Propagation of a lava flow is governed by slope topography, magma rheology, heat exchange with the atmosphere and the underlying terrain, and the rate of the eruption. Highly viscous crust is formed due to cooling and solidification of the uppermost layer of the flow. We consider here two numerical model problems for lava flows, both based on the fundamental physics of a hot fluid flow: a model problem, where thermal conditions (e.g. temperature and heat flow) at the lava surface are unknown a priori (a direct model problem), and a model problem, where the lava surface conditions are known and determined from observations(an inverse model problem). In both models, the lava viscosity depends on temperature and the volume fraction of crystals. By way of solving the direct model problem, we perform a parametric study of steady state lava flows to investigate the influence of the heat flux, viscosity, and effusion rate on the lava crust development. Numerical experiments show that a lava crust becomes thicker in the case of the nonlinear heat transfer compared to the case of a linear heat flow at the interface of lava with the atmosphere. Also, the crust thickens at lower lava effusion rates, while higher rates result in a rapid lava advection, slower cooling, and development of a thinner crust. Moreover, a lava crust becomes thicker with a higher coefficient of conductive heat transfer, or a higher lava viscosity, or the growth of effective emissivity of the lava surface. By way of solving the inverse model problem, we use an assimilation technique (that is, a method for an optimal combination of a numerical model of lava flows with observations) to propagate the temperature and heat flow, inferred from measurements at the interface between lava and the atmosphere, into the lava flow interior and to analyse the evolving lava crust. Results of thermal data assimilation illustrate that the physical parameters of lava flows, including the thickness of it crust, can be recovered from measured surface thermal data well enough at least for slow effusion rates.


What macroeconomic requirements must Turkey meet in its quest to accede to the European Union? This book, with its distinguished contributors – well-known economists and policymakers – examines and analyses these macroeconomic challenges confronting Turkey. Although the focus is on the specific situation of Turkey, the lessons are informative for other candidate countries and the findings directly relevant to the process of European integration.


Due to a flexible and cross-cutting approach, the urban project is emblematic of contemporary urbanistic concepts. Can this approach reconnect cities, ports and waterways? On the contrary, can it reinforce the disconnection under way, in a context in which the rationale of the market is more favourable to the sphere of residential economy than to the sphere of productive economy? This question is raised especially with respect to the canal area of Brussels, where major challenges intersect: urban densification in a context of demographic growth, the transferring of river freight as a sustainable alternative to the road network, and the improvement of water management. The aim of this article is to understand the evolution of the relationship between city and port via the interactions of the projects of the different stakeholders concerned. By means of a spatial and temporal approach, the results show that through their materialisation, the projects contribute to reproducing the functional divisions of the industrial era, caused by their economic environment. However, through their processes, new frameworks for a dialogue between city and port emerge. These observations provide some ideas for a reconnection between the city and its port.


We study the relationship between the Lyapunov exponents of the geodesic flow of a closed negatively curved manifold and the geometry of the manifold. We show that if each periodic orbit of the geodesic flow has exactly one Lyapunov exponent on the unstable bundle then the manifold has constant negative curvature. We also show under a curvature pinching condition that equality of all Lyapunov exponents with respect to volume on the unstable bundle also implies that the manifold has constant negative curvature. We then study the degree to which one can emulate these rigidity theorems for the hyperbolic spaces of nonconstant negative curvature when the Lyapunov exponents with respect to volume match those of the appropriate symmetric space and obtain rigidity results under additional technical assumptions. The proofs use new results from hyperbolic dynamics including the nonlinear invariance principle of Avila and Viana and the approximation of Lyapunov exponents of invariant measures by Lyapunov exponents associated to periodic orbits which was developed by Kalinin in his proof of the Livsic theorem for matrix cocycles. We also employ rigidity results of Capogna and Pansu on quasiconformal mappings of certain nilpotent Lie groups.


On August 30, 2017 the US Food and Drug Administration approved tisagenlecleucel (Kymriah; Novartis, Basel, Switzerland), a synthetic bioimmune product of anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR-T), for the treatment of children and young adults with relapsed/refractory B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL). With this new era of personalized cancer immunotherapy, multiple challenges are present, ranging from implementation of a CAR-T program to safe delivery of the drug, long-term toxicity monitoring, and disease assessments. To address these issues experts representing the American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplant, the European Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation, the International Society of Cell and Gene Therapy, and the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy formed a global CAR-T task force to identify and address key questions pertinent for hematologists and transplant physicians regarding the clinical use of anti CD19 CAR-T therapy in patients with B-ALL. This article presents an initial roadmap for navigating common clinical practice scenarios that will become more prevalent now that the first commercially available CAR-T product for B-ALL has been approved.


After successive global environmental conferences in which national governments pledged to reduce carbon emissions, there is ever-increasing scrutiny on the construction industry. This is because the energy used in the production of building materials and subsequently required to power a completed building form a substantial part of the overall carbon emissions generated by society. The response from both public and private sector interests around the world has been to enhance the importance of environmental assessments – both of building methods and the finished product – almost in inverse proportion to the tolerance for energy waste. The standards required by individual states vary considerably: part of this is down to local climate and geographical considerations, but a major consideration is the incentives offered for meeting a given standard. These consist primarily of tax credits and quality certificates, and the right to promote a building as "green", thus improving the reputation of its designers and sales potential for buyers. Some of the various Assessment organisations around the world have already franchised their standards to other countries (both government-sponsored and private enterprises) and continue to form partnerships with each other, usually in the same continent or hemisphere. The principal aim appears to be expanding the influence of that particular environmental standard. There is the real possibility of environmental assessment methods in certain countries becoming counter-productive: in the rush to standardize, actual improvements made possible by new technologies are rendered useless by political manoeuvring to make a particular standard "the one" to use.


CONTEXT: There is an increasing concern about chronic low-level pesticide exposure during childhood and its influence on childhood cancers. OBJECTIVE: In this meta-analysis, we aimed to examine associations between residential childhood pesticide exposures and childhood cancers. DATA SOURCES: We searched all observational studies published in PubMed before February 2014 and reviewed reference sections of articles derived from searches. STUDY SELECTION: The literature search yielded 277 studies that met inclusion criteria. DATA EXTRACTION: Sixteen studies were included in the meta-analysis. We calculated effect sizes and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) by using a random effect model with inverse variance weights. RESULTS: We found that childhood exposure to indoor but not outdoor residential insecticides was associated with a significant increase in risk of childhood leukemia (odds ratio [OR] = 1.47; 95% CI, 1.26–1.72; I2 = 30%) and childhood lymphomas (OR = 1.43; 95% CI, 1.15–1.78; I2 = 0%). A significant increase in risk of leukemia was also associated with herbicide exposure (OR = 1.26; 95% CI, 1.10–1.44; I2 = 0%). Also observed was a positive but not statistically significant association between childhood home pesticide or herbicide exposure and childhood brain tumors. LIMITATIONS: The small number of studies included in the analysis represents a major limitation of the current analysis. CONCLUSIONS: Results from this meta-analysis indicated that children exposed to indoor insecticides would have a higher risk of childhood hematopoietic cancers. Additional research is needed to confirm the association between residential indoor pesticide exposures and childhood cancers. Meanwhile, preventive measures should be considered to reduce children's exposure to pesticides at home.


An effective immune response to the ubiquitous fungus Aspergillus fumigatus is dependent upon production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) by the NADPH oxidase. This is evidenced by the acute sensitivity of oxidase-deficient humans and mice to invasive aspergillosis. Neutrophils are recruited to the lungs shortly postinfection and respond by phagocytosing conidia and mediating extracellular killing of germinated hyphae in a ROS-dependent manner. However, the signaling mechanisms regulating the generation of ROS in response to hyphae are poorly understood. PI3Ks are important regulators of numerous cellular processes, with much recent work describing unique roles for the different class I PI3K isoforms. We showed by live-cell imaging that the lipid products of class I PI3Ks accumulated at the hyphal-bound neutrophil plasma membrane. Further, we used pharmacological and genetic approaches to demonstrate essential, but overlapping, roles for PI3Kβ and PI3Kδ in the ROS and spreading responses of murine neutrophils to Aspergillus hyphae. Hyphal-induced ROS responses were substantially inhibited by deletion of the common β2-integrin subunit CD18, with only a minor, redundant role for Dectin-1. However, addition of soluble algal glucans plus the genetic deletion of CD18 were required to significantly inhibit activation of the PI3K-effector protein kinase B. Hyphal ROS responses were also totally dependent on the presence of Syk, but not its ITAM-containing adaptor proteins FcRγ or DAP12, and the Vav family of Rac-guanine nucleotide exchange factors. These results start to define the signaling network controlling neutrophil ROS responses to A. fumigatus hyphae.


Using biotechnology, we can change agricultural wastes into high‐quality organic fertilizers, which leads us in the direction of the development in modern agriculture and act as substitute to the chemical fertilizers. In this chapter, five types of technologies of organic amendment are elaborated. Each method can be selected based on the specific circumstance. The effects of the technology in the production are introduced and the principles of the technologies are explained in a simple manner.


