Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to look into the ethical practices of a profit-driven financial institution that is currently adopting Islamic banking and whether it can actually be ethical from an Islamic perspective. The recent decade has seen an upsurge of the increasingly integration of ethical management into operational strategies by businesses across the globe. Like any other religion, Islam wants its followers to be truthful and honest and to be compliant with its teachings and especially in a business transaction. This research paper explores the ethical factors of Islamic banking and how it is perceived by its stakeholders. Design/methodology/approach - – Due to the exploratory nature of the research and the fact that it involves in-depth theoretical analysis, a qualitative research method was adopted to explore the details of ethics in Islamic banking sector. The aim of this research was to explore the ethical options of an Islamic bank. This was done by carrying out in-depth interviews with the managers and executives of Islamic banks having authority over the subject of Islamic banking and Shariah finance. Furthermore, a detailed session of interviews was also carried out with the customers of Islamic banking to take their views on the subject issues. The data are analysed through thematic content analysis and matched with the existing theory with the objective of coming up with detailed findings that would contribute to knowledge on the subject of ethical Islamic banking. Findings - – The paper provides empirical insights about ethical management as a vital part of Islamic banking Practical implications - – The motivation of this thesis comes from literature review to explore the ethics of Islamic banking and how it Islamic banking is perceived by stakeholders at an ethical banking practice. This research aims to aid bankers in identifying what practices they can enhance and what practices should be dropped to bring about a more ethical banking system. This research was prompted as a result of the gaps identified in the literature review followed by the observations made of the market by the researcher. It was evident that further research on this topic was required to aid the subject. Originality/value - – The research is original in its nature, as there have not been many instances where the ethical management theory has been explored within the Islamic banking sector. Given the new literature on corporate branding and customer perception, this research can contribute very positively towards the subject area. This research would pave new research avenues to be explored and enhance academic contribution on the common subjects.


In the past 50 years women have gradually caught up with, and even surpassed, men in educational achievement. Nevertheless, women seem to lose their advantageous position as soon as they enter the labour market. Compared to men they earn less, work fewer hours a week and are more often employed with temporary contracts. These differences are frequently attributed to a differential career investment made by men and women. Previous studies on labour market outcomes mostly focus on the effect of the level of education. Nevertheless, this can not explain gender differences as women are generally higher educated than men. It is well-established, however, that men and women tend to choose different subjects in school. While men are overrepresented in the 'harder' and more technical subjects, women dominate the 'softer' subjects like health and welfare. The subject choices young people make in secondary and/or higher education might explain the lower labour market opportunities of women since these different subjects lead to the acquisition of different skills and competences. Using data from the longitudinal SONAR-survey, which registers the transition from school to work of Flemish youth, we examine to what extent different subject choice influences the gender differences in labour market positions in both the first job and at the age of 26. Since previous analyses have shown that patterns of family formation have an effect on the labour market position, we control our models for these patterns.


Chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients are at a high risk for acute renal failure.
Glomerular filtration rate must be estimated in all patients with hypertension, diabetes and other CKD risk factors for diagnosis and staging of CKD.
Always look for reversible causes in patients presenting with renal failure.
Correction of hypovolaemia and hypotension restores baseline renal function in prerenal causes.
Immediate relief of obstruction is critical to prevent further kidney damage in postrenal acute-on-chronic.
Avoid NSAIDs, nephrotoxic antimicrobials and radiocontrast agents in CKD patients.
ACE-Is and ARBs must be stopped if serum creatinine increases more than 15% from baseline value within a week of starting treatment.
Optimal BP control may result in renal recovery in accelerated phase hypertension.
Urgent referral for renal biopsy is mandatory where recurrence of active lupus nephritis or rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis are suspected.
Preserving renal function and delaying onset of chronic dialysis is the ultimate goal in the care of CKD patients.


Background: Knee joint motion and quadriceps activity play a crucial role in all lower limb tasks, especially those which are highly dynamic and weight-bearing. Due to anatomical differences between men and women such as height, leg length, and hip width, alignment and mechanics of the lower limb are different between males and females. An anatomical variable which is associated with alignment in the lower limb is the quadriceps muscle angle (q-angle). The purpose of this study is to determine if there is a relationship between q-angle, activity of the quadriceps and hamstring muscles and the kinetics and kinematics of the knee during stairclimbing. An investigation on the reliability of q-angle measurements was also made prior to the primary study. Methods: To test the interclass reliability of q-angle measurements, three individuals measured the q-angle on 20 subjects. The primary researcher measured the same twenty individuals on three separate days to determine intra-rater reliability. The primary study involved 10 male and 10 female subjects completing 20 stair-climbing trials (10 ascent, 10 descent). Kinematic and kinetic data were collected on the lower limbs as well as electromyography (EMG) on two quadriceps muscles and one hamstring muscle. Knee joint peak and occurrence of peak moments, average EMG amplitude and peak and occurrence of peak EMG were analyzed by gender and high and low q-angle. A two way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to test the statistical significance of each measured variable (α = 0.05).


This paper estimates the coefficients of the determinants of international tourism demand for the period 1995–2014 in the USA using the gravity framework. The analysis is based on a panel dataset of tourist arrivals among 14 countries using autoregressive distributed lag methods. The results show real gross domestic product, consumer price index, real exchange rate and certain specific events have a significant impact on international tourism demand. The income elasticity suggests that tourism is non-luxury goods, and prices and real exchange rate have negative relation to tourist arrivals. We also find that tourism transport infrastructure is a significant determinant of tourist arrivals into USA. This implies that infrastructure to reinforce taste formation is important to attract more international tourists to USA. In addition, results also suggest implications for public and private tourism authorities.


From the late imperial period until 1922, the British and French made private and government loans to Russia, making it the foremost international debtor country in pre-World War I Europe. To finance the modernization of industry, the construction of public works projects, railroad construction, and the development and adventures of the military-industrial complex, Russia's ministers of finance, municipal leaders, and nascent manufacturing class turned, time and time again, to foreign capital. From the forging of the Franco-Russian alliance onwards, Russia's needs were met, first and foremost, its allies and diplomatic partners in the developing Triple Entente. In the case of Russia's relationships with both France and Great Britain, an open pocketbook primed the pump, facilitating the good spirits that fostered agreement. Russia's continued access to those ready lenders ensured that the empire of the Tsars would not be tempted away from its alliance and entente partners. This web of financial and political interdependence affected both foreign policy and domestic society in all three countries. The Russian state was so heavily indebted to its western creditors, rendering those western economies almost prisoners to this debt, that the debtor nation in many ways had the upper hand; the Russian government at times was actually able to dictate policy to its French and British counterparts. Those nations' investing classes-which, in France in particular, spanned not only the upper classes but the middle, rentier class, as well-had such a vast proportion of their savings wrapped up in Russian bonds that any default would have been catastrophic for their own economies. That default came not long after the Bolshevik Revolution brought to power a government who felt no responsibility whatsoever for the debts accrued by the tsars for the purpose of oppressing Russia's workers and peasants. The ensuing effect on allied morale, the French and British economies and, ultimately, on the Anglo-French relationship, was grim and far-reaching. This book will contribute to understandings of the ways that non-governmental and sometimes transnational actors were able to influence both British and French foreign policy and Russian foreign and domestic policy. It will address the role of individual financiers and policy makers-men like Lord Revelstoke, chairman of Baring Brothers, the British and French Rothschild cousins, Edouard Noetzlin of the Banque de Paris et de Pays Bas, and Sergei Witte, Russia's authoritative finance minister during much of this age of expansion; the importance of foreign capital in late imperial Russian policy; and the particular role of British capital and financial investment in the construction and strengthening of the Anglo-Russo-French entente. It will illustrate the interrelationship of political and economic decision-making with the ideas and beliefs that inform security policy. Drawing upon both the traditional archival sources for diplomatic history-the government holdings of Great Britain, France, and Russia-and the non-governmental archival holdings of international finance-this project looks beyond the realm of high politics and state-centered decision making in the formation of foreign policy, offering insights into the forms and functions of diplomatic alliances while elucidating the connections between finance and foreign policy. It is a classic tale of money and power in the modern era-an age of economic interconnectivity and great power interdependency. Available in OSO: http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/oso/public/content/history/9780199387816/toc.html


In a systematic way, the impact of chaos present in transmitters for chaos based communications is discussed; based on arguments from information theory. Conditions for the optimality of communication systems involving chaos in the transmitter are developed. Based on these results which apply quite generally, different approaches to chaos based communications will be analyzed. In particular, what will be shown is that optimal performance in Shannon's sense implies that no information about the chaos (in the Shannon/Kolmogorov-Sinai sense) reaches the receiver. There are several ways to achieve this, some following previously known arguments, and some others that perhaps open new perspectives. In particular, it is shown that the emission of chaotic signals by the transmitter is not precluded in general, but for a number of common communication channels.


CandidaDB is a database dedicated to the genome of the most prevalent systemic fungal pathogen of humans, Candida albicans. CandidaDB is based on an annotation of the Stanford Genome Technology Center C.albicans genome sequence data by the European Galar Fungail Consortium. CandidaDB Release 2.0 (June 2004) contains information pertaining to Assembly 19 of the genome of C.albicans strain SC5314. The current release contains 6244 annotated entries corresponding to 130 tRNA genes and 5917 protein-coding genes. For these, it provides tentative functional assignments along with numerous pre-run analyses that can assist the researcher in the evaluation of gene function for the purpose of specific or large-scale analysis. CandidaDB is based on GenoList, a generic relational data schema and a World Wide Web interface that has been adapted to the handling of eukaryotic genomes. The interface allows users to browse easily through genome data and retrieve information. CandidaDB also provides more elaborate tools, such as pattern searching, that are tightly connected to the overall browsing system. As the C.albicans genome is diploid and still incompletely assembled, CandidaDB provides tools to browse the genome by individual supercontigs and to examine information about allelic sequences obtained from complementary contigs. CandidaDB is accessible at http://genolist.pasteur.fr/CandidaDB.


