OBJECTIVE
The objective of this study was to examine the extent of possible dissociation in pharmacokinetic decay between central dopamine D₂ receptor occupancy with antipsychotics and their peripheral blood concentrations.

DATA SOURCES
MEDLINE and Embase were searched using the following keywords: (positron emission tomography OR PET OR single-photon emission computed tomography OR SPECT) AND (dopamine OR D2) AND (receptor* OR occupanc*) AND antipsychotic*, with a limitation of English language (last search: December 14, 2019).

STUDY SELECTION
The search identified 18 studies that met the following criteria: (1) including patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders and/or healthy subjects, (2) using positron emission tomography or single-photon emission computed tomography, and (3) examining the time courses of D₂ occupancy with antipsychotics and their blood concentrations.

DATA EXTRACTION
The ratios of D₂ occupancy reduction rate (%) from peak to blood concentration reduction rate (%) from peak (relative attenuation ratio) were calculated.

RESULTS
Among the studies, oral risperidone, olanzapine, quetiapine, aripiprazole, ziprasidone, perospirone, haloperidol, sulpiride, and clozapine and long-acting injectable risperidone and haloperidol were included. Relative attenuation ratios were less than 1, indicating a slower central versus peripheral attenuation, across the time points for all antipsychotic types and doses with only a few exceptions. The ratio decreased in a dose-dependent as well as a peak D₂ occupancy-dependent fashion. It contrarily increased in a time-dependent manner.

CONCLUSIONS
The findings indicate pharmacokinetic attenuation of antipsychotics was generally slower at the central versus the peripheral level and pose a critical challenge to the current dosing strategy that primarily relies on peripheral pharmacokinetics of antipsychotics.


Lisianthus (Eustoma exaltatum (L.) Salisb. ex G. Don subsp. russellianum (Hook.) Kartesz) is an economically important ornamental crop in Taiwan. Over the past decade, nine viruses have been identified or detected in lisianthus including: Bean yellow mosaic virus (BYMV), Lisianthus necrosis virus (LNV) (2), Cucumber mosaic virus (CMV) (1), Turnip mosaic virus (TuMV), Tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV), Broad bean wilt virus (BBWV), Tomato mosaic virus (ToMV), Pepper veinal mottle virus (PVMV), and Ageratum yellow vein virus (AYVV) (4). In May 2007 (late period of growing season) in central Taiwan, systemic necrotic spots, which are similar to that caused by LNV (2), were found on approximately 20% of the lisianthus plants. Spherical virus particles, approximately 32 nm in diameter, were found in the crude sap of infected lisianthus collected from the fields. However, the diseased samples did not react with antisera against domestic lisianthus-infecting spherical viruses, LNV (2) and CMV (1). A virus culture was isolated via mechanical inoculation on Chenopodium quinoa and serologically identified as Carnation mottle virus (CarMV) by ELISA, western blotting, and immunoelectron microscopy using antiserum against the CarMV zantedeschia strain (3). The virus induced necrotic local lesions on the inoculated leaves of C. quinoa, C. amaranticolor, Gomphrena globosa, Cucurbita moschata, Phaseolus angularis, P. vulgaris, and Vigna unguiculata. Lisianthus was previously reported as a local lesion host for CarMV (3). In current studies with 8 of 10 lisianthus plants, the newly isolated virus induced necrotic local lesions on inoculated leaves 20 days post inoculation (dpi). However, systemic necrotic lesions on noninoculated upper leaves, as were observed in the fields, appeared 120 dpi on inoculated plants, indicating that CarMV induces systemic infection in lisianthus during late growth stages. Noninoculated plants did not develop symptoms. Complementary DNA fragments of viral genomic RNA were amplified with a specific primer of the coat protein gene (3) and sets of degenerate primer for CarMV. The amplified cDNA fragments were cloned and sequenced. The full-length sequence was submitted as GenBank Accession No. FJ843021. The genomic RNA consists of 4,003 nucleotides and has an identical genome organization to that reported for members of the genus Carmovirus. The nucleotide sequence of the full-length genome shares more than 95% identity to isolates of CarMV (GenBank Accession Nos. AF192772, AJ304989, AJ811998, NC_001265, and X02986), and the nucleotide and deduced amino acid sequence of coat protein shares more than 98% identity with that of CarMV-TW (AY383566) (3), CarMV-FO25 (EF622206), CarMV-Italy-Ca1 (EF622207), and CarMV-Netherland Ca2 (EF622210). To our knowledge, this is the first report of natural infection of CarMV in lisianthus in Taiwan. References: (1) C. C. Chen and C. C. Hu, Plant Prot. Bull. 41:179, 1999. (2) C. C. Chen et al. Plant Dis. 84:506, 2000. (3) C. C. Chen et al. Plant Dis. 87:1539, 2003. (4) Y. H. Cheng et al. J. Taiwan Agric. Res. 58:196, 2009.


During the 19th and 20th centuries, European countries based their language policies on the principle lingua instrumentum regni ("language is the instrument of political control"), born with the French Revolution. As a direct consequence, the numerous local languages and dialects spoken in Europe have considerably lost ground in favour of national languages. However, in the last few decades the approach to linguistic diversity has changed contextually to the strengthening of the globalised dimension of society, so that nowadays states recognise regional and minority languages in addition to the national ones. But dialects are not legally recognised nor are regarded as languages. I deal with the Cremonese dialect, analyse briefly linguistic studies and literature, and conclude by advancing a proposal for its safeguard. As any other idiom, Cremonese dialect should be preserved for reasons of linguistic rights and cultural diversity.


This book presents a systematic study of the decorative motifs and designs found on painted Canaanite pottery vessels excavated in Palestine and dating to the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age I. The study is based on an analysis of 3,225 painted vessels and sherds. One of its most important goals is to provide a taxonomy of the decorative motifs and designs found on the vessels. To achieve this goal, each of the motifs and designs is carefully described and codified as a unit within a system of classification grouping them into categories, sub-categories, classes, types, and sub-types.
Based on this classification system, statistical figures representing the frequency of occurrence of the decorative motifs and designs are produced. The degree of popularity and the temporal or spatial distribution of each of the motifs and designs are thus clarified. Based on the statistical analysis, tree iconography (representing particularly the date-palm, often called "tree of life") was confirmed to be the most prominent and representative feature of the Canaanite pottery painting tradition. The motif most commonly found on handles and best known as "Union Jack" mark is demonstrated to be a schematized representation of the date-palm. Canaanite tree iconography was probably associated with a fertility cult, but there is no direct evidence associating it with the goddess Asherah.
The cultural origins of painted pottery traditions, colors used for decoration, archaeological contexts where the decorative motifs come from and their socio-political meanings are also considered in detail. Although during the Late Bronze and Iron IA ages the inhabitants of Canaan were politically controlled by New Kingdom Egypt, Egyptian influence on their pottery painting tradition was insignificant. Western Asiatic features prevail much more in the main motifs and design elements, their iconography, design, and style. The archaeological contexts of painted Canaanite vessels indicate that the decorative motifs reveal the Canaanites' desire for blessing in present life rather than in the afterlife.
The rise and decline of the painted pottery phenomenon is most likely associated with socio-political changes. The Canaanite pottery painting tradition declined notably in the 11th century BCE, following the end of Egyptian rule in Canaan. In the 10th century BCE, tradition virtually disappeared, indicating the rise of a new socio-political order in Canaan.


There are three classical algorithms to visit all the nodes of a binary tree - preorder, inorder and postorder traversal. From this one gets a natural labelling of the n internal nodes of a binary tree by the numbers 1, 2, ..., n, indicating the sequence in which the nodes are visited. For given n (size of the tree) and j (a number between 1 and n), we consider the statistics number of ascendants of node j and number of descendants of node j. By appropriate trivariate generating functions, we are able to find explicit formulae for the expectation and the variance in all instances. The heavy computations that are necessary are facilitated by MAPLE and Zeilberger's algorithm. A similar problem comes fromlabelling the leaves from left to right by 1, 2, ..., n and considering the statistic number of ascendants (=height) of leaf j. For this, Kirschenhofer [1] has computed the average. With our approach, we are also able to get the variance. In the last section, a table with asymptotic equivalents is provided for the reader's convenience.


The history of radiation therapy treatment planning and delivery has been one of constant improvement in the accuracy and precision of target identification, target localization, and dose delivery. The demands on delivery have now crossed a threshold where radiation therapy is inherently dependent on image guidance as a standard of care. While much image guidance in RT is acquired with ionizing radiation modalities such as CT and fluoroscopy, ultrasound has always played a role in specialized situations. However, improving technologies for ultrasound transducers, spatial transducer localization, post-acquisition image analysis, and automated control of acquisition parameters are creating new opportunities for ultrasound across the breadth of radiation oncology. This education session will highlight several new developments in the use of ultrasound imaging for radiation therapy treatment planning and delivery. Topics will include:* Real-time telerobotic 3D ultrasound for soft-tissue guidance concurrent with beam delivery* US for prostate positioning - Trans-perineal approach combined with real-time monitoring* Challenges and opportunities of trans-rectal ultrasound (TRUS)-based prostate HDR brachytherapy* Speed of sound aberration evaluation and correction in ultrasound-guided radiation therapy applications This session is intended to provide a window into how ultrasound can be used to meet the demand for a non-ionizing, non-invasive, real-time image guidance solution. Attendees to the session should expect to meet the following: Learning Objectives: 1. Understand the advantages and disadvantages of trans-rectal and trans-perineal approaches for ultrasound imaging during prostate HDR 2. Understand the current limitations of ultrasound for quantitatively imaging heterogeneous tissue as well as methods for detecting and correcting aberrations in soft tissue. 3. Learn how spatial tracking of ultrasound transducers and standardization of ultrasound acquisition techniques through the use of robotics can make ultrasound a viable solution for anatomical motion during radiation therapy procedures. David Schlesinger has a research grant from Elekta, AB unrelated to the topic of this session.