This study investigates how drying affects the quality of bamboo kraft pulps. Two bamboo pulps, cooked to different kappa numbers (i.e. 10 and 26) and D(EOP)D bleached to approximately the same brightness, were used to examine the relationship between cooking, drying, refining, and pulp/fiber properties. Drying of the two pulps caused, as expected, a loss in tensile and burst strength while the tear index was improved. The bleached high kappa pulp required less energy to reach a certain Schopper Riegler value and exhibited greater strength properties than the low kappa number pulp. These differences were also maintained after drying. Results showed that the properties of the pulp before drying determined the final strength potential of the pulp after drying. Thus, kraft cooking of bamboo to high kappa number prior to bleaching gave pulps with improved response to refining and pulp strength properties, which in turn influenced the properties of the dried pulps.


Buddhist meditation practices have become a topic of widespread interest in both science and medicine. Traditional Buddhist formulations describe meditation as a state of relaxed alertness that must guard against both excessive hyperarousal (restlessness) and excessive hypoarousal (drowsiness, sleep). Modern applications of meditation have emphasized the hypoarousing and relaxing effects without as much emphasis on the arousing or alertness‐promoting effects. In an attempt to counterbalance the plethora of data demonstrating the relaxing and hypoarousing effects of Buddhist meditation, this interdisciplinary review aims to provide evidence of meditation's arousing or wake‐promoting effects by drawing both from Buddhist textual sources and from scientific studies, including subjective, behavioral, and neuroimaging studies during wakefulness, meditation, and sleep. Factors that may influence whether meditation increases or decreases arousal are discussed, with particular emphasis on dose, expertise, and contemplative trajectory. The course of meditative progress suggests a nonlinear multiphasic trajectory, such that early phases that are more effortful may produce more fatigue and sleep propensity, while later stages produce greater wakefulness as a result of neuroplastic changes and more efficient processing.


We investigate Morningstar's new qualitative, forward-looking analyst ratings, which reflect independent analysts' expectations of a fund's future performance. We find relatively higher flows to funds receiving higher ratings, suggesting that the average investor values the analyst's subjective views when allocating their wealth. Performance tests show that investors would have earned significantly higher returns over our sample period by investing in funds with the highest analyst conviction. These results suggest that independent research that expands the information set to include qualitative elements may help investors make better investment allocation decisions.


This dissertation covers the issues related to credit risk that stem from the recent financial crisis and that are concerned by investors, financial intermediaries, and governments. The results of the research have important implications for asset managers, such as using the information from the credit risk market to rebalance stock portfolios, and for policy makers in regulating or bailing out banks. The first paper, Hidden in the factors? The effect of credit risk on the cross-section of equity returns, disentangles the "distress puzzle" or the opposite, i.e. the existence of a positive cross-sectional relationship between credit risk and stock returns, as well as investigates whether market β, size, value, and momentum effects are attributed to a positive credit risk effect. The second paper, Banks' credit portfolio choice and risk-based capital regulation, studies banks' risk taking in relation to credit risk. I regard a bank as its assets' manager, develop a model of portfolio allocation among assets with different levels of credit risk, and examine the impact of risk-based capital regulation on banks' asset risk. The third paper, TARP and market discipline: Evidence on the moral hazard effects of bank recapitalizations (with Jens Forssbaeck), examines the moral hazard effect of government bailout. Specifically, we examine the possible moral hazard effect of the U.S. Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) by assessing its impact on the extent of market discipline exerted by uninsured debt-holders on participating and non-participating bank holding companies, and the impact of crisis on the market discipline. (Less)


American Manufacturers Mutual Insurance Company v. Sullivan, __ U.S. __, __ S.Ct. __, L.Ed.2d __, 1999 U.S. LEXIS 1711 (March 3, 1999) Pennsylvania has a typical workers' compensation system in which employers are held liable without fault for work-related injury to employees (subject to certain exceptions such as employee misconduct or fraud in the claim). In return, the employee's rights of compensation against the employer for such injuries are determined "exclusively" by the remedies of the workers' compensation statute. The employee may not sue the employer for additional damages beyond those set forth in the prevailing schedule of benefits under the prevailing workers' compensation statute. To ensure that workers' compensation claims are paid, Pennsylvania requires that the employer obtain private insurance, obtain insurance from the State Workers' Insurance Fund, or obtain state permission to self-insure. If liability for a work-related injury is not at issue, the statute requires that employers or insurers pay the "reasonable" and "necessary" medical expenses of the employee within 30 days after receiving the bill. Once the insurer has paid the medical provider, the matter is final. The insurer may not seek reimbursement even if it comes to find that the charges were unnecessary or excessive. However, the reasonableness or necessity of a medical bill may be challenged under a system of "utilization review" in which the insurer (or self-insuring employer) files a notice with the Workers' Compensation Bureau of the Department of Labor and Industry. The Bureau then notifies the parties of the requested review, which is conducted by a private "utilization review organization," which is comprised of licensed health care providers for the type of treatment at issue. The URO then determines "whether the treatment under review is reasonable or necessary for the medical condition of the employee" according to "generally accepted treatment protocols," with any doubts to be resolved in favor of the employee. See 7 Pa. Stat. Ann. [Sections] 127.470(a); 127.467, 127.471(b). The statute also requires that the review be completed within 30 days. If the insurer prevails, the employee may seek to have the decision overturned by a workers' compensation judge or further judicial review by the general jurisdiction courts of the state. If the employee prevails, the insurer must pay immediately with 10 percent interest on the money and must also pay the costs of the review itself. A class of employees subjected to utilization review challenged the statute as an unconstitutional deprivation without adequate due process of law of their property right to receive prompt payment of medical benefits. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit agreed and specifically found that the utilization review procedure was faulty in that it did not notify the employees themselves of the insurer or employer's challenged and did not give the employees a right to participate in the procedure and defend the reasonableness and necessity of their medical bills. See 139 F.3d 158 (3d Cir. 1998). As a result, Pennsylvania changed its review procedures. Insurers did not challenge the "new, improved" procedures designed to give injured employees notice and opportunity to be heard. However, workers' compensation insurers did successfully petition for Supreme Court review of the constitutional premises underlying the employees' victory. Specifically, insurers and employers argued that the review procedure was not "state action," that is, conduct by the state government or its agents that subjects the state to scrutiny and regulation under the Due Process Clause of the United States Constitution. Due process requirements, when applicable, require that a person not be deprived of a property interest without notice and opportunity to be heard in a timely manner and reasonable fashion before a sufficiently neutral and qualified factfinder. …


This report is the product of the first year of study of the Statewide Systemic Initiatives (SSI) Study on exploring data and methods to assess and understand the performance of states participating in the SSI. The report describes three sets of studies. The first studied valid and reliable measures of student achievement, and how to combine multiple measures of achievement, as well as how results of certification based on a single-measure compare with those based on a multimeasure analysis. The study addressed these questions through analyses of state and local data from two sites in Maine. The second study focused on valid and reliable ways to estimate school performance and identify value-added school effects on student achievement, as well as how the results of school evaluation based on a unilevel analysis compare with those based on a multilevel analysis. The study addressed these questions through multilevel analyses of National Assessment of Educational Progress assessment data in Maine and Kentucky. Results suggest that schoollevel compositional effects and student-level background characteristics need to be taken into account for fair evaluation of school performance. The third study explored ways to estimate academic progress and how to identify true achievement gains without statistical artifacts. These questions were addressed through the analysis of Maine Educational Assessment and Kentucky Instructional Results Information System assessment data. Results show that to set realistic expectations about schools' academic progress, past trends need to be taken into account, and that combining multiple years of data improves the reliability of school performance measures. (Contains 24 tables and 28 references.) (SLD) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document.


In order to provide customized personal learning environment (PLE) implementations for real-world test-beds, this deliverable aims at elaborating a methodology to validate educational settings according to the ROLE vision. Basically, the overall approach consists of two parts. In the first part the most relevant results from the first 18 months of the ROLE project are summarised in order to outline the key concepts and to formulate questions for analysing and improving real-world scenarios with respect to ROLE vision. Thereby, project outcomes are presented along four dimensions related to PLEs, namely the psycho-pedagogical, the community, the technical, and the development perspective. In the second part of the deliverable, the ROLE test-beds and their results from former project milestones are analysed through this PLE scenario validation method. The study gives an overview of starting points, ROLE-related improvements and future plans for each test-bed. Additionally, experiences and limitations of realising the ROLE vision in the test-beds are manifested.

Overall, the findings of the test-bed validation study can be summarised as follows:

• In university settings, like OU, SJTU and RWTH, learning is driven by the organisation, primarily through the efforts of teaching staff and by applying LMS technology. Yet, higher and further education settings are open to new pedagogical, community-oriented, or technical concepts. At the university test-beds, various ROLE ideas have been realised before or within the project.

• Corporate settings, like FESTO and BILD, are highly focussing on competences related to their businesses, thus being praxis-oriented but also very instutionalised. However, it requires more efforts to open up or personalise learning environments. Various aspects of the ROLE vision are restricted by organisational policies or boundaries. On the other side, these test-beds also offer great opportunities for exploiting ROLE concepts commercially.

With respect to work package 4 ('ROLE services'), this document proposes a methodology to validate real-world learning scenarios under consideration of psycho-pedagogical and community issues and according to the technical infrastructure, the personal learning services, and novel software development methods. Additionally, it is shown how this validation can be conducted in praxis and with the aim to analyse and improve real-world test-beds.

