers, and professionals in computer networking require a firm conceptual understanding of its foundations. Mathematical Foundations of Computer Networking provides an intuitive yet rigorous introduction to these essential mathematical principles and techniques. Assuming a basic grasp of calculus, this book offers sufficient detail to serve as the only reference many readers will need. Each concept is described in four ways: intuitively; using appropriate mathematical notation; with a numerical example carefully chosen for its relevance to networking; and with a numerical exercise for the reader. The first part of the text presents basic concepts, and the second part introduces four theories in a progression that has been designed to gradually deepen readers understanding. Within each part, chapters are as self-contained as possible. The first part covers probability; statistics; linear algebra; optimization; and signals, systems, and transforms. Topics range from Bayesian networks to hypothesis testing, and eigenvalue computation to Fourier transforms. These preliminary chapters establish a basis for the four theories covered in the second part of the book: queueing theory, game theory, control theory, and information theory. The second part also demonstrates how mathematical concepts can be applied to issues such as contention for limited resources, and the optimization of network responsiveness, stability, and throughput.


Currently, there is a significant amount of work in the field of wettability science to try and better understand wetting transitions and subsequent developments of mixed-state wetting regimes. This is of extreme importance as this knowledge will have significant impact in those industries and academic fields which rely heavily on adhesion science. This work details the implementation of CO2 lasers to surface engineer polymeric materials, poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) and polyamide 6,6 (nylon 6,6), to bring about and gain a further understanding of the wetting nature of laser surface engineered polymeric materials. With the laser, the surface roughness (Ra) was dramatically increased by up to 4.5 μm in comparison to the as-received sample (AR). It was determined for all samples that the polar component had a strong inverse relationship with the contact angle, θ. For the laser surface engineered polymers a modest increase in θ indicated a possible formation of a mixed-state wetting regime, highlighting the influence of laser-modified surface topography on θ. The polar component and surface pattern were found to be the most dominant parameters governing the wettability characteristics of the laser-surface-modified polymeric materials. The latest state-of-the-art knowledge and understanding of wetting transitions and mixed-state wetting regimes with specific regard to roughened laser surface engineered polymeric materials is discussed identifying significant wettability knowledge and theories.


A new cell has been developed for the measurement of fiber and textile samples using FT-Raman spectroscopy. It improves the strength of the signal over that of conventional solid cells by the compression of the samples to be analyzed and the use of a mirror to reflect scattered radiation back out of the cell and into the collection lens of the spectrometer. The new cell also eliminates the problem of cell window material interfering with the sample spectrum, since the laser passes through a windowless aperture to reach the sample. This consideration is particularly important when spectra are being obtained from weakly scattering samples. The design, optimization, and use of the new cell are presented. The performance of the new cell in terms of improvements in signal-to-noise ratio and elimination of spectral artifacts is compared to that of other conventional sampling techniques. Significant improvements in spectral quality were obtained from both natural and synthetic fiber and textile samples.


Today's product development process should be rapid andcost-efficient, and should result in innovative and reliableproducts. A crucial factor is the dynamic behaviour of theproduct. This thesis focuses on theoretical, numerical andexperimental approaches to achieve a comprehensiveunderstanding of dynamical phenomena occurring in nonlinearproducts, especially in products with parts that includeimpacts. The aim is to show the usefulness of nonlineartheories to better understand and optimise the dynamicbehaviour of products and thereby account for nonlinearphenomena already in the product development process. This is achieved through an investigation of researchefforts in the field of nonlinear dynamics; identification ofimportant research directions; a study on the effect ofcouplings between nonlinear parts; a detailed study on thedynamic behaviour of a product component; investigations oflow-cost strategies for controlling the dynamics of a nonlinearsystem; and the design and implementation of experimentalset-ups of two studied products. The investigation of research efforts shows that nonlinearparts are frequently included in products. Most common areparts that are nonlinear due to impacts and friction. Twoimportant areas are identified; to study coupling effectsbetween nonlinear subsystems and to study how nonlinearanalysis can be used to improve existing designs. Considering the studied products; a pantograph on a trainand a Braille printer, it can be concluded that thecharacteristics of a part can largely affect the dynamicbehaviour of the product. Typical nonlinear behaviour, such ascoexisting solutions and irregular motions, do occur. Theanalysis of the pan- tograph motion shows important aspects toconsider in the modelling process; coupling effects. In thecase of the Braille printer it is shown possible to create alow-cost control, by taking advantage of an existingdiscontinuity, to achieve a desired motion. Altogether, this work contributes to improved understandingof the be- haviour of nonlinear parts in products, especiallythose including impacts, pro- viding greater knowledge aboutaspects to consider in the design process. Keywords:Nonlinear Dynamics, Impacts, Discontinuities,Subsystems, Chaos, Irregular Behaviour, Printer Dynamics,Suspensions, Coupled Systems, Control.