We would like to thank Dr. Zelano for his accurate coverage of our recent study (1). Concerning the definition of what is considered an early seizure after intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH), we would like to point out that no recommendation or explicit consensus existed when we began collecting our data (2,3). At that time several different cut-off points for differentiating between early and late seizures were used in the field, the most frequent ones being at 7 and 14 days. We chose the 14-day time frame for early seizures partly to make our results more comparable with those released at the time, e.g., by Bladin et al . and Cervoni et al . (4,5). This heterogeneity in definitions has been a significant problem to date, and we recommend all future studies to follow the recently established guidelines to ameliorate comparability (6).


Languages that allows a vacuous past tense morpheme in complement clauses of attitude verbs are referred to as SOT (sequence-of-tense) languages, and languages that do not are referred to as non-SOT languages. This squib observes that quite generally, if in a given language the present tense morpheme obligatorily refers to the utterance time in present-under-past sentences, that language allows a vacuous past. The author shows that in order to account for this correlation, any theory of SOT has to be supplemented with a principle of Universal Grammar that requires every well-formed matrix sentence to be embeddable under a propositional attitude verb. He calls this principle the Embeddability Principle


Background Circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) is an approved noninvasive biomarker to test for the presence of EGFR mutations at diagnosis or recurrence of lung cancer. However, studies evaluating ctDNA as a noninvasive "real-time" biomarker to provide prognostic and predictive information in treatment monitoring have given inconsistent results, mainly due to methodological differences. We have recently validated a next-generation sequencing (NGS) approach to detect ctDNA. Using this new approach, we evaluated the clinical usefulness of ctDNA monitoring in a prospective observational series of patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Methods and Findings We recruited 124 patients with newly diagnosed advanced NSCLC for ctDNA monitoring. The primary objective was to analyze the prognostic value of baseline ctDNA on overall survival. ctDNA was assessed by ultra-deep targeted NGS using our dedicated variant caller algorithm. Common mutations were validated by digital PCR. Out of the 109 patients with at least one follow-up marker mutation, plasma samples were contributive at baseline (n = 105), at first evaluation (n = 85), and at tumor progression (n = 66). We found that the presence of ctDNA at baseline was an independent marker of poor prognosis, with a median overall survival of 13.6 versus 21.5 mo (adjusted hazard ratio [HR] 1.82, 95% CI 1.01–3.55, p = 0.045) and a median progression-free survival of 4.9 versus 10.4 mo (adjusted HR 2.14, 95% CI 1.30–3.67, p = 0.002). It was also related to the presence of bone and liver metastasis. At first evaluation (E1) after treatment initiation, residual ctDNA was an early predictor of treatment benefit as judged by best radiological response and progression-free survival. Finally, negative ctDNA at E1 was associated with overall survival independently of Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST) (HR 3.27, 95% CI 1.66–6.40, p < 0.001). Study population heterogeneity, over-representation of EGFR-mutated patients, and heterogeneous treatment types might limit the conclusions of this study, which require future validation in independent populations. Conclusions In this study of patients with newly diagnosed NSCLC, we found that ctDNA detection using targeted NGS was associated with poor prognosis. The heterogeneity of lung cancer molecular alterations, particularly at time of progression, impairs the ability of individual gene testing to accurately detect ctDNA in unselected patients. Further investigations are needed to evaluate the clinical impact of earlier evaluation times at 1 or 2 wk. Supporting clinical decisions, such as early treatment switching based on ctDNA positivity at first evaluation, will require dedicated interventional studies.


Praetorius' book advocates a healthy review and reform of the basic assumptions of much general theorising in psychology. Her central concern is to supply reasons of principle to demarcate the psychological and stave off reductionism. She seeks to derive these results from a handful of principles that she holds must be accepted since they form the very grounds for engaging in any inquiry at all. She employs these to good effect by showing that a number of prominent targets engaged in psychological theorising, including Gibson, Marr, Saussure, Stich and Fodor, are prey to deep-seated confusions about the general relation between language and the world. Similarly, she argues that social constructivists and relativists fall foul of the same oversight. I applaud her arguments against these


In "Beyond Nihilism, "Michael Polanyi argued that a merely "negative" liberty of doing as one pleases so long as one does not impinge upon the equal liberty of others--must and has led to destructive nihilism and a fierce reaction to collectivism. R.T. Allen takes up this argument in "Beyond Liberalism, "and shows how Polanyi's political philosophy evolved into a more "positive" and distinctly conservative concept of liberty, converging upon the archetypal conservatism of Edmund Burke. Allen examines Polanyi's and F.A. Hayek's thinking with respect to the nature, value, and foundations of liberty. Negative and positive liberties are two sides of one liberty, and Allen believes negative conceptions of liberty are as dangerous as positive ones. He distinguishes among general and abstract definitions of liberty and shows how all, including that of Hayek, ultimately dissolve. According to Allen, only tacit conceptions of liberty, such as those of Burke and Polanyi, prove viable. This is because they rest on concrete tradition. Allen examines how the skeptical, rationalist, and utilitarian philosophies of Ludwig von Mises and Sir Karl Popper fail to support the value of liberty and even proved to be destructive of it. Allen argues that society cannot rely upon the classically liberal notion of contract but rather upon prescriptive and inherited obligations. In turn, this means that citizens have positive, as well as negative, duties to each other and the body politic of which they are part and upon whose support liberty depends. A free society is held together by emotional bonds and the traditions and rituals that sustain them. A free society also presupposes that the individual has inherent value in and for himself. For R.T. Allen, only Christianity, and certainly no modern philosophy, has a conception of the unique individual and his irreplaceable value and of a political order that transcends itself into the moral order. Even Polanyi's liberty is ultimately insufficient, for it gives no inherent value to the person himself but instead to the ideals which he serves. "Beyond Liberalism "challenges deeply ingrained notions of liberty and its meaning in modern society. It is a call for traditions of self-restraint and justice for their own sakes. This noteworthy volume is an essential addition to the libraries of political scientists, philosophers, and theologians alike.


The spatial and temporal variation and uncertainty of precipitation and runoff in China were compared and evaluated between historical and future periods under different climate change scenarios. The precipitation pattern is derived from observed and future projected precipitation data for historical and future periods, respectively. The runoff is derived from simulation results in historical and future periods using a dynamic global vegetation model (DGVM) forced with historical observed and global climate models (GCMs) future projected climate data, respectively. One GCM (CGCM3.1) under two emission scenarios (SRES A2 and SRES B1) was used for the future period simulations. The results indicated high uncertainties and variations in climate change effects on hydrological processes in China: precipitation and runoff showed a significant increasing trend in the future period but a decreasing trend in the historical period at the national level; the temporal variation and uncertainty of projected precipitation and runoff in the future period were predicted to be higher than those in the historical period; the levels of precipitation and runoff in the future period were higher than those in the historical period. The change in trends of precipitation and runoff are highly affected by different climate change scenarios. GCM structure and emission scenarios should be the major sources of uncertainty.


Summary Introduction: The recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP), which is caused by the human papilomavirus type 6 and 11, is the most common benign neoplasm in the larynx among infants and the second more frequent cause of the hoarseness in childhood. Is a enigmatic disease that can be devastating for those whom are affected. Is way misunderstood, and the investigation is still on matter. Objective: This review had as objective provide a global vision and an update of what is recognized about the RRP and that is ahead of interns therapies. This surgical and adjuvant was performed through the research of database PubMed, MEDLINE, Cumulative index to nursing and health, Allied Literature and Cochrane. Eletronic library sought to use the headers of the subject "Recurrent Respiratory Papillomatosis", "Juvenile Laryngeal Papillomatosis", "Respiratory Papillomatosis", "Pediatric Laryngeal Obstruction" and "Airway Management". The obtained results were analyzed of relevance for the theme. Discussion: The human papillomavirus (HPV) is a little DNA virus that contain. The recurrent respiratory papillomatosis can affect people of any age, with the younger patient identified in a day of age and the oldest with 84 years. The most common presentation is the supporter of the RRP, it is the hoarseness. The therapy has been repetitive and debulking. The objective is to erradicate the disease, without damaging the normal structures. None modality has proven effective in the eradication of RRP. Conclusion: Recurrent Respiratory Papillomatosis is a frustrating disease, capricious with the potential of the morbid consequences by the cause of involvement of the airway and the risks of malignant degeneration.


Gindis, B. (2014). Psychological characteristics of internationally adopted post-institutionalized children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders. The International Journal Of Alcohol And Drug Research, 3(1 ), 35-42. doi:10.7895/ijadr.v3i1.133 Aims: Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder (FASD) is widely observed in internationally adopted (IA) post-institutionalized children. The specificity of FASD in IA children has significant practical implications and necessitates a modified methodology for identification and remediation. Design methods, and participants: Clinical case study with statistical analysis (simple frequency recorded in an Excel spreadsheet); quantitative and qualitative data was obtained through individual medical, neuropsychological, and educational assessments of 63 children, ages five to sixteen, adopted from Eastern Europe to the United States. Findings: FASD in international adoptees presents amplified characteristics typical for this condition, with the following specificities revealed in our research: rapid first-language loss and a particular pattern of English language learning; profound complex childhood trauma related to extreme deprivation and institutional upbringing; "mixed maturity" evident in impaired executive functions; low predictive accuracy during a pre-adoption screening for FASD conditions; general cognitive ability (IQ) being in the Low Average to Borderline range, with processing speed, attention, and working memory as the weakest cognitive skills; and academic achievements being higher than could be predicted based on cognitive abilities. Conclusions: FASD must be recognized as an educational handicap in our school system in order to change the outcomes for afflicted children. Educational remediation and cognitive-behavioral therapeutic intervention are the most effective remedial methods for IA children with FASD. Practical recommendations for adoptive parents include early identification and specialized remediation of "secondary" disabilities through concerted efforts of the school and family.