This deliverable relates to the five ROLE objectives (cf. ROLE-DoW, p.6), as it summarises technical approaches (RO1: support of individual assembly of learning environments), psycho-pedagogical aspects (RO2: psycho-pedagogically sound framework), community-oriented PLE development (RO3: new engineering methods considering the different stakeholder communities), and evaluation methodologies (RO4: evaluation of the effectiveness of PLEs in the test-beds) within the ROLE project. Moreover, this document indicates possible exploitation strategies (RO5), e.g. within the BILD test-bed. The deliverable is related to task 4.4 ('Test-bed Technical Platforms') and a joint outcome of the work packages 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 9. It also includes contributions of an external partner (Etestme).


This paper describes the application of cluster analysis to X-ray powder diffraction patterns (XRPD) to define homogeneous groups of mortar-based materials according to their mineralogical composition. For this purpose, the diffraction patterns of 110 samples of mortars from the Temple of Venus (Pompeii, southern Italy) were used to test the method. Rietveld refinement, for quantitative mineralogical phase analysis, was performed on the most representative sample of each cluster. The mineralogical grouping yielded by cluster analysis of XRPD data turned out to be consistent with the petrographic groups.


This is the fourth book master discographer Ruppli has contributed to Greenwood's outstanding series, and it is as well organized and authoritative as its predecessors. After Atlantic, Chess was the most important black-oriented, independent American label...Session musicians, recording dates, and label numbers are given when available, and can be cross-referenced. Invaluable for researchers. Library Journal


In this paper, firstly we utilize the elastic model, which provides the simplest representation of material behavior in civil engineering. This model is valid for homogeneous, isotropic, continuous materials that exhibit linear stress-strain behavior with no hysteresis on unloading. The elastic models include both isotropic and anisotropic elastic models. Then the Mohr-Coulomb model is used which can represent shear failure in soils and rocks in civil engineering and geotechnical engineering. After that, the strain- softening model is founded, which allows representation of nonlinear material softening and hardening behavior based on prescribed variations of the Mohr-Coulomb model properties (cohesion, friction, dilation, tensile strength) as functions of the deviatoric plastic strain. Finally, a case study is done for the stratified rock mass, the elastic modulus of the rock sample for different surrounding compressive are obtained, to exhibit the anisotropy characteristic of this type of rock material


Abstract Obesity is a complex health and social issue globally. The 2013 restructuring of Public Health in England resulted in a move from within the National Health Service to local government. The aim of this research was to understand the views of individuals working in public health and those working in spatial planning within local government on their respective responsibilities for addressing obesity through spatial planning. Spatial planning measures include planning policy, development control and built environment design at different scales. Findings identified a range of barriers for planners to be engaging with outcomes that can help reduce obesity. These include having an insufficient understanding of the causes of obesity and the importance of addressing obesity through multiagency approaches. They also include what was seen as a fragmentation in the health system and conflicting priorities. Our findings indicate that planners could be better engaged in the obesity agenda through formal incentives and also soft approaches. Formal approaches include written responsibilities within planners' job descriptions or regulations. Soft approaches include and aligning spatial and health priorities and providing planners with public health leadership roles.


Background: This pilot trial investigated whether a 3-week self-help model for stress reduction using the Trauma Tapping Technique (TTT) would impact traumatized youth in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on post-traumatic stress symptoms and general happiness. It also focussed on the acceptability of the program to recipients and implementation in a community with complex trauma and conflict. Methods: The study involved 77 youth who received a TTT 3-week model of intervention (self-applied). Post traumatic stress symptoms and general happiness were assessed pre and post the intervention and at 6-month follow-up. Results: TTT was associated with a significantly greater improvement in happiness (12.12% increase, p<0.05) and a significant reduction in trauma symptomology from preto immediately post-test (6% decrease, p<0.05). The 6-month results were nonsignificant (p=0.056) however from pre to follow-up, participants indicated an 11.4% reduction in their trauma symptoms. The qualitative investigation of staff and participants revealed the intervention had a positive effect on trauma stress symptoms and happiness outcomes findings. OBM Integrative and Complementary Medicine Medicine 2018; 3(4), doi:10.21926/obm.icm.1804036 Page 2/15 Conclusions: The proposal that a 3-week model of teaching emotional literacy via a self help technique such as TTT is a potential solution for complex communities is discussed, and suggestions for future large scale trials are offered.


Arıkan's `polar coding' is a technique to achieve the symmetric capacity of binary input memoryless channels. In this talk I will attempt to describe this technique, and briefly discuss its extensions to q-ary input channels, multiple access channels and rate-distortion coding. The underlying principle of polar coding allows one to view randomness from a different vantage. I will try to illustrate this with a recent result of Şaşoğlu: when a binary ergodic process is transformed by Arıkan's `polar transform' the resulting process, in the limit, consists only of fair coin flips or constants.


OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to investigate the differential effects of breastfeeding practice and having an intention to breastfeed (during pregnancy) on a mother's maternal responsiveness to her infant after birth. METHODS Using longitudinal data from a subsample of 962 mother-infant dyads from a UK cohort study (Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children), we investigated the influence of intention to breastfeed at 3 months pregnancy and breastfeeding practice and on mother-infant interactions at 12 months after birth. Breastfeeding intent and practice were assessed by questionnaires administered to the mothers. Intention to breastfeed in the first 3 months postpartum was measured at 32 weeks into the pregnancy, while breastfeeding practice (over first 12 months postpartum) was measured retrospectively at 15 months post partum. RESULTS Using logistic regression analyses, we found that intending to breastfeed at 32 weeks gestation significantly predicted maternal responsiveness, namely that an intention to breastfeed increased the odds of positive maternal responsiveness, independently of breastfeeding practice. However, we found the practice of breastfeeding was not an independent predictor of positive maternal responsiveness once intention to breastfeed was accounted for. Using a life course epidemiology approach we further demonstrated that maternal responsiveness is most positive when both the intention to breastfeed and breastfeeding practice are present. CONCLUSIONS To our knowledge this is the first study to report that having the intention to breastfeed an infant is more strongly associated with positive maternal responsiveness than the act of breastfeeding itself. This may suggest that more responsive mothers choose to Breastfeeding intentions, practices and maternal responsiveness 3 breastfeed rather than breastfeeding practice directly causing enhanced responsiveness. Further research will be needed to understand the nature of this intention and its relationships with maternal responsiveness. However, the results may also highlight the potential importance of parenting intentions/ preparations during pregnancy for a mothers developing abilities to be responsive to her infant after birth. Breastfeeding intentions, practices and maternal responsiveness 4


This paper proposes a new lightweight deterministic authenticated encryption (DAE) scheme providing 128-bit security. Lightweight DAE schemes are practically important because resource-restricted devices sometimes cannot afford to manage a nonce properly. For this purpose, we first design a new mode LM-DAE that has a minimal state size and uses a tweakable block cipher (TBC). The design can be implemented with low memory and is advantageous in threshold implementations (TI) as a side-channel attack countermeasure. LM-DAE further reduces the implementation cost by eliminating the inverse tweak schedule needed in the previous TBC-based DAE modes. LM-DAE is proven to be indistinguishable from an ideal DAE up to the O(2n) query complexity for the block size n. To achieve 128-bit security, an underlying TBC must handle a 128-bit block, 128-bit key, and 128+4-bit tweak, where the 4-bit tweak comes from the domain separation. To satisfy this requirement, we extend SKINNY-128-256 with an additional 4-bit tweak, by applying the elastic-tweak proposed by Chakraborti et al. We evaluate the hardware performances of the proposed scheme with and without TI. Our LM-DAE implementation achieves 3,717 gates, roughly 15% fewer than state-of-the-art nonce-based schemes, thanks to removing the inverse tweak schedule.


Quantifying the factors that predict parasite outbreak and persistence is a major challenge for both applied and fundamental biology. Key to understanding parasite prevalence and disease outbreaks is determining at what age individuals show signs of infection, and whether or not they recover. Age-dependent patterns of the infection of a host population by parasites can indicate among-individual heterogeneities in their susceptibility to, or rate of recovery from, parasite infections. Here, we present a cross-sectional study of avian malaria in a long-lived bird species, the mute swan Cygnus olor, examining age-related patterns of parasite prevalence and modelling patterns of infection and recovery. One-hundred and fifteen swans, ranging from one to nineteen years old, were screened for infection with Plasmodium, Haemoproteus and Leucocytozoon parasites. Infections with three cytochrome-b lineages of Haemoproteus were found (pooled prevalence 67%), namely WW1 (26%), which is common in passerine birds, and two new lineages closely related to WW1: MUTSW1 (25%) and MUTSW2 (16%). We found evidence for age-related infection in one lineage, MUTSW1. Catalytic models examining patterns of infection and recovery in the population suggested that infections in this population were not life-long – recovery of individuals was included in the best fitting models. These findings support the results of recent studies that suggest hosts can clear infections, although patterns of infection-related mortality in older birds remain to be studied in more detail.


Heart rate turbulence (HRT) is a recently coined phrase that describes the short term fluctuation in sinus cycle length that follows a ventricular premature complex (VPC). Its proven clinical significance lies in its ability to predict mortality and sudden cardiac death following myocardial infarction, although small studies suggest that it is also applicable to many other cardiac diseases. This review will attempt to summarize the literature to date, and to speculate on possible mechanisms. Because HRT is a new field, there are only a handful of full length papers on it. In order to present the full breadth of the research being carried out, the information provided here is based on conference abstracts as well as peer reviewed articles, and readers should keep this in mind. Most of the literature cited here, and downloadable HRT calculation programs (in C++) are available on the website www.h-r-t.org.


Dietary supplements have been manufactured and supplied to the market with the objective of enhancing the overall health of the general population and optimising the performance of athletes. The perceived intention of dietary supplementation is to increase the nutritional content of a normal diet, and to fill a dietary need and/or presumed deficiency. The usage and popularity of dietary supplements, however, raises concerns from a health benefit and risk perspective. Moreover, safety and efficacy of these supplements have generally not been established by the Medicines Regulatory Authorities, both nationally and internationally. The exponential increase in supplement sales can, however, be attributed to aggressive marketing by manufacturers, rather than the development of more effective nutritional supplements. These supplements may contain adulterated substances that may potentially have harmful short- and long-term health consequences for the patient. In addition, a large spectrum of drug interactions may render the use of such supplements risky, without proper medical and scientific assessment.


The requirements in credibility, availability and legitimacy of board members have increased substantially since 2000. In that context, directors' compensation and its impact on their conduct and decisions become salient issues. Yet, directors' compensation remains a little examined topic of governance. This is why the Institute for Governance (IGOPP) has produced a report prepared by Dr. Michel Magnan, Professor and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Chair in Corporate Governance from John Molson School of Business at Concordia University, to provide a general survey of the issue and propose some recommendations.This IGOPP report highlights some important findings:_Over the 10 year period from 2001 to 2010, the average annual fees received by directors of Canadian public corporations have increased of 465%. However, this significant increase is not uniform among all corporations since the most substantial raises have occurred in the large financial institutions and in corporations in the oil and mining industries._The level of compensation paid to directors of Canadian corporations remains below that of comparable corporations in the United States._Directors' compensation has not attained levels that can be considered excessive after taking into account the growth in institutional and regulatory requirements during the same period._The debate over directors' compensation and independence should be seen as an issue of board composition and functioning. If cases arise in which directors' compensation is considered excessive, it only reflects more serious underlying governance problems that undermine the legitimacy, and possibly the credibility, of the board._We are in a context of fiduciary governance. The directors will therefore concern themselves with legislative and regulatory compliance and with the implementation and monitoring of the mechanisms and systems governing the controls, incentives and accountability. Their remuneration is thus a function of this role.The analysis shows that directors' compensation is only one facet of the board of directors' governance and is not necessarily the most strategic since it only adds little to the processes for the appointment and assessment of directors, which are already rigorous. The directors' compensation should reflect the fact that their responsibility is joint, continuous and focused on the long-term oversight of the corporation's interests as a whole, and not just the short-term interests of some shareholders. Consequently, this report propounds several recommendations, among which the following stand out:_The board's priority in governance matters is to maintain and increase its legitimacy and credibility through rigorous practices and processes._Directors' compensation should not be based on the achievement of short-term objectives or goals._Directors' compensation must be sufficiently high to attract credible candidates that have integrity and specific skills corresponding to the corporation's objectives._The directors should hold a significant long-term investment in the corporation's shares._The directors' compensation should be uniform across individuals with similar tasks._Directors' compensation must rationally reflect the specific risks they face.Investors are not hesitating to challenge the skills of directors and their decisions. In this context, their compensation could become a major governance issue. Hence, this IGOPP report frames the debate with an analysis of the potential determining factors of directors' compensation and suggests principles and recommendations which will serve as guides for the boards' working on this issue.


With the explosive growth of online images and the popularity of search engines, a great demand has arisen for small and medium-sized enterprises to build and outsource large-scale image retrieval systems to cloud platforms. While reducing storage and retrieval burdens, enterprises are at risk of facing untrusted cloud service providers. In this paper, we take the first step in studying the problem of query authentication for large-scale image retrieval. Due to the large size of image files, the main challenges are to (i) design efficient authenticated data structures (ADSs) and (ii) balance search, communication, and verification complexities. To address these challenges, we propose two novel ADSs, the Merkle randomized k-d tree and the Merkle inverted index with cuckoo filters, to ensure the integrity of query results in each step of image retrieval. For each ADS, we develop corresponding search and verification algorithms on the basis of a series of systemic design strategies. Furthermore, we put together the ADSs and algorithms to design the final authentication scheme for image retrieval, which we name ImageProof. We also propose several optimization techniques to improve the performance of the proposed ImageProof scheme. Security analysis and extensive experiments are performed to show the robustness and efficiency of ImageProof.


The rapid increase in number of devices in Internet-of-Things generates astronomic amounts of data. Dealing with noisy and low quality data uses more effort than the data analysis itself. Dealing with noisy data at the source would significantly reduce the effort of pre-processing during analysis, as well as the storage and bandwidth overhead. In this paper we introduce an Adaptive Signal Processing Platform (ASPF) for CPS/IoT Ecosystems. It provides ability to dynamically detect noise variation in a signal and successfully filter these components out of the signal leaving only clean and useful data. The paper shows two approaches with different requirements on effort and scalability.


This Applied Optics feature issue on Topics in Biomedical Optics highlights papers presented at the 2006 Biomedical Optics Topical Meeting sponsored by the Optical Society of America. The feature includes 40 papers that represent a cross section of topics that were covered at the meeting.


Much has been written on the theory of discontinuous groups and automorphic functions since 1880, when the subject received its first formulation. The purpose of this book is to bring together in one place both the classical and modern aspects of the theory, and to present them clearly and in a modern language and notation. The emphasis in this book is on the fundamental parts of the subject. The book is directed to three classes of readers: graduate students approaching the subject for the first time, mature mathematicians who wish to gain some knowledge and understanding of automorphic function theory, and experts.


The ominous vision of elephants and dragons in the title of this article represents the perplexing equation of progress and backlash that characterises work on gender equality and women's rights. This article advocates a move away from the ongoing debates about gender mainstreaming, towards re-framing strategies for ending gender discrimination. Synthesising the analysis and priorities for action shared by 40 gender and development activists and practitioners participating in an eight-day electronic discussion on gender and organisational change sponsored by Gender at Work, the article identifies three strategies for social transformation that are central to enabling feminists to seize emerging opportunities and avert emerging threats. We argue that the current debates on whether to hold a Fifth World Conference on Women in 2015 present an important opportunity to catalyse a global reflection on which strategies are no longer relevant and which approaches will infuse women's networks and movements with the vitality and vibrancy required to meet the challenges of the 21st century.


A GLORIA side scan sonar survey along the crest of the midocean ridge in the Gulf of Aden has provided information on the small-scale morphology of its spreading centers and fracture zones. Spreading center offsets increase in length to the east. This is thought to result from changes in the behavior of the mantle with increasing distance from the Afar hot spot. A 300-km-long spreading center in the western Gulf of Aden is oriented obliquely to the spreading direction. Nested within the obliquely oriented median valley is an en echelon arrangement of a number of smaller, elongated basins, each oriented approximately normal to the spreading direction. Close to the axis of spreading, volcanic and closely spaced tectonic structures run approximately normal to the spreading direction. Higher on the walls of the median valley, more-widely-spaced normal faults have formed subparallel to the valley. In the western Gulf of Aden there are no indications of sonar targets that might represent transform faults parallel to the NNE spreading direction. In the east, spreading center offsets of 15–25 km are made at fracture zones which are best described as narrow zones of highly oblique spreading. Offsets of greater than 25 km are achieved on single transform faults, and the associated tectonic fabric has a spreading direction trend. The boundaries between crusts of different ages along inactive transform fault extensions lie along the bases of fracture zone scarps. These scarps are situated in the older crust and face the younger. This is the opposite of the situation predicted on the basis of simple plate cooling models. At some places in the Gulf of Aden the fracture zone topography is very subdued, and this is attributed to the failure of the two slabs of lithosphere at the end of the transform fault to couple completely before the younger lithosphere on the nontransform side of the spreading center completes its ascent of the median valley wall. There is evidence of a change of spreading direction 3.5 m.y. ago, from about 040° to 022°. It is argued that the small-scale morphology of the transform fault/spreading center intersections can be understood in terms of the transfer of shear fracture on a transform fault to tensile fracture on a spreading center propagating away from the intersection. It is concluded that the transform fault must be weaker than the spreading center.


These NCCN Guidelines Insights focus on the major updates to the 2013 NCCN Guidelines for Ovarian Cancer. Four updates were selected based on recent important updates in the guidelines and on debate among panel members about recent clinical trials. The topics include 1) intraperitoneal chemotherapy, 2) CA-125 monitoring for ovarian cancer recurrence, 3) surveillance recommendations for less common ovarian histopathologies, and 4) recent changes in therapy for recurrent epithelial ovarian cancer. These NCCN Guidelines Insights also discuss why some recommendations were not made.