When the renowned chess genius Bobby Fischer died, his body was exhumed in order to determine whether his genetic samples matched samples from a child whose mother claimed he fathered outside of a marital union. Bobby Fischer was domiciled in Iceland and under Icelandic law, if there had been a genetic connection, the child would have been the sole legal heir of his intestate estate. The law is not so clear in the United States. Each state has enacted laws of intestate succession. While the laws in all fifty states provide that a child born out of wedlock is automatically his or her mother's legal child, state statutes vary substantially as to when that same child is entitled to an intestate inheritance from or through his or her genetic father.If Fischer, the Chicago native, had been domiciled in North Carolina at his death, even if DNA had established a genetic relationship between Fisher and the child, the child would still have been precluded from inheriting her father's estate. In North Carolina, a biological or genetic connection is not enough to constitute a paternal legal heir without strict compliance with statutory formalities. In contrast, if Fischer had been domiciled in Georgia, and through clear and convincing evidence a genetic relationship was established, the child would inherit from her father's estate as his legal child. As one can see, in the United States, paternal inheritance depends on the state of the father's *532 domicile. As such, when we discuss the out of wedlock child and his or her right to inherit family wealth through intestate succession, the old adage "Mother's baby, father's maybe" comes to mind.In this paper, I suggest that each of the fifty states should, like Georgia and other similarly situated states, follow the trend of Icelandic law in the area of intestate succession. Specifically, where clear and convincing evidence (either before or after a father's death) determines that a father is the genetic parent of a child, and there has been no formal adoption of the child, such child should be entitled to an intestate share of his or her father's estate in the same manner as a child born to a married parents.


This paper presents the basic concepts required to construct a computer code capable of deriving element stiffness matrices. The computer program requires only the displacement functions, transformation matrices, and a few control cards as input. The computer code assembles a complete element stiffness matrix for any type of configuration and displacement functions of any order. The matrix is stored in an alpha-numeric array. The final form is printed in terms of numerical coefficients and material and geometric properties of the element in symbol form. The output is received printed or punched on cards ready for incorporation into existing finite element computer codes. Examples are presented for a two-dimensional triangular plate element in which the displacements are represented in terms of area coordinates. However, the concept is not limited to local coordinate representations of displacement functions or to two-dimensional problems.


Perspectives from the sociology of scientific knowledge are deployed to explore the birth of Internet research, focusing in particular on the development of methodological approaches. For a researcher based in the sociology of scientific knowledge, being an Internet researcher has been a vivid opportunity to experience at firsthand a phenomenon usually studied from the outside. The article begins by assessing some models of the process of scientific change. Characterizing Internet research as new has been a potent resource for enrolling researchers into the field and positioning research responses. The development of virtual methods for doing social research illustrates the process of methodological innovation in social science and the negotiation of methodological adequacy. Methodological discussions have been enlivened by the advent of the Internet as an object of study. Internet research has arguably been a valuable reflexive opportunity for the traditional disciplines that have fed its development.


The influence of gas nitriding of commercial pure titanium and Ti-6Al-4V (Ti64) alloy by using a Q-sw laser on the wear loss during rolling contact fatigue is investigated. Despite very good biocompatibility, high strength to weight ratio and corrosion resistance, the tribological properties of titanium alloys are inferior to those of other metal alloys, such as steel. Fretting and wear related aspects become important issues when titanium alloys are used in rolling contact applications. Titanium bearings are employed in applications requiring high strength, light weight, and minimum maintenance (for example, aerospace and defense industries). In this work, a Q-sw laser was used to coat pure commercial titanium and Ti-6Al-4V bearings with TiN in a closed chamber in nitrogen atmosphere. The samples were tested under water by using a thrust-type rolling contact fatigue machine. The microstructure, morphology and crystallographic texture of the layers were observed by laser confocal microscope, scanning electron microscope and electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD). By optimizing the laser processing parameters, such as laser scanning speed, power and beam diameter, thin TiN coats of 1 to 3 m were produced. The wear loss of the coated samples was at least ten times lower than that of the uncoated bearings.


Again and again in regard to recent high-profile disputes, the legal community has tied itself in knots over questions about when state plaintiffs should have standing to sue in federal court, especially in cases where they seek to sue federal-government defendants. Lawsuits challenging everything from the Bush administration's environmental policies to the Obama administration's immigration actions to the Trump administration's travel bans have become mired in tricky and technical questions about whether state plaintiffs belonged in federal court.

Should state standing cause so much controversy and confusion? This Essay argues that state plaintiffs are far more like at least one other category of so-called "aggregate litigants," organizational plaintiffs, than the literature has previously recognized. In short, one can see state standing and organizational standing as fitting either side by side (in the sense that state standing runs parallel to organizational standing) or hand in glove (in the sense that state standing represents a species of organizational standing). And a preliminary comparison of institutional features suggests that state plaintiffs should have at least as strong a claim to standing in federal court as associational plaintiffs do.

These contentions lead to the conclusion that if the legal community feels comfortable with the wide scope of organizational standing, it should feel equally — and probably more — comfortable with the wide scope of state standing.


Since blended learning has become increasingly popular, teachers as well as learners are supported by a number of electronic platforms: starting from the distribution of digital learning content, via automatically advised online exercises to final exams being carried out in a university's PC lab. However, the concept of intensive learning, for example immediately prior to an exam, is only supported to a minor degree, if at all; thus, a recapitulation of learning content often still takes place in a traditional way where digital content is printed on paper and then annotated with highlighters and post-its, for example. The Learnr Web platform under development at the University of Munster bridges this gap within the process of technology enhanced learning by adopting well-known learning paradigms to the digital world. Following a community-driven, Web 2.0-coined approach, on the one side structures representing the learners' language, collaboratively created summaries and file cards arise; at a social level bottom-up networking and learning communities are fostered through sharing of individually created material.


A novel materials science appraisal that proposes a paradigm shift in the evaluation of recycling materials for road applications has been developed. The appraisal advances materials science thinking in the field of road engineering, has consistent performance criteria for road materials and addresses the concerns about the variable nature of recycled material sources. The appraisal has been realised by reviewing material types, road pavement structures and road pavement distress, and, consequently, conceptual development of the appraisal for materials recycling in roads. The development of the novel materials science appraisal, based on broad fundamental material-types (ceramic-type, metallic-type and polymeric-type), has defined how materials science through a systematic step-by-step procedure can be used to achieve engineering sustainability. The materials science appraisal provides a method for addressing uncertainties in material properties. Thus, the materials science appraisal evaluates recycling o...


Abstract. We investigate the spatial and temporal distribution of hydrogen cyanide (HCN) in the upper troposphere through numerical simulations and comparison with observations from a space-based instrument. To perform the simulations, we used the Global Environmental Multiscale Air Quality model (GEM-AQ), which is based on the three-dimensional global multiscale model developed by the Meteorological Service of Canada for operational weather forecasting. The model was run for the period 2004–2006 on a 1.5°×1.5° global grid with 28 hybrid vertical levels from the surface up to 10 hPa. Objective analysis data from the Canadian Meteorological Centre were used to update the meteorological fields every 24 h. Fire emission fluxes of gas species were generated by using year-specific inventories of carbon emissions with 8-day temporal resolution from the Global Fire Emission Database (GFED) version 2. The model output is compared with HCN profiles measured by the Atmospheric Chemistry Experiment Fourier Transform Spectrometer (ACE-FTS) instrument onboard the Canadian SCISAT-1 satellite. High values of up to a few ppbv are observed in the tropics in the Southern Hemisphere; the enhancement in HCN volume mixing ratios in the upper troposphere is most prominent in October. Low upper-tropospheric mixing ratios of less than 100 pptv are mostly recorded at middle and high latitudes in the Southern Hemisphere in May–July. Mixing ratios in Northern Hemisphere peak in the boreal summer. The amplitude of the seasonal variation is less pronounced than in the Southern Hemisphere. The comparison with the satellite data shows that in the upper troposphere GEM-AQ performs well globally for all seasons, except at northern high and middle latitudes in summer, where the model has a large negative bias, and in the tropics in winter and spring, where it exhibits large positive bias. This may reflect inaccurate emissions or possible inaccuracies in the emission profile. The model is able to explain most of the observed variability in the upper troposphere HCN field, including the interannual variations in the observed mixing ratio. A complementary comparison with daily total columns of HCN from two middle latitude ground-based stations in Northern Japan for the same simulation period shows that the model captures the observed seasonal variation and also points to an underestimation of model emissions in the Northern Hemisphere in the summer. The estimated average global emission equals 1.3 Tg N yr−1. The average atmospheric burden is 0.53 Tg N, and the corresponding lifetime is 4.9 months.


The sensible and latent heat fluxes are obtained, using the modified Bowen ratio method (MBR) and Bowen ratiolEnergy balance method (BREB) with the data of LINEX-97/l and LITFASS-1998 experiments. The error analysis of MBR and the error comparisons between both methods are also made in detail by a lot of numerical experiments and the measured data. The results illustrate that the MBR, compared with the BREB, can obtain higher accurate results with errors of less than ±lO% for sensible heat flux and less than ±20% for latent heat flux.


Electromagnetic interference, equipment noise, multi-path effects and obstructions in harsh smart grid environments make the quality-of-service (QoS) communication a challenging task for WSN-based smart grid applications. To address these challenges, a cognitive communication based cross-layer framework has been proposed. The proposed framework exploits the emerging cognitive radio technology to mitigate the noisy and congested spectrum bands, yielding reliable and high capacity links for wireless communication in smart grids. To meet the QoS requirements of diverse smart grid applications, it differentiates the traffic flows into different priority classes according to their QoS needs and maintains three dimensional service queues attributing delay, bandwidth and reliability of data. The problem is formulated as a Lyapunov drift optimization with the objective of maximizing the weighted service of the traffic flows belonging to different classes. A suboptimal distributed control algorithm (DCA) is presented to efficiently support QoS through channel control, flow control, scheduling and routing decisions. In particular, the contributions of this paper are three folds; employing dynamic spectrum access to mitigate with the channel impairments, defining multi-attribute priority classes and designing a distributed control algorithm for data delivery that maximizes the network utility under QoS constraints. Performance evaluations in ns-2 reveal that the proposed framework achieves required QoS communication in smart grid.


We report progress in the study of thick CZT strip detectors for 3-D imaging and spectroscopy and discuss two approaches to device design. Unlike double-sided strip detectors, these devices feature both row and column contacts implemented on the anode surface. This electron-only approach circumvents problems associated with poor hole transport in CZT that normally limit the thickness and energy range of double-sided strip detectors. The work includes laboratory and simulation studies aimed at developing compact, efficient, detector modules for 0.05 to 1 MeV gamma radiation measurements while minimizing the number and complexity of the electronic readout channels. These devices can achieve similar performance to pixel detectors for both 3-D imaging and spectroscopy. The low channel count approach can significantly reduce the complexity and power requirements of the readout electronics. This is particularly important in applications requiring large area detector arrays. We show two single-sided strip detector concepts. One, previously reported, features rows established with collecting contacts and columns with noncollecting contacts. Another, introduced here, operates on a charge sharing principle and establishes both rows and columns with collecting contacts on the anode surface. In previous work using the earlier strip detector concept we reported simulations and measurements of energy and spatial resolution for prototype 5- and 10-mm-thick CZT detectors. We now present the results of detection efficiency and uniformity measurements conducted on 5-mm-thick detectors using a specific configuration of the front-end electronics and event trigger. We discuss the importance of the detector fabrication processes when implementing this approach.


During most of the 20th century, the Church of Sweden was a typical example of a northern European national established church. The separation of church and state in Sweden had been discussed repeatedly during most of the century, without reaching an overall solution. However, in the early 1990's, a compromise was reached, and the relationship between church and state in Sweden was transformed, simultaneously changing the nature of the Church of Sweden itself by apparently transferring it from the public sector to the private sector. This paper offers an analysis of this reform, which came in effect in 2000, including how the issue was framed and the arguments used to legitimize the reform. It also offers an analysis of what the reform changed in terms of the relationship between the Church and the state, arguing that a strong relationship between the state and religious denominations still exists in Sweden. Even though several steps have been taken towards considering Lutheran Christianity one religion among many in a society where the state is neutral in religious affairs, the reform has left the Church as a legally regulated entity in the gray zone between the state and the third sector, while at the same time strengthening the relationship between the government and other denominations. In spite of this, the changed relationship between church and state may have enabled the Church of Sweden to take a more active part in Swedish society, both in terms of politics, and in terms of supply of welfare services.


OBJECTIVE: We examined staff utilization and procedure length for percutaneous and open bedside tracheostomies in an intensive care setting STUDY DESIGN: Prospective clinical outcomes study. METHODS: Intensive care unit (ICU) tracheostomy consults meeting criteria for bedside procedures were randomized to open or percutaneous procedures. The Cook percutaneous kit and a prepackaged tracheostomy tray were used. ICU nursing and respiratory therapy staff was present for all procedures. The total resident time, staff time, and procedure length were recorded. Twelve patients underwent percutaneous tracheostomy, and 12 received an open tracheostomy. RESULTS: An operating room nurse was present for 7 of the open procedures. Ancillary medical staff was present for 3 open tracheostomies: anesthesia for 2 and critical care for 1. Ancillary medical staff was present for 4 percutaneous tracheostomies: anesthesia staff for 1 and critical care for 3. The average resident presence, staff presence, and procedure length for open tracheostomies were 47, 30, and 12 minutes, respectively. For percutaneous tracheostomies, the times were 39, 29, and 12 minutes, respectively. One intraoperative complication occurred during a percutaneous procedure and 2 perioperative complications occurred: 1 in the open group and 1 in the percutaneous group. CONCLUSIONS: There was no significant difference in procedure length, resident time, or staff time between the 2 procedures. Ancillary staff was occasionally used but was not thought to be necessary for the majority of procedures. Both procedures can be safely and expediently performed in the ICU.


We consider a new opportunistic interference alignment (OIA) for the K-cell multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) interfering multiple-access channel (IMAC) with time-invariant channel coefficients, where each cell consists of a base station (BS) with M antennas and N mobile stations (MSs) having L antennas each. In this paper, we propose three OIA techniques: antenna selection-based OIA, singular value decomposition (SVD)-based OIA, and vector-quantized (codebook-based) OIA. Then, their performance is analyzed in terms of user scaling law required to achieve KS degrees-of-freedom (DoF), where S(≤ M) denotes the number of simultaneously transmitting MSs per cell. As our main result, it is shown that the antenna selection-based OIA does not fundamentally change the user scaling required to achieve KS DoF if L is fixed, compared with the single-input multiple-output (SIMO) IMAC case. In contrast, it is shown that the SVD-based OIA can greatly reduce the required user scaling to SNR(K-1) S-L+1 through optimizing weight vectors at each MS. Furthermore, we show that the vector-quantized OIA can achieve the same user scaling as the SVD-based OIA case if the codebook size is beyond a certain value. For the vector-quantized OIA, we analyze a fundamental tradeoff between the quantization level (i.e., codebook size) and the required user scaling.


Circle size and circle color indicates frequency and geographical location of haplotypes, respectively. Haplotype numbers are indicated next to the corresponding circle H_XX. Red numbers between haplotypes indicate number of mutations between haplotypes. (PPTX)


The second half of the 20th century has witnessed a watershed in the systematic study of crime. Until then, crime estimates were locked up in an administrative monopoly : the only available figures resulted from counting the activities of various criminal justice agencies. By contrast, from then on, alternative measurement methods were developed based on general population surveys, which severed the crime estimates' dependency on the operation of the police or the courts. However, widening the range of the tools used for measuring crime will only be fruitful if their consideration proceeds beyond mere juxtaposition, towards genuine comparison. This volume accounts for the comparisons performed in a number of European countries between official criminal statistics and victimisation surveys. Bruno Aubusson de Cavarlay has taken stock of research in France, Joachim Obergfell-Fuchs in Germany, Giovanni Sacchini in Italy, Karin Wittebrood in the Netherlands, Mike Hough and Paul Norris in the United Kingdom, finally Sandrine Haymoz, Marcelo Aebi, Martin Killias and Philippe Lamon in Switzerland. The synthesis for all these countries has been drawn by Jan Van Dijk. Philippe Robert coordinated the volume. This comparison was carried out in one of the workpackages of a Coordination Action (CrimPrev, see http://www.crimprev.eu) funded by the European Commission (under FP6) under the leadership of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS, Groupe europeen de recherches sur les normativites – GERN). This workpackage (coordinated by Philippe Robert and Renee Zauberman) includes three more European overviews pertaining to victimisation and insecurity surveys, self reported crime and deviance surveys and finally evaluative research on safety and crime prevention policies. This European comparison will be useful for public policies decision makers at various governmental levels (European, national, regional, local), for crime prevention NGOs, for journalists, and for academics, researchers and students.


In searchable encryption in the public key setting, a trapdoor is uploaded to a server, and the server runs the test algorithm by using the trapdoor. However, if trapdoors stored in the server will be exposed due to unexpected situations, then anyone can run the test algorithm. Therefore, the trapdoor revocation functionality is desirable in practice. Moreover, even certain keyword revocation functionality is supported, the impact of trapdoor exposure should be minimized. In addition to this, it seems difficult to assume that revoked keywords will never be used. Therefore, we need to consider the case where a new trapdoor can be generated even a trapdoor has been revoked before. In this paper, we give a formal definition of keyword revocable public key encryption with keyword search (KR-PEKS), and propose a generic construction of KR-PEKS from revocable identity-based encryption with a certain anonymity. Our construction is not only a generalization of revocable keyword search proposed by with Yu, Ni, Yang, Mu, and Susilo (Security and Communication Networks 2014), but also supports trapdoor exposure resistance which guarantees that an exposure of a trapdoor does not infect of other trapdoors, and trapdoor re-generateability which guarantee that a new trapdoor can be generated even a keyword has been revoked before.


Lewis acidic boranes containing the –BMes2 unit (Mes = 2,4,6-Me3C6H2) have been widely exploited in molecular sensors for the fluoride ion reflecting, at least in part, the stability to air and moisture of derivatives of the type ArBMes2. In the current study, the fluoride binding capabilities of the simplest such system, PhBMes2 (1), have been investigated by spectroscopic and crystallographic methods, with a view to experimentally determining the fundamental thermodynamic and structural parameters associated with this host/guest interaction. A binding constant, KF, of 8.9(1.9) × 104 M−1 in dichloromethane solution and a B–F bond length of 1.481(2) A for the salt [nBu4N]+[PhMes2BF]− have thus been elucidated and provide a baseline for the analysis of more complex systems. Competitive binding of the cyanide ion is implied by a similar binding constant, KCN, of 1.9(0.5) × 105 M−1; structurally, similar degrees of pyramidalization of the BC3 framework are observed on coordination of each anion {Σ(C–B–C) = 339.8, 340.1° for [nBu4N]+[PhMes2BF]− and [K(18-crown-6)]+[PhMes2BCN]−, respectively}. Linking of two ArBMes2 units via an alkyne spacer results in a 2,2′-bis(dimesitylboryl)tolan system, which is characterized by independent binding of two equivalents of the CN− anion, rather than cyanide chelation.


In this paper, we merge three datasets - individual income data, patenting data, and IQ data - to analyze the deterninants of an individual's probability of inventing. We find that: (i) parental income matters even after controlling for other background variables and for IQ, yet the estimated impact of parental income is greatly diminished once parental education and the individual's IQ are controlled for; (ii) IQ has both a direct effect on the probability of inventing an indirect impact through education. The effect of IQ is larger for inventors than for medical doctors or lawyers. The impact of IQ is robust to controlling for unobserved family characteristics by focusing on potential inventors with brothers close in age. We also provide evidence on the importance of social family interactions, by looking at biological versus non-biological parents. Finally, we find a positive and significant interaction effect between IQ and father income, which suggests a misallocation of talents to innovation


BACKGROUND
Cesarean delivery has negative effects on breastfeeding. The objective of this study was to evaluate breastfeeding rates, defined in accordance with World Health Organization guidelines, from delivery to 6 months postpartum in infants born by elective and emergency cesarean section and in infants born vaginally.

METHODS
Delivery modalities were assessed in relation to breastfeeding patterns in 2,137 term infants delivered at a tertiary center, the Padua University School of Medicine in northeastern Italy, from January to December 2007. The study population included 677 (31.1%) newborns delivered by cesarean section, 398 (18.3%) by elective cesarean, 279 (12.8%) by emergency cesarean section, and 1,496 (68.8%) delivered vaginally.

RESULTS
Breastfeeding prevalence in the delivery room was significantly higher after vaginal delivery compared with that after cesarean delivery (71.5% vs 3.5%, p < 0.001), and a longer interval occurred between birth and first breastfeeding in the newborns delivered by cesarean section (mean ± SD, hours, 3.1 ± 5 vs 10.4 ± 9, p < 0.05). No difference was found in breastfeeding rates between the elective and emergency cesarean groups. Compared with elective cesarean delivery, vaginal delivery was associated with a higher breastfeeding rate at discharge and at the subsequent follow-up steps (7 days, 3 mo, and 6 mo of life).

CONCLUSIONS
  Emergency and elective cesarean deliveries are similarly associated with a decreased rate of exclusive breastfeeding compared with vaginal delivery. The inability of women who have undergone a cesarean section to breastfeed comfortably in the delivery room and in the immediate postpartum period seems to be the most likely explanation for this association.


Collecting training data from untrusted sources exposes machine learning services to poisoning adversaries, who maliciously manipulate training data to degrade the model accuracy. When trained on offline datasets, poisoning adversaries have to inject the poisoned data in advance before training, and the order of feeding these poisoned batches into the model is stochastic. In contrast, practical systems are more usually trained/fine-tuned on sequentially captured real-time data, in which case poisoning adversaries could dynamically poison each data batch according to the current model state. In this paper, we focus on the real-time settings and propose a new attacking strategy, which affiliates an accumulative phase with poisoning attacks to secretly (i.e., without affecting accuracy) magnify the destructive effect of a (poisoned) trigger batch. By mimicking online learning and federated learning on MNIST and CIFAR-10, we show that model accuracy significantly drops by a single update step on the trigger batch after the accumulative phase. Our work validates that a well-designed but straightforward attacking strategy can dramatically amplify the poisoning effects, with no need to explore complex techniques.


Transient well testing provides indirect determination of reservoir and well parameters. It is one of the most important in a spectrum of diagnostic tools used by petroleum engineers to characterize hydrocarbon assets and predict their future performance. This new monograph is the go-to handbook for designing, running, and analyzing different types of transient tests in oil and gas reservoirs. Since the publication of SPE's last monograph on well testing, considerable advances in testing tools, computing technology, and theoretical development have continued to enhance the information that can be obtained from transient testing and change the methods of interpretation. A gap in the petroleum engineer's library for a comprehensive book covering the state of the art in well-test analysis has existed for some time now. Practicing petroleum engineers need a single up-to-date reference for transient testing of oil, gas, and water wells; Transient Well Testing has been written to fill that gap.
 Errata (http://go.spe.org/TWTerrata)


The identification of critical states is a major task in complex systems, and the availability of measures to detect such conditions is of utmost importance. In general, criticality refers to the existence of two qualitatively different behaviors that the same system can exhibit, depending on the values of some parameters. In this paper, we show that the relevance index may be effectively used to identify critical states in complex systems. The relevance index was originally developed to identify relevant sets of variables in dynamical systems, but in this paper, we show that it is also able to capture features of criticality. The index is applied to two prominent examples showing slightly different meanings of criticality, namely the Ising model and random Boolean networks. Results show that this index is maximized at critical states and is robust with respect to system size and sampling effort. It can therefore be used to detect criticality.


Many coral reef ecosystems have undergone profound ecological changes over the past decades leading sometimes to a shift from coral to macroalgal-dominated areas. In Martinique (Caribbean region), the proliferation of macroalgae is an important phenomenon. Coral reef resilience, involving reef building species recruitment, might be modified by macroalgal presence. This work aimed at understanding reef recruitment processes in areas dominated either by macroalgae, coral or intermediate, based on scuba diving observations, manipulative experiments and laboratory studies. Particular attention was given to the physical and chemical effects of Sargassum (one of the most represented species: 100-200 g.m-2 (wet weight) in algal beds) on benthic invertebrates' larvae recruitment. Further experiments focused on the effects of surface molecules and of the waterborne cues produced by Sargassum polyceratium on the development of marine invertebrates' embryos.

This study demonstrated that juvenile coral diversity and density vary between the considered habitat types (i.e: dominated by algae, coral or intermediate with numerous sea urchins). It was low in algal areas (0.9-1.4 recruit.m-2) as compared to coral ones (7-8 recruit.m-2) and intermediate in urchin zones (2-3.2 recruit.m-2). Moreover, species recruiting differed according to their reproductive mode. Brooders recruited more in coral areas, which suggested that they settled in the vicinity of their parent colonies. Settlement and recruitment experiments demonstrated the barrier effect of Sargassum species on
settlement but no allelochemical impacts could be identified in situ. However, the laboratory based experiments demonstrated that S. polyceratium surface molecules were active against the early stages of development of Arenicola brasiliensis (annelid), Codakia orbicularis (bivalvia) and Diadema antillarum (sea urchin, a reef key stone species) (LC50 between 25 and 51 μg.mL-1).

These results give insight into the coral recruitment capacities in several habitats, which is of major importance for reef managers.


The retreat history of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) since the Last Glacial Maximum is important for understanding the process of rapid deglaciation, constraining models that seek to predict the future trajectory of the ice sheet, and for estimating rates of sea-level change. Here we report new glacial geologic data from the southwestern Weddell Sea embayment that demonstrate that this part of the WAIS was thinner than previously suggested, and that there was progressive thinning of the ice sheet by 230–480 m since ca. 15 ka. We use geomorphological data and a numerical ice sheet model to reconstruct the ice sheet in the Weddell Sea at the Last Glacial Maximum. The volume of this ice would have added between 1.4 and 2.0 m to postglacial sea-level rise and would not have been sufficient to contribute significantly to meltwater pulse 1A, a rapid rise in sea level ∼14,200 yr ago.


The transformation of labour and unemployment in China raises a question of "What was socialism and what comes next." This paper attempts to answer this question for China by looking at the unemployment policy changes before and after the reform. I employ Walder's classic work, Communist Neo-Traditionalism, to discuss the nature of work and welfare prior to reform. I discuss three "caring" features of labour relations prior to the reform; 1) the state enterprise (Danwei) as a small welfare state; 2) organizational dependence between workers and their superiors; and 3) Maoist emphasis on political education. Then I attempt to address three new "daring" characteristics of unemployment practice in the process of dismantling the old socialist workfare, the Iron Rice Bowl; 1) Massive Unemployment; 2)From Organizational Dependence to Self-Reliance; 3) Ideology still matters: Persistence of Political Education and Thought Work. I argue that the current unemployment policy is a combination of both new and old, neo-liberal market rationality combined with old socialist ideological work.


Martin Kreiswirth challenges the accepted notion that The Sound and the Fury, Faulkner's fourth and possibly finest novel, represented an unprecedented turning point in the writer's literary career, a quantum leap in his imaginative development. He argues that Faulkner's earlier work, both published and unpublished, not only distinctly prefigured techniques, narrative strategies, and creative procedures used in the writing of his fourth novel, but also provided him with materials and methods to which he could return. Viewed in the context of his literary development, the author says, the writing of The Sound and the Fury constituted for Faulkner not so much a mysterious leap as a moment of initiation; it marks that crucial point in his career at which he revisited his past, saw it anew, and reworked it into his future. Focusing his attention on the works that preceded The Sound and the Fury--and specifically on the strategies and conventions that informed those works--Kreiswirth reassesses Faulkner's imaginative growth and offers new insights into the place and significance of The Sound and the Fury itself. He provides detailed analyses of such works as the New Orleans short fiction, the abandoned novel Elmer, Mosquitoes, Flags in the Dust, and particularly Faulkner's neglected first novel, Soldier's Pay. These texts are reexamined not only as anticipations of later developments but as literary achievements in their own right.


The proposed research objective is to develop, test, and evaluate a mixer and charger-supply CMOS IC that derives and mixes energy and power from mixed sources to accurately supply a miniaturized system. Since the energy-dense source stores more energy than the power-dense source while the latter supplies more power than the former, the proposed research aims to develop an IC that automatically selects how much and from which source to draw power to maximize lifetime per unit volume. Today, the state of the art lacks the intelligence and capability to select the most appropriate source from which to extract power to supply the time-varying needs of a small system. As such, the underlying objective and benefit of this research is to reduce the size of a complete electronic system so that wireless sensors and biomedical implants, for example, as a whole, perform well, operate for extended periods, and integrate into tiny spaces.


This is an empirical study of leaders and how they affect organizational performance. Its context is the research university as a knowledge intensive organization. It appears to be the first of its kind.
The thesis explores whether the characteristics of a leader in position today can tell us about the future success of their institution. It asks the question: Should research universities be led by top scholars? One reason why universities are an interesting case is that, unusually for knowledge-intensive organizations, their leaders' technical expertise can arguably be measured reasonably objectively.
Using cross-sectional analysis, the first approach adopted in this thesis is to identify whether accomplished scholars are currently leading the world's top universities and business schools. It demonstrates -- using a variety of data sets, and in a variety of settings, including a check on the role of outliers -- that better universities and business schools are led by presidents and deans with systematically higher numbers of life-time scholarly citations.
Next the dissertation attempts to go beyond simple cross-sectional patterns to address the question of causality. It does so in a longitudinal study that follows the performance of a panel of 55 universities over a nine-year period from 1992 to 2001. Using regression analysis, this thesis uncovers some evidence that is consistent with the existence of a causal relationship between the research ability of a leader and the future achievement of their institution. The results suggest that a university tends to improve in the UK Research Assessment Exercise if its leader has been a successful scholar.
Qualitative evidence in the form of interviews with university leaders then motivates a theory of strategic leadership that might explain the statistical patterns. It is argued in the thesis that scholars may make effective leaders for reasons that are both internal and external to the individual. A scholar-leader, it is suggested, influences performance because of an inherent knowledge of the core business of a research university, and also through the extension of powers acquired by being viewed as credible by followers. Finally, the thesis concludes by asking whether university governing bodies appoint the right people.
The central argument being made in this thesis is that where expert knowledge is the key factor that characterises an organization it is expert knowledge that should also be key in the selection of its leader.


Background: Controversy continues to exist regarding how EMDR works and whether its mechanisms differ from those at work in standard exposure techniques. Aims: To investigate first whether eye movement bilateral stimulation is an essential component of EMDR and, second, the current status of its theoretical basis. Method: A systematic search for relevant articles was conducted in databases using standard methodology. Results: Clinical research evidence is contradictory as to how essential EMs are in PTSD treatment. More positive support is provided by analogue studies. With regards to potential theoretical support, some evidence was found suggesting bilateral stimulation first increases access to episodic memories; and second that it could act on components of working memory which makes focusing on the traumatic memories less unpleasant and thereby improves access to these memories. Conclusions: The results suggest support for the contention that EMs are essential to this therapy and that a theoretical rationale exists for their use. Choice of EMDR over trauma-focused CBT should therefore remain a matter of patient choice and clinician expertise; it is suggested, however, that EMs may be more effective at reducing distress, and thereby allow other components of treatment to take place.


A new dual-log spiral geometry is proposed for microstrip resonators, offering substantial advantages in performance and size reduction at subgigahertz frequencies when realized in superconducting materials. The spiral is logarithmic in line spacing and width such that the width of the spiral line increases smoothly with the increase of the current density, reaching its maximum where the current density is maximum (in its center for /spl lambda//2 resonators). Preliminary results of such a logarithmic ten-turn (2 /spl times/ 5 turns) spiral, realized with double-sided YBCO thin film, showed a Q.-factor seven times higher than that of a single ten-turn uniform spiral made of YBCO thin film and 64 times higher than a copper counterpart. The insertion loss of the YBCO dual log-spiral has a high degree of independence of the input power in comparison with a uniform Archimedian spiral, increasing by only 2.5% for a 30-dBm increase of the input power, compared with nearly 31% for the uniform spiral. A simple approximate method, developed for prediction of the resonant frequency of the new resonators, shows a good agreement with the test results.


On February 15, 2015 the FAA announced historic regulations that for the first time in American history will allow small aircraft without onboard pilots --- drones --- to fly in the national airspace. Legal and technological developments have thus made it all but certain that drones will be a catalyst for new ways of thinking about privacy and surveillance. This is especially the case because the drones that the FAA has approved for operation in the national airspace (small aircraft under 55 pounds) are the exact type of drones that local law enforcement will be most likely to acquire and use. Thus, the battle over privacy and aerial surveillance will be fought in statehouses throughout the country. This article seeks to frame future discussions about how states will handle the privacy issues associated with aerial surveillance. The article takes the counterintuitive position that technology may make unmanned aerial surveillance more protective of privacy than manned surveillance. It further argues that scholars and legislators should move beyond a warrant-based, technology centric approach to protecting privacy from aerial surveillance. Such an approach is unworkable, counterproductive, and may stifle efforts to enact more privacy protective legislative regimes. Instead, this article proposes that legal reforms should focus on excluding low altitude flights and surveillance coupled with imposing limits on persistent surveillance, requiring enhanced accountability procedures for data retention and access, and creating new transparency, accountability and oversight measures.


Play and playfulness compose an essential part of our lives as human beings. From childhood to adultness, playfulness is often associated with remarkable positive experiences related to fun, pleasure, intimate social activities, imagination , and creativity. Perhaps not surprisingly, playfulness has been recurrently used in NIME designs as a strategy to engage people, often non-expert, in short term musical activities. Yet, designing for playfulness remains a challenging task, as little knowledge is available for designers to support their decisions. To address this issue, we follow a design rationale approach using the context of Live Looping (LL) as a case study. We start by surveying 101 LL tools, summarizing our analysis into a new design space. We then use this design space to discuss potential guidelines to address playful-ness in a design process. These guidelines are implemented and discussed in a new LL tool–called the " Voice Reaping Machine ". Finally, we contrast our guidelines with previous works in the literature.


Abstract. Among the sets of sequences studied, difference sets of sequences are probably the most common type of sets. This paper considers some lp type fractional difference sequence spaces via Euler gamma function. Although we characterize compactness conditions on those spaces using the main tools of Hausdorff measure of noncompactness, we can only obtain sufficient conditions when the final space is l∞. However, we use some recent results to exactly characterize the classes of compact matrix operators when the final space is the set of bounded sequences.


One of the vital challenges in the field of image retrieval is the semantic gap between visual features and high-level semantic concepts. Various kinds of relevance feedback approaches have been developed to deal with this semantic gap. Of these, the support vector machine is important. The support vector machine relies upon its parameters and the number of feedback samples. This paper uses a Gaussian firefly algorithm along with support vector machine to raise the relevance feedback performance. The proposed approach determines the parameters of the support vector machine and increases the number of relevant feedback samples, thereby optimizing the retrieval process. The performance of the proposed approach is compared with other existing retrieval methods.


Nimesulide, a non-steroidal antiinflammatory drug with very short biological half-life was encapsulated within lipid microspheres by a modified solvent evaporation method with an aim of targeting the drug to the site of inflammation and for controlled release. Physiological lipids such as glyceryl tristearate, cholesterol were used instead of synthetic polymer matrix materials. The prepared lipid microspheres were evaluated with respect to particle size distribution, encapsulation efficiency, in vitro release behaviour and in vivo antiinflammatory activity in rats. Lipid microspheres with a suitable average particle size of 6-7I¼m could be prepared with this method. The drug was released continuously over 12 days with no burst effect with a maximum release of 74%. The in vivo drug release was investigated in rats, by measuring antiinflammatory activity using cotton pellet granuloma method. A single administration of lipid microspheres showed a better antiinflammatory activity when compared to equivalent multiple administrations of the standard nimesulide solution. The drug concentration was higher in the tissues at the site of inflammation of lipid microspheres treated rats. These results indicated the possibility of drug being released at a controlled rate from lipid microspheres and targeted at the inflamed cells.


After the passage of the Dawes Severalty Act in 1887, the Southern Ute Agency was the scene of an intense federal effort to assimilate the Ute Indians. The Southern Utes were to break up their common land holdings and transform themselves into middle-class patriarchal farm and pastoral families. In this assimilationist scheme women were to surrender the greater autonomy they enjoyed in traditional Ute society and to become house-bound homemakers, the "civilizers" of their fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons. This history of Southern Ute women shows that they accommodated Anglo ways that benefited them but refused to give up indigenous culture and ways that gave their lives meaning and bolstered personal autonomy. In spite of federal policies that stripped women of many legal rights, Southern Ute women demanded participation in political, economic, and legal decisions that affected their lives and insisted on retaining control over their marital and sexual behavior.