This geological study on the Vicentinian Alps is mainly an analysis of the tectonic and paleomagnetic data, collected by the author in the years 1959, 1960, and 1961. The stratigraphy is based for the greater part on data published in the first decenniums of this century. In the westtern part of the region the exposed basement consists of quartz -phyllites. The age of the strata overlying the basement ranges from Permian, to Miocene. During the Permian and the Mesozoic, sedimentation was mainly the result of a slow subsidence and a supply of clastic material from a land in the south (northern Adria and Po-block). Facieschanges are due to WNW-ESE trending uplifts, accompanied by magmatic (volcanic) activity (the Schio-Recoaro horst). In the late Cretaceous the southern land area subsided and the Alpine geanticline began to rise. The sedimentation in the Tertiary was mainly controlled by the presence of this source area in the north. In this period changes in facies took place also,which were mainly controlled by NNW-SSE trending uplifts (e. g. EuganeiBerici- Lessini horst). Volcanic activity is known to have taken place in the Vicentinian Alps in various periods. Next to basaltic dikes of either devonian or early permian age, two major volcanic periods can be distinguished; the Permo-Triassic and the Tertiary. During the Permo-Triassic mostly acid magmas intruded and effusive rocks were formed in either marine or terrestrial environment. During the Tertiary mostly basic magmas ascended, forming thick tuff- and lava deposits. It is noteworthy that the centres of maximal volcanic activity moved from southwest to northeast in the early Tertiary The tectonics are rather complex and may be ass igned to three tectogenetic periods. The first comprises the Hercynic orogenesis, in which two phases can be distinguished, one of subvertical movements (primary tectonics) and another of subhorizontal movements (secondary tectonics). During the first the region was elevated and heavily eroded; the second caused WNW-dipping overthrust and NNE-SSW striking folds (originally, Le. prior to the permotriassic rotation as determined by paleomagnetic data, the overthrust planes were dipping WSW and the fold axes were E-W. The second tectogenetic period is of permo-triassic age. At this time, a horst-like doming-up was caused in het Valli-Becoaro area by ascending basic magmas in an ENE-WSW striking zone of weakness. Originally, this zone had a WNW-ESE direction (see paleo-mag-. netism). Normal faults were formed,striking ENE-WSW (dipping north or south) and NNW-SSE (dipping east or west). The thi I'd tectogenetic period coincided with the alpine orogenesis. The Vicentinian region was located on the intersection of two hinge zones. One is ENEWSW and lies between the rising Alpine geanticline and the subsiding Adria mass; the other is NW-SE and forms the northern flank of the subsiding Po area. In both hinge belts the basement and the sedimentary cover reacted differently to differential vertical movements. In the basement, the older, permo - triassic zones of weakness were reactivated;ENEWSW striking step faults, dipping south, were formed as reaction to the subsidence of the Adria mass and NNW-SSE faults dipping east originated on the NE-side of the Po geosyncline. This second set of faults is closely related to the doming-up along the northeastern margin of the subsiding Po region, which can be interpreted as a correction of the isostatic equilibrium. The updoming was accompanied by volcank acti vity. The centra of volcanic acti viiy shifted northeastward (each time over about 30 km) between upper Cretaceous and Oligocene. The sedimentary cover slided off the south flank of the alpine geanticline to the south ("decollement "); this caused approximately E-W (Tauern-decollement) and NNE -SSW trending fold axes (Oetzdecollement). Only the former have been of importance in the Vicentinian Alps. These southward movements of the sedimentary cover were locally obstructed by the permo-triassic horst ("bufferzone"), causing the fold axes there to be striking NE-SW. In the younger Tertiary, NNE -SSW sinistral wrench faults caused anti -clockwise rotations of minor blocks. From paleomagnetic data of permotriassic and tertiary rocks may be concluded that NE-Italy has been subjected to majol' translations and rotations since the Permian. Three relatively fixed points are known. Firstly, the present position of the region (450 45' N. L., 110 30' E. L. ). Secondly, the position in the Eocene (NE-Italy must have been located on the +500 isocline of the Eocene, which runs across the present position of southern Italy). Thirdly, the position during the Permian (NE-Italy was probably on the intersection of the permian -300 isocline and the Tethys zone; this point is at the present location of the western Himalayas). Two major movements may be distinguished: awestdrift of the region during the Permian and Mesozoic (over maxima14800km) and a northdrift during the Tertiary (over 800 km). During the westdrift, the Vicentinian region rotated about 600 anti-clockwise in the late Triass ic. This rotation corresponds with right lateral shear movements along the north side of the Tethys zone. The northward movement of the region during the Tertiary may have been caused by a NW drift of Africa.


We propose novel controller synthesis techniques for probabilistic systems modelled using stochastic two-player games: one player acts as a controller, the second represents its environment, and probability is used to capture uncertainty arising due to, for example, unreliable sensors or faulty system components. Our aim is to generate robust controllers that are resilient to unexpected system changes at runtime, and flexible enough to be adapted if additional constraints need to be imposed. We develop a permissive controller synthesis framework, which generates multi-strategies for the controller, offering a choice of control actions to take at each time step. We formalise the notion of permissiveness using penalties, which are incurred each time a possible control action is blocked by a multi-strategy. Permissive controller synthesis aims to generate a multi-strategy that minimises these penalties, whilst guaranteeing the satisfaction of a specified system property. We establish several key results about the optimality of multi-strategies and the complexity of synthesising them. Then, we develop methods to perform permissive controller synthesis using mixed integer linear programming and illustrate their effectiveness on a selection of case studies.


Language acquisition is viewed as an example of a dynamic system. It consists of many components that interact with each other. The components show trajectories over time, the properties of which result from the dynamics of the interaction. A large variety of components can be taken as potential indicators of underlying mechanisms of change and acquisition. Examples of such indicators are the number of one-, two-, three- and more word sentences, the number of spatial prepositions, and many others. These and other observable aspects may be used as stochastic indicators of underlying processes such as transitions between qualitatively distinct generative mechanisms, discontinuities, and so forth. Insights into the dynamics of language acquisition may be obtained, first, by modeling the dynamic interactions between the components at issue and by comparing qualitative properties of data simulated by those models with properties of empirical data. A second approach to obtaining more insight into the dynamics of language acquisition is by applying flexible smoothing techniques to time-serial language data and to determine the eventual changes in the amount of fluctuation in the data. Both the smoothed curves and fluctuation data can provide indirect evidence of underlying processes, such as continuities or discontinuities and regressions. The modeling, smoothing, and fluctuation techniques are primarily quantitative and should be seen as an addition to qualitative analyses.


Introduction A new market trend offers long canes for individuals with visual impairments in a variety of colors; however, the impact of these colors is unknown to orientation and mobility (O&M) specialists and individuals who are blind or who have low vision. The authors examined the impact of cane color on drivers' yielding behaviors; also, cane display effectiveness was assessed. Methods At traffic signal–controlled intersections, drivers' yielding responses (yield–no yield and seconds to crosswalk) were recorded by two raters when a pedestrian presented one of two conditions (display and flagging) with four differently colored long canes (white, black, yellow, and green). Results In trials where the pedestrian used a flagging cane technique, the white cane achieved 290% more yielding than the green cane, 100% more yielding than the yellow cane, and 40% more yielding than the black. Statistical differences were found between the white-with-red cane and the yellow and green canes. The measure of drivers' latency for moving forward was not statistically different between trials in which a pedestrian displayed a white cane at the crosswalk and trials in which no pedestrians were present. Discussion Cane color appears to have a substantial effect on drivers' yielding responses. The results also indicate only a slight driver response to a highly visible cane display, confirming the results of previous studies that recommended more potent pedestrian movements to mitigate the threat from turning vehicles. Implications for practitioners O&M specialists and cane travelers need to consider the options for cane color when using a cane to cross streets. A white cane, flagged at the onset of the walk signal, can achieve more desirable responses from drivers than can the long canes of other colors. More effective cane behaviors exhibited by pedestrians who are visually impaired should always be considered by O&M instructors in order to influence drivers.