Isotretinoin (ISR), the common therapeuticagent for acne vulgaris, when used long term, leads to various side effects viz., oxidative toxicity, renal and hepatic dysfunction, depression, congenital abnormalities, aortic art defects, microcephaly, etc. Here, we explored the effects of silymarin (SLY), a flavonolignan from the seeds of the milk thistle Silybum marianum (L.) which has potential to protect the liver against chemical and environmental toxins and increase proliferation rate of tubule cells, against ISR induced liver and kidney injury. Thirty-two male Balb/c mice (3 months of age) were divided into four groups: control, isotretinoin (ISR, 40 mg/kg/day), silymarin (SLY, 200 mg/kg/day), and ISR+SLY group. We investigated liver and kidney injury by histopathological scoring system, and apoptotic cells labelled by TUNEL method. Alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) levels were measured in serum samples biochemically. ALT and AST levels were increased in ISR group (P = 0.025, P = 0.003, respectively). SLY decreased those levels in ISR+SLY group (P = 0.002, P = 0.013, respectively). Liver tissues of ISR group showed interstitial edema and necrosis, alteration in shape and size of nuclei, mononuclear and kuppfer cell infiltration. Kidney tissues of ISR group showed tubular degeneration, necrosis, glomerular collapse, mononuclear cell infiltration, and hemorrhage. SLY improved those histopathological changes and suppressed apoptotic cell death. We suggest that silymarin might be beneficial to some extent by preventing the side effects induced by chronic ISR therapy in patients with acne vulgaris.


The synthetic biology toolbox lacks extendable and conformationally controllable yet easy-to-synthesize building blocks that are long enough to span membranes. To meet this need, an iterative synthesis of α-aminoisobutyric acid (Aib) oligomers was used to create a library of homologous rigid-rod 310-helical foldamers, which have incrementally increasing lengths and functionalizable N- and C-termini. This library was used to probe the inter-relationship of foldamer length, self-association strength, and ionophoric ability, which is poorly understood. Although foldamer self-association in nonpolar chloroform increased with length, with a ∼14-fold increase in dimerization constant from Aib6 to Aib11, ionophoric activity in bilayers showed a stronger length dependence, with the observed rate constant for Aib11 ∼70-fold greater than that of Aib6. The strongest ionophoric activity was observed for foldamers with >10 Aib residues, which have end-to-end distances greater than the hydrophobic width of the bilayers used (∼2.8 nm); X-ray crystallography showed that Aib11 is 2.93 nm long. These studies suggest that being long enough to span the membrane is more important for good ionophoric activity than strong self-association in the bilayer. Planar bilayer conductance measurements showed that Aib11 and Aib13, but not Aib7, could form pores. This pore-forming behavior is strong evidence that Aibm (m ≥ 10) building blocks can span bilayers.


The defining characteristic of the South-South solidarity is cooperation the member countries of the South. The original vision was for member countries to promote trade as well as to demonstrate, through practical examples, how commercially viable projects can be implemented using the technology, experience and capital from the South. Regrettably, these dreams still remain unfulfilled. The experience gained by the developing countries after several years of bilateral interaction with the North underscores the idea that South-South trade should be symmetrical. However the most discernible pattern in the South-South relationship is still asymmetrical. A case in point is the Nigeria-China relations which appear to be in great disequilibrium and to China's advantage. As the bilateral relations have progressed from cultural linkages to intense economic penetration of the Nigerian economy, observers of Nigeria's international relations have become highly conscious of the reciprocal need to transform this intensive relationship into a mutually constructive one, that is towards the promotion of a more symmetrical relationship. This article, using dependency approach, demonstrates that these disparities actually account for the sharp differences in the outcomes of the bilateral trade and the level of development in the two countries. It also draws some vital lessons not only for Nigeria but also for other sub-Saharan African countries to learn from China in terms of the approach to economic reforms and development experience. The study seeks also to identify the crucial aspects of Nigeria-China bilateral interactions, assess the receptivity to the Chinese penetration of the Nigerian economy and the changing perspectives on the viability of the bilateral relations.


A review is provided of early attempts at determining the elemental composition of the body by radioactive isotope dilution techniques. The development and the current status of in-vivo neutron activation analysis is presented and the ways in which it supersedes or supplements certain of the former techniques is outlined. A description is given of an irradiation facility which employs a 5 Ci neutron source. The facility was designed to be flexible and it is capable of performing prompt and delay gamma-ray measurements as well as cyclic activation. Personnel and gamma-ray detectors are shown to be adequately shielded from the mixed radiation field from the source. The uniformity of thermal neutron flux in a phantom is demonstrated by flux profiles obtained experimentally. Principles and techniques of dosimetry are given and the relationship between radiation quality and radiobiological effect is examined. The neutron spectrum at a depth in the phantom has been obtained by means of the activities induced in a set of threshold detectors. An examination is made of the possible applications of the Monte Carlo method to the design of irradiation and detection facilities and in yielding information about areas which are inaccessible to the experimenter. Detection limits for the bulk body elements have been determined by measurement of prompt and delay gamma rays and cyclic activation. Detection limits are also presented for trace elements using cyclic activation and prompt gamma ray analysis. It is shown that the depth of an organ or region of the body can be determined from information present in a prompt gamma ray spectrum. This technique can be used to correct measurements when it is known that activation and detection is non-uniform. Computed tomography scanning offers the possibility of determining the amount of bone mineral per unit volume of bone. The feasibility of using a C.T. whole body scanner to measure bone demineralisation is explored. Finally, the advantages and problems of each of the techniques mentioned above is discussed and suggestions are made for further work.


Generally, the user requires customized information reflecting his current needs and interests that are stored in his profile. Therefore, taking into account this latter is significant to improve the recommended results. Along the day, the user is more and more active. Consequently, his interests evolve over time at the moment of updating his profile and they are distributed over different systems. This updating was the subject of several research works, in order to reduce the overload of the user's profile, either by using the machine learning techniques or the notion of temperature. In this paper, we propose an approach to improve the updating of user's profile by respectively merging the temperature and the k-means leaning algorithm.


Tremendous effort has been extended by the computer graphics community to advance the level of realism of material appearance reproduction by incorporating increasingly more advanced techniques. We are now able to re-enact the complicated interplay between light and microscopic surface features—scratches, bumps and other imperfections—in a visually convincing fashion. However, diffractive patterns arise even when no explicitly defined features are present: Any random surface will act as a diffracting aperture and its statistics heavily influence the statistics of the diffracted wave fields. Nonetheless, the problem of rendering diffraction effects induced by surfaces that are defined purely statistically remains wholly unexplored. We present a thorough derivation, from core optical principles, of the intensity of the scattered fields that arise when a natural, partially coherent light source illuminates a random surface. We follow with a probability theory analysis of the statistics of those fields and present our rendering algorithm. All of our derivations are formally proven and verified numerically as well. Our method is the first to render diffraction effects produced by a surface described statistically only, and bridges the theoretical gap between contemporary surface modelling and rendering.


A 16S rDNA clone library was generated to investigate the bacterial diversity in tidal flat sediment in Ganghwa Island, Republic of Korea. A total of 103 clones were sequenced and analyzed by comprehensive phylogenetic analyses. No clones were identical to any of known 16S rRNA sequences in public databases. Sequenced clones fell into thirteen lineages of the domain Bacteria: the alpha, beta, gamma, delta, and epsilon Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, CFB group, Chloroflexi, Acidobacteria, Planctomycetes, Verrucomicrobia, and known uncultured candidate divisions (OP11, BRC1, KSB1, and WS1). Two clones were not associated with any known bacterial divisions. The majority of clones belonged to the gamma and delta Proteobacteria (46.7%). Clones of Actinobacteria were distantly related to known taxa. It is evident from 16S rDNA-based community analysis that the bacterial community in tidal flat sediment is remarkably diverse and unique among other marine environments examined so far.


This paper presents a method for extracting purpose statements from clinical trial protocol summaries. Simple summarization technology based on regular expressions and natural language processing techniques were applied in a controlled environment with structured sectioning to address an expressed user need: providing access to information about the purpose of specific clinical trials, originally in English, to Spanish speakers. Following an analysis of manually annotated data, based on a cascade of criteria, the "Purpose Extractor Algorithm" was developed to select tightly-focused candidate excerpts out of lengthy descriptions, for translation into Spanish. The extracts reduce the translation task and provide purposive content in biomedical text. The results were validated in a focused user study. It is anticipated that this extractive summarization approach may be generalized to documents from other databases as the algorithm can be tailored to different applications or needs.


[1] The global oceans serve as the largest sustained natural sink for increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations. As this CO2 is absorbed by seawater, it not only reacts causing a reduction in seawater pH (or acidification) but also decreases the carbonate mineral saturation state (Ω), which plays an important role in calcification for many marine organisms. Ocean acidification could affect some of the most fundamental biological and geochemical processes of the sea in coming decades. Observations obtained in situ from Volunteer Observing Ships and multiple geochemical surveys have been extended using satellite remote sensing and modeled environmental parameters to derive estimates of sea-surface alkalinity (AT) and carbon dioxide partial pressure (pCO2,sw). Pairing estimates of AT and pCO2,sw have permitted characterization of the changes in sea-surface Ω, which have transpired over the past decade throughout the Greater Caribbean Region as a consequence of ocean acidification. The results reveal considerable spatial and temporal variability throughout the region. Despite this variability, we observed a strong secular decrease in aragonite saturation state (Ωarg) at a rate of approximately −0.012 ± 0.001 Ωarg yr−1 (r2 = 0.97, P < 0.001).