The purpose of this paper is to outline an approach for Bank engagement in forests, trees, and woodlands on farms in Sub-Saharan Africa for the coming five years. The paper takes the framework of the Africa development strategy, which has two main pillars: supporting employment and competitiveness, and building resilience and reducing vulnerability; and one underlying foundation: strengthening capacity and governance. It is consistent with the pillars of the bank forest strategy from 2002, which highlight the contribution of forests to economic development, poverty reduction, and protection of global public goods. Several other World Bank corporate strategies are also relevant for the implementation of this action plan. The primary messages of this paper are linked: enhanced forest, tree and woodland management can play a key role in achieving the goals of the Africa Strategy. Employment generation, improving competitiveness as well as building resilience and reducing vulnerability are the overall objectives of the World Bank's forest engagement in Sub-Saharan Africa; and in many countries the most effective approaches will be outside the traditional forestry institutions and will involve working through operations and reforms supported through other sectors.


Objective: To identify the level of effort state tobacco control programmes and partners have expended on interventions recommended by the community guide and how those efforts have changed over time between 1999 and 2004. Design: Longitudinal study. Setting: United States. Participants: State tobacco control partners, including the state health department, voluntary agencies and tobacco control coalitions. Main outcome measure: We used the Strength of Tobacco Control survey responses in 1999, 2002 and 2004 to calculate the mean proportion of state tobacco control partners working on recommended interventions and subsequently analysed changes in effort over time. Results: The proportion of state tobacco control partners working to promote clean indoor air legislation remained at more than 70% in all three years. The proportion working to increase taxes on tobacco rose significantly between 1999 and 2002 (from 54% to 70%), and those working to reduce patient costs for tobacco cessation treatments never exceeded 31% in any year. Use of mass media targeting youths decreased significantly in all years (from 40% to 32% to 26%), and the proportion of state tobacco control partners participating in a quitline has increased steadily and significantly in all years (from 24% to 36% to 41%). The level of effort in each area varied widely between states and over time. Conclusions: State tobacco control partners are implementing evidence based interventions, but more focus is needed on the tobacco cessation and mass media campaign components of comprehensive tobacco control programmes.


The paper studies the post-Asian crisis investment performance of crisis affected countries in ASEAN. The empirical evidence clearly indicates that the ASEAN and East Asian countries are emerging from the Asian crisis with strong output growth. As expected, the output growth seems to be driven by the growth in export sector. The growth in the post-crisis period indicates that it is reaching the level similar to that of the pre-crisis. However, the paper highlights that the output growth in the post crisis period is also observed with rising unemployment rate, growth government deficit, and declining FDI inflows into the South-East Asian region. The empirical evidence also indicates that there is a fundamental shift in the industrial structure of the South- East after the Asian crisis. This directly raises the issue of sustainability of the output growth in the post-crisis period.


Commissioned by the European Parliament, this study outlines concrete options for improving the external representation of the euro area in international institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank and the G-20. The study proposes a two-stage process, the first of which requires the creation of a permanent subcommittee of the Eurogroup Working Group (EWG) to elaborate common positions at international level. A second step, taken in the longer term, would consist of creating a single-member position in the IMF and World Bank by merging national quotas via the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). For the G-20, a single membership of the euro area could create inconsistencies with the European Union membership. However, a euro area membership could be envisaged if a more economically and financially integrated euro area were to develop.


In the modern popular imagination, the British Army's campaign in the Middle East during World War I is considered somehow less brutal than the fighting on European battlefields. A romantic view of this conflict has been further encouraged by such films as Lawrence of Arabia and The Light Horsemen. In Hell in the Holy Land, David R. Woodward uses graphic eyewitness accounts from the diaries, letters, and memoirs of British soldiers who fought in that war to describe in rigorous detail the genuine experience of the fighting and dying in Egypt and Palestine. The massive flow of troops and equipment to Egypt eventually made that country host to the largest British military base outside of Britain and France. Though many soldiers found the atmosphere in Cairo exotic, the desert countryside made the fundamentals of fighting and troop maintenance extremely difficult. The intense heat frequently sickened soldiers, and unruly camels were the only practical means of transport across the soft sands of the Sinai. The constant shortage of potable water was a persistent problem for the troops; one soldier recalled, "It is impossible to realize the depth a man will sink to endeavor to appease the terrible horror of thirst." The voices of these British soldiers offer a forgotten perspective of the Great War, describing not only the physical and psychological toll of combat but the daily struggles of soldiers who were stationed in an unfamiliar environment that often proved just as antagonistic as the enemy. A soldier of the Dorset Yeomanry, stationed in Egypt, wrote: "There are three sounds in Egypt which never cease-the creaking of the waterwheels, the song of the frogs, and the buzz of flies...Letter writing is an impossibility in the evening, for as soon as the sun goes down, if a lamp is lighted, the air all round is thick with little grey sand-flies which bite disgustingly." Using archival records, many from the Imperial War Museum in London, England, Woodward paints a vivid picture of the mayhem, terror, boredom, filth, and sacrifice that marked the daily life of British soldiers in the Middle East. In telling the story of these soldiers, Woodward provides a personal history of a campaign that laid the groundwork for the continuing turmoil in the Middle East.


Low back and neck pain disorders are among the leading causes for work loss, suffering, and health care expenditures throughout the industrialized world. It has been extensively demonstrated that sagittal plane alignment of the cervical and lumbar spines impacts human health and well-being. Today there are reliable and predictable means through the application of extension spinal traction as part of comprehensive rehabilitation programs to restore the natural curvatures of the spine. High-quality evidence points to Chiropractic BioPhysics® (CBP®) methods offering superior long-term outcomes for treating patients with various craniocervical and lumbosacral disorders. CBP technique is a full spine and posture rehabilitation approach that incorporates mirror image® exercises, spinal and postural adjustments, and unique traction applications in the restoration of normal/ideal spinal alignment. Recent randomized controlled trials using CBP's unique extension traction methods in conjunction with various conventional physiotherapeutic methods have demonstrated those who restore normal lordosis (cervical or lumbar) get symptomatic relief that lasts up to 2 years after treatment. Comparative groups receiving various 'cookie-cutter' conventional treatments experience only temporary symptomatic relief that regresses as early as 3 months after treatment. The economic impact/benefit of CBPs newer sagittal spine rehabilitation treatments demand continued attention from clinicians and researchers alike.


Agriculture is one of the most important strategic sectors in terms of
the social and economic ways for Turkey. Approximately 35% of the
population has lived in rural areas and there is a huge inactive labor force in
such regions. Success and sustainability of agricultural activities depends on the
education and social structures of farmers. Irrigation and irrigation technologies
are possibly the most important inputs in agricultural activities. This study was
conducted in Konya where it has the greatest agricultural land of Turkey with
25% of the total sugar beet production of Turkey. The preferences of irrigation
methods by sugar beet producers, age distributions, education status, and
number of person in family were researched by face to face technique. The
percentages of farmers in 20-30, 31-40, 41-50 and 51-60 years old were 18.2% ,
22.7%, 35.2% and 23.9%, respectively. The education levels of those farmers
graduated from university, high, and primary schools were determined as
12.5%, 23.3%, and 64.2%, respectively. The number of person in most family
varied from 5 to 8. The 95% of the farmers have preferred sprinkler irrigation
method. The preference of drip irrigation method was 4.7% for high school
graduated farmers. The 89.3% of the farmers defined that irrigation charges
were expensive. The overall result of the study showed that increasing the
education level in farmers contributed sensitivity of farmers for the water
saving irrigation technologies


Abstract Primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD) is a rare autosomal recessive disorder affecting motile cilia. This can lead to neonatal respiratory distress, early onset upper and lower airway infections, laterality abnormalities and sub- or infertility. Although disease progression shows large individual variability, all adult patients eventually develop extensive bronchiectasis. As in cystic fibrosis, early diagnosis and frequent follow-up with microbiological control is the best therapeutic strategy, as other treatment options are lacking. PCD is underdiagnosed and diagnosed late due to clinical unawareness, limited availability of diagnostic tests and difficult interpretation of test results. Diagnosis is currently based on a combination of assessment of ciliary motion and ultrastructure by high-speed video microscopy and electron microscopy, respectively. As nasal nitric oxide is low in almost all PCD patients, these measurements can be used for screening. Although there are 26 PCD genes known so far, the genetic basis of the disease has not been unraveled in an estimated 30–40% of patients. However, the rapid discovery of novel PCD genes in recent years is expected to enable accurate genetic characterization of most patients in the near future. Large-scale use of next-generation sequencing and the availability of large ciliary proteomic and transcriptomic databases accelerate the identification of novel PCD genes, especially those that play a key role in cytoplasmic assembly of ciliary ultrastructural components. These genetic advances are revolutionizing the process of obtaining a molecular diagnosis for PCD as we speak and may ultimately lead to an increased understanding of ciliogenesis and function, providing novel handles for therapeutic interventions in PCD patients.