Freetown has over 1 million residents, many of whom live in about 68 crowded informal settlements Residents of these settlements struggle daily to access basic services such as water, sanitation, and health-care services We found that the government's Covid-19 response measures (curfews, lockdowns, and travel restrictions) excluded informal residents from contributing to its design, and the implementation of these measures prevented these residents from accessing basic services Like the urban planning processes in Freetown, the Covid-19 response planning was done with the limited inclusion of informal residents, and not considering how these response measures would affect their livelihood priorities The economic conditions of already vulnerable people such as those living with disabilities, beggars, and women heads of households worsened as a result of these measures While these challenges were dire, communities were resilient in reversing the spread of Covid-19 through tailor-made messaging and by supporting the most vulnerable with food and basic needs In this article we argue that the inclusion of the urban poor in decision-making and urban planning processes can improve service delivery and their ability to cope with health shocks © 2021 The Authors IDS Bulletin © Institute of Development Studies


HIV/AIDS continues to be the pandemic of our times and there has not been a comprehensive medically based AIDS prevention book published in the last 5 years. It is estimated that 36 to 45 million people including 2-3 million children already are infected worldwide and an additional 4-7 million more are infected each year. There are about 6,000 new infections daily and about 12 million AIDS orphans. People receiving AIDS treatments feel well and have no detectable viral load, but still can infect others. And even when a vaccine is found, it will take many years before it can be administered across the developing world. * Discusses all aspects of AIDS prevention, from epidemiology, molecular immunology and virology to the principles of broad-based public health prevention interventions. * Special focus on the array of interventions that have been proven effective through rigorous study * Identifies new trends in HIV/AID epidemiology and their impact on creating and implementing prevention interventions * Incorporates virology, biology, infectious diseases, vaccinology, microbicides and research methodologies into AIDS prevention


Over the last few years, many new algorithms have been proposed to solve combinatorial problems. In this field, Monte-Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) is a generic method which performs really well on several applications; for instance, it has been used with notable results in the game of Go. To find the most promising decision, MCTS builds a search tree where the new nodes are selected by sampling the search space randomly (i.e., by Monte-Carlo simulations). However, efficient Monte-Carlo policies are generally difficult to learn. Even if an improved Monte-Carlo policy performs adequately in some games, it can become useless or harmful in other games depending on how the algorithm takes into account the tactical and the strategic elements of the game. In this article, we address this problem by studying when and why a learned Monte-Carlo policy works. To this end, we use (1) two known Monte-Carlo policy improvements (PoolRave and Last-Good-Reply) and (2) two connection games (Hex and Havannah). We aim to understand how the benefit is related (a) to the number of random simulations and (b) to the various game rules (within them, tactical and strategic elements of the game). Our results indicate that improved Monte-Carlo policies, such as PoolRave or Last-Good-Reply, work better for games with a strong tactical element for small numbers of random simulations, whereas more general policies seem to be more suited for games with a strong strategic element for higher numbers of random simulations.


The extensive world-wide morbidity and mortality caused by influenza A viruses highlights the need for new insights into the host immune response and novel treatment approaches. Cationic Host Defense Peptides (CHDP, also known as antimicrobial peptides), which include cathelicidins and defensins, are key components of the innate immune system that are upregulated during infection and inflammation. Cathelicidins have immunomodulatory and anti-viral effects, but their impact on influenza virus infection has not been previously assessed. We therefore evaluated the effect of cathelicidin peptides on disease caused by influenza A virus in mice. The human cathelicidin, LL-37, and the murine cathelicidin, mCRAMP, demonstrated significant anti-viral activity in vivo, reducing disease severity and viral replication in infected mice to a similar extent as the well-characterized influenza virus-specific antiviral drug zanamivir. In vitro and in vivo experiments suggested that the peptides may act directly on the influenza virion rather than via receptor-based mechanisms. Influenza virus-infected mice treated with LL-37 had lower concentrations of pro-inflammatory cytokines in the lung than did infected animals that had not been treated with cathelicidin peptides. These data suggest that treatment of influenza-infected individuals with cathelicidin-derived therapeutics, or modulation of endogenous cathelicidin production may provide significant protection against disease.


In the last years several satellite projects started providing on-orbit servicing capabilities. This means that an on-orbit servicing spacecraft approaches to a client satellite, captures it, takes over the attitude and orbit control and possibly performs additional maintenance tasks. One of the critical phases of such a mission is to ensure a safe and reliable rendezvous and docking (RvD) process. Especially this phase has to be analyzed, simulated and verified in detail. For the special case of verification of rendezvous and docking sensors and systems, DLR has built a new hardware-in-the-loop simulator capable of testing and verifying rendezvous and docking subsystems. This simulator is known as the European Proximity Operations Simulator (EPOS). It is part of the German Space Operations Center (GSOC) located near Weßling. After completion of the baseline simulator concept in 2009, the facility is going to be used for the first time for an internal research project concentrating on a CCD-based rendezvous and docking sensor. This leads to results of both the research project and information about the facility in operation. The paper presents first results and provides insight into ongoing work and projects as well as an outlook of future things to come.


Pigpen, a nuclear protein with RNA‐binding motifs and a putative transcriptional activation domain (TAD), is expressed at high levels in proliferating endothelial cells and expression is down‐regulated when cells adopt a quiescent or differentiated phenotype. We cloned the mouse homolog of pigpen and investigated the regulation of its expression during embryogenesis. In situ hybridization demonstrated that a broad pattern of pigpen expression became restricted during tooth formation in the mandible. In the eye, pigpen showed a spatial restriction to the more proliferating and less differentiated regions of the lens and neural retina. Expression was also restricted in the developing vibrissae, lung, and kidney, all sites where epithelial‐mesenchymal interactions are vital for morphogenesis. In vitro assays, that focused on the mandible and tooth development, indicated that epithelial signals, mediated by fibroblast growth factor‐8, were required to maintain pigpen expression in the mandibular mesenchyme, whereas bone morphogenetic protein‐4 negatively regulated expression in that tissue during early odontogenesis. At the protein level, immunocytochemistry demonstrated that Pigpen was expressed diffusely in the cytoplasm and more concentratedly in focal granules within the nuclei of mouse embryonic cells. Lastly, CAT reporter assays showed that the N‐terminus of mouse pigpen encodes an active TAD. These data suggest that mouse Pigpen may activate transcription in vivo in response to specific growth factor signals and regulate proliferation and/or differentiation events during mouse organogenesis. Developmental Dynamics 228:59–71, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


With the trend towards social interaction over the Internet and the popularity of websites such as Myspace, Facebook and Youtube among others, practitioners and researchers are motivated to explain the sudden surge in user interest, in a phenomenon that we term, Social Computing. We seek to research the question: "Why do people engage in Social Computing?" The motivation is to determine some of the underlying human psychological factors that are driving this phenomenon. Towards this end, we propose a reformulation of the interactivity construct by suggesting new dimensions of interactivity that are unique to social computing. With this reformulated interactivity construct, we conduct an exploratory study using the need fulfillment lens provided by the Self Determination Theory. We assess if interactivity, in its richer formulation, influences need fulfillment, which in turn leads to higher levels of self-determined motivation. We also evaluate the impact of the latter on intentions for continued use and actual use of these websites. The results largely support the hypothesized model.


My father will have told you a great deal. He will have told you too how much we are interested & agitated by the probable event of the approaching trials ... we are resolved to emigrate if the event of the trial be fatal.(1) In 1794, the treason trials of Home Tooke, Thomas Hardy, and Thomas Holcroft crystallized the philosophical differences between revolutionary sympathizers and a nervous British government. An ardent admirer of revolutionary principles, Amelia Alderson attended the trials and later "confessed" that they marked "the most interesting period of [her] long life."(2) In letters home, Alderson exults in radical "victories" and scorns governmental treachery. Her father was so disturbed by his daughter's outspoken objections to the trials that he destroyed many of her letters. In surviving letters written to Susannah Taylor, Alderson openly expresses her dissatisfaction with an increasingly reactionary government: "Hang these politics! how they haunt me. Would it not be better, think you, to hang the framers of them?"(3) In yet another letter dated 1794, Alderson writes: "I believe an hour to be approaching when salut and fraternite will be the watchwords for civil slaughter throughout Europe; and the meridian glory of the sun of Liberty, in France, will light us to courting the past dangers and horrors of the republic, in hopes of obtaining her present power and greatness. It will be an awful time; may I meet it with fortitude!"(4) I quote these letters at length to indicate Amelia Alderson's commitment to radical politics throughout the 1790s. As an enthusiastic member of the circle surrounding William Godwin, Holcroft, and Elizabeth Inchbald, and later Mary Wollstonecraft, Alderson participated in "Jacobin" politics and philosophy. Her ties to the group were, however, broken by marriage to John Opie, a painter and member of the Royal Academy, in 1798. The year in which Amelia Alderson Opie became a respectable wife is also the year in which Godwin wrote and published his Memoirs of Mary Wollstonecraft. Recent literary scholarship tends to identify the publication and reception of the Memoirs as a watershed moment in the late eighteenth-century "backlash" against outspoken "philosophical women." Such women were a vocal and highly visible part of revolutionary discourse in both France and England and attempts to silence them resonate throughout conservative Regency publications. Yet too often literary criticism has erred in assuming that the eighteenth-century revolutionary woman immediately became the Victorian angel in the house. Modern critics often focus on conservative Regency voices because in retrospect they seem to have won the ideological battle waged over the construction of femininity.(5) Amelia Opie--her life and her works--provides an ideal opportunity to study the manifold subtleties implicit in the highly volatile discourse surrounding the British woman writer between 1798 and 1832. Because Opie forgoes overtly radical "philosophizing" after 1798 she has often been identified as a frightened reactionary, yet another Regency woman writer who abandoned revolutionary philosophy to protect her reputation.(6) Godwin's revelations about Wollstonecraft's passion for Henry Fuseli, her love affair with Gilbert Imlay, and their own pre-marital relationship gave rise to slanderous attacks against Wollstonecraft in the conservative press. The Anti-Jacobin Review carried out an extensive campaign to discredit Wollstonecraft's political ideas by identifying her as a prostitute rather than as a writer and social critic. In a review of the Memoirs, the Anti-Jacobin makes the following judgment: "We must observe, that Maty's theory, that it is the right of women to indulge their inclinations with every man they like, is so far from being new, that it is as old as prostitution."(7) And as late as 1801, the magazine printed a poem which included the following lines about Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman: Such license loose-tongued liberty adores, Which adds to female speech exceeding graces; Lucky the maid that on her volume pores, A scripture, archly fram'd, for propagating w--s. …