Abstract. Ten different approaches for applying lateral and top climatological boundary conditions for ozone have been evaluated using the off-line regional air-quality model AURAMS, driven with meteorology provided by the GEM weather-forecast model. All ten approaches employ the same climatological ozone profiles, but differ in the manner in which they are applied, via the inclusion or exclusion of (i) a dynamic adjustment of the climatological ozone profile in response to the model-predicted tropopause height, (ii) a sponge zone for ozone on the model top, (iii) upward extrapolation of the climatological ozone profile, and (iv) different mass consistency corrections. The model performance for each approach was evaluated against North American surface ozone and ozonesonde observations from the BAQS-Met field study period in the summer of 2007. The original daily one-hour maximum surface ozone biases of about +15 ppbv were greatly reduced (halved) in some simulations using alternative methodologies. However, comparisons to ozonesonde observations showed that the reduction in surface ozone bias sometimes came at the cost of significant positive biases in ozone concentrations in the free troposphere and upper troposphere. The best overall performance throughout the troposphere was achieved using a methodology that included dynamic tropopause height adjustment, no sponge zone at the model top, extrapolation of ozone when required above the limit of the climatology, and no mass consistency corrections (global mass conservation was still enforced). The simulation using this model version had a one-hour daily maximum surface ozone bias of +8.6 ppbv, with small reductions in model correlation, and the best comparison to ozonesonde profiles. This recommended and original methodologies were compared for two further case studies: a high-resolution simulation of the BAQS-Met measurement intensive, and a study of the downwind region of the Canadian Rockies. Significant improvements were noted for the high resolution simulations during the BAQS-Met measurement intensive period, both in formal statistical comparisons and time series comparisons of events at surface stations. The tests for the downwind-Rockies region showed that the coupling between vertical transport associated with troposphere/stratosphere exchange, and that associated with boundary layer turbulent mixing, may contribute to ozone positive biases. The results may be unique to the modelling setup employed, but the results also highlight the importance of evaluating boundary condition and mass consistency/correction algorithms against three-dimensional datasets.


This study presents the thin layer drying characteristic of Morinda Citrifolia Linn fruit
and drying effects on scopoletin content. The optimum mature stage of M.citrifolia fruit
was found to be four months after bud flowering with high scopoletin content of
1.65'gSC/g fresh weight.
Thin-layer drying characteristics of M. citrifolia fruit slices were investigated at 50, 60
and 70oC, and air velocity of 0.5, 1.5 and 2.5 m/s. Relative humidity range of 64-85 %
was observed. The drying time required to reduce the moisture content from initial
average value of 5.25g water/g dry solid (= 84%wet basis ) to a desired final moisture of less
than 0.053g water/g dry solid (=5%wet basis) was 6.0h, 3.0h and 1.5h for drying air
temperatures of 50oC, 60oC and 70oC respectively. An increase in drying temperatures shortened the drying time. The drying time needed to dry M. citrifolia fruit slices at
intermediate moisture content decreased when the air velocities was increased at constant
drying temperature. However, different air velocity had no significant difference in
overall drying time to achieve equilibrium moisture content at constant temperature.
Drying rates for M. citrifolia fruit as affected by drying air temperature and air velocity
were determined. The influence of temperature on the drying rate is more pronounced as
compared to the influence of the air velocity. From the drying rates it was observed that
drying of M. citrifolia fruit slices took place under the falling rate period.
The drying data were then fitted to different semi-theoretical models such as diffusion,
Lewis and Page models, based on the moisture ratio (MR). The results of analysis
showed that Page model gave better predictions than other models, and satisfactorily
described the thin-layer drying characteristics of sliced M. citrifolia fruit.
Freeze drying and hot air drying experiments were conducted on M.citrifolia fruit. The
effect of drying on scopoletin content of M.citrifolia was evaluated. Spectrofluorometer
was used for the determination of scopoletin in M.citrifolia fruit. An analysis of variance
(ANOVA) revealed that there is no significant difference in scopoletin content obtained
from freeze dried and hot air dried sample. This study shows that the remaining
scopoletin content after either drying technique is nearly 26% of the initial content


This dissertation investigates the intersection between music, gender, religion, and state agencies in the war against HIV /AIDS in Tanzania. The dissertation explores how music, gender and sexuality, religion, and state agencies impact one another in the creative process of musical and dramatic performances that address the education and prevention of HIV/AIDS. The ethnographic data, which focuses on musical and dramatic performance groups in Bukoba Urban and Rural Districts in Kagera Region, and Dar es Salaam Region, was collected from September 2008–May 2009. The dissertation views performance from multiple perspectives: as an avenue for the production of diverse types of knowledge such as musical, biomedical, religious, and localized or indigenous knowledge about healing in the context of HIV/AIDS; as a space in which gender and religious ideologies and identities are displayed and contested; and finally, as the space in which the manifestations of negotiations of power relations take place. The dissertation shows that health is at the center of music and dramatic performances as they are concerned with the maintenance of individual and community health. By doing so, performances serve as the hub of the social agency in preventing ill health and in restoring the well-being of the individual and communities at large. With regard to music, gender, and sexuality, the dissertation demonstrates that music performance is not only considered an avenue that provides one of the best contexts for observing and understanding the gender structure of any society. Performance is also a space for public discourse on sexuality in the context of HIV/AIDS. The state and religious ideology affect the creative process by either attempting to control meanings or by preventing certain performance. However, such attempts are not always successful. Finally, the dissertation demonstrates that performance is more than space for message-oriented or crowd-attracting activity but serves as a site upon which readings of the social transformation of gender roles through performance can take place.


The purpose of this study was to explore the importance of the integration of technology into educational classrooms and why teachers are reluctant to embrace this integration. Further, this study systemically evaluated the effects of professional development on teacher change in beliefs in and use of the given workshop focus (technology) and on learning outcomes in participant's classroom. The Stages of Concern Questionnaire (SOCQ) was administered to a treatment group of teachers who agreed to participate in a 40-hour workshop of intense technology training and to a control group of teachers who attended other technology workshops on a volunteer basis.
Data were analyzed with the statistical software SPSS for Windows version 11.0. Two one-way repeated measures of Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) at the simple effect level were performed to examine the mean differences between the treatment group and the control group. The analysis results indicated a significant increase for the treatment group mean scores on the personal subscale and no significant increase or decrease for the control group. No significant differences (p = .05) occurred between the control group and the treatment group indicating that 40-hours of intense technology training may not be the answer to technology training for teachers. The data indicated an increase in all of the subscales, from pre-test to post-test, for the treatment group. The intense technology training workshop helped improve the integration of technology in the classrooms of the teachers who attended the workshop, but not to the extent that this workshop is the best way to provide professional development.


We describe an instrument for simultaneous measurements of glyoxal (CHOCHO) and nitrogen dioxide (NO 2 ) using cavity enhanced absorption spectroscopy with a broadband light source. The output of a Xenon arc lamp is coupled into a 1 m optical cavity, and the spectrum of light exiting the cavity is recorded by a grating spectrometer with a charge-coupled device (CCD) array detector. The mirror reflectivity and effective path lengths are determined from the known Rayleigh scattering of He and dry zero air (N 2 +O 2 ). Least-squares fitting, using published reference spectra, allow the simultaneous retrieval of CHOCHO, NO 2 , O 4 , and H 2 O in the 441 to 469 nm spectral range. For a 1-min sampling time, the precision (±1σ) on signal for measurements of CHOCHO and NO 2 is 29 pptv and 20 pptv, respectively. We directly compare measurements made with the incoherent broadband cavity enhanced absorption spectrometer with those from cavity ringdown instruments detecting CHOCHO and NO 2 at 404 and 532 nm, respectively, and find linear agreement over a wide range of concentrations. The instrument has been tested in the laboratory with both synthetic and real air samples, and the demonstrated sensitivity and specificity suggest a strong potential for field measurements of both CHOCHO and NO 2 .


People could be influenced by other's recommendations when they are in making decision to buy something. This phenomenon was called as 'word of mouth effect' and proved to be very significant to change consumer's attitude. However, recently people consider others' experiences or feelings written online due to the development of internet. Those kinds of information were called as 'Online word of mouth'. Because of these phenomena, there are views about Brand communication. It is that Brand communication would be weakening due to less cost to search information. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine the function of online word of month and Brand. Particularly, the concept of Consumer brand relationship quality was adopted in this study. As a results, Online word of mouth have significantly effected on consumer's attitude even though those information are all texts and have been suspicious if it is true or not. Hence, consumer brand relationship quality has a influence on consumer's attitude as well. But the effect was different according to types of relationship quality. This study would give much implication for companies to build marketing strategies.


Since 2013, northern Australia has experienced a large downturn in its population growth rate, and negative growth in some areas. This followed the highs of the mining boom and was due to net losses of residents to southern regions. Under these circumstances, positive contributions of migrants to population, jobs, and communities have become increasingly important. Existing studies show that northern and remote regions of Australia fare poorly at attracting and retaining international migrants. However, an important consideration in evaluating the success of policies and initiatives for attracting and retaining migrants to these regions is how these are assessed and measured. For many communities across the north, permanent retention of a handful of skilled migrants and their families can significantly improve demographic and economic trajectories. Evaluations on the success of schemes at macro-region levels may miss nuanced and significant population impacts at the local level. This working paper presents three case examples from the Northern Territory demonstrating the potential for overseas migration to alter demographic, economic, and social pathways for northern and remote communities, and thus the broader region. W ORKING PAPER HEADING NORTH, STAYING NORTH? THE INCREASING IMPORTANCE OF INTERNATIONAL MIGRANTS TO NORTHERN AND REMOTE AUSTRALIA


In this paper, advanced MOSFET modeling for radiofrequency (RF) integrated-circuit (IC) design is discussed. An introduction of the basics of RF modeling of MOSFET is given first. A simple sub-circuit model is then presented with comparisons of the data for both y parameter and fT characteristics. The high frequency (HF) noise and distortion modeling issues are also discussed by showing the validation results against measured data. The developed RF MOSFET model can be the basis of a predictive and statistical modeling approach for RF applications.