By focusing on an example of a public social debate on language policy, this article aims at showing the relevant contribution of argument analysis to the understanding of such debates. Argumentative discourse constitutes an essential condition for real democratic practice. Perelman & Olbrechts-Tyteca (1958: 73) point out that the commitment to argumentative practice offers an alternative to the use of violence. The relationship between argumentation and a democratic society is fundamental: argumentation is the substance of democracy, which differs from other social systems in that the only legitimate power is the power of the word. It is free will, which builds on the word alone, that enables us to live together in freedom. An important aspect of democracy, being based on a dialectic ideal, is its uncertain outcome: van Eemeren (2002: 71) characterizes democracy as «institutionalized uncertainty». Thus, insight into the functioning of argumentation contributes significantly to the understanding of democratic processes.


We present a study of the quantum properties of two light fields used in parametric four-wave mixing in a Raman-type atomic system. The system realizes an effective Hamiltonian of beam-splitter-type coupling between the light fields, which allows one to control squeezing and amplitude distribution of the light fields, as well as realizing their entanglement. The scheme can be feasibly applied to engineer the quantum properties of two single-mode light fields in properly chosen input states.


Has the Brighton Declaration produced a New Deal on European human rights in terms of engendering a new and more central role to national legal and political institutions? A greater subsidiarity? Against the backdrop of a systematic exploration of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the articles concludes that the ECtHR is indeed providing more subsidiarity following the Brighton Declaration. It does so by a greater use of the terms "margin of appreciation" and "wide(r) margin," and particularly with regard to two areas of law: Art. 8 on the right to privacy and Art. 35 on access to the Court. However, as the article further demonstrates, this increase in subsidiarity is very uneven across the member states. The old Western member states generally benefit far more from these new directions in the ECtHR's jurisprudence. But contrary to popular belief, vocal critiques of the system are not given more deference according to this analysis. A final more general conclusion follows from these findings, namely that the ECtHR is receptive to political signals and does not operate in isolation from politics as it is often claimed. Although currently merely soft law documents, the Brighton Declaration and associated Protocols have triggered change at the Court in the direction set out in these documents and events. This has theoretical implications for the understanding of the evolution of international courts.


The cranial nerves are an endlessly fascinating family of twelve nerves that have a dramatic impact on our daily lives. A dysfunction of the cranial nerves can cause loss of vision or double vision, loss of smell, poor balance, or loss of muscle function, and can also be an indicator of underlying neurological disorders. The Clinical Anatomy of the Cranial Nerves: The Nerves of "On Old Olympus Towering Top is an engaging and accessible book on the anatomy and clinical importance of these unique nerves. Thetext opens with a brief introduction of key neuroanatomical concepts that relate the clinical and anatomical sections that follow. Additionally, this book uniquely provides a detailed description of the bones of the head and face in order for the reader to understand the routes taken by the cranial nerves through the skull. Chapters then detail each nerve and its unique impact in relationship to our senses, motor function, and health. Vividly illustrated and supported by real-life clinical cases, the book will appeal to anyone wishing to gain a better understanding of the cranial nerves. Merging anatomical and clinical information with intriguing clinical cases, The Clinical Anatomy of the Cranial Nerves: The Nerves of "On Old Olympus Towering Top introduces readers to the anatomy and diverse function of this intriguing family of nerves.


The algebraic operation of approximate roots provides a geometric approximation of the zeros of a polynomial in the complex plane given conditions on their symmetry. A polynomial of degree n corresponds to a cluster of n zeros in the complex plane. The zero of the nth approximate root polynomial locates the gravitational center of this cluster. When the polynomial is of degree mn, with m clusters of n zeros, the centers of the clusters are no longer identified by the zeros of the nth approximate root polynomial in general. The approximation of the centers can be recovered given assumptions about the symmetric distribution of the zeros within each cluster, and given that m > n. Rouch´e's theorem is used to extend this result to relax some of these conditions. This suggests an insight into the geometry of the distribution of zeros within the complex plane hidden within the coefficients of polynomials.


Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the interest in the in utero treatment of twin anemia-polycythemia sequence (TAPS). Methods: The obstetrical and neonatal data on all cases of TAPS followed up in our institution between 2006 and 2013 were reviewed. Statistical analyses were conducted using Bayesian methods. Results: Twenty cases of TAPS were included. Laser therapy or intrauterine transfusion (IUT) was performed on the donor twin in 9 cases. Eleven cases were included in the 'nontreated' group (managed expectantly or diagnosed at birth). The gestational age at diagnosis was lower in the group with treated TAPS [difference (diff) = -22.20 days (-57.13, 14.28), probability (Pr) (diff >0) = 10.6%]. The rate of preterm premature rupture of membranes was higher in the group with treated TAPS [diff = 22.5% (-14, 57), Pr (diff >0) = 89%], but overall mortality was similar. The interval between diagnosis and delivery was longer [diff = 44.37 days (9.41, 77.90), Pr (diff >0) = 99.2%], the TAPS resolution rate was higher [diff = 49.9% (12, 81), Pr (diff >0) = 99.4%], and the neonatal transfusion rate was lower [diff = -30.5% (-60, 0), Pr (diff >0) = 2.6%] in the treated group. Conclusion: In utero treatment for TAPS is associated with a higher resolution rate of TAPS and a longer time between diagnosis and birth, but overall mortality is the same as with expectant management.


Streptococcus equi subspecies equi (S. equi) is the causative agent of strangles, a contagious respiratory disease of horses. Transmission of the bacteria can occur when animals share water sources. Detection of S. equi in water could improve strangles surveillance and move towards eradication of the disease. The aims of this study were to determine the optimal membrane pore size for bacterial retention from an aqueous suspension, to determine the likely dispersion pattern of S. equi contaminated mucus in a water bucket to develop a collection technique to be used by veterinarians, and to find the sensitive range for S. equi detection in water. Samples from the top, middle, and bottom of a five-gallon water bucket were collected by aspiration and swabbing, and streptococci harvested by filtration. Mucus strands remained suspended at the top, middle, and bottom the bucket for over an hour. Membrane filters with pore sizes of 0.45 μm were found to retain all streptococci. After one hour, viable S. equi were obtained predominantly from the top and middle of the bucket. The threshold for detection lies between 10 C.F.U./mL and 0.1 C.F.U./ mL. Membrane filtration of water from the top two thirds of a bucket proved to be the most sensitive sampling technique. However, the technique requires validation in the field.


146 children (mean age 6 years 10 months) were included in the Numeracy Recovery intervention programme. The programme involved working with children who have been identified by their teachers as having problems with arithmetic. These children were assessed on nine components of early numeracy, and received weekly individual intervention (half an hour a week for approximately 30 weeks) in the particular components with which they have been found to have difficulty. Six months after the start of intervention, the children showed significant improvement on three standardised tests. Scores on three components (estimation; derived fact strategies; translation between concrete, numerical and verbal presentations of arithmetic problems) were analysed in relation to one another; to general level of addition performance; to standardised test scores; and to improvements in these scores. Regressions showed few relationships between the components, addition level, and standardised test scores. However, addition level predicted both the initial standardised test scores and improvement in these scores; and derived fact strategy use showed a negative relationship to test improvement. Implications of these findings are discussed.


This article examines the public relations management of communication about genetic engineering in New Zealand. The theme is explored through an analysis of work developed by the consultancy Communication Trumps for, on the one hand, a private company involved in genetic research on fish, and, on the other hand, a government-supported public information campaign about genetic engineering. In relation to the issues management strategies employed by Communication Trumps, the article exemplifies how, by deploying tactics more commonly associated with propaganda and the engineering of consent, public relations can purposively attempt to undermine democratic processes. The article argues that through the attempted sabotage and silencing of the genetic engineering debate in New Zealand, the government, corporations, and the public relations industry combined in an effort to develop genetic engineering technologies while stifling public understanding of the implication of these technologies.


Darani, H. R., M. Kohansal, M. R. Ghorbani and M. Saboohi, 2017. An integrated hydro-economic modeling to evaluate marketing reform policies of agricultural products. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 23 (2): 189–197 Water scarcity is a global concern, particularly in arid and semi-arid. This fact should be considered in decision making and management of water resources and also policy makers should pay attention to the effects of these policies as a crucial criterion. This study was carried out to investigate the effect of different policies of agricultural products marketing network reform on water resources management, especially on the use of groundwater in the Neyshabur basin in Iran. Thus, taking into account the effects of marketing on the supply and demand water, we used hydro-economic (H-E) model. In the economic sector of the H-E model, Regional Positive Mathematical Programming (RPMP) was used to study the effects of various scenarios (marketing network reform policies) on crop patterns. In the hydrologic sector of the H-E model, WEAP was used to analyze and simulate of water resources according to the different crop patterns (results obtained from economic sector). The results showed the network marketing reform leads to change in cropping pattern. The cultivated area of crops with high marketing margin was increased. Also, the cultivated area of alfalfa and cotton decreased in most scenarios. The results of the hydrological model simulations (WEAP model) showed that the change in cropping pattern (due to marketing network reform) made increase water use in Neyshabur basin and increase pressure on groundwater. It seems the marketing reform could not reduce overdraft of water resources. Complementary policies appear to be necessary to gain desirable achievements from marketing network reform and reduce groundwater overdraft.