The migration of animals across long distances and between multiple habitats presents a major challenge for conservation. For the migratory Mexican free-tailed bat (Tadarida brasiliensis mexicana), these challenges include identifying and protecting migratory routes and critical roosts in two countries, the United States and Mexico. Knowledge and conservation of bat migratory routes is critical in the face of increasing threats from climate change and wind turbines that might decrease migratory survival. We employ a new modeling approach for bat migration, network modeling, to simulate migratory routes between winter habitat in southern Mexico and summer breeding habitat in northern Mexico and the southwestern United States. We use the model to identify key migratory routes and the roosts of greatest conservation value to the overall population. We measure roost importance by the degree to which the overall bat population declined when the roost was removed from the model. The major migratory routes—those with the greatest number of migrants—were between winter habitat in southern Mexico and summer breeding roosts in Texas and the northern Mexican states of Sonora and Nuevo Leon. The summer breeding roosts in Texas, Sonora, and Nuevo Leon were the most important for maintaining population numbers and network structure - these are also the largest roosts. This modeling approach contributes to conservation efforts by identifying the most influential areas for bat populations, and can be used to as a tool to improve our understanding of bat migration for other species. We anticipate this approach will help direct coordination of habitat protection across borders.


The way users intectact with smartphones is changing after the improvements made in their embedded sensors. Increasingly, these devices are being employed as tools to observe individuals habits. Smartphones provide a great set of embedded sensors, such as accelerometer, digital compass, gyroscope, GPS, microphone, and camera. This paper aims to describe a distributed architecture, called inContexto, to recognize user context information using mobile phones. Moreover, it aims to infer physical actions performed by users such as walking, running, and still. Sensory data is collected by HTC magic application made in Android OS, and it was tested achieving about 97% of accuracy classifying five different actions (still, walking and running).


Gender-mediated habitat associations of kelp greenling (Hexagrammos decagrammus) along the central coast of California by Jessica Flower Moye Coastal And Watershed Science And Policy California State University Monterey Bay, 2017 Marine fish assemblages are broadly associated with physical habitat attributes such as water temperature and depth. At smaller spatial scales fishes are known to associate with specific substrate types such as rocky reef or unconsolidated sediments. Understanding these fine-scale habitat associations for economically and ecologically important species allows for more refined resource management and spatial planning efforts against a framework of increasing use of the marine environment. This study quantified the distribution and habitat associations of kelp greenling (Hexagrammos decagrammus) at four locations across north-central California, ranging from Point Arena to Pillar Point. Data on the distribution of kelp greenling were extracted from continuous video and still photographic imagery collected by a remotely operated vehicle between 2010 and 2011 as part of the baseline characterization of the newly implemented network of California marine protected areas (MPAs). Results indicate kelp greenling associate with low-relief, continuous rock substrates at each of the four sites. Distribution of fish within sites varied significantly based on gender, with females occurring more frequently in sand habitat than males, particularly in areas immediately adjacent to hard substrate. The geo-referenced kelp greenling observations were coupled with bathymetry-derived environmental parameters using generalized linear models to predict areas of fish occurrence beyond the sampled areas. These results advance our understanding of how kelp greenling utilize the habitats in which they occur, while the resulting predictive maps provide information on their distribution at spatial scales appropriate for MPA management and marine spatial planning.


Abstract Hematite is a mineral the chemical composition of which rarely differs significantly from stoichiometric Fe2O3. As such, little attention has been paid to the mineral chemistry of hematite in Precambrian iron formations, where hematite forms monomineralic high-grade orebodies. Electron microprobe analysis of hematite from two iron-ore deposits, Cauê (Itabira district) and Gongo Soco, in the Palaeoproterozoic Itabira Iron Formation, Quadrilátero Ferrífero of Minas Gerais, Brazil, has revealed distinct variations in chemical composition with respect to Ti and Cr. Hematite containing Ti and/or Cr is of very local occurrence in the itabirite unit and shows a spatial relationship to hematitic, palladiferous gold-bearing veins (known as 'jacutinga'), occurring either within the veins (adjacent to, or included in, palladiferous gold grains) or in their vicinity. Where present, titaniferous hematite (to ~1.3 wt.% TiO2) is lepidoblastic and defines a pervasive tectonic foliation (S1). In contrast, Ti-free, chromiferous hematite (to ~6.4 wt.% Cr2O3) characteristically occurs as inclusions in palladiferous gold within S1-truncating 'jacutinga'. Replacement of granoblastic, Ti-free, chromiferous martite with relicts of magnetite by lepidoblastic, Cr-depleted, titaniferous hematite proves that Cr and Ti were mobile during metamorphism. Chromium was ultimately fractionated into the hematite found in auriferous aggregates within cross-cutting 'jacutinga'. A positive correlation between Cr and Pt in bulk-rock samples from the Itabira district suggests that Cr is a potential prospective guide for Au-Pd-Pt-bearing hematitic veins ('jacutinga').


ABSTRACT The ICC and R2P share the goal of ending atrocity crimes. Nonetheless, they operate quite differently. Recently, there has been increasing support for bringing the ICC within the R2P toolkits, hoping they will complement each other to achieve their shared goal. The Security Council put this idea into practice to deal with the 2011 crisis in Libya. However, the invocation of ICC against the backdrop of an evolving military intervention under the R2P mandate highlighted significant risks to its integrity and legitimacy. This paper argues that the invocation of ICC to constrain violence and to hold accountable the Libyan regime for atrocity crimes eventually resulted in legitimizing military intervention and regime change under the R2P mandate. The Libya case suggests that neither the push for complementarity nor a full separation between the ICC and R2P benefits the ICC. There needs to be a balance between full engagement and separation. Such an alternative rests on the ICC avoiding entanglement with R2P's military mandate, while maintaining close interaction with its non-military components through the Security Council. Lastly, the paper also points to areas in which the Council could play a more constructive role in cementing greater cooperation between R2P and the ICC.


Isotopic discrimination and turn-over are fundamental to the application of stable isotope ecology in animals. However, detailed information for specific tissues and species are widely lacking, notably for herbivorous species. We provide details on tissue-specific carbon and nitrogen discrimination and turn-over times from food to blood, feathers, claws, egg tissues and offspring down feathers in four species of herbivorous waterbirds. Source-to-tissue discrimination factors for carbon (δ13C) and nitrogen stable isotope ratios (δ15N) showed little variation across species but varied between tissues. Apparent discrimination factors ranged between −0.5 to 2.5‰ for δ13C and 2.8 to 5.2‰ for δ15N, and were more similar between blood components than between keratinous tissues or egg tissue. Comparing these results with published data from other species we found no effect of foraging guild on discrimination factors for carbon but a significant foraging-guild effect for nitrogen discrimination factors. Turn-over of δ13C in tissues was most rapid in blood plasma, with a half-life of 4.3 d, whereas δ13C in blood cells had a half-life of approximately 32 d. Turn-over times for albumen and yolk in laying females were similar to those of blood plasma, at 3.2 and 6.0 d respectively. Within yolk, we found decreasing half-life times of δ13C from inner yolk (13.3 d) to outer yolk (3.1 d), related to the temporal pattern of tissue formation. We found similarities in tissue-specific turn-over times across all avian species studied to date. Yet, while generalities regarding discrimination factors and tissue turn-over times can be made, a large amount of variation remains unexplained.


BACKGROUND
Glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency decreases the ability of red blood cells (RBCs) to withstand oxidative stress. Refrigerated storage of RBCs induces oxidative stress. We hypothesized that G6PD-deficient donor RBCs would have inferior storage quality for transfusion as compared to G6PD-normal RBCs.

METHODS
Male volunteers were screened for G6PD deficiency; 27 control and 10 G6PD-deficient volunteers each donated one RBC unit. After 42 days of refrigerated storage, autologous 51-Chromium 24-hour post-transfusion RBC recovery (PTR) studies were performed. Metabolomics analyses of these RBC units were also performed.

RESULTS
The mean 24-hour PTR for G6PD-deficient subjects was 78.5 ± 8.4% (mean ± SD), which was significantly lower than that for G6PD-normal RBCs (85.3 ± 3.2%; P = 0.0009). None of the G6PD-normal volunteers (0/27) and three G6PD-deficient volunteers (3/10) had PTR results below 75%, a key FDA acceptability criterion for stored donor RBCs. As expected, fresh G6PD-deficient RBCs demonstrated defects in the oxidative phase of the pentose phosphate pathway. During refrigerated storage, G6PD-deficient RBCs demonstrated increased glycolysis, impaired glutathione homeostasis, and increased purine oxidation, as compared with G6PD-normal RBCs. In addition, there were significant correlations between PTR and specific metabolites in these pathways.

CONCLUSIONS
Based on current FDA criteria, RBCs from G6PD-deficient donors would not meet the requirements for storage quality. Metabolomics assessment identified markers of PTR and G6PD deficiency (e.g., pyruvate/lactate ratios), along with potential compensatory pathways that could be leveraged to ameliorate the metabolic needs of G6PD-deficient RBCs.REGISTRATION. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04081272.