Objective: We reviewed the occupational health and safety intervention literature to synthesize evidence on financial merits of such interventions. Methods: A literature search included journal databases, existing systematic reviews, and studies identified by content experts. Studies meeting inclusion criteria were assessed for quality. Evidence was synthesized within industry-intervention type clusters. Results: We found strong evidence that ergonomic and other musculoskeletal injury prevention interventions in manufacturing and warehousing are worth undertaking in terms of their financial merits. We also found strong evidence that multisector disability management interventions are worth undertaking. Conclusions: While the economic evaluation of interventions in this literature warrants further expansion, we found a sufficient number of studies to identify strong, moderate, and limited evidence in certain industry-intervention clusters. The review also provided insights into how the methodological quality of economic evaluations in this literature could be improved.


Recent human fMRI and monkey electrophysiology has shown that MT neurons are tuned to 3D direction. Furthermore, both psychophysics and single-unit recordings in MT have demonstrated that 3D motion signals arise from two distinct binocular cues: changing disparity (CD), and inter-ocular velocity differences (IOVD). We assessed how these two binocular cues for 3D motion interact in the visual hierarchy using an fMRI adaptation paradigm. We tested (1) whether CD- and IOVD-isolating stimuli could generate 3D direction-selective adaptation using cue-congruent test stimuli, and (2) whether cross-cue adaptation occurred. In a fully-crossed design, the adapter was either an IOVD or CD stimulus, and the test probe was either an IOVD or CD stimulus (or a "Full" cue stimulus containing both CD and IOVD). On a given scan, observers were adapted to either towards or away 3D motion of one adapting cue (e.g., IOVD towards) and tested with all possible combinations of test stimulus (CD, IOVD, and Full) and motion direction (towards/away). We found robust adaptation effects for cue-congruent conditions: after adaptation to IOVD and testing with IOVD, or after adaptation to CD and testing with CD, the fMRI response in MT+ was lower when the test direction was the same as the adapting direction compared to when the test direction was the opposite. However, we found no adaptation in MT+ in cross-cue conditions: IOVD adaptation did not affect CD test responses in a direction-selective manner, and vice versa. In V1 there was no adaptation effect across all conditions, consistent with previous findings suggesting that 3D motion signals are computed after V1. The lack of cross-cue interactions in MT+ suggests that, even though both CD and IOVD stimuli drive MT neurons, they represent distinct channels of 3D motion information. Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2015.


In the search for explanations for three of the most pressing crises of the early twenty-first century (the housing meltdown and financial crisis, the Gulf oil spill, and the nuclear disaster at Fukushima), commentators pointed to the structure of the regulatory agencies charged with overseeing the associated industries, noting that the need to balance competing regulatory and non-regulatory missions undermined each agency's ability to be an effective regulator. Christopher Carrigan challenges this critique by employing a diverse set of research methods, including a statistical analysis, an in-depth case study of US regulatory oversight of offshore oil and gas development leading up to the Gulf oil spill, and a formal theoretical discussion, to systematically evaluate the benefits and concerns associated with either combining or separating regulatory and non-regulatory missions. His analysis demonstrates for policymakers and scholars why assigning competing non-regulatory missions to regulatory agencies can still be better than separating them in some cases.


Two key issues for public insurance policy are the effect of insurance status on medical treatment, and the implications of insurance-induced treat- ment differentials for health outcomes. We address these issues in the context of the treatment of childbirth, using Vital Statistics data on every birth in the U.S. over the 1987-1992 period. The effects of insurance status on treat- ment and outcomes are identified using the tremendous variation in eligibility for public insurance coverage under the Medicaid program over this period. Among teen mothers and high school dropouts, who were largely uninsured before being made eligible for Medicaid, eligibility for this program was associated with significant increases in the use of a variety of obstetric procedures. On average, this more intensive treatment was associated with only marginal changes in the health of infants, as measured by neonatal mortality. But the effect of eligibility on neonatal mortality is sizeable among children born to mothers whose closest hospital had a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, suggest- ing that insurance-induced increases in use of `high tech' treatments can have real effects on outcomes. Among women with more education there is a counter- vailing effect on procedure use. Most of these women had private insurance before becoming Medicaid-eligible, and some may have been 'crowded out' onto the public program. These women moved from more generous to less generous insurance coverage of pregnancy and neonatal care. This movement was accompanied by reductions in procedure use without any discernable change in neonatal mortality.


This paper re-examines Benjamin's understanding of the technological mediation of reality, as presented in his Work of Art essay, in relation to the surgical mediation of the body and to conceptions of embodiment. Through a focus upon the history of surgery in Britain in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and its relationship to current (cyber)surgical practices, the paper demonstrates Benjamin's continuing relevancy in understanding the contemporary mediation of the body through the lens of surgical technologies. Firstly, it calls attention to the historical role of the surgeon in the formation of an anatomical conception of the body, mediated through imaging and surgical technologies. Secondly, it shows how this anatomically fragmented view of the body is articulated in current surgical practices, reliant upon the digitised image of the body for the practice of surgery. The effects of the digital penetration of the body are that in attempting to bring the body closer to the surgeon, the body becomes even more fragmented and disembodied; an image on a flat screen, rather than a whole, three- dimensional, material body


Earth-air systems are already commonly applied as a passive technique to reduce the overall energy use of buildings by reducing the required cooling or heating demand. However, they often require large surface area for their installation, and make use of large diameter tubes to reduce the pressure drop. As an alternative, waterearth systems are being considered. To explore these two options, one dimensional analytical models were derived. The impact of different design parameters, including tube length, tube diameter, fluid flow rate, etc., have been investigated. For the earth-air system, it is shown that for high Reynolds numbers, the soil resistance is in fact dominating, and as such this should be carefully considered in the design. For the water-earth systems, the addition of a compact heat exchanger to transfer the heat to the air, has a strong impact on the overall performance compared to an earth-air system. To allow for comparable performance, a compact heat exchanger with a high effectiveness is required (0.8 or higher). A strong interaction between the effectiveness of these two heat exchangers was found as the water flow rate varies. For the earth-water heat exchanger, the soil resistance is even more dominant than for the earth-air system.


n reviewing my daily in-box feeds I was surprised to learn that the SELECT Trial ("Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial") was updated at the 2014 ASCO meeting in Chicago. SELECT was a major NCI sponsored trial that studied the effect of vitamin E and selenium alone and in combination in the prevention of prostate cancer. I thought the trial had ended several years ago so I was curious about the new information presented. Clicking on the link I found myself learning that the SELECT trial in my e-mail referred to lenvatinib in a trial of advanced thyroid cancer ("Study of (E7080) LEnvatinib in differentiated Cancer of the Thyroid"). I discovered there was yet another SELECT trial, this one short for "Second-Line Effective Combination Therapy", an HIV study. Thinking about this further I recalled a confusing conversation about the PROCEDE trial with a colleague earlier this year. While I was referencing the PROCEDE genomic clinical registry being developed by Myriad ("PROlaris Clinical Evaluation DEcision"), he was referring to the Dendreon PROCEED study that stood for "Provenge Registry for Observation, Collection, and Evaluation of Experience Data". Not to be viewed as narrow minded on this topic of contemporary clinical trials I also should acknowledge a third PROCEED trial: "Study for Women With Platinum Resistant Ovarian Cancer Evaluating EC145 in Combination With Doxil". ASPIRE, ASSURE, ENABEL, OPTIMIZE…. the list of clever monikers for other clinical trials seems to go on and on. I am also having flashbacks to Mr. Riley, my high school sophomore English teacher. (He would ask questions such as "Mr. Gomella are these abbreviations, acronyms, or initialisms? Hurry we need the correct answer before midnight!"). Abbreviations do not seem to fit these clinical trials names cleanly. Could these be initialisms? Initialisms, another type of abbreviation, are made from the first letter or letters of a string of words, but they cannot be pronounced as words themselves. Examples include CBC or CPR. Acronym seems to fit some of these clinical trials as these are abbreviations that can be pronounced as words (think transurethral resection of the prostate or TURP). Acronyms can be made from the first letter or letters of a string of words but are pronounced as if they were words themselves. ClinicalTrials.gov is considered the most authoritative web based resource for clinical trials in the United States. In addition to the full title and the unique ClinicalTrials.gov numeric identifier, the trial acronyms are commonly used. The use of these acronyms for clinical trials has increased and can clearly increase visibility of a trial. In one study 33% of clinical trials were associated with an acronym. In a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine, Stanbrook and colleagues noted that "Enhanced attention to and recall of studies through the use of acronyms may facilitate the appropriate translation of research findings into clinical practice". 1 These clinical trial acronyms can be beneficial when compared to their formal trial designation number or their often cumbersome full title. However, repetitive use of the same or similar clinical trials acronym can lead to confusion particularly when they are in the same specialty such as the two PROCEED/PROCEDE studies that are urologically centric. Maybe keeping these trial acronyms separate when they are in different disease states is easy but when they are in overlapping areas such as urology or oncology it can be quite challenging. Perhaps the trial sponsors would consider working backwards to create titles based on previously unused acronyms. In the future I hope that clinical trial designations will be more diverse or else medicine will need to borrow a term from the world of computer science, "YABA", an acronym for "Yet another bloody acronym".


The importance of treating people with dignity and respect has been highlighted in a number of government documents (Department of Health, 2000; 2005), while The National Service Framework for Older People (DH, 2001) specified the need to ensure that older people were treated with dignity and respect and The Essence of Care (DH, 2003) identified benchmarks specifically for privacy and dignity. In November 2006 the Dignity in Care Campaign was launched by Ivan Lewis, minister for care services, to stimulate debate around the issue and 'The Dignity Challenge' was issued to health care workers (www.dh.gov.uk/dignityincare). Dignity and respect in healthcare is everybody's business and is an issue of concern to everyone working in the NHS.
In 2002, Southend University Hospital NHS Trust invited service users to an open forum to talk about their experiences of receiving healthcare from SouthendHospital. A video was made of the open-forum discussion showing both patients' positive and negative experiences. Staff present at the forum were particularly concerned about some of the comments made as they indicated that a minority of staff were not treating their patients with the dignity and respect expected as part of the hospital's customer care policy. The video was therefore shown to the trust managers and a planned response was agreed to address concerns raised by the patient experiences. As part of this response AngliaRuskinUniversity was invited to develop, in partnership with the trust, an accredited programme that focused on how dignity and respect can be fostered. A programme entitled 'Fostering dignity and respect in healthcare settings' was developed and validated in December 2003. The first cohort of students completed the programme in 2004 and the programme has been running regularly since then.


Korz is a new computational model that provides for context-oriented programming by combining implicit arguments and multiple dispatch in a slot-based model. This synthesis enables the writing of software that supports contextual variation along multiple dimensions, and graceful evolution of that software to support new, unexpected dimensions of variability, without the need for additional mechanism such as layers or aspects. With Korz, a system consists of a sea of method and data slots in a multidimensional space. There is no fixed organization of slots into objects - a slot pertains to a number of objects instead of being contained by a single object - and slots can come together according to the implicit context in any given situation, yielding subjective objects. There is no dominant decomposition, and no dimension holds sway over any other. IDE support is essential for managing complexity when working with the slot space and with subjectivity, allowing the task at hand to dictate what subspaces to isolate and what dominance of dimensions to use when presenting nested views to the user. We have implemented a prototype interpreter and IDE, and used it on several examples. This early experience has revealed much that needs to be done, but has also shown considerable promise. It seems that Korz's particular combination of concepts, each well-known from the past, is indeed more powerful than the sum of its parts.


Pollock and Maitland's classic The History of English Law before the time of Edward I is perhaps unique amongst late Victorian historical works in remaining the fundamental text on its subject a hundred years later. The current volume gathers leading legal historians to celebrate Maitland's achievement, to analyse his methods, to assess his legacy, and to suggest new directions for research into the history of English law before the reign of Edward I.


ABSTRACT Multi-scale statistics are used to analyse the flow structure of wake flow in the boundary layer of a wind turbine array. Experimentally, a wind turbine array is tested with X-type hot-wire anemometry, providing a velocity signal at discrete locations downstream of the array along the centreline of the centre turbine. Based on the Markov property, the turbulent cascade can be taken as a stochastic process in scale, for which an underlying Fokker-Planck equation and its Kramers-Moyal coefficients are assigned. The first two terms of the Kramers-Moyal expansion (drift and diffusion coefficients) are estimated directly from the measured data by an optimisation procedure, which includes reconstruction of the joint probability density functions via short-time propagator. To quantify the accuracy of estimated the Fokker-Planck equation for describing the turbulent cascade process, the validity of a fundamental law of nonequilibrium thermodynamics named integral fluctuation theorem is verified. The results highlight that multi-scale analysis separates the stochastic cascade into universal and non-universal portions with respect to physical location downstream of the rotor. In addition, the Kramer-Moyal coefficients reveal the impact of a specific generation mechanism of turbulence and its large and small scale motions. Velocity-intermittency quadrant method is used to characterise the flow structure of the wake flow. Multifractal framework presents the intermittency as a pointwise Hölder exponent. The relationship between large and small scales in wake flow is considered by quantifying the impact of the small scales on the large scales in terms of the pointwise Hölder condition. A negative correlation between the velocity and the intermittency is shown at the hub height and bottom tip, whereas the top tip regions show a positive correlation. The second and fourth quadrants are dominant downstream from the rotor. The pointwise results reflect large-scale organisation of the flow and velocity-intermittency events corresponding to a foreshortened recirculation region near the hub height and the bottom tip. A linear regression approach based on the Gram-Charlier series expansion of the joint probability density function is used to model the contribution of the second and fourth quadrants arriving at an excellent agreement between the model and the experiment. The model shows the best fit with the correlation of 0.9864.


The ever-increasing data sharing demands of modern technologies forces scientists to adopt new methods that can surpass the approaching limits of classical physics. Quantum optical communications and information, based on single-photon detectors offer the most promising possibility to reach new levels of data rate and communication security. Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) have already been used in the past to demonstrate new protocols of quantum key distribution and are currently the best single-photon detection technology to enable quantum optical communication. With the goal of creating a global quantum communication network, both optical fiber and free-space optical communication technologies have been explored. In addition, the scientific community started pursuing smaller and cheaper cryogenic solutions to enable the use of SNSPDs on a large scale. In this thesis, I describe the design and development of a cryogenic SNSPD receivers in free-space and optical-fiber configurations for 1550-nm-wavelength. The first configuration was created with the goal of enabling optical communication in the mid-IR. I present future steps to achieve this goal. The second configuration was designed to enable a compact and scalable integration of multiple SNSPD channels in the same system. Our approach has the potential of enabling SNSPD systems with more than 64 channels. Thesis Supervisor: Karl K. Berggren Title: Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science


Abstract Variations in the origination and extinction rates of species over geological time often are linked with a range of factors, including the evolution of key innovations, changes in ecosystem structure, and environmental factors such as shifts in climate and physical geography. Before hypothesizing causality of a single factor, it is critical to demonstrate that the observed variation in diversification is significantly greater than one would expect due to natural stochasticity in the evolutionary branching process. Here, we use a likelihood‐ratio test to compare taxonomic rate heterogeneity to a neutral birth‐death model, using data on well‐supported sister pairs of taxa and their species richness. We test the likelihood that the distribution of extant species among angiosperm genera and families could be the result of constant diversification rates. Results strongly support the conclusion that there is significantly more heterogeneity in diversity at the species level within angiosperms than would be expected due to stochastic processes. This result is consistent in datasets of genus pairs and family pairs and is not affected significantly by degrading pairs to simulate inaccuracy in the assumption of simultaneous origin of sister taxa. When we parse taxon pairs among higher groups of angiosperms, results indicate that a constant rates model is not rejected by rosid and basal eudicot pairs but is rejected by asterid and eumagnoliid pairs. These results provide strong support for the hypothesis that species‐level rates of origination and/or extinction have varied nonrandomly within angiosperms and that the magnitude of heterogeneity varies among major groups within angiosperms.


Background: Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a neurobehavioral disorder characterized by the inability to sustain attention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. Recent studies showed that it can persist in adulthood. The modification of the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders" in its fifth edition has a significant impact on detecting adult ADHD. To the best of our knowledge, there are no studies done on adult ADHD among medical students in the Gulf region. Methodology: A cross-sectional study was conducted on 487 medical students from all academic year from February 1, 2018, until March 31, 2018, in two governmental and one private medical school in Riyadh city. Self-reported English questionnaire paper used for the study was composed of two parts; socio-demographic and adult ADHD screening scale of DSM-5 version. Results: Fifty-three students (10.9%) reported symptoms of ADHD. Concerning the prevalence and percentage, there was no noticeable difference in gender (p value = 0.364), academic year (p value = 0.666), nationality (p value = 0.379), colleges (p value=0.836), and age (p value = 0.992). History of early life ADHD was significantly associated with adult ADHD (p value = 0.012), along with student's grade point average, mainly from a score of three and above out of five (p value = 0.024). Conclusion: Our study found a higher prevalence of ADHD among medical students compared with worldwide prevalence. This difference could be due to social and cultural factors. Those individuals may have difficulty in communication and learning which can disturb academic efficiency, lengthen their study, and even disturb


International cooperation and coordination among countries is a highly sought after goal for many. In that regard, in order to achieve international cooperation and coordination, this Article focuses on the concept of mutual recognition and the key areas of global financial regulatory reform to which the concept could be applied. The benefits of mutual recognition are increased market liberalization, facilitation of private cross-border movement, and increased regulatory standards. To discuss the concept of mutual recognition, this Article examines the European Union/European Economic Area approach provided by the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive ("MiFID"). This Article reviews the EU's idea of a single European Market based on fundamental freedoms. Further, it concludes that in order to establish a system of mutual recognition between two countries in a particular field of financial regulation, the countries must have some form of regulatory coordination or harmonization.


Does Norway belong to Western Europe? This provocative question, put to the head of the Norwegian delegation to the conference on the reconstruction of Europe after World War II, begins the history of Norwegian attitudes towards European integration. From 1905 to 1994, Norway opposed practically all types of European and international cooperation. Had Norway's views gained traction, Europe and the world would look very different today. Towards Europe demonstrates how little Norwegians knew before the 1994 referendum about the EU Single Market and the European Economic Area (EEA). The book takes the reader behind the scenes of secret negotiations between the EU and Norway, giving an unprecedented insight into how the EEA works in practice. It illustrates with concrete examples Norway's ability to articulate its views and to be heard in Brussels, from the perspective of both government and interest groups. It also looks at Norway's potential to tackle future EU challenges such as the Energy Union, migration policies, transatlantic trade and the Banking Union.