Why aren't more women pursuing careers in science, engineering, and math? Is the lack of women in these fields a consequence of societal discouragements, innate differences in ability between the sexes, or differences in aspirations? These questions always spark a host of other questions - and a multiplicity of answers - all of which have important implications for gender equality and for retaining the nation's competitiveness in the technological marketplace. The most reliable and current knowledge about women's participation in science is presented in this collection of fifteen essays written by top researchers on gender differences in ability. The essayists were chosen to reflect the diversity and complexity of views on the topic, about which knowledge has been accumulating and evolving for decades. The editors provide an introduction that defines the key issues and embeds them in historical context and a conclusion that synthesizes and integrates the disparate views. Written accessibly to appeal to students and non-specialists as well as psychologists and other social scientists, the contributors reframe this key controversy and challenge readers' emotional and political biases through solid empirical science. Taken together, the introduction, essays, and conclusion make a convincing case that sex differences are neither as unambiguous as earlier researchers suggested nor as insubstantial as some current critics claim. Sex differences in career choices are definitely not inevitable, as the past thirty years have documented both a sea change in the gender makeup of various fields and fluctuations in ability-score differences between the sexes. However, as the essays make clear, such changes leave open the possibility of cultural and biological bases for today's sex differences in science, engineering, and math participation.


Efficient logistics and supply chain management are enabled through utilization of efficient information technologies. A personal digital assistant (PDA) is a handheld computer that is used for mobile data applications in different industries to improve the effectiveness of the organizations. The objective of this paper is to aid decision makers to identify the most appropriate PDAs especially for logistics companies. To achieve this, several evaluation criteria have been identified and existing leading PDAs have been investigated. An axiomatic design based fuzzy group decision making is adopted to evaluate PDA alternatives. Finally, a case study is given to demonstrate the potential of the methodology.


Democracy and democratization at the European level have long been a non-problem. The issues related to democracy after the Second World War were purely national (would Italy and Germany finally be able to build up and consolidate their new democratic systems?) or international (would the Western-type democracies be able to resist and counterweight the Soviet-style Eastern European regimes?). When the first foundations of what would become the European Union ("EU") were laid down, very few had a democratic vision in mind. The then-dominant concerns were both economic (how to facilitate the reconstruction of Europe while avoiding again the economic and military domination of Germany over the continent) and security-related (how to strengthen the Atlantic alliance and reintegrate Germany in the defense of the West). Only a few idealist visionaries were dreaming of a democratized and united Europe, but few others were paying attention to what was perceived as intellectual fantasies. CAN EUROPE BE DEMOCRATIC? IS IT FEASIBLE? IS IT NECESSARY? IS THE PRESENT SITUATION SUSTAINABLE?


The study focuses on the fact that, in major Russian cities, up to 80% of the negative impact on the environment is formed by motor transport emissions. The authors analyze the indicators of the negative impact due to the forced increase in the Russian fleet and the age pattern of the Russian fleet is researched. The proposed paper argues the conclusion that fleet capacity leads to an increase in its quantitative indicators, but does not lead to a rapid displacement of cars with the environmental classes 1 and 2. In Russia, the share of these vehicle classes continues to be very high. The presented research analyzes the reasons for the conservation of the unsatisfactory environmental Russian fleet structure. The conclusion is proved that one of the significant reasons for the continued manufacturing and consumption of low environmental class vehicles is the lack of real tax incentives. The authors analyze the fiscal payment's system in the production and consumption of vehicles. It is concluded that these payments do not depend now on the environmental performance of the vehicle. The research paper introduces the renewed combination of tax instruments, the implementation of which will encourage producers and consumers to produce and purchase cars of a higher environmental class. The presented paper provides producers to make the excise tax on the car sale and disposal charge to be dependent on engine power and environmental class. The authors argue that the higher costs will be made up by the manufacturers' lower tax payments. As a result, it will not lead to a sharp increase in car prices. For consumers it is proposed to modify the transport tax, the value of which should be dependent on the environmental class of the car. Environmentally-oriented transport tax will stimulate consumers to purchase cars of a higher environmental class with the expectation that their higher costs will be paid off later with lower tax payments.


James Lindgren's recent forward to The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology's 2015 symposium on "The Past and Future of Guns," purports to be a neutral and scholarly account of the current state of the debate on the meaning of the Second Amendment. Lindgren's introductory essay fails to achieve both of these goals. Rather than survey the pre-Heller scholarship in a comprehensive and even-handed manner, Lindgren provides a distorted and superficial account of the historical literature. He compounds this error by ignoring the vast post-Heller scholarly literature, failing to note that much of this recent body of scholarship has been deeply critical of Heller, and has generally vindicated the work of the historians he criticizes. Indeed, the evidence he himself offers in defense of his interpretation actually undercuts his claims about the meaning of the Second Amendment. Lindgren's essay does not chart a path forward in this contentious debate, but proffers an incomplete and analytically flawed account of the Founding Era's understanding of this important provision of the Constitution.


The author examines in detail the on-going Chinese build-up of ballistic missile forces, and suggests the potential impact of this build-up on the balance of forces as against, in particular, Taiwan and the United States. Key Words: China, ballistic missiles, MIRVs, cruise missiles, United States' missile strategy, Taiwan's defense, non-nuclear weapon strategy Ballistic Missiles as a Key Element in China's Military Transformation China is building short, intermediate, and long-range ballistic missiles with which it could threaten the United States and numerous other countries. The situation is potentially parallel to that reached in China's relations with Taiwan, when in 1995 and 1996 it was able to threaten Taiwan with ballistic missile "test" firings. There are indications that China's ballistic missile buildup reflects a strategy of using missiles for deep, rapid strikes directed at an opponent's air and naval forces, and at radar, naval, and air bases, without first requiring air superiority. In contrast to U.S. military strategy, which relies heavily on air power, Chinese missile strategy appears to involve the use of ballistic missiles as a counterforce strike against an opponent's military forces, seizing the initiative and taking advantage of the element of surprise. America's perception of the use of ballistic missiles in a counterforce strike appears limited, reflecting a Cold War context of nuclear-armed ICBMs targeted at missile silos, long-range bomber bases, Trident submarine bases, and command and control centers. But counterforce strategy may be applied to use non-nuclear, accurate ballistic missiles targeted at conventional air and naval forces. Such a strategy would be unusual for the United States, as the U.S. relies predominately on air power and has not encountered a similar strategy since the end of the Cold War. With the exception of some tactical short-range multiple rocket launchers, the United States uses ballistic missiles only for deterrence. In contrast, China evidently contemplates the use of ballistic missiles both for aggression and deterrence. For example, on March 6, 2000 the PLA (People's Liberation Army) newspaper Liberation Army Daily noted China "is a country that has certain abilities of launching strategic counterattack and the capacity of launching a long-distance strike... It is not a wise move to be at war with a country such as China, a point which the U.S. policymakers know fairly well also."2 China's strategy has resulted in the development of a variety of nonnuclear weapons such as radio-frequency warheads that generate a powerful electromagnetic pulse disabling electronics, computers and radar; and cluster munitions to disable runways and air bases.3 It has developed warheads for penetrating hardened command posts; and warheads using fuel-air explosives that produce three to five times the blast damage of conventional high-explosives, similar to what the United States used in Afghanistan.4 China has, in addition, developed maneuverable warheads for its short-range ballistic missiles to evade ballistic missile interceptors like the Patriot missiles Taiwan has deployed around Taipei. It has reduced the radar signature of its short-range DF-11 and DF-15 ballistic missile warheads to evade detection. It has tested chaff, jammers, and other countermeasures.5 The variety of its warheads combined with its development of accurate missiles has given China a potent arsenal for deep penetration, first strike weapons in conventional warfare. It was would evident that China plans to use its ballistic missiles in tactical military situations - in attacking air and naval forces and bases, not just as terror weapons as seen in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. China is developing the ability to use ballistic missiles to penetrate an opponent's air and missile defenses, weakening an opponent to create a favorable playing field for the rest of its armed forces. …


Oral submucous fibrosis (OSF) is an insidious, chronic, progressive, debilitating disease. It is mostly prevalent in the South-east Asian countries. Areca nut chewing usually causes the condition. The hallmark of the disease being sub mucosal fibrosis that affects most parts of the oral cavity, pharynx and upper third of the oesophagus and its clinical presentation depends on the stage of the disease at detection. As the disease has a spectrum of presentation, the management differs with the various stages of the disease. This article reviews the various medical management techniques of oral submucous fibrosis.


The Bank of Canada conducted a Wage Setting Survey with a sample of 200 private sector firms from mid-October 2007 to May 2008. Results indicate that wage adjustments for the Canadian non-union private workforce are overwhelmingly time dependent, with a fixed duration of one year, and are clustered in the first four months of the year, suggesting that wage stickiness may not be constant over the year. Ad hoc adjustments between these fixed dates are rare, but when they do occur they are almost always upward and often in response to tight labour markets. The market wage rate is the most important factor managers consider when setting wages for their employees. Depending on firm size, different strategies are used to gain information about the market wage. Other important factors taken into account when setting wages include the firm's profitability, its difficulty in attracting staff and workers' productivity. While many managers acknowledge a link between the wage decision and inflation, very few use formal wage indexation rules such as a cost-of-living adjustment. Rather, most describe an informal backward-looking link. Survey results also suggest that managers are very reluctant to cut nominal base wages in times of weak demand. Managers are more likely to cut incentive pay, which would allow some flexibility in total compensation even if base pay is inflexible, or reduce the quantity of labour inputs (hours and employees).