FUNDING
The Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Grant 71590, the National Blood Foundation, NIH grant UL1 TR000040, the Webb-Waring Early Career Award 2017 by the Boettcher Foundation and the NHLBI grant R01HL14644 and R01HL148151.


In this paper, a substantial set of simultaneous measurements of the sum of peroxy radicals, [HO2 + RO2], NO3, hydrocarbons (HCs), and ozone, taken at Mace Head on the Atlantic coast of Ireland in spring 1997, is presented. Conditions encountered during the experiment ranged from semipolluted air masses advected from Britain and continental Europe to clean air masses off the North and mid-Atlantic, where mixing ratios of pollution tracers approached Northern Hemispheric background mixing ratios. Average mixing ratios of peroxy radicals varied from 2.5 to 5.5 parts per trillion by volume (pptv) at night depending on wind sector, and were observed to decay only very slowly from late afternoon to early morning (0.1–0.5 pptv h−1). Measurements of OH and HO2 on two nights using the Fluorescence Assay by Gas Expansion (FAGE) technique give an upper limit for [OH] of 2.5×105 molecules cm−3 and an average upper limit [HO2]/[HO2 + RO2] ratio of 0.27. A modeling study of the 1/e lifetimes of the peroxy radicals, assuming no radical production at night, yielded mean lifetimes of between ∼8–23 min for HO2 and 3–18 min for CH3O2. Given these lifetimes, it may be concluded that the peroxy-radical mixing ratios observed could not be maintained without substantial production at night. No significant correlation is observed between measured [HO2 + RO2] and [NO3] under any conditions. Calculation of the reaction rates for ozone and NO3 with hydrocarbons (HCs) shows that the ozone-initiated oxidation routes of HCs outweighed those of NO3 in the NE, SE and NW wind sectors. In the SW sector, however, the two mechanisms operated at similar rates on average, and oxidation by NO3 was the dominant route in the westerly sector. The oxidation of alkenes at night by ozone was greater by a factor of 4 than that by NO3 over the whole data set. The HC degradation rates from the three "westerly" sectors, where tracer mixing ratios were relatively low, may be representative of the nighttime oxidative capacity of the marine boundary layer throughout the background Northern Hemisphere. Further calculations using literature values for OH yields and inferred RO2 yields from the ozone-alkene reactions show that peroxy radicals derived from the ozone reactions were likely to make up the major part of the peroxy-radical signal at night (mean value 66%). However, the NO3 source was of similar magnitude in the middle of the night, when [NO3] was generally at its maximum. The estimated total rates of formation of peroxy radicals are much higher under semipolluted conditions (mean 8.0×104 molecules cm−3 s−1 in the SE wind sector) than under cleaner conditions (mean 2.4×104 molecules cm−3 s−1 in the westerly wind sector). A model study using a campaign-tailored box model (CTBM) for semipolluted conditions shows that the major primary sources of OH, HO2, and CH3O2 (the most abundant organic peroxy radical) were the Criegee biradical intermediates formed in the reactions of ozone with alkenes.


ABSTRACT Support (one object preventing another from falling) is linguistically encoded by adults and children in a highly structured and differentiated way, with basic locative expressions or Light verbs (e.g., in English, the block is on/put on the box) encoding Support-from-Below, and lexical verbs (e.g., she stuck the block on the box) encoding Mechanical Support. We ask whether parents use such highly differentiated language when describing support configurations to their young children and whether the age of the child moderates this effect. We found that when parents of children 6-months to 3.5 years of age described events of Support-from-Below and Mechanical Support to their children, they did use distinct linguistic expressions, encoding Support-from-Below with Light verbs (e.g., put on) and Mechanical Support with other lexical verbs (e.g., stick on/to). This differentiation was especially prominent for parents of the oldest children, who used more lexical verbs (stick), and fewer Light verbs (put), to encode Mechanical Support. These findings are the first to demonstrate that parents' spatial language to their young children distinguishes between two distinct types of support and suggest that parent input may play an important role in helping children learn to linguistically carve up the semantic domain of support. This sets the stage for future research to test the causal connection between the two.


When performance measures are used for evaluation purposes, agents have some incentives to learn how their actions affect these measures. We show that the use of imperfect performance measures can cause an agent to devote too many resources (too much effort) to acquiring information. Doing so can be costly to the principal, because the agent can use information to game the performance measure to the detriment of the principal. We analyze the effect of endogenous information acquisition on the optimal incentive strength and the quality of the performance measure used.


The general perception of the Siege of Jerusalem is best summed up in Ralph Hanna's phrase that it is "the chocolate-covered tarantula of the alliterative movement". Only one critic has moved away from this consensus of opinion, Elisa Narin van Court, who argues "that in addition to the graphically violent anti-Judaism of the poem, there is a competing sympathetic narrative strand that complicates what has been considered a straightforward and brutal poetic." I follow Narin van Court in rejecting the standard opinion of the poem as a univocal narrative of unsavoury anti-Semitism and proceed to examine the poet's conception of his work, and how this poem differs from other accounts of the destruction of Jerusalem and the legend of Veronica. Pertinently, he uses different sources in an effort to bring out the contradictions latent in the story of the destruction of Jerusalem. He juxtaposes historical elements from the Polychronicon, such as the allusion to the tribute, with religious material in an attempt to query the necessity of war, even if the cause is ostensibly noble. Most notably, he raises the question of the motivation behind the campaign in Judaea. He avoids expressing value judgements, unlike texts such as the Vindicta Salvatoris and Titus and Vespasian which interpret the destruction of Jerusalem as the justifiable punishment of the Jews for the death of Christ. Not only is the poet's approach very different from that of literary and religious works, it also differs from that of historians. He is interested in people's motivation and how they react to the situations in which they find themselves. Hence he does not try to find overarching patterns in the siege of Jerusalem. The poem's literary context is of vital importance, for although the text bears certain similarities to works of crusading interest, such as the Charlemagne romances, it is nonetheless very different from them in terms of its attitude to non-Christians. The poet is anti-Judaic in that he believes that the Jewish religion is based on error and that the Jews were manifestly wrong in crucifying Christ, but he is still capable of making a distinction among them, seeing only their leaders as evil tyrants and expressing sympathy for the common citizens of Jerusalem. Thus he is not motivated by the anti-Semitism of the later Middle Ages, which led to accusations of host desecration, ritual murder and historiographic crucifixion being levelled against them. In this he differs from other redactions of the story of the destruction of Jerusalem, such as Titus and Vespasian and the accounts of medieval drama, which are virulently anti-Semitic as well as anti-Judaic in sentiment.

The intricacy of the narrative, which incorporates historical and religious elements raises a series of implications as to how we classify the poem. It has been variously designated as a romance, history, religious tale and a combination of two or all of these categories. It is my contention that the poet is stretching the limitations of genre, presenting religious and historical topics in the format of a romance, as it is his intention to explore the nature of Christian-Jewish relations, the personal experiences of the protagonists and the moral issues involved in warfare in his account of this traditional and popular story.


The semi-commune "Little Home" is a cultural enclave whose beliefs and idiosyncratic, seemingly chaotic interactions are based on gender relations translated into the terms of the purity and impurity of the female body. This framework is the scene of fictional and real kinship relations that play distinct roles within this mini-society and are dominated by symbolic types, which determine their social context. This article examines a ritual of purification performed by the Father/leader of the semi-commune. In this ritual, the Father enters into a symbolic type that is impure to restore male-perceived order and dominance. This is in response to the disordering capacity of a phenomenon I call a "wave," which is perceived as the potential of the female.


This book analyses the various ways counterinsurgency in Afghanistan is gendered.

The book examines the US led war in Afghanistan from 2001 onwards, including the invasion, the population-centric counterinsurgency operations and the efforts to train a new Afghan military charged with securing the country when the US and NATO withdrew their combat forces in 2014. Through an analysis of key counterinsurgency texts and military memoirs, the book explores how gender and counterinsurgency are co-constitutive in numerous ways. It discusses the multiple military masculinities that counterinsurgency relies on, the discourse of 'cultural sensitivity', and the deployment of Female Engagement Teams (FETs). Gendering Counterinsurgency demonstrates how population-centric counterinsurgency doctrine and practice can be captured within a gendered dynamic of 'killing and caring' – reliant on physical violence, albeit mediated through 'armed social work'. This simultaneously contradictory and complementary dynamic cannot be understood without recognising how the legitimation and the practice of this war relied on multiple gendered embodied performances of masculinities and femininities. Developing the concept of 'embodied performativity' this book shows how the clues to understanding counterinsurgency, as well as gendering war more broadly are found in war's everyday gendered manifestations.

This book will be of much interest to students of counterinsurgency warfare, gender politics, governmentality, biopolitics, critical war studies, and critical security studies in general.


ABSTRACT President Andrew Jackson's protracted conflict with Nicholas Biddle, known colloquially as the "Bank War," endures as a seminal chapter in the nation's political and economic history. This article analyzes Biddle's interactions with lawmakers, financiers, newspaper editors, and intellectuals during the Second Bank's campaign for recharter from early 1830 to mid-1832. It brings together research from numerous manuscript collections, bank balance sheets, newspapers, and legislative debates to show how Biddle orchestrated one of the earliest business lobbies and public relations campaigns conducted on a nationwide scale. Biddle developed a nationwide lobby primarily because of the Bank's branch structure and vast financial holdings, because he mobilized a large army of campaign surrogates, because he targeted voters with a standardized campaign message, and because recent advancements in transportation and communication enabled him to correspond with scores of subordinates separated by hundreds of miles of distance. Pursuing this analysis sheds light on one of the nation's most powerful businesses and contains valuable insights for scholars interested in the burgeoning history of capitalism.