 Towards Europe will provide the reader with pertinent insights into whether the EEA is a suitable alternative for Britain's future relations with the EU.

 This edition includes an extra chapter on how to influence the EU from a non-member country.


Determining the place and use of capital punishment in the American legal system is a challenging affair and one that is closely associated with and determined by religion's role in American legal decision-making. Both capital punishment and religion are controversial issues, and tend to challenge legal scholars and practitioners about whether they should function together or alone as valid parts of the legal system in the United States. Professor Levine argues that religious arguments should be employed to interpret and explain American legal thought when the need or proper situation arises. He uses capital punishment as an example of how to properly reconcile a controversial legal issue with religious thought. Professor Levine suggests that religion acts as a comparative law model and provides another valid and instructive way of viewing capital punishment. Religious thought serves to provide explanation and insight into controversial American legal issues, and helps legal scholars and practitioners toward forming permanent solutions.


This work reports on a conference held by SUNCETT(University of Sunderland Centre for Excellence in Teacher Training) held in May 2009. The event, which involved keynotes from Professor Michael Fielding and Professor Frank Coffield, explored notions of collaborative practice between colleagues in the post compulsory sector. In drawing on the experiences of the many practitioners who attended the conference, the paper concludes that a more sustainable sector is possible where trust is nurtured; time, space, and designated places are provided for practitioners' development; where open and frequent dialogue between colleagues, and staff and learners is established; and where a greater sense of a combined vision and shared values is created.


Investigations of DNA damage response (DDR) mechanisms in normal tissues have implications for both cancer prevention and treatments. The accumulating knowledge about protein function and molecular markers makes it possible to directly trace and interpret cellular DDR in a tissue context. Using immunohistochemical techniques and digital image analysis, we have examined several principal DDR events in epidermis from patients undergoing fractionated radiotherapy. Acquiring biopsies from different regions of the skin provides the possibility to determine in vivo dose response at clinically relevant dose levels throughout the treatment. A crucial event in cellular DDR is the repair of DNA double strand breaks (DSBs). These serious lesions can be directly visualised in cells by detecting foci forming markers such as γH2AX and 53BP1. Our results reveal that DSB-signalling foci can be detected and quantified in paraffin-embedded tissues. More importantly, epidermal DSB foci dose response reveals hypersensitivity, detected as elevated foci levels per dose unit, for doses below ~0.3Gy. The low-dose hypersensitive dose response is observed throughout the treatment course and also in between fractions: at 30 minutes, 3 hours and 24 hours following delivered fractions. The dose response at 24 hours further reveals that foci levels do not return to background levels between fractions. Furthermore, a low-dose hypersensitive dose response is also observed for these persistent foci. Investigations of end points further downstream in the DDR pathways confirmed that the low-dose hypersensitivity was preserved for: the checkpoint regulating p21 kinase inhibitor; mitosis suppression; apoptosis induction and basal keratinocyte reduction. Our results reveal preserved low-dose hypersensitivity both early and late in the DDR pathways. A possible link between the dose-response relationships is therefore suggested. The preserved low-dose hypersensitivity is a cause for re-evaluation of the risks associated with low-dose exposure and has implications for cancer treatments, diagnostics and radiation protection.


This dissertation investigates the role of public higher education institutions in state-level arts policy in the state of Virginia. The strength of public support for the arts historically has been measured by per capita arts spending, as determined by appropriations to state arts agencies. However, this is a very thin measure that misses an increasingly important contributor to the arts policy landscape—higher education institutions. As direct sources of funding for the arts decline, universities increasingly are contributing to the state arts landscape with the construction and operation of performing arts centers. Framed by resource dependency theory and rational choice institutionalism, this research sheds light on the motivations of actors contributing to the arts policy field in a resource-scarce environment. Evidence suggests that public higher education institutions invest in the co-curricular arts to capitalize on and acquire resources, including image and prestige, and to fulfill their public service missions. Although higher education institution performing arts centers are contributing to the state's arts landscape, they are only informally participating in arts policy formulation and implementation. These findings have financial and decision-making implications for arts policymakers, university administrators, and arts agencies as the inclusion of public higher education institutions in the arts policy field affords new opportunities and challenges for the state encouragement of the arts.


The reactivation of discontinuities in response to stress field variations was a common feature in the structural evolution of the Adriatic Block in the central Mediterranean. This elongate crustal element of African origin, which is characterized by a thick Mesozoic carbonate section, constitutes the foreland to the orogenic belts of the Apennines as well as the Dinarides. Between the Southern Apennines and the Dinarides, its northwest-southeast trending longitudinal fault trends are dissected by oblique discontinuities corresponding to prominent wrench zones, such as the east-west trending Mattinata Fault System. Field data from the Gargano Promontory in southeastern Italy, integrated with subsurface data from the adjacent Bradanic Trough, have revealed that the Mattinata Fault System during the Cretaceous acted as a transfer zone linking synsedimentary normal fault trends. In consequence of the Late Miocene through Early Pliocene paroxysm of Apenninic tangential shortening, it was reactivated in a sinistral sense with local convergent and divergent shearing according to the orientation of fault segments. The stress regime from the Late Pliocene on, instead, favored dextral strike slip. Some fault segments were unaffected by this complete reversal of relative motion as pre-existing longitudinal discontinuities accommodated a diffuse northward slip transfer, thereby allowing the partial preservation of earlier features.


Conservation of biodiversity throughout the world is often characterized by the establishment
of protected areas. The implementation of this approach is extremely challenging particularly in
developing countries due to expanding human population and demand for resources. Yet,
information that is needed to guide managers and policy makers to develop effective
conservation strategies is scarce in most of these countries. This thesis aimed to explore the
impact of human activities on carnivore biodiversity inside and outside Tarangire National Park
in Tanzania using camera traps, and to assess attitudes of agropastoralists towards carnivores
using interviews. Results showed no significant difference in carnivore species richness
between the park and communal grazing areas outside the park, but was a significantly
different between the park and cultivated areas outside it. Non-carnivore species richness was
significantly higher outside the park in grazing areas than either within the park or in cultivated
areas. However, relative abundance of both carnivores and non-carnivores were both
significantly higher in the park than in either grazing areas or cultivated areas outside the park.
These variations in species richness and relative abundances are apparently due to differences
in the intensity and extent of human use between these areas. Estimation of species absolute
abundances targeted individually identifiable species in the park only. Results showed that
density of animals per 100 km2 was: leopard (7.9 ± 2.09), serval (10.9 ± 3.17), and aardwolf
(9.0 ± 2.54). No estimates were obtained for spotted hyaena and common genet due to a lack of
recaptures, while variation in trail density, prey availability, and camera spacing appear to
influence species capture. Attitudinal surveys revealed a low level of wildlife-related benefits
and reported levels of conflict were generally high despite low levels of livestock depredation,
suggesting other factors such as demand for land might be important in the reported conflict.


This chapter presents performance of a new technique for constructing Quasi-Cyclic Low-Density ParityCheck (QC-LDPC) encrypted codes based on a row division method. The new QC-LDPC encrypted codes are flexible in terms of large girth, multiple code rates, and large block lengths. In the proposed algorithm, the restructuring of the interconnections is developed by splitting the rows into subrows. This row division reduces the load on the processing node and ultimately reduces the hardware complexity. In this method of encrypted code construction, rows are used to form a distance graph. They are then transformed to a parity-check matrix in order to acquire the desired girth. In this work, matrices are divided into small sub-matrices, which result in improved decoding performance and reduce waiting time of the messages to be updated. Matrix sub-division increases the number of sub-matrices to be managed and memory requirement. Moreover, Prototype architecture of the LDPC codes has been implemented by writing Hardware Description Language (VHDL) code and targeted to a Xilinx Spartan-3E XC3S500E FPGA chip.


Postpartum haemorrhage remains a major problem in obstetrics, both nationally and internationally, since if bleeding is not controlled major organ failure may result, leading to maternal death or severe morbidity in the women who experience this traumatic event. Postpartum haemorrhage is defined as bleeding from, or into the genital tract after the birth of the baby up to the end of the puerperium, of 500 ml of blood or more, or any amount of blood loss that is deleterious to the health of the mother.
The incidence of postpartum haemorrhage varies from 6-20%, with rates varying between countries and between hospitals. The current incidence of postpartum haemorrhage in the collaborating unit is 14.2%, showing a gradual rise over the past 5 years. However, blood loss is notoriously underestimated, and it could be suggested that these figures are not fully representative of the incidence of postpartum haemorrhage.
The purpose of the study was to investigate primary postpartum haemorrhage in the absence of predisposing factors. There were two parts to the study. The first part of the study was exploratory in nature, and attempted to examine predisposing factors to postpartum haemorrhage in the collaborating unit, in the light of evidence from the literature. This part of the study involved 140 subjects who had a postpartum haemorrhage and 140 subjects who did not have a postpartum haemorrhage, who acted as a control group. There were two variables that appeared to be have some significance with regard to postpartum haemorrhage in this part of the study, namely, prolonged second stage of labour and birthweight of the baby >4000g. The study alsoappeared to accede to the findings of other authors, with regard to primigravidity, twin pregnancy and placental abruption, although no significance could be attached to these findings.
The second part of the study tested the hypothesis that it would be possible to predict atonic postpartum haemorrhage by the use of conventional uterine monitoring techniques. This part of the study involved 10 subjects who had a postpartum haemorrhage and 10 subjects who acted as controls. The methodology was by use of a retrospective case/control study, and involved examination of case notes and tocographic recordings taken in labour. Difficulties were encountered with regard to reliability of the research tool, and the accuracy of prediction of postpartum haemorrhage using this particular tool is therefore in doubt. In-depth examination of the case notes identified the numerous interventions that take place during labour, and led to the idea that in the absence of predisposing factors, primary postpartum haemorrhage may be associated with iatragenicity.
The findings from this study gave rise to the concept that in the absence of known predisposing factors, postpartum haemorrhage is due to a combination of factors, rather than one single factor.


To understand the population growth potential of different species of rotifers in nature, field collections through seasons are essential. We sampled zooplankton (and measured selected physicochemical variables) from the Madín reservoir, a high altitude eutrophic urban waterbody from Mexico, every month for a year. Qualitative analysis of zooplankton revealed 28 rotifer species and four cladoceran crustaceans plus one unidentified copepod. Cephalodella catellina (1400 ind L-1), Horaella thomassoni (550 ind L-1), Conochilus dossuarius (380 ind L-1) and Filinia longiseta (25 ind L-1) had higher peak density than other rotifers. Based on the concentrations of nitrates and phosphates, chlorophyll a levels or different diversity indices (e.g., Carlson, Shannon-Wiener, Pantle and Buck, Ejsmont-Karabin's TSIRot), the waterbody is eutrophic to hypertrophic, depending on the season. In this waterbody we observed high densities of Aphanothece sp. which is a toxic picocyanobacterium. During the blooms of Aphanothece, we also recorded higher densities of H. thomassoni and C. catellina. Based on the gut contents we found that both these rotifer species feed on Aphanothece in this waterbody. This study thus suggests the potential growth of Horaella, Cephalodella, Conochilus and Filinia in this eutrophic reservoir containing blooms of Aphanothece.


What is a good exploration strategy for an agent that interacts with an environment in the absence of external rewards? Ideally, we would like to get a policy driving towards a uniform state-action visitation (highly exploring) in a minimum number of steps (fast mixing), in order to ease efficient learning of any goal-conditioned policy later on. Unfortunately, it is remarkably arduous to directly learn an optimal policy of this nature. In this paper, we propose a novel surrogate objective for learning highly exploring and fast mixing policies, which focuses on maximizing a lower bound to the entropy of the steady-state distribution induced by the policy. In particular, we introduce three novel lower bounds, that lead to as many optimization problems, that tradeoff the theoretical guarantees with computational complexity. Then, we present a model-based reinforcement learning algorithm, IDE3AL, to learn an optimal policy according to the introduced objective. Finally, we provide an empirical evaluation of this algorithm on a set of hard-exploration tasks.


Abstract. This study focuses on the investigation and quantification of low-cost sensor performance in application fields such as the extension of traditional air quality monitoring networks or the replacement of diffusion tubes. For this, sensor units consisting of two boxes featuring NO2 and O3 low-cost sensors and wireless data transfer were engineered. The sensor units were initially operated at air quality monitoring sites for 3 months for performance analysis and initial calibration. Afterwards, they were relocated and operated within a sensor network consisting of six locations for more than 1 year. Our analyses show that the employed O3 and NO2 sensors can be accurate to 2–5 and 5–7 ppb, respectively, during the first 3 months of operation. This accuracy, however, could not be maintained during their operation within the sensor network related to changes in sensor behaviour. For most of the O3 sensors a decrease in sensitivity was encountered over time, clearly impacting the data quality. The NO2 low-cost sensors in our configuration exhibited better performance but did not reach the accuracy level of NO2 diffusion tubes (∼ 2 ppb for uncorrected 14-day average concentrations). Tests in the laboratory revealed that changes in relative humidity can impact the signal of the employed NO2 sensors similarly to changes in ambient NO2 concentration. All the employed low-cost sensors need to be individually calibrated. Best performance of NO2 sensors is achieved when the calibration models also include time-dependent parameters accounting for changes in sensor response over time. Accordingly, an effective procedure for continuous data control and correction is essential for obtaining meaningful data. It is demonstrated that linking the measurements from low-cost sensors to the high-quality measurements from routine air quality monitoring stations is an effective procedure for both tasks provided that time periods can be identified when pollutant concentrations can be accurately predicted at sensor locations.


This research is focused on the performance evaluation of micro Combined Heat and Power (mCHP) systems based on modern prime mover technologies using both theoretical and experimental analysis. Estimations of the environmental and economic impact associated with their deployment in residential conditions were also carried out.

Experimental work was performed on assessing the dynamic and steady-state performance of the 1 kWe Stirling based mCHP system (Whispergen), the 0.75 kWe Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC, PA Hilton Ltd) and the 5.5 kWe Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) based mCHP (Dachs). Results obtained from experiments (such as partial efficiencies, nominal capacities etc.) were fed directly in a theoretical model. Primary energy requirements corresponding to average UK domestic conditions were simulated based on real life technical data. All theoretical work was conducted using EnergyPlus building simulation tool in which the operation of several hydronic heating systems was modelled. Furthermore, attained experimental data and previously published research results were used to validate the theoretical modelling process.

Several operating strategies of the Stirling based mCHP unit were simulated in order to determine the regime which offers highest reduction in carbon emissions and household expenditures. In addition, variations in a number of parameters that significantly affect the performance of the system were investigated including energy consumption profiles, occupancy characteristics, dwelling thermal requirements, domestic hot water tank volume, etc). For the optimum performance strategy, several configurations of co-generation systems with nominal capacity in the range from 1 to 3 kWe were simulated. All simulated mCHP scenarios were compared against a conventional heating equipment. Finally, the advantages of a mass installation on a district level, consisting of 60, 120 and 240 dwellings and utilising a mixture of different mCHP units (ICE, Stirling, PEMFC), were estimated.


Psychological skills can help athletes maximize their physical skills (Smith, Schutz, Smoll, & Ptacek, 1995) and overcome sport-related adversity. These skills may be especially beneficial to athletes performing within natural and unstable risk sport environments. The current study assessed psychological skills among risk sport athletes (N 5 232) and the impact of experience on the use of such skills. Risk sport athletes of varying degrees of experience completed a modified version of the Athletic Coping Skills Inventory (ACSI; Smith et al., 1995). Risk sport athletes exceeded the midpoint on all of the ACSI subscales, indicating psychological skills usage. Experienced athletes scored significantly higher (p , .05) on three of the subscales and the total score, then leisure and novice athletes. These findings suggest the use of psychological skills within unpredictable and dynamic risk sport environments.


The European Union is currently engaged in formulating a new five-year strategy for the development of the next phase of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ), to replace The Hague Programme of 2004, which expires at the end of this year. In June 2009, the European Commission published its views on the new so-called 'Stockholm Programme', which will be adopted under the Swedish Presidency in December, in its Communication "An area of Freedom, Security and Justice serving the citizen: Wider freedom in a safer environment". In this Policy Brief, JHA specialists Elspeth Guild and Sergio Carrera take a closer look at the Commission's Communication and highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the approaches adopted for each of the different policy domains falling under the AFSJ rubric. Their commentary on the three areas also provides answers to some of the thorny questions raised in the priorities for the Stockholm Programme, which are spelt out in the conclusions and policy recommendations.


Abstract Italy is the most hydrocarbon endowed country of southern Europe, with total discovered reserves (produced+remaining) of 1840 million barrels of oil and 30 trillion ft 3 of gas. The production of oil amounts to 43.2 million barrels per year, about 75% of which comes from the Val d9Agri Field in the southern Apennines. The production of gas is 340 billion ft 3 per year, most of it coming from the northern Adriatic Sea. Hydrocarbon occurrences derive from a variety of petroleum systems which are the result of a complex geological history. At least five important source rocks have been recognized which are distributed in age from Mesozoic through Pleistocene. Three of them were deposited during Mesozoic crustal extension and are mainly oil-prone. Hydrocarbon occurrences associated with these sources are usually found in complex carbonate structures along the Apennines thrust-and-fold belt and in the foreland. Villafortuna–Trecate (Po Plain), Val d9Agri/Tempa Rossa (southern Apennines) and Gela (Sicily) fields represent the largest oil accumulations pertaining to these systems. Two other important sources rocks were deposited in the foredeep terrigenous units of the foreland basins which formed during the Cenozoic orogenesis. The older source is thermogenic gas-prone and is found in the highly tectonized Oligo-Miocene foredeep wedges: gas occurrences associated with this source are mainly concentrated along the northern Apennines margin (e.g. Cortemaggiore Field), in Calabria (e.g. Luna Field) and Sicily (e.g. Gagliano Field). The younger source is biogenic gas-prone and is situated in the outer Plio-Pleistocene foredeeps. The most important gas fields of Italy, located in the eastern Po Plain and northern Adriatic sea (Barbara and other gas fields), have originated from this source. Hydrocarbon exploration in Italy is overall mature, especially for gas, whose residual potential is estimated to be 6.0 trillion ft 3 of reserves. The remaining potential of oil is estimated to be 800 million barrels.