Stereotypes and self-perceptions are important in
understanding how people develop their self-knowledge and social
identity, become members of groups, and view groups and their
members. While we have some understanding of the stereotypical view
of the physical education teacher, we currently have little knowledge
of how physical education pre-service teachers (students studying a
physical education degree) are stereotyped, and also if there is any
relationship between these stereotypes and how physical education
pre-service teachers perceive themselves. The purpose of this study
was to examine the stereotypes and self-perceptions of physical
education pre-service teachers. The aims were to describe how
physical education pre-service teachers stereotype and perceive
themselves, examine if there are differences in the stereotypes and
self-perceptions between males and females, and to explore if there
were relationships between what the physical education pre-service
teachers believed stereotyped them and how they perceived
themselves. Participants were 250 students (n=120 males, n=130
female) studying a 4-year Bachelor of Education (Physical Education)
degree at a university who completed a questionnaire which contained
10 items about how they viewed physical education pre-service
teachers (stereotypes), and 26 items on how they viewed male physical
education pre-service teachers and female pre-service teachers
(stereotypes) and 26 items on how they view themselves (self-
perceptions). Factor analysis revealed 2 stereotype factors, which
were labelled as Sociable (e.g., socialise, partying, drinking, loud and
outgoing) and Health and Lifestyle (e.g., fit, playing sport and not
smoking). The stereotype of the male physical education pre-service
teacher, comprised two factors: physical, assertive and aggressive
behaviour (e.g., aggressive, dominant, self-confident, and competitive)
and physical and self-presentation factors (muscular, athletic,
physically fit, physically coordinated, and attractive). The stereotype
of female physical education pre-service teachers comprised three
factors: physical appearance and ability (e.g., physically fit, athletic,
able-bodied, attractive, thin, and physically coordinated), aggressive
and assertive behavioural style (e.g., intimidating, unapproachable, and aggressive), and masculine behavioural style (e.g., aggressive, masculine, feminine, muscular and dominant). The self-perception of
male physical education pre-service teachers comprised three factors:
perceived appearance and ability (e.g., athletic, physical fit, thin,
attractive, muscular and pleased with their body), aggressive and
confident behaviour (e.g., intimidating, dominant, show off and
aggressive) and independence and intellect (e.g., independent,
ambitious, self confident and intelligent). The self-perception of female
physical education pre-service teachers comprised three factors:
strong willed behaviour (e.g., ambitious, and dominant), presentation
and appearance (e.g., pleased with their body, attractive, thin and self
confident), and aggressive and dominant behaviour (e.g., aggressive,
intimidating, masculine and show off). There were significant
relationships between the male physical and self-presentation
stereotype factor stereotype and perceived appearance and ability
self-perception factor and between the male physical, assertive and
aggressive behaviour stereotype factor and the male aggressive and
confident behaviours self-perception factor. For females, the
aggressive and dominant behaviour stereotype was related to both the
aggressive and assertive behavioural style self-perception factor and
the masculine behavioural style self-perception factor. It is suggested
that future studies investigate the stereotypes and self-perceptions of
students in schools during the recruitment phase of socialisation, and
the possible influence of the physical education teacher education
programme, faculty leaders, and significant others on the physical
education pre-service teachers' self-perceptions, stereotypes and
socialisation into physical education.


Without warning, the patient sat up in bed and shouted, 'I see everything twice!' And thus Yossarian, the war-weary bomber pilot of the masterful novel, Catch-22, was able to malinger in an Italian hospital even longer while nervous doctors attended to the strange malady of his neighbor. The storied literary diversion may highlight the good fortune of those evading government prosecution of financial crimes in 2011, a year that fulfilled the promise that observers of hedge fund discipline would similarly see things twice. To wit, in May 2011, a Manhattan jury convicted billionaire hedge fund entrepreneur Raj Rajaratnam of fourteen counts of conspiracy and securities fraud. Chief among these convictions was the crime of insider trading. The case punctuated two years of criminal actions based upon insider trading allegations by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who had called Rajaratnam "the modern face of illegal insider trading." Perhaps more significantly, five months later, Judge Richard J. Holwell sentenced Rajaratnam to eleven years in prison, in handing down the harshest sentence ever in such a case. The Rajaratnam trial was the climax to a prolonged investigation that resulted in the conviction of over two dozen hedge fund workers and public company/financial firm employees for their roles in a $50 million scheme. The case also emphasized the unforgiving nature of securities fraud accusations where those who should know better (for example, attorneys) were concerned, as lawyers ensnared in the net cast at the fallen Galleon Management, LP ("Galleon") received consistently glaring prison sentences. Further, the Rajaratnam conviction seemingly reverberated through the courts, leading to strict interpretations of procedural rules attending unrelated insider trading casesBut the celebrated conviction failed to end the parallel U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC" or the "Commission") investigation, litigation, or its pursuit of both fine and disgorgement. Thus, while commentators accurately noted that the use of Department of Justice ("DOJ") wiretaps changed the nature of both the game and the results for Wall Street's illegal players, receiving less attention is the delaying effect the trial had — both on clarifying insider trading law and questioning the unchecked use of government resources. While no one could quibble with the efficiency of the DOJ's results, this Article seeks to reveal their equally significant effects on the government's ongoing crusade against insider trading. Born via an administrative decision, decades after the adoption of the securities laws themselves, the uniquely American insider trading prohibition (and the attendant efforts of its chief enforcer) became perhaps a little more unique and problematic with the U.S. Attorney's 2011 conviction of Rajaratnam.


Classification for very large datasets has many practical applications in data mining. Techniques such as discretization and dataset sampling can be used to scale up decision tree classifiers to large datasets. Unfortunately, both of these techniques can cause a significant loss in accuracy. We present a novel decision tree classifier called CLOUDS, which samples the splitting points for numeric attributes followed by an estimation step to narrow the search space of the best split. CLOUDS reduces computation and I/O complexity substantially compared to state of the art classifiers, while maintaining the quality of the generated trees in terms of accuracy and tree size. We provide experimental results with a number of real and synthetic datasets.


Current data and models for Mount St. Helens volcano (Washington, United States) suggest relatively rapid transport from magma genesis to eruption, with no evidence for protracted storage or recycling of magmas. However, we show here that complex zircon age populations extending back hundreds of thousands of years from eruption age indicate that magmas regularly stall in the crust, cool and crystallize beneath the volcano, and are then rejuvenated and incorporated by hotter, young magmas on their way to the surface. Estimated dissolution times suggest that entrained zircon generally resided in rejuvenating magmas for no more than about a century. Zircon elemental compositions refl ect the increasing infl uence of mafi c input into the system through time, recording growth from hotter, less evolved magmas tens of thousands of years prior to the appearance of mafi c magmas at the surface, or changes in whole-rock geochemistry and petrology, and providing a new, time-correlated record of this evolution independent of the eruption history. Zircon data thus reveal the history of the hidden, long-lived intrusive portion of the Mount St. Helens system, where melt and crystals are stored for as long as hundreds of thousands of years and interact with fresh infl uxes of magmas that traverse the intrusive reservoir before erupting.


Seoul is one of the most connected and one of the fastest cities in the world when it comes to transformation. Like any contemporary city, Seoul allows people to abandon the scale conception imposed by urbanism, and thanks to its equipment of connection tools, it allows us to construct identities through a complex process, in which both the controversy and disparity of Korean culture are introduced as building values. This is how the "Bang" is born; one of the manifestations of hybrid public spaces, domestic but at the same time commercial, that serves as an extension of the private space. A useful took from which to equip the ways of building society. Bangs exist thanks to the multiple geographic, technological and social conjunctures, connecting the population, technology and space. The Bang as a mediation model; whose reading and reassembly will make it a useful tool for the construction of the contemporary city.


The purpose of this bachelor thesis is to seek knowledge about how children and their parents use the children's section in a newly built library, and what function it has for its users. We also want to seek knowledge about how the children's section is seen as a meeting place by the parents.Our research questions are: How is the children's section at the public library of Lidkoping being used as a meeting space, performative space, inspiration space and learning space? What are the functions of the children's section at the public library of Lidkoping for families with children? Do the parents see the children's section as a meeting place, then in which way?The theoretical approach is based on The Four Space Model by Henrik Jochumsen, Casper Hvenegaard Rasmussen and Dorte Skot-Hansen. We used qualitative interviews and non-participant observations to answer our questions. The results show that the library is mostly being used for reading, playing and to consort within the family. The children's section functions as an entrance to books and reading, and it also has a function as a place where you spend time with your family. We discovered that half of the parents in our study did see the children's section as a meeting place because they thought it is a good place to meet and consort.


Background The different hypotheses proposed to explain positive species richness–productivity relationships, i.e. selection effect and complementarity effect, imply that plant functional characteristics are at the core of a mechanistic understanding of biodiversity effects. Methodology/Principal Findings We used two community-wide measures of plant functional composition, (1) community-weighted means of trait values (CWM) and (2) functional trait diversity based on Rao's quadratic diversity (FDQ) to predict biomass production and measures of biodiversity effects in experimental grasslands (Jena Experiment) with different species richness (2, 4, 8, 16 and 60) and different functional group number and composition (1 to 4; legumes, grasses, small herbs, tall herbs) four years after establishment. Functional trait composition had a larger predictive power for community biomass and measures of biodiversitity effects (40–82% of explained variation) than species richness per se (<1–13% of explained variation). CWM explained a larger amount of variation in community biomass (80%) and net biodiversity effects (70%) than FDQ (36 and 38% of explained variation respectively). FDQ explained similar proportions of variation in complementarity effects (24%, positive relationship) and selection effects (28%, negative relationship) as CWM (27% of explained variation for both complementarity and selection effects), but for all response variables the combination of CWM and FDQ led to significant model improvement compared to a separate consideration of different components of functional trait composition. Effects of FDQ were mainly attributable to diversity in nutrient acquisition and life-history strategies. The large spectrum of traits contributing to positive effects of CWM on biomass production and net biodiversity effects indicated that effects of dominant species were associated with different trait combinations. Conclusions/Significance Our results suggest that the identification of relevant traits and the relative impacts of functional identity of dominant species and functional diversity are essential for a mechanistic understanding of the role of plant diversity for ecosystem processes such as aboveground biomass production.


The administration of musk extract, that is, ingredients obtained by extraction of the liquid secreted from the preputial gland or resulting grains of the male musk deer (eg, Moschus moschiferus), has been recommended in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) applications and was listed in the Japanese pharmacopoeia for various indications requiring cardiovascular stimulation, anti-inflammatory medication or androgenic hormone therapy. Numerous steroidal components including cholesterol, 5α-androstane-3,17-dione, 5β-androstane-3,17-dione, androsterone, etiocholanolone, epiandrosterone, 3β-hydroxy-androst-5-en-17-one, androst-4-ene-3,17-dione and the corresponding urea adduct 3α-ureido-androst-4-en-17-one were characterised as natural ingredients of musk over several decades, implicating an issue concerning doping controls if used for the treatment of elite athletes. In the present study, the impact of musk extract administration on sports drug testing results of five females competing in an international sporting event is reported. In the course of routine doping controls, adverse analytical findings concerning the athletes' steroid profile, corroborated by isotope-ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS) data, were obtained. The athletes' medical advisors admitted the prescription of TCM-based musk pod preparations and provided musk pod samples for comparison purposes to clarify the antidoping rule violation. Steroid profiles, IRMS results, literature data and a musk sample obtained from a living musk deer of a local zoo conclusively demonstrated the use of musk pod extracts in all cases which, however, represented a doping offence as prohibited anabolic–androgenic steroids were administered.


In 1995, in United States v. Lopez, the Supreme Court for the first time in five decades struck down a statute enacted by Congress under the Commerce Clause. In holding the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 unconstitutional, the Court established, that Congress' authority under the Commerce Clause is subject to outer limits, and that the Supreme Court will strike down federal statutes that obliterate the distinction between what is national and what is local. This Note reviews the Court's holding in Lopez, and argues in favor of the adoption of a two-step approach as the proper judicial inquiry regarding jurisdictional challenges to the Hobbs Act. The adoption of this two-step approach will ensure a return to the limited application of the Hobbs Act intended by Congress and will preserve our government's first principle—that the federal government is one of limited, enumerated powers.


Libraries, especially those which are universally accessible and funded by the state, have been seen as important means to democratize access to knowledge, and have gained renewed relevance in the information age as agents through which the digital divide can be addressed, particularly in developing countries. India's system of statutorily established libraries has seen considerable State attention since independence through policy-making, legislation and financial investment through the successive Five Year Plans aimed at ameliorating infrastructure. Nevertheless, much still remains to be achieved. Creating the legal infrastructure as well as the technological edifice for an effective, sustainable and relevant system of public and national libraries, is crucial for ensuring that these institutions are capable of preserving and sharing content (whether it is books, art or audio and/or visual content) effectively. This paper examines the amended Indian Copyright Act, 1957 for its compatibility with the project of modernizing our libraries, and attempts to suggest how the vacuum should be filled in.


Words & Pictures explores three fascinating examples of relationships between artists and writers: the illustrations of Paradise Lost and Pilgrim's Progress; Hogarth and Fielding, a writer and artist dealing with common material; Wordsworth and Thomas Bewick, a poet and engraver working separately, but imbued with the spirit of their age. A brief coda turns to a fourth kind of relationship, the writers and artists who collaborate from the start, beginning with Dickens and Phiz. Illustrated throughout with a wide variety of examples, this is a book to pore over and enjoy. At turns moving and comic, this book illuminates a brilliant poet, an engraver, a writer and an artist, it touches on a peculiarly British tradition of community and defiance of authority, unmasking pretension and celebrating energy and warmth. The visions it considers link daily life to the universal, the passionate and the sublime. Jenny Uglow is the award-winning author of Elizabeth Gaskell (winner of the Portico Prize), Nature's Engraver, which won the National Arts Writers Award, and A Gambling Man, which was shortlisted for the 2010 Samuel Johnson Prize and most recently In These Times. "Perhaps future biographies (of requisite quality) celebrating a certain kind of unshowy Georgian figure could be called "Uglow's Lives" after the woman who has made the genre her own." (Sunday Telegraph).


We show that complete population inversion can be obtained in a micromaser even in the presence of large detuning. This spectacular effect is due to nonadiabatic transitions induced in the atomic system when the atom crosses the cavity. This effect is shown to depend strongly on the shape of the cavity mode and the axial atomic position.


Although conventional reinforced concrete (RC) is the most globally used building material; however, its detrimental structural characteristics such as brittle failure mechanism in tension need to be improved. Discrete and short steel fibers (SFs) can be added into the concrete mix to improve its brittleness. The effects of the addition of optimum percentage of SFs on flexural behavior of RC beams have been investigated in this paper. In this study, the optimum percentage of hooked-end SFs with the dimensions of 0.75 mm in diameter and 50 mm in length are added in RC beams with two different classes of concrete (i.e. two different compressive strengths of 30MPa (C30) and 50MPa (C50)). In order to determine the optimum percentage of SFs added to the concrete mix, 15 prisms and 30 cubes with 5 different percentages of SFs (i.e. 0%v/v, 0.5%v/v, 1%v/v, 1.5%v/v, and 2%v/v) from both C30 and C50 classes of concrete have been tested. Based on the results of the flexural strength and compressive strength tests, it is found that the optimum value is 1% by volume (i.e. 78.5 kg/m 3 ) for the specific type of fiber used in this study. Subsequently, to investigate the flexural behavior of steel fiber added RC (SFARC) beams compared to conventional RC beams with no SFs, two RC beams with the dimensions of 170 mm in height, 120 mm in width, and 2400 mm in length, with the SF percentages of 0 and 1%v/v and both having exactly the same steel reinforcement were tested under flexure using a four-point loading test setup for both C30 and C50 classes of concrete. The experimental results show that the SFARC beams with 1% by volume of the SFs have higher first cracking strength, ultimate flexural strength, stiffness, and ductility compared to that of the conventional RC beams with no SFs. Furthermore, the addition of the SFs has more effects on the RC beams with higher compressive strength (50 MPa) compared to lower concrete grade (30 MPa).


It is now virtually a dogma among contemporary tort scholars that the non-recovery of pure economic loss in a variety of situations may be justified, if at all, only as a special, policy-driven rule that limits the usual operation of general negligence principles, in particular the foreseeability doctrine. This familiar view in turn rests on a further assumption as to the underlying conception of negligence in which the central concept is the standard of care, with the notion of duty being a matter of foreseeability and playing at most a subsidiary and instrumental role. My aim has been to challenge these views through a systematic reconsideration of the rationale for the denial of so-called relational economic loss claims – the longest standing category of non-recoverable pure economic loss. Drawing on the leading cases, I argue that the prevailing policy-driven explanation not only fails to account for core instances of the law but in fact obscures the basis for non-recovery as set out in the decisions. A completely different rationale for non-recovery emerges: one that is rights-based and that has nothing to do with foreseeability, limitations on foreseeability or the usual policy concerns which writers endorse and dispute. Not only does this rationale account for this area of negligence; it also suggests a larger conception of negligence which affirms the autonomy and priority of duty and is both rights-based and relational, in contrast to the dominant model widely assumed by scholars. I argue that it is this alternative conception that not only underlies the law's treatment of relational economic loss but shows this to be fully consonant with the very same principles of negligence that govern physical loss.


Early life stages of tuna species were investigated along the northern coasts of Tunisia in the summer of 2010, from 7 to 14 July. A total of 74 stations, distributed on a regular grid, were sampled. Larvae of five tuna species were identified: the Atlantic bluefin tuna, the bullet tuna, the Atlantic black skipjack, the Atlantic bonito and the albacore tuna. Larval distribution patterns show that Atlantic bluefin tuna and albacore tuna usually spawn in offshore oligotrophic waters and Atlantic black skipjack larvae on the continental shelf. The widespread distribution of bullet tuna larvae, suggests that it spawns on the entire continental shelf and over the shelf break. The results from the quotient analysis carried out to characterize the spawning habitat of each species, show that the input of recent surface Atlantic water (AW) masses play a key role in the spawning strategy of tuna species, particularly in the case of the Atlantic bluefin tuna, whose larvae were mainly caught in the mixed waters resulting from the interaction between recent AW and resident AW, as demonstrated by their preference for salinity values between 36.9 and 37.4.


ABSTRACT Since 1997 ageing research in the United Kingdom (UK) has been promoted through a series of research council special programmes with an emphasis on multi-disciplinary, collaborative, user-focused research. There has been notable progress and substantial setbacks, especially a major lull in activity, and strong disciplinary biases in later programmes. Skills, expertise and influence on policy and practice, developed through early programmes, have been lost. Two philosophies of programme management have emerged: a top-down approach to the development of priorities and activities, largely reflecting a linear model of research, development and diffusion; and, a bottom-up approach strongly influenced by the priorities of users including older people, which has emphasised the role of problem-solving and social interaction between researchers and users. A comparison of these two philosophies highlights factors which contribute to successful programme implementation and valuable outcomes for society at large. These emphasise: involvement of all potential users; encouragement of champions; supporting researchers at all stages in their careers; transparency in communicating intent, progress and achievements; varied and robust knowledge transfer; and, above all else, understanding the challenges faced by individuals as they grow older. Future programmes would be assured of making significant contributions to supporting older people and an ageing society if those commissioning the programmes recognised the importance of these factors and accepted the consequent challenges for the organisation of the programmes.


Emphasizing the significant socio-demographic changes of the last decades (family transformation and ageing of modern societies), the capability of family to perform some of its essential functions (i.e., care for the elderly) and to maintain solidarity between generations is being questionned both in academic and social policy discourse. Statistical and socio-demographic research data show that the processes related with deinstitutionalisation of a family and a rapid increase in the number of elderly people are observed in Lithuania as well. This indicates a relevance of the questions raised by Western sociologists regarding the fragmentation of social and personal ties and modification of relationships between generations (both "within" and "outside" a family) to the national context. The article explores the peculiarities of intergenerational communication in Lithuanian families, aiming to reveal the frequency of contact between parents and children, patterns of their interaction and emotional closeness—the dimensions that are crusial to an understanding of the intergenerational solidarity, exchange and support in a family. Analysis is based on the data of questionnaire survey of the Lithuanian population representing four age cohorts (persons born in 1950-1955, 1960-1965, 1970-1975 and 1980-1985, N=2000), carried out in 2011-2012. The methodology of conducted quantitative research is discussed in the first chapter; the second chapter presents analysis of empirical data. Conducted research provides evidence of maintenance of regular communication between respondents and their children/parents living apart, and reveals a more active women's role in interaction. Personal relationships are viewed commonly through emotional prism and are given, in overall, high evalution, thus indicating the strong bonds between generations in Lithuanian families.


Recent and proposed fiscal policies-the tax cuts, proposals to make them permanent, and the medicare prescription drug bill-will hurt economic prospects for most of today's children and all future generations. The programs will leave economic growth largely unchanged, but will redistribute resources from future to current generations and, within each generation, from low- and middle-income families toward an affluent minority. These effects exacerbate the impact of underlying federal budget trends and processes that will place significant, imminent pressure on funding for children's programs. An expanded program of investments in children is both feasible and desirable. [© Brookings Institution]


Abstract This Article comparatively analyses how the prohibition of refoulement is interpreted by United Nations Treaty Bodies (UNTBs) in their individual decision-making, where we suggest they act as "soft courts." It asks whether UNTBs break ranks with or follow the interpretations of non-refoulement of the European Court of Human Rights. This investigation is warranted because non-refoulement is the single most salient issue that has attracted individual views from UNTBs since 1990. Moreover, our European focus is warranted as nearly half of the cases concern states that are also parties to the European Convention on Human Rights. Based on a multi-dimensional analysis of non-refoulement across an original dataset of over 500 UNTB non-refoulement cases, decided between 1990–2020, as well as pertinent UNTB General Comments, the Article finds that whilst UNTBs, at times, do adopt a more progressive position than their "harder" regional counterpart, there are also instances where they closely follow the interpretations of the European Court of Human Rights and, on occasion, adopt a more restrictive position. This analysis complicates the view that soft courts are likely to be more progressive interpreters than hard courts. It further shows that variations in the interpretation of non-refoulement in a crowded field of international interpreters present risks for evasion of accountability, whereby domestic authorities in Europe may favor the more convenient interpretation, particularly in environments hostile to non-refoulement.


ABSTRACT The development of novel magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) with satisfactory biocompatibility for biomedical applications has been the subject of extensive exploration over the past two decades. In this work, we synthesized superparamagnetic iron oxide MNPs coated with polystyrene sulfonic acid (PSS-MNPs) and with a conventional co-precipitation method. The core size and hydrodynamic diameter of the PSS-MNPs were determined as 8–18 nm and 50–200 nm with a transmission electron microscopy and dynamic light scattering, respectively. The saturation magnetization of the particles was measured as 60 emu g−1 with a superconducting quantum-interference-device magnetometer. The PSS content in the PSS-MNPs was 17% of the entire PSS-MNPs according to thermogravimetric analysis. Fourier-transform infrared spectra were recorded to detect the presence of SO3 − groups, which confirmed a successful PSS coating. The structural properties of the PSS-MNPs, including the crystalline lattice, composition and phases, were characterized with an X-ray powder diffractometer and 3D nanometer-scale Raman microspectrometer. MTT assay and Prussian-blue staining showed that, although PSS-MNPs caused no cytotoxicity in both NIH-3T3 mouse fibroblasts and SK-HEP1 human liver-cancer cells up to 1000 μg mL−1, SK-HEP1 cells exhibited significantly greater uptake of PSS-MNPs than NIH-3T3 cells. The low cytotoxicity and high biocompatibility of PSS-MNPs in human cancer cells demonstrated in the present work might have prospective applications for drug delivery. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT


Strawberry and oilseed rape are economically important and co-flowering insect-pollinated crops that may affect each other via shared pollinators. One potential negative effect of pollinator sharing is stigma clogging, i.e. that pollen from one plant species covers the stigma and prevents pollination in the other. We tested if application of oilseed rape pollen on strawberry receptacles reduces pollination with subsequent effects on strawberry weight, number of malformations and ripening time. We simulated real pollination situations by using dead bees mounted on toothpicks to mimic flower-visitation of foraging bees. Six strawberry flowers, usually on different plant individuals, were hand-pollinated sequentially per simulated foraging bout. In half of these foraging bouts, we started with an oilseed rape flower, and in those foraging bouts the proportion oilseed rape pollen was expected to decline with increasing number of visited strawberry flowers. Oilseed rape pollen had no effect on any of the tested variables. Increasing number of previously visited strawberry flowers in the simulated foraging bout enhanced the number of developed achenes, but this was marginally non-significant when accounting for the total number of achenes. Strawberry weight increased and ripening time decreased with increasing number of pollinated achenes, whereas none of the tested factors had any effect on the number of malformations. Our results have implications for strawberry farmers, because shortened ripening time could reduce the risk of yield loss from pests, diseases and unfavourable weather conditions. In addition, we show that oilseed rape pollen is unlikely to disturb pollination success of strawberry flowers.


Through window displays, newspapers, soap operas, gay bars, and other public culture venues, Chinese citizens are negotiating what it means to be cosmopolitan citizens of the world, with appropriate needs, aspirations, and longings. Lisa Rofel argues that the creation of such "desiring subjects" is at the core of China's contingent, piece-by-piece reconfiguration of its relationship to a post-socialist world. In a study at once ethnographic, historical, and theoretical, she contends that neoliberal subjectivities are created through the production of various desires—material, sexual, and affective—and that it is largely through their engagements with public culture that people in China are imagining and practicing appropriate desires for the post-Mao era.

Drawing on her research over the past two decades among urban residents and rural migrants in Hangzhou and Beijing, Rofel analyzes the meanings that individuals attach to various public cultural phenomena and what their interpretations say about their understandings of post-socialist China and their roles within it. She locates the first broad-based public debate about post-Mao social changes in the passionate dialogues about the popular 1991 television soap opera Yearnings . She describes how the emergence of gay identities and practices in China reveals connections to a transnational network of lesbians and gay men at the same time that it brings urban/rural and class divisions to the fore. The 1999–2001 negotiations over China's entry into the World Trade Organization; a controversial women's museum; the ways that young single women portray their longings in relation to the privations they imagine their mothers experienced; adjudications of the limits of self-interest in court cases related to homoerotic desire, intellectual property, and consumer fraud—Rofel reveals all of these as sites where desiring subjects come into being.


Many commonly used culvert rehabilitation technologies entail the use of a resin or coating that cures to form a rigid liner within the damaged culvert. However, the potential environmental impacts of leaching or release of contaminants during normal installation practices have not been well studied. Evaluations of previous culvert repair operations by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) were conducted for conventional (styrene-based) cured-in-place pipe and fold and form repair technologies. The study reported herein included an evaluation of two additional technologies available for use by VDOT: a polymer-enhanced cement mortar (or cementitious) spray-on liner and a polyurea spray-on liner. To evaluate the potential for these lining technologies to impact water quality, installations were monitored up to 49 days. Three water quality tests were conducted for each installation, and water samples were analyzed for water quality indicators and constituents listed in material safety data sheets. Tests included a water flow simulation with low dilution potential; an immersion test to simulate a standing water scenario; and a laboratory leaching test. Results were then compared against established regulatory standards and published toxicity criteria for aquatic species. For the cementitious spray-on liner evaluated, pH and alkalinity exceeded specified Virginia water standards in laboratory tests but pH and other evaluated compounds were within the acceptable range in water flow and immersion tests. For the polyurea spray-on liner evaluated, elevated water quality indicators (i.e., biochemical oxygen demand, chemical oxygen demand, total organic carbon, and total nitrogen) in laboratory tests suggested that contaminants were released from the polyurea liner, particularly during its initial contact with water, but water quality impacts were not detected in the other tests. Water flow, dilution, and volatilization appear to play an important role in reducing water quality impacts from contaminant leaching. The study recommends that VDOT specifications include protective controls for spray-on liners to prevent exceeding water quality standards or toxicity thresholds for aquatic species in receiving waters with low flows and little dilution potential.


Purpose: The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence of laryngeal involvement in RA patients, and thus, to increase the awareness of this condition among rheumatologists and otolaryngologists.
Method: A total of 82 subjects with non-smoker, consisting of 42 patients with RA and 40 non-RA patients in the control group, were enrolled in this study. The laryngeal symptoms such as dysphonia, vocal fatigue, foreign body sensation, coughing, dryness, dyspnea, and stridor were assessed in all patients. These patients were screened for laryngeal abnormalities using flexible Nasopharyngolaryngoscope (NFL).
Results: The mean age was 51.7 ± 10.5 years in RA group and 53.8 ± 10.1 years in control group. Concerning laryngeal symptoms, 61.9% patients reported at least one symptom in RA group, 37.5% in the control group. There was a statistically significant difference in the prevalence of coughing, dryness, foreign body sensation and dsypnea among patients with RA versus controls (respectively 42.9% vs. 17.5%, 31% vs. 2.5%, 28.6% vs. 7.5%, 9.5% vs. 0%). The prevalence of NFL alterations was 57.1% in RA patients and 30% in the control group. In RA group, the arytenoid and interarytenoid inflammation were higher compared with control (respectively 50% vs. 12.5%, 54.8% vs. 22.5%).
Discussion: The laryngeal involvement in RA is very common and critical because it can lead to lifethreatening conditions such as airway obstruction. Therefore, early diagnosis has utmost important. We suggest that both the rheumatologists and the otolaryngologists should certainly evaluate the laryngeal symptoms, and moreover, they should get their patients laryngoscopic examinations are made periodically.


BACKGROUND
Many healthcare professionals performing spirometry in primary care have had less than half a day's training in spirometry practice, and the validity of the test results is questionable. Longer training periods, with or without follow-up training, may improve test validity.

OBJECTIVE
To determine if a 14-hour spirometry training course provides sufficient skill to produce valid results, and if follow-up training improves test validity.

METHODS
Nurses and physiotherapists from rural health facilities chosen by their local area health service undertook a 14-hour spirometry course facilitated by respiratory scientists with at least 5 years experience. Participants consented to on-site reviews at 5, 7, and 9 months after the course. Participants were assessed for adherence to American Thoracic Society (ATS) acceptability and repeatability criteria by undertaking an assessment of spirometry on a naïve subject and a retrospective review of a selection of spirometry results at each site at each visit. Further education was provided following the reviews at 5 and 7 months.

RESULTS
Fifteen participants from 10 sites were available for all 3 visits. The prospective phase revealed poor adherence to ATS criteria at 5 months, though this improved over the study period with follow-up training (40% at 5 months, 67% at 7 months, 87% at 9 months). The retrospective review showed that 37%, 60%, and 58% of the tests at 5, 7, and 9 months, respectively, met the ATS criteria and had correctly selected the best test.

CONCLUSION
A 14-hour spirometry training course alone does not provide sufficient skill to perform spirometry to ATS criteria, and short-term follow-up is an essential component for improving test validity.


In 2005, the ACS Green Chemistry Institute (GCI) and the global pharmaceutical corporations developed the ACS GCI Pharmaceutical Roundtable to encourage the integration of green chemistry and green engineering into the pharmaceutical industry. The Roundtable has developed a list of key research areas. The purpose of this perspective is to summarise how that list was agreed, provide an assessment of the current state of the art in those areas and to highlight areas for future improvement.


Sound and noise are as old as humanity itself. They have accompanied civilization, evolution, and development for centuries. Music and speech represent not only the key elements of human life but also unpleasant feelings of noise that have always been an integral part of human existence. As industrial development has required more energy, powerful machinery, and equipment, there have been still noisier machines. Traffic has grown quickly due to the number and speed of vehicles. For that reason, an acoustic camera is used for the dynamic visualization of machinery and equipment noise as it analyses the sources of noise in details. Subsequently, qualified measures are introduced based on the results of the analysis. The paper considers launching another application. According to the proposed methodology, its use in identifying machinery and equipment failures and their maintenance is proved. The experiment was performed on a four-wheel lawn mower. The primary focus was on the identification of failures using an acoustic camera. The previous method allowed to quickly, precisely and efficiently identifying the failures in two out of five tested machines.


This article surveys the evolution of the international arms market since the end of the Cold War. It begins with the policy context, the choices made by the national Ministries of Defence and the constraints they faced. It then looks at the choices available to the arms producers: convert, diversify, divest, co-operate or concentrate. These choices, by governments and firms, produced a large increase in the degree of concentration. The share of the five largest firms increased from just over 20% in 1990 to 45% in 1998, and it has increased further since then. Finally, the author looks at the economic adjustment in response to these shocks.


In recent years concerns over dwindling reserves of ground water and overloaded or costly sewage treatment plants has generated much interest in the reuse or recycling of greywater. Re-use of greywater offers several advantages including a reduction in the demand on potable water supplies. Despite the prevalent direct reuse of greywater, especially in water scarce areas, its quality is not well documented. This study determined the physico-chemical and microbial quality of greywater produced by households in Homa Bay town. Most of greywater generated had a higher electrical conductivity and salinity and lower concentration of dissolved oxygen. Greywater pH values varied widely but were mostly higher than that of clean water. Biological oxygen demand varied widely (410-6250 mg L -1 ). Total coliform (TC) counts in greywater samples ranged from 1.3 to 7.6 colony forming units (CFU)/ 100 mL while fecal coliform (FC) counts varied between 3000 and 7.4 million CFU/ 100 mL. Field observations showed that the variation in TC and FC counts resulted from differences in the level of households' personal hygiene, difference in the intensity of greywater reuse and duration of storage. Among the potentially pathogenic bacteria investigated, Salmonella was the most frequent, occurring in 31% of all the greywater samples collected. Vibrio occurred in the least number of samples (9%). The study concludes that greywater produced is most likely to be contaminated by pathogenic bacteria and should therefore be disinfected prior to reuse.


As the rapidly expanding literature on post-1989 developments of former Soviet-type societies notes it unequivocally, one of the most disturbing accompanying features of post-Communist transformation has been the steady increase of poverty in all Central-European countries. Although the actual size of social groups which have been hit by a significant decline of their living standards can be estimated with great difficulties, the socio-pshyhological shock that the remarkable jump in the number of those living amid unbearable conditions has generated is acknowledged even by the most radical protagonists of rapid marketization.
Despite the shock and frustration that has been born out of the paintful experiences of "economic adjustmen" in broad layers of these societies, the boom of poverty has not been put on the list of the most burning socio-political issues in any of the countries under concern. Regarding Hungary, one can formulate this statement even in a sharper manner: literally in the moment of birth of the new democratic order, the issue of poverty was actually removed from the political agenda.
However, the examination of the background of the phenomenon leads the author to express doubt over the view that the poverty in Hungary is simple the unavoidable concomitant of the economic difficulties and the transformation.


To convey authority in a document, people choose specific typefaces (or fonts). Studies find that repeating a message makes it more persuasive, and that different typefaces lead to different associations. Also, statements are more memorable when written in harder-to-read typefaces; yet more believable for easier-to-read ones. In each of the two present experiments, surveys measuring authoritarianism were written in various typefaces. The first experiment sought evaluations of groups such as the army and police. The second experiment included subject matters like illegal wiretapping by the F.B.I. The results suggested participants had more positive views for authoritarian groups and more likely supported morally questionable actions when the surveys were written in an easy-to-read typeface.


Access control is one the main security mechanisms for software applications. It ensures that all accesses conform to a predefined access control policy. It is important to check that the access control policy is well implemented in the system. When following an MDD methodology it may be necessary to check this early during the development lifecycle, namely when modeling the application. This paper tackles the issue of verifying access control policies in statecharts. The approach is based on the transformation of a statechart into an Algebraic Petri net to enable checking access control policies and identifying potential inconsistencies with an OrBAC set of access control policies. Our method allows locating the part of the statechart that is causing the problem. The approach has been successfully applied to a Library Management System. Based on our proposal a tool for performing the transformation and localization of errors in the statechart has been implemented.


This book shows how the Age of Reason relied on emotion.At the outset of the eighteenth century, many British Americans accepted the notion that virtuous sociable feelings occurred primarily among the genteel, while sinful and selfish passions remained the reflexive emotions of the masses, from lower-class whites to Indians to enslaved Africans. Yet by 1776 radicals would propose a new universal model of human nature that attributed the same feelings and passions to all humankind and made common emotions the basis of natural rights. In "Passion Is the Gale", Nicole Eustace describes the promise and the problems of this crucial social and political transition by charting changes in emotional expression among countless ordinary men and women of British America.From Pennsylvania newspapers, pamphlets, sermons, correspondence, commonplace books, and literary texts, Eustace identifies the explicit vocabulary of emotion as a medium of human exchange. Alternating between explorations of particular emotions in daily social interactions and assessments of emotional rhetoric's functions in specific moments of historical crisis (from the Seven Years War to the rise of the patriot movement), she makes a convincing case for the pivotal role of emotion in reshaping power relations and reordering society in the critical decades leading up to the Revolution. As Eustace demonstrates, passion was the gale that impelled Anglo-Americans forward to declare their independence - collectively at first, and then, finally, as individuals.


Infrared spectroscopy of ices in interstellar dense molecular clouds has shown that they contain a variety of simple molecules, as well as aromatic hydrocarbons. While in these clouds, these ices are processed by ultraviolet light and cosmic rays. High vacuum, UV irradiation laboratory simulations conducted using various realistic approx. 10 K interstellar mixed-molecular ice analogs, both with and without polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), have been carried out in NASA-Ames' Astrochemistry Laboratory. Upon warming, these irradiated ices are found to produce refractory organic residues. These residues have been analyzed using a variety of techniques, including HPLC and laser desorption mass spectrometry, and they have been shown to contain a variety of complex organic compounds. Several of these compounds may be of prebiotic significance. In particular, we will discuss the detection of quinones (substituted PAHs that are used by living systems for electron transport) and amphiphiles (molecules that self-assemble to form membranes). Laboratory simulations have also demonstrated that the organic products can show isotopic enrichments in D that provide clues for the mechanisms of their formation. Similar compounds and D enrichments are seen in the organics found in primitive meteorites, suggesting a direct link between interstellar chemistry and the delivery of organics to newly formed planets.


This paper specifies a new convenient algorithm to construct policy projections conditional on alternative anticipated policy-rate paths in linearized dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models, such as Ramses, the Riksbank's main DSGE model. Such projections with anticipated policy-rate paths correspond to situations where the central bank transparently announces that it, conditional on current information, plans to implement a particular policy-rate path and where this announced plan for the policy rate is believed and then anticipated by the private sector. The main idea of the algorithm is to include among the predetermined variables (the "state" of the economy) the vector of nonzero means of future shocks to a given policy rule that is required to satisfy the given anticipated policy-rate path.


Abstract Low oxygen fugacity (fO2) in the lunar interior (one log unit below the iron-wüstite buffer [IW-1]) offers the possibility that stable Fe-metal and sulfide phases exist as restites within lunar mare basalt source regions. Metal and sulfide phases have high metal-melt and sulfide-melt partition coefficients for chalcophile, siderophile (>100), and highly siderophile elements (>>100 000; HSE: Os, Ir, Ru, Rh, Pt, Pd, Re, Au). If these phases are residual after mare basalt extraction, they would be expected to retain significant quantities of these elements, likely generating non-chondritic HSE inter-element ratios, including Re/Os in the silicate magma. If such phases were present, then the estimated HSE abundances of the bulk silicate moon (BSM) would be proportionally higher than current estimates (0.00023 ± 2 × CI chondrite), and perhaps closer to the bulk silicate earth (BSE) estimate (0.009 ± 2 × CI chondrite). Here I show that relationships between elements of similar incompatibility but with siderophile (W), chalcophile (Cu), and lithophile tendencies (Th, U, Yb) do not deviate from expected trends generated by magmatic differentiation during cooling and crystallization of mare basalts. These results, combined with chondrite-relative HSE abundances and near-chondritic measured 187Os/188Os compositions of primitive high-MgO mare basalts, imply that lunar mantle melts were generated from residual metal- and sulfide-free sources, or experienced complete exhaustion of metal and sulfides during partial melt extraction. Evidence for the loss of moderately volatile elements during lunar formation and early differentiation indicates that the BSM is >4 to 10 times more depleted in S than BSE. Because of an S-depleted BSM, mare basalt melts are unlikely to have reached S saturation, even if sulfide concentration at sulfide saturation (SCSS) was lowered relative to terrestrial values due to low lunar fO2. In the absence of residual sulfide or metal, resultant partial melt models indicate that a lunar mantle source with 25 to 75 μg/g S and high sulfide-melt partition coefficients can account for the chondritic-relative abundances of the HSE in mare basalts from a BSM that experienced <0.02% by mass of late accretion.


This article considers what we can and cannot learn from objects in texts. As its chief example, it takes Peggotty's workbox in Charles Dickens's David Copperfield and, through this particular object in a particular text, thinks about how far it is legitimate to "read" cultural-social-historical meanings back into a text, and how far objects in texts operate differently than objects in the world. It then reads the workbox as a marker of memory in the novel, challenging Nicholas Dames's "associationist" reading of David Copperfield in his Amensiac Selves. The essay ends by considering some of the problems and potentials of "thing theory" in literary studies.


There is a notable lack of effective treatments and therapies available for the treatment of existential anxiety. There are, however, a number of avenues worthy of more attention, all experiential or using insights gained from experiences. Such experiences include near-death experiences (NDEs), out-of-body experiences (OBEs) and those yielded by classical psychedelics such as psilocybin. Of these, the psychedelics may have a particular utility when it comes to the treatment of existential anxiety. Psychedelics are currently undergoing a long-overdue scientific research renaissance, and there has been some highly promising research utilizing psilocybin in the treatment of existential anxiety and depression in terminally ill cancer patients, yielding compelling and robust findings. A single dose of psilocybin produced immediate and sustained decreases in anxiety and depression and improvements in outlook and life meaning in an overwhelming majority of study participants. At sufficient doses, psychedelics can occasion mystical-type experiences, and it appears this is intimately tied to their long-term psychotherapeutic efficacy. There is some intriguing overlap in aftereffects reported by those who have undergone mystical experiences via psychedelics, NDEs, and OBEs. An interesting property of the NDE is that the psychological changes appear to be mentally contagious, so that one may reap the benefits of the experience without incurring the risk of experiencing one. A common thread and apparently psychotherapeutic element linking these experiences is the experience of being disembodied and of transcending the limits of the body.


Natural light illumination system (NLIS) generates increasing research interest because of the recent trend toward green energy. Various crucial optical components used in a NLIS are analyzed, designed, and fabricated to obtain high efficiency. A large amount of light is loss because of the large viewing angle during light transmission. A tapered light pipe (TLP) is used to collimate light viewing angles. In this letter, we combine a TLP and a traditional lens as a new coupler based on Etendue theory. The original efficiency is only 17.54%, but the efficiency reaches more than 70% when the new coupler is applied.


While marijuana remains a prohibited substance under federal law – one whose manufacture, possession, or distribution is a serious felony – 17 states plus the District of Columbia have legalized the drug for certain medical uses. This tension between state and federal law creates confusion for all of those who work in the emerging medical marijuana ("MMJ") industry. As marijuana moves from the shadows to the storefronts, it becomes a business. Businesses have employees, shareholders and leases; they must comply with state and local zoning ordinances and pay their taxes. In most businesses, proprietors turn to lawyers for help with these and other legal issues. Lawyers incorporate businesses, they write leases and employment agreements, they help navigate the labyrinth of regulatory compliance and ensure that taxes are being paid promptly and accurately.This usual relationship is obviously and necessarily complicated by the fact that the manufacture and sale of marijuana remains a federal offense punishable by up to twenty-five years in prison. While a state may choose to de-criminalize, medicalize, or even legalize marijuana, it does not have the power to undo the federal prohibition of the drug. Thus, an attorney engaged by a marijuana practitioner to do the work that lawyers traditionally do for businesses necessarily puts herself at risk. Because all lawyers have an obligation not to knowingly assist criminal conduct – and because their clients' conduct is by definition criminal – attorneys who do any legal work for MMJ clients face the possibility of both significant ethical and criminal consequences for their actions. In this essay, we discuss the ethical and criminal provisions that impact a lawyer's representation of those working in the MMJ industry. We show that under traditional readings of both criminal law and the Model Rules of Professional Responsibility, an attorney is prohibited from providing most kinds of legal assistance to a medical marijuana client. We argue, however that a literal reading of the rules would have serious negative repercussions in those states that have enacted MMJ regulations. Without the participation of attorneys, important state policies regarding access to medicine and the allocation of criminal justice resources will be frustrated; where a state has chosen to regulate marijuana as medicine, lawyers are a necessary part of the implementation of that policy decision. There are important limits to this representation, however. Some of these limits are easy to define, while others are far more amorphous. We borrow from the law of accomplice and co-conspirator liability to give shape to the line between permitted and forbidden legal help. We argue that so long as lawyers merely provide the same services on the same terms to their MMJ clients that they do to their other clients, they violate neither their ethical obligations nor the prohibitions of the criminal law. Using specific examples, we give much-needed guidance to attorneys engaged in this emerging and fraught area of practice. Our proposed reading of Rule 1.2(d) establishes that lawyers may generally help MMJ clients address the majority of their legal needs; attorneys may defend MMJ clients charged with violations of the Controlled Substances Act, may serve as lobbyists in challenging federal law and can advise clients about the state of the law. Lawyers may also generally help these clients with compliance work – such as filing for a license to own and operate a medical marijuana dispensary – and may negotiate leases, draft contracts, and advise clients about employment matters. In most instances, we argue, such conduct will not violate Rule 1.2(d) at all because lawyers lack the intent necessary for assistance of criminal activity. In those situations where lawyers' conduct does violate Rule 1.2(d), we argue, there may nonetheless be arguments for providing legal services to MMJ practitioners, though lawyers proceed here at their peril.