For some time, 1366's co-founders, Frank van Mierlo and Ely Sachs, had faced a choice, which was now made all the more stark: 1366 could expand to produce silicon wafers itself, raising the required capital from "friendly" investors and building shipment volume slowly, or 1366 could accelerate its market entry dramatically by partnering with the Asian manufacturers that had begun to dominate the world-wide solar industry. While accelerated growth was attractive to 1366 and its current investors, the company believed that it would face considerable risks if it were to expose its intellectual property to the "wrong" partners. 1366 had no intention of losing control of its technology, but given the pace of innovation and the active role of governments in the solar industry, van Mierlo and Sachs feared this might not be a race that could be won by the cautious.Learning Objective:Study issues faced in scaling from laboratory- to commercial-scale operations in clean tech.


A core symptom of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a deficit in binding sensory inputs into a unified representation. Past research suggests that these impairments extend from lower-level perceptual grouping to higher-level holistic face perception. Given that visuo-spatial attention plays a critical role in binding, we hypothesized that normally-distributed autistic traits in the healthy population would predict the degree to which attentional scope could be modified to influence holistic face perception. We directed participants to adopt either a global or local attentional scope using a Navon task. Participants viewed pairs of Navon letters (big letters composed of small letters) and made same/different judgments based on attention to the big (global scope) or small (local scope) letter. The effects of this manipulation were measured on the composite face task, a well-established measure of holistic face perception. Autistic traits and sensory processing styles were measured using the Autism Quotient (AQ) and Sensory Profile (SP), respectively. In the Navon task, we observed a global interference effect, that is, greater susceptibility to interference from global information, relative to local. Furthermore, individuals with higher SP scores showed weaker global interference effects. ASD has been associated with both abnormal sensory processing styles, as well as weaker global interference effects. Consistent with this idea, we found an interaction in that SP was more strongly associated with global interference in individuals with higher AQ scores. In the composite face task, we found that the attention-to-detail subscale of the AQ predicted differences in susceptibility to the composite face illusion between global and local conditions. Specifically, individuals high in autistic traits were less capable of adopting a global attentional setting, which led to weaker holistic face perception. These results shed light on how autistic traits and sensory processing styles converge to influence visual binding abilities. Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2015.


Deportation of so-called "criminal aliens" has become the driving force in U.S. immigration enforcement. The Immigration Accountability Executive Actions of late 2014 provide the most recent example of this trend. Even for immigrants' rights advocates, conventional wisdom holds that if deportations must occur, "criminal aliens" should be the first to go. A voluminous crimmigration scholarship notes the ever-growing entwinement of criminal and immigration enforcement, but does not challenge this fundamental premise.This Article calls for a rejection of the formulation of the "criminal alien" — the figure used to increasingly justify the preservation and expansion of a harmful immigration regime. It thus defends a normative claim that is starkly at odds with settled assumptions in advocacy and the literature: Deportations should not be distributed along the lines of migrant criminality. As a consequence, this Article argues, scholarship and advocacy should embrace "criminal aliens" as the priority group to defend against immigration enforcement efforts.This move is long overdue. Across the political spectrum, calls are being made to trim back the excesses of the criminal justice system, with both policing and incarceration practices suffering from crises of legitimacy. Yet the immigration system continues to layer the shortcomings and dysfunctions of the criminal justice system onto immigration enforcement efforts. The latest immigration reform effort, the Immigration Accountability Executive Actions, refine what it means to be a "criminal alien," thereby expanding partnerships with the criminal justice system and creating stronger nets of social control over broad swaths of the noncitizen population. While offering the possibility of deportation relief to part of the undocumented population, the Executive Actions ultimately do not curb deportations. Rather, the programs refocus enforcement efforts on an ideologically acceptable target: the "criminal alien." To avoid this outcome, and to begin to dismantle immigrant vulnerability, the "criminal alien" paradigm must be challenged.


The Raman spectra of DNA in different levels of vitamin C with 10- and 30-min ultraviolet (UV) radiations were reported. The intensity of UV radiation was 18.68 W/m2. The experimental results proved that vitamin C could alone prevent UV radiation from damaging DNA, but the effects depended on the concentration of vitamin C. When the concentration of vitamin C was about 0.08-0.4 mmol/L, vitamin C decreased UV radiation-induced DNA's damage. When the concentration of vitamin C exceeded 0.4 mmol/L, vitamin C accelerated DNA's damage instead. Maybe the reason is that when DNA in aqueous solution is radiated by UV, free radicals come into being, and vitamin C can scavenge free radicals, so vitamin C in lower concentration can protect DNA. The quantity of free radicals is finite, when vitamin C is superfluous, free radicals have been scavenged absolutely and vitamin C is residual. Vitamin C is a strong reductant. When the mixture of DNA and residual vitamin C is radiated by UV, vitamin C reacts with DNA. The more residual vitamin C and the longer time of UV radiation, the more DNA is damaged.


Although deep learning-based methods have dominated stereo matching leaderboards by yielding unprecedented disparity accuracy, their inference time is typically slow, on the order of seconds for a pair of 540p images. The main reason is that the leading methods employ time-consuming 3D convolutions applied to a 4D feature volume. A common way to speed up the computation is to downsample the feature volume, but this loses high-frequency details. To overcome these challenges, we propose a \emph{displacement-invariant cost computation module} to compute the matching costs without needing a 4D feature volume. Rather, costs are computed by applying the same 2D convolution network on each disparity-shifted feature map pair independently. Unlike previous 2D convolution-based methods that simply perform context mapping between inputs and disparity maps, our proposed approach learns to match features between the two images. We also propose an entropy-based refinement strategy to refine the computed disparity map, which further improves speed by avoiding the need to compute a second disparity map on the right image. Extensive experiments on standard datasets (SceneFlow, KITTI, ETH3D, and Middlebury) demonstrate that our method achieves competitive accuracy with much less inference time. On typical image sizes, our method processes over 100 FPS on a desktop GPU, making our method suitable for time-critical applications such as autonomous driving. We also show that our approach generalizes well to unseen datasets, outperforming 4D-volumetric methods.


PurposeCodes of ethics have become the mainstay of the ethics programs of corporations. Many studies have explored their contents, but few have examined what makes them effective. This international study aims to identify the measures viewed as being important by top executives in determining the worth to their organizations of corporate codes of ethics.Design/methodology/approachData were collected by questionnaires sent to the top 500 companies ranked by revenue operating in the private sectors in Australia, Canada and Sweden. By analyzing the survey results from the top corporate executives in these countries, the research team was able to test for a number of determinants of effectiveness for codes of ethics.FindingsIn a statistically significant model, it was found that four factors related to the internal management of the corporation are positively correlated to executives' perceptions of the value of their corporate codes of ethics.Research limitations/implicationsFuture research may seek to address features of this study that limit its generalizability, as it was conducted on the largest of companies in each country and thus this sample may not reflect the way that business ethics are managed in smaller organizations in those countries.Originality/valueIf executives see particular items as important to their business ethics success, one could postulate that this has arisen from a perception that implementing these measures has been effective for their organizations. This provides guidance to other organizations on what items could enhance the effectiveness of their codes of ethics.


A mechanism for lightning initiation by the sustained runaway breakdown of air is presented. Unlike earlier models that rely upon large cosmic‐ray air showers, this mechanism uses the runaway electrons produced by the steady background of atmospheric cosmic‐rays to amplify non‐uniformities in the electric field. The ionization of air from the runaway electrons creates a region of discharge that propagates in the opposite direction of the electrons, enhancing the electric field in front of it to the point where a conventional breakdown can occur. As the discharged region grows, positron feedback can become important, dramatically increasing the flux of runaway electrons and increasing the propagation speed of the discharged region up to 106 m/s. The ambient electric field strength needed for this mechanism is within the range of values observed in thunderclouds and is substantially lower than that required by most other mechanisms.


Background Improved chemical hazard management such as REACH policy objective as well as drug ADMETOX prediction, while limiting the extent of animal testing, requires the development of increasingly high throughput as well as highly pertinent in vitro toxicity assays. Methodology This report describes a new in vitro method for toxicity testing, combining cell-based assays in nanodrop Cell-on-Chip format with the use of a genetically engineered stress sensitive hepatic cell line. We tested the behavior of a stress inducible fluorescent HepG2 model in which Heat Shock Protein promoters controlled Enhanced-Green Fluorescent Protein expression upon exposure to Cadmium Chloride (CdCl2), Sodium Arsenate (NaAsO2) and Paraquat. In agreement with previous studies based on a micro-well format, we could observe a chemical-specific response, identified through differences in dynamics and amplitude. We especially determined IC50 values for CdCl2 and NaAsO2, in agreement with published data. Individual cell identification via image-based screening allowed us to perform multiparametric analyses. Conclusions Using pre/sub lethal cell stress instead of cell mortality, we highlighted the high significance and the superior sensitivity of both stress promoter activation reporting and cell morphology parameters in measuring the cell response to a toxicant. These results demonstrate the first generation of high-throughput and high-content assays, capable of assessing chemical hazards in vitro within the REACH policy framework.


Objective: We conducted our study involving 1400 peri- and post-menopausal women who live in a slum area of Mumbai to determine the prevalence of osteoporosis, awareness about osteoporosis, education (knowledge regarding osteoporosis), treatment and prevention of osteoporosis. Material and Methods: A detailed medical, surgical, obstetrical & gynecological, menstrual, and drug history was recorded in a predesigned questionnaire designated for the study. Height and weight and body mass index were measured, physical activity level especially load bearing exercise was recorded, and amount of sunlight exposure per day was also recorded. Food intake was estimated using the 24 h dietary recall method and calcium and Vitamin D consumption pattern was assessed. We used calcaneum quantitative ultrasound to assess bone mineral density (BMD) for such large population. Results: The prevalence of low BMD was found in more than half of this population (81%). The mean age in Group I was found to be 36.50 ± 2.74 years as compared to 37.5 ± 3.44 years in Group II with low BMD, which was statistically significant (P = 0.02). The average age at menopause was 51.62 ± 5.72 years in Group I and 49.43 ± 4.52 years in Group II. The number of children and type of menopause has been found to be associated with low BMD in our study. Lack of physical exercise and low-calcium diet were significantly associated with low BMD. Conclusion: Our study showed that there is a high prevalence of Vitamin D deficiency and Osteoporosis even in adult women who live in a slum area. The findings from the study also suggest the need for large community-based studies so that high-risk population can be picked up early and early interventions and other lifestyle changes can be instituted so that no delay in implementing state and national or international health policy to tackle this increasing global health problem. The public awareness is important, and strategies to identify and manage low BMD in the primary care setting needs to be established and implemented.


Parallel-plate capacitors based on ferroelectric thin films are considered as high density capacitors and varactors. Due to the small thickness of the ferroelectric films, typically less than 1.0 mu m, high electric fields are generated even at relatively low voltages inducing piezoelectric effect associated with electrostriction. This induced piezoelectric effect has negative impact on ferroelectric capacitors since it causes extra loss (electroacoustic transformation of microwave energy). In this work the use of Bragg reflectors between the substrate and ferroelectric film is proposed as a possible way of suppression of the enhanced losses associated with the piezoelectric activity of the ferroelectric film.


Residential Grid-Connected Photovoltaics (GPV) systems hold remarkable promise in their potential to reduce energy use, air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, and energy costs to consumers, while also providing grid efficiency and demand-side management benefits to utilities. Broader adoption of customer-sited GPV also has the potential to transform the traditional model of electricity generation and delivery. Interest and activity has grown in recent years to promote GPV in north central Texas. This study employs a mixed methods design to better understand the status of residential GPV adoption in the DFW area, and those factors influencing a homeowner's decision of whether or not to install a system. Basic metrics are summarized, including installation numbers, distribution and socio-demographic information for the case study city of Plano, the DFW region, Texas, and the United States. Qualitative interview methods are used to gain an in-depth understanding of the factors influencing adoption for the Solarize Plano case study participants; to evaluate the effectiveness of the Solarize Plano program; and to identify concepts that may be regionally relevant. Recommendations are presented for additional research that may advance GPV adoption in north central Texas.


This working paper argues that pension funds should adopt a funding principle that is consistent with a return on holdings conditional on the state of the stock market. As will be shown, the expected "conditional rate of return" used in making this assessment will vary depending on the current ratio of stock prices to trend corporate earnings. This funding rule will lead to a more even flow of contributions into the fund than a rule that is based on a fixed return for assets over time.


Radical-mediated damage to proteins may be initiated by electron leakage, metal-ion-dependent reactions and autoxidation of lipids and sugars. The consequent protein oxidation is O2-dependent, and involves several propagating radicals, notably alkoxyl radicals. Its products include several categories of reactive species, and a range of stable products whose chemistry is currently being elucidated. Among the reactive products, protein hydroperoxides can generate further radical fluxes on reaction with transition-metal ions; protein-bound reductants (notably dopa) can reduce transition-metal ions and thereby facilitate their reaction with hydroperoxides; and aldehydes may participate in Schiff-base formation and other reactions. Cells can detoxify some of the reactive species, e.g. by reducing protein hydroperoxides to unreactive hydroxides. Oxidized proteins are often functionally inactive and their unfolding is associated with enhanced susceptibility to proteinases. Thus cells can generally remove oxidized proteins by proteolysis. However, certain oxidized proteins are poorly handled by cells, and together with possible alterations in the rate of production of oxidized proteins, this may contribute to the observed accumulation and damaging actions of oxidized proteins during aging and in pathologies such as diabetes, atherosclerosis and neurodegenerative diseases. Protein oxidation may also sometimes play controlling roles in cellular remodelling and cell growth. Proteins are also key targets in defensive cytolysis and in inflammatory self-damage. The possibility of selective protection against protein oxidation (antioxidation) is raised.


Fifty years have passed since Cyert and March's 1963 A Behavioral Theory of the Firm. During this time, BTOF has been adopted across different research domains to investigate how organizations set goals, how they determine aspirations and how they finally react to performance aspiration discrepancies. Cyert and March's framework has also recently emerged as one of the dominant paradigms to understand the ways in which family business organizations make decisions. In this chapter, I review the theoretical development and empirical results of BTOF and its application in the family business field of study in order to identify theoretical and empirical gaps and propose suggestions for future research. The conclusions suggest that BTOF is both a theoretically and empirically valid perspective in family business research, particularly when combined with other theoretical frameworks. The principal recommendation is to apply behavioral theory to enhance scholarly understanding of how family organisations define their aspiration levels and respond to organizational problems.


This paper analyses the impact of unemployment on the gender division of household work. A sample of 643 dual full-time employed couples and 160 with an unemployed partner was considered. Variance analysis and chi-square tests were performed to analyse the differential impact of the spouses' employment status on the time devoted to domestic and parental work and on the division of household chores among partners. Results show that male unemployment increases men's participation in domestic work only on weekdays while female unemployment constrains women into domestic activities both on week and weekend days. Gender patterns of task division also showed to relate significantly to partners' employment status.


Abstract This paper describes a system for accommodating active listening for persons with hearing aids or cochlear implants, with a special focus on children at an early stage of cognitive development and with additional physical disabilities. A system called the Soundscraper is proposed and consists of a software part in Pure data and a hardware part using an Arduino microcontroller with a combination of sensors. For both the software and hardware development it was important to always ensure that the system was flexible enough to cater for the very different conditions that are characteristic of the intended user group. The Soundscraper has been tested with 25 children with good results. An increased attention span was reported, as well as positively surprising reactions from children where the caregivers were unsure whether they could hear at all. The sound synthesis methods, the gesture sensors and the employed parameter mapping were all simple, but they provided a controllable and sufficiently complex sound environment even with limited interaction. A possible future outcome of the application is the adoption of long-time analysis of sound preferences as opposed to traditional audiological investigations.


A method is presented for the automatic time detection of watches, where the hands are classified by a neural network. In order to reduce the overall cost of data collection, strict limits were imposed on the data collection time. This constraint severely limits the available amount of images, and poses the challenge to solve the hand recognition problem with a minimum amount of training and test data. Two neural network approaches are presented together with their performance results, which show an excellent final recognition rate.


The Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) Model explains that job resources foster a psychological process that motivates employees, engendering positive outcomes. Using structural equation modeling the indirect effect of engagement on the relationship between two personal resources: proactive personality and adaptability, three environmental resources: coworker, management, and senior leadership support, and three outcomes: job performance, turnover intentions, and subjective well-being was examined. There was an indirect effect of engagement on the relationship between proactive personality, adaptability, and senior leadership support and turnover intentions and subjective well-being. Implications for the work environment are discussed.


Assessing the environmental impacts of fertilizer nitrogen (N) used to increase productivity in managed forests is complex due to a wide range of abiotic and biotic factors affecting its forms and movement. Models developed to predict fertilizer N fate (e.g., cycling processes) and water quality impacts vary widely in their design, scope, and potential application. We review the applicability of five commonly used eco-hydrologic models (APEX, MIKESHE-DNDC, DRAINMOD-FOREST, REMM, and SWAT) in assessing N fate and transport in southern forest landscapes (<50 km) because of their comprehensiveness and multi-scale predictions. The field-scale models DRAINMOD-FOREST and REMM contain process-level components characterizing hydrology, forest growth, and N dynamics, but they have limited capability to describe transport processes at the landscape scale. APEX can describe hydrology, forest growth, N fate processes, and plant competition at the landscape and small watershed scales mostly for upland. SWAT is best suited to hydrologic simulations at watershed scale (>50 km), although N routing below the subbasin level does not yet exist. Similarly, the distributed MIKESHE-DNDC model has been used to assess N cycles across different spatial scales, on both uplands and lowlands, but was not intended to model lateral N transport. However, MIKESHE alone is capable of describing the hydrology and N transport. The strengths of each of the models reflect their original design and scope intent. Based on this review, none of the five models that we considered is independently adequate to address the fate of N fertilizers applied to forest stands at both small and large scales, including uplands and lowlands. While efforts are underway to extend these tools' capabilities and address their various limitations, the models must be validated using experimental data before using their outputs, together with uncertainty analysis, for developing forest fertilization guidelines and the fate and transport of N.