We introduce the concept of this special focus issue on solitons in nonintegrable systems. A brief overview of some recent developments is provided, and the various contributions are described. The topics covered in this focus issue are the modulation of solitons, bores, and shocks, the dynamical evolution of solitary waves, and existence and stability of solitary waves and embedded solitons.


This paper presents the first complete data of global downwelling irradiance (Ed) and the diffuse attenuation coefficient (K,,) for solar ultraviolet-B (UVB; 280 to 320 nm) in tropical waters. The penetration of solar UVB into shallow (0 to 5 m) seawater a t 3 sites in the central Indian Ocean and Andaman Sea, adjacent to areas of coral reefs. 1 t . d ~ studied using a semi-submersible scanning spectroradiometer. Downwelling global spectral irradiance (E,) w ~ i s measured at 2 nm intervals over the wavebands 280-320 nm (UVB), 320-400 nm (U\-:\) and 400-700 n m (PAR) above the sea surface (O* m) and at each of 5 depths (1, 2, 3. 4, and 5 m). The 3 sltes consisted of an ocean atoll in the Maldives (central Indian Ocean), a small (8 km') high island 11 km off the continental coastline at Phuket, Thailand (Andaman Sea), and an inshore reef at Phuket. E, at each of the depths was integrated over the wavebands as a percentage of the above-watcr irradiance. E,(UVB) at 5 m depth was found to decrease to 12"& of incident ~rradiancye at the mid-occan atoll, to 2 % for the high island site, and to 0.4 %) in the turbid waters of the inshore reef. A 1 'X , Ed(UVB) depth was computed for each site and found to be 11, 6, and 3 m respectively. The diffuse attenuation for downwelling irradiance (Kd) for the depth range 0m (just below the surface) to 5 m showed a very rapid attenuation with decreasing ~vavelength in the UVB at all sites. Biological damage potential, as weighted by the DNA-damage action spectrum, showed a more rapid attenuation with depth than Ed(UVB), w ~ t h a 1 % EDN, depth of 9 m for the ocean atoll, 4.7 m for the coastal island, and 2.6 m for the inshore reef.


We show that subglacial freshwater discharge is the principal process driving high rates of submarine melting at tidewater glaciers. This buoyant discharge draws in warm seawater, entraining it in a turbulent upwelling flow along the submarine face that melts glacier ice. To capture the effects of subglacial discharge on submarine melting, we conducted 4 days of hydrographic transects during late summer 2012 at LeConte Glacier, Alaska. A major rainstorm allowed us to document the influence of large changes in subglacial discharge. We found strong submarine melt fluxes that increased from 9.1 ± 1.0 to 16.8 ± 1.3 m d−1 (ice face equivalent frontal ablation) as a result of the rainstorm. With projected continued global warming and increased glacial runoff, our results highlight the direct impact that increases in subglacial discharge will have on tidewater outlet systems. These effects must be considered when modeling glacier response to future warming and increased runoff.


The investigation and development of new methods from diverse perspectives to shed light on portfolio choice problems has never stagnated in financial research. Recently, multi-armed bandits have drawn intensive attention in various machine learning applications in online settings. The tradeoff between exploration and exploitation to maximize rewards in bandit algorithms naturally establishes a connection to portfolio choice problems. In this paper, we present a bandit algorithm for conducting online portfolio choices by effectually exploiting correlations among multiple arms. Through constructing orthogonal portfolios from multiple assets and integrating with the upper confidence bound bandit framework, we derive the optimal portfolio strategy that represents the combination of passive and active investments according to a risk-adjusted reward function. Compared with oft-quoted trading strategies in finance and machine learning fields across representative real-world market datasets, the proposed algorithm demonstrates superiority in both risk-adjusted return and cumulative wealth.


The actual impact of Open Access (OA) self-archiving on research, researchers, their institutions, their funders, and the tax-paying public (which has all already been shown to be highly positive) must be clearly separated from any hypothetical impact it might have on publishers (whether commercial or scholarly-society publishers). Researchers do not conduct research -- nor does the tax-paying public fund research -- for the benefit of publishers. The sole point at issue concerning the FRPAA is whether or not self-archiving should be mandated. The two concrete questions that researchers, their institutions and funders need to put to themselves regarding any "special relationship" with scholarly society publishers are therefore: (a) Would (or should) researchers, their institutions and their funders knowingly choose to subsidise their scholarly societies with their own actual lost research impact in order to immunise those scholarly societies from any hypothetical risk of lost subscription revenue? (b) If, contrary to all evidence to date, self-archiving were indeed destined one day to cause publisher revenue losses -- or even to force a shift to the open-access publishing cost-recovery model (with author-institutions paying the publication costs for their own institution's research output out of their own windfall savings from the cancellation of their former costs as user-institutions, buying in the published output of other institutions) -- is the prevention of that hypothetical outcome something that researchers, their institutions and their funders would (or should) knowingly choose to subsidise with their own actual lost research impact? A dissenting minority of 10 US provosts opposes the FRPAA Self-Archiving Mandate (vs. 125 in favor) on the grounds of risk to scholarly society subscription revenue. There is obviously a biomedical publisher lobby behind some or all of the 10 dissenting voices; the arguments are old ones, already rebutted many times: (1) The hypothesis that mandated self-archiving will force a shift to the OA publishing cost-recovery model is pure speculation at this time, with no evidence in its support, and evidence from both the American Physical Society and IOPP contradicting it. (2) But even if the hypothesis were ever to come to pass, it would not mean "diminishing funds available for research to benefit the public good". (3) To force a shift to the OA publishing cost-recovery model, there would first have to be substantial revenue losses for publishers, from institutional subscription cancellations. (4) But for every penny of revenue lost by publishers in the form of institutional subscription cancellations, there has to be a penny saved by institutions, in the form of windfall savings. (5) Hence if publisher revenue losses were ever to force a shift to the OA cost-recovery model, the institutions would have a large annual pot of windfall savings on which to draw to pay for their own outgoing publication costs. (6) Hence there would be nothing at all "requiring authors to pay for their publications through their Federal grants, diminishing funds available for research to benefit the public good." (7) It is only now -- when there are neither any institutional subscription cancellation pressures, nor any institutional subscription windfall savings -- that it looks as if paying OA publishing costs would require diverting money from research. (8) Hence it is both self-serving and self-contradictory to invoke both the "damage" hypothesis and the "research fund diversion" hypothesis against the FRPAA in the same breath: If the hypothetical "damage" is the hypothetical subscription revenue loss, then that is also the diversion: no need to poach hypothetical research funds. (9) The rationale for the FRPAA self-archiving mandate, however, has nothing to do with speculative hypothesizing about journal economics but with demonstrable facts about maximizing research usage and impact.


The report synthesizes and summarizes current Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) sponsored bridge research and related technical reports ion the seismic design of large pile groups and caissons into one design-oriented guideline report on seismic design, suitable for applications to the retrofit of existing long span bridges, or a new design. The characterization of ground motions for seismic soil-foundation-structure interaction analyses is an important component of the foundation modeling process and is discussed in detail. Discussion includes methods for generating spectrum compatible time histories, spatial variations of ground motion and effects of local soil conditions on site response. Modeling approaches for large pile groups focus on the use of substructuring approach, the use of p-y curves and associated pile group effects to develop linearized Winkler springs and the assembly of pile group stiffness matrices. The analysis approach is illustrated with several case history examples, including the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge East Span project. The complexity of kinematic soil-pile interaction as related to modification of input ground motions is also described. Modeling approaches for large caisson foundations often employed as piers for large over-water bridges are discussed in detail, with an emphasis on the use of linear stiffness matrices, and nonlinear lumped spring and nonlinear distributed spring approaches. The influence of kinematic interaction on input ground motions is also described. Two case history examples are used to illustrate the modeling approaches, including one used for the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge.


Abstract The effect of temperature changes and in particular those that are accompanied by strong gradients was extensively investigated for fast reactors. Subcritical systems designed for their transmutation ability are to some extent similar to critical power reactors in their subassembly structure. However, they differ in two main aspects. First, the coolant in a subcritical system is lead or lead-bismuth eutectic (LBE) and not sodium, and second, the main cause for steep temperature gradients in a fast power reactor is sudden control rod insertion, or scram, whereas in subcritical systems shutdown of the accelerator and its proton beam is the main cause for temperature gradients. Furthermore, the increased probability of operational interruptions in an accelerator-driven system is largely due to the instability of the accelerator generating the proton beam. This study uses the knowledge gained from fast reactors as a preliminary reference and concentrates further on the unique features of the proposed subcritical systems. In particular, the effect of beam trips on the fuel pin integrity is evaluated as a function of the temperature gradients and the duration of the beam trips. It seems, however, that the largest hazard to the fuel pin integrity is due to the lead (or LBE) coolant. In particular, the stability of the protective oxide layer built on the clad surface with the lead coolant appears quite sensitive to sudden temperature changes. In the second part of this study, several available experimental results show that even very moderate temperature changes are sufficient to cause crack formation in the oxide layer thereby exposing the clad surface to enhanced LBE corrosion. In the worst case, complete exfoliation of the magnetite outer layer is observed. As a consequence, clad failure probability due to corrosion is considerably increased.