In this paper, I direct attention to the role of class politics in shaping the outcomes of social protection interventions. I highlight the ways in which class politics is constituted by the interaction of class relations and the balance of substantive class power in a polity. I demonstrate the ways in which variations in class politics influence outcomes of a large social protection programme in India, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). In localities where either of the elite classes has successfully co-opted or eliminated the other, their stark contradictions against the interests of agricultural labourers result in them sabotaging the labour-friendly MGNREGA or implementing it half-heartedly. On the other hand, in localities characterised by an overarching framework of contest between the precarious classes and the entrenched classes, dominant class hostility to agricultural labourers is dissipated and labour-friendly programmes such as the MGNREGA have a chance of being implemented. However, the transformative aspect of the programme's intent, in terms of dissolving the relations of power that bolster poverty, appears to be more in evidence in localities where emergent classes with precarious surpluses, together with agricultural labourers, challenge the influence of the entrenched classes. In these localities, the implementation of the programme, even where fraught with difficulties, contributes to dissolving hierarchical relations and establishing egalitarian ones.


This paper presents the prestriking and re-striking phenomenon caused by switching disconnect switches in a high-voltage switchyard. A detailed transient model of a representative utility 345 kV substation was developed in the electromagnetic transient program, EMTP-RV and the phenomenon was studied for different cases of multiple prestrike transients. It was determined that the transient voltages during prestriking could have large differential values which could put much more switching stress on the nearby circuit breaker and other equipment. This could be the probable cause of equipment failure in the future.


Abstract. Soils affected by forest wildfires in 2010 in Russia were studied on postfire and mature plots near the Togljatty city, Samara region. Soil biological properties and ash composition dynamics were investigated under the forest fire affect: a place of local forest fire, riding forest fire and unaffected site by fire-control (mature) during 3 yr of restoration. Soil samples were collected at 0–15 cm. Soil biological properties was measured by the fumigation method. The analytical data obtained shows that wildfires lead to serious changes in a soil profile and soil chemistry of upper horizons. Wildfires change a chemical composition of soil horizons and increase their ash-content. Fires lead to accumulation of biogenic elements' content (P and K) in the solum fine earth. Calcium content is increased as a result of fires that leads to an alkaline pH of the solum. The values of nutrients decreased as a result of leaching out with an atmospheric precipitation during the second year of restoration. Thus, when the upper horizons are burning the ash arriving on a soil surface enrich it with nutrients. The mature (unaffected by fire) soils is characterized by the greatest values of soil microbial biomass in the top horizon and, respectively, the bigger values of basal respiration whereas declining of the both parameters was revealed on postfire soils. Nevertheless this influence does not extend on depth more than 10 cm. Thus, fire affect on the soil were recognized in decreasing of microbiological activity.


We demonstrate, through the use of an acousto-optic system, the generation of two-dimensional uniform spot arrays with high diffraction efficiency. The system consists of two acousto-optic cells oriented orthogonally to each other and driven by an arbitrary waveform generator. Determination of the acousto-optic drive signal is discussed, as well as techniques for generating arbitrary spot arrays.


The work of Humanities & Social Sciences students involves learning to express disciplinary content in essay assessment to disciplinary norms. Though tutors use a genre for professional writing, literacy is often not part of the classroom discussion. Therefore, many students have difficulty appropriating the communicative tools of that disciplinary genre. This may be solved by a turn in pedagogy towards tutors' awareness of students' processes (Hornsby & Osman, 2014) which may, in turn, improve tutors' feedback. Ethnography has provided insights into students' attitudes, their impressions of feedback and experiences, largely through interview methods, and classroom observation (Saville-Troike, 1989), but assessment writing does not typically occur in class. What was needed was a closer examination of students' literacy processes. This study looked at literacy work through Activity Theory (Leont'ev, 1978) which represents human activity as a contextualised system where a group works together towards an object. Group collaboration allows for concepts to be negotiated and for interpretations to be shared, which can aid understanding (Mercer, 1995). This cross-sectional study examined three L2-English Business Studies student groups' collaborative writing with observation of activity as its primary instrument for capturing student literacy work. Using an Educational Talk framework (Mercer, 1995) to examine the qualities of negotiation, this study offers a new understanding of students' processes of literacy work and their possible effect on literacy appropriation. The results showed how the task and other structural tensions drive literacy work, and how the particular attributes of Educational Talk, in a tertiary context, contribute to the negotiation of meaning in the resolution of tensions. It also showed how literacy work involves the inter-mingling of textual work, subject content (Tardy, 2006, 2009) and contextual factors. These indicate the importance of group literacy activity for students, and the importance of understanding group discussions involving literacy work.


Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian bodily discipline that has now become a global phenomenon. In 2014 the cultural significance of capoeira was recognized on the world stage when it was awarded the special protected status of an 'Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity' by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation. In the application to this organisation, and in wider advertising material and practitioner literature, capoeira is celebrated as a practice that promotes social cohesion, inclusivity, integration, racial equality and resistance to all forms of oppression. This paper seeks to problematize this inclusive discourse, exploring the extent to which it is both supported and contradicted in the gendered discourses and practices of specific capoeira groups in Europe. Drawing upon ethnographic data, produced through two sets of ethnographic research and the researchers' 24 years of combined experience as capoeira players, this paper documents the complex and contradictory contexts in which discourses and practices of gender inclusivity are at once promoted and undermined.


SUMMARY Open science is a new concept for the practice of experimental laboratory-based research, such as drug discovery. The authors have recently gained experience in how to run such projects and here describe some straightforward steps others may wish to take towards more openness in their own research programmes. Existing and inexpensive online tools can solve many challenges, while some psychological barriers to the free sharing of all data and ideas are more substantial.


Exome sequencing (exome-seq) has aided in the discovery of a huge amount of mutations in cancers, yet challenges remain in converting oncogenomics data into information that is interpretable and accessible for clinical care. We constructed DriverDB (http://ngs.ym.edu.tw/driverdb/), a database which incorporates 6079 cases of exome-seq data, annotation databases (such as dbSNP, 1000 Genome and Cosmic) and published bioinformatics algorithms dedicated to driver gene/mutation identification. We provide two points of view, 'Cancer' and 'Gene', to help researchers to visualize the relationships between cancers and driver genes/mutations. The 'Cancer' section summarizes the calculated results of driver genes by eight computational methods for a specific cancer type/dataset and provides three levels of biological interpretation for realization of the relationships between driver genes. The 'Gene' section is designed to visualize the mutation information of a driver gene in five different aspects. Moreover, a 'Meta-Analysis' function is provided so researchers may identify driver genes in customer-defined samples. The novel driver genes/mutations identified hold potential for both basic research and biotech applications.


The objective of this research is to identify Chilean consumer attitudes towards COO (Country-of-Origin) labeling, determine the importance of COO, and identify consumers who are most likely to buy COO-labeled beef products from Uruguay. The results suggest that age, number of children at home, whether the interviewee was the primary person responsible for meal selection, and whether interviewees purchased beef from different countries were significant determinants of whether a Chilean interviewee regarded COO as important. Age, income level, beef purchase frequency, and homemaker were significant determinants of whether an interviewee would purchase COO-labeled beef from Uruguay. These results suggest that COO is not a particularly important variable to consumers surveyed in this study.


The mobile game markets are increasingly competitive and the
game publishers are looking for new ways to increase player retention and
cross commercialization of games. In this paper, we examine how a
purchasing system using virtual currency based common market can be
designed and implemented in order to create a larger service platform. The
solution enables cross-game purchasing of virtual items from one game into
another. We present how such a system can be designed, how it would fit
into larger vision of multi-game ecosystem and what kind of limitations
there are when implementing such a system. As a result, we describe
solution of a bank and a marketplace entity, which are responsible of the
transactions, virtual items and connecting games to each other. As a
conclusion, we are presenting the expected challenges and expansion plans
for the common market system.


The development of Stone Age archaeology in South Africa has a long and chequered history. It is now over 80 years since the discipline was placed on a firm, international, scientific footing. Since then, several histories of its development have been produced, although most of these focus on the country's rich ethnography, with few discussing the development of Stone Age archaeology in any detail. However, throughout its early history, the study of the Stone Age in South Africa was tied to international developments in archaeology and strong links existed with many of the world's leading authorities. Unfortunately, social and political developments in South Africa stunted the discipline's growth, leaving it for many years in a form of limbo from which, I argue, it has still not fully recovered. What I present here is a review that largely follows an historical narrative of the development of Stone Age studies in the country, in which I highlight some shortcomings. Major issues discussed are a lack of accepted typological or terminological understandings of the evidence as well as the influence of individual workers' own intuitive knowledge. It is hoped that realising the origins of these problems will aid in developing a comprehension of them. In turn it is hoped that, just as the country's Stone Age Archaeology is re-emerging onto the international scene, this shall allow fruitful discussions on terminology to re-emerge and the country's vast wealth of material may begin to be understood in relation to the rest of the world, and in many cases in relation to other material within South Africa itself.


Attempts at distinguishing one part of language from another on the basisof naturalness, or certain other criteria that recapitulate the dichotomy of something that is grounded versus something that is not, can be regarded as normative, and ultimately tautological. A historical continuity exists linking such attempts across the centuries, despite changes in terminology and shifts in the balance of the sometimes contradictory conceptions of what in language is natural. This paper examines the history of eleven conceptual features traditionally associated with linguistic naturalness: mimesis, orality, physicality, rationality, simplicity, unplannedness, rusticity, musicality, purity, systematicity and efficiency. The aim is to uncover some of the underlying methodological and ideological assumptions of modern linguistics by examining how these concepts have been deployed. This offers a way forward beyond the limits which the implicit tautology has imposed upon our explanatory and analytic imaginations.


BACKGROUND
There have been very few reports of HIV-1 subtypes and drug resistance mutations (DRMs) from Nepal which is geographically located between two high-prevalence HIV-1 infection countries, China and India.

OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to determine prevalence of acquired and transmitted DRMs and HIV-1 subtypes in Nepal.

METHODS
Thirty-five HIV-1 seropositive samples from central region of Nepal were collected in 2011. The subjects were divided into two groups, antiretroviral (ARV) drug naïve group (n=15) and antiretroviral treatment (ART) group (n=20), 90% (18/20) of them received zidovudine, lamivudine and nevirapine (AZT/3TC/NVP) regimen. HIV pol (protease and reverse transcriptase regions) nucleotide sequences were analyzed by Viroseq HIV-1 Genotyping System. Nearly full-length genomic (NFLG) sequences of 10 samples were performed.

RESULTS
NFLG genotyping revealed that 80% of samples were infected with subtype C and 20% with recombinants (C/D/H and C/A). Phylogenetic analysis of 35 pol sequences from Nepal were subtype C. The prevalence of acquired DRMs to NNRTIs and NRTIs was 15% (3/20). DRMs to NVP, K103N and V179D, and to NRTIs were observed at 11.1% (2/18) and 5% (1/20), respectively. The prevalence of DRMs to rilpivirine for E138A/G was 5.7%. The minor protease inhibitors (PI) associated mutations (A71T/V and T74S) were observed in 5/35 (14.3%) subjects.

CONCLUSION
This is the first report of NFLG HIV-1 genomic sequences and DRMs from Nepal. National surveillance of HIV DRMs to ARVs and molecular epidemiology study should be done annually for better prevention and treatment of HIV infection in Nepal.


Land ties people to specific localities featuring different levels of accessibility and natural endowments; it is therefore related in various ways to matters of inequality. Drawing from economics and human geography, we explore the multifaceted and complex nature of inequality. Our case study takes place in rural Tigray, Ethiopia. Quantitative data analysis is used to reveal (spatial) income distribution patterns between statistically representative population groups. Qualitative data are then used to describe the productive activities of these groups, their respective processes of material asset accumulation or losses, and how their economic activities are affected by location. The paper concludes that, where measures of the distribution of income falls short, we require other tools that will help us reveal patterns: (1) of material wealth distribution; (2) of control over production; and (3) of the unaccounted value created within the household or derived from the natural environment.


Whatever the reason, underachievement in mathematics in South Africa is endemic and tantamount to a national disaster. Despite the transformation of education in South Africa, failure rates in mathematics at
 school and university remain unacceptably high, and the number of learners who leave Grade 12 with a pass mark in both mathematics and physical science is unacceptably low. Relatively little has been written about inadequate performance of Grade
 4 to 7 learners in mathematics in South Africa, and even less about possible solutions to the problem. South African primary school learners' lack of basic mathematics and vocabulary skills in particular is a source of major concern. In the first
 national systemic evaluation of learners' skills in English, mathematics and science in 2001 Grade 3 learners achieved an average of 30% in mathematics. In the follow-up studies, Grade 6 learners achieved a national average of 27% in
 mathematices, in 2004, while nationally eighty percent of Grade 3 and 6 learners achieved less than 50 percent for mathematics and Languages in 2008. The finding that so many primary school learners today are not numerate or literate has a direct
 influence both on the teaching and the learning of mathematics. Everything possible needs to be done to change this situation. During the past 15 years, the research focus in mathematics has shifted to an examination of the influence of social,
 cognitive and metacognitive, conative and affective factors on achievement in mathematics. In this regard, it is of particular importance that an ongoing investigation into "other" aspects that impact on achievement in mathematics is launched,
 rather than to restrict the investigation to mere assessment of objectives that are aimed at continually evaluating cognitive progress in mathematics. There is sufficient empirical evidence that an adequate orientation to the study of mathematics
 correlates positively with high achievement in mathematics on secondary and tertiary levels. The aim of this research was to investigate the extent to which the performance in study orientation (Study Orientation questionnaire in Mathematics
 (Primary)) and knowledge of basic vocabulary/terminology in mathematics (Mathematics Vocabulary (Primary)) (vocabulary as one aspect of language in Mathematics) of Grade 4 to 7 learners predict performance in mathematics (Basic Mathematics
 (Primary)). Three standardised questionnaires were administered, namely the Study Orientation questionnaire in Mathematics (Primary), or SOM(P), Mathematics Vocabulary (Primary) or (MV(P), and Basic Mathematics (Primary) or BM(P). The
 participants consisted of learners in Grade 4 to 7 (n = 1 103) in North-West Province with respectively Afrikaans, English and Tswana as their home language. Results from the data, by calculating intercorrelations and stepwise regression,
 confirmed that learners' performance in mathematics (BM(P)) can be predicted through their performance in the knowledge of basic vocabulary in mathematics (MV(P)), their "maths" anxiety, study attitude towards and study habits in mathematics
 (SOM(P)). The results can be implemented to improve learners' performance in mathematics when teachers identify inadequate knowledge of basic vocabulary in mathematics as well as study orientation (for example, "maths" anxiety, study attitude
 towards and study habits in mathematics) in the early years of schooling. Learners' scores can be checked to identify those requiring aid, support, remediation and/or counselling. An analysis of individual answers (particularly those where
 learner's replies differ significantly in respect of the answers usually given by good achievers in mathematics) could be extremely useful. Enculturing learners to the vocabulary of mathematical language is an aspect of instruction that needs
 specific attention. The three questionnaires, which are administered in this research, provide mathematics teachers with standardised tools with which to make a simple systematic analysis of a number of important background particulars, feelings,
 attitudes, habits and customs with regard to the learner's academic orientation in mathematics, as well as to their knowledge of basic vocabulary in mathematics that could be remedied when inadequate.


We present a new method for creating and enhancing the stereoscopic 3D (S3D) sensation without using the parallax disparity between an image pair. S3D relies on a combination of cues to generate a feeling of depth, but only a few of these cues can easily be modified within a rendering pipeline without significantly changing the content. We explore one such cue—shading stereopsis—which to date has not been exploited for 3D rendering. By changing only the shading of objects between the left and right eye renders, we generate a noticeable increase in perceived depth. This effect can be used to create depth when applied to flat images, and to enhance depth when applied to shallow depth S3D images. Our method modifies the shading normals of objects or materials, such that it can be flexibly and selectively applied in complex scenes with arbitrary numbers and types of lights and indirect illumination. Our results show examples of rendered stills and video, as well as live action footage.


An intrusion detection system should support the operator of the system. Thus, in addition to producing alerts, it should allow for easy insertion of new detection algorithms. It should also support dynamic selection and de-selection of detection algorithms, and it should adjust its resource consumption to the current need. Such a system would allow the operator to easily extend the system when new detection algorithms become available. It would also allow the operator to maintain a low-cost monitoring baseline and perform more extensive monitoring when it is required. In this paper we propose an architecture for intrusion detection which aims at providing the operator with this support. The architecture uses a modular design to promote a high degree of flexibility. This supports creation of an environment in which state-of-the-art intrusion detection algorithms easily can be inserted. The modular design also allows for detection algorithms to be enabled and disabled when required. Additionally, the architecture uses a sensor reconfiguration mechanism to affect the amount of data collected. When a detection algorithm is enabled or disabled, the sensor providing the input data to the algorithm is correspondingly reconfigured. This implies a minimum of excess collected data. To illustrate the feasibility of the architecture, we provide a proof - of-concept supporting monitoring of users for insider detection and webserver monitoring for intrusion attempts.


The main purpose of this paper is the presentation of some of the results of a series of simulation experiments investigating the phenomenon of storage fragmentation. Two different types of storage fragmentation are distinguished: (1) external fragmentation, namely the loss in storage utilization caused by the inability to make use of all available storage after it has been fragmented into a large number of separate blocks; and (2) internal fragmentation, the loss of utilization caused by rounding up a request for storage, rather than allocating only the exact number of words required. The most striking result is the apparently general rule that rounding up requests for storage, to reduce the number of different sizes of blocks coexisting in storage, causes more loss of storage by increased internal fragmentation than is saved by decreased external fragmentation. Described also are a method of segment allocation and an accompanying technique for segment addressing which take advantage of the above result. Evidence is presented of possible advantages of the method over conventional paging techniques.


In these affairs, no gun is needed. The victims do it all themselves. And the bullets never miss.--Bruce Jackson, CounterPunch, May 2003 Libraries play an important role in community building by supporting the public sphere to provide a commons environment that addresses the need for people to meet and interact with others. (1) Additionally, the library preserves historical and cultural memory and maintains resources for discourse and decision-making. However, since the tragic events of September 11, 2001, and the passage of the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT) Act, the community-building commons role of the public library has been at risk. Learning why first requires a look at the climate for free speech in the United States since September 11. Patriotism, when construed as unquestioning support for government actions, narrows discourse and chills dissent. There have been numerous well-publicized instances since September 11 that have equated dissent with lack of patriotism. These include: * Canceling public speeches by government critics such as Tim Bobbins (by the Baseball Hall of Fame) and Susan Sarandon (by the United Way of Tampa Bay). Both Robbins and Sarandon have been featured on American Library Association READ posters. * Censoring Michael Moore's book Stupid White Men until librarian Ann Sparanese led an e-campaign to save it. * Clear Channel Communications' protesting the singing group Dixie Chicks because one of the singers dared to criticize the war in Iraq. In a Bad Subjects essay, Lockard characterizes Iraqi war culture as the "beginning of progressive regimentalization. It supplies rationales of repression, demands for the subordination of counter-argument, delimitations between permissible speech, and silence that knows its place." (2) Jackson describes the heartbreaking self-censorship of archivists and librarians who buckle to silent pressure to conform to government ideology. He discusses the case of the Smithsonian's downgrading of Subhankar Baneriee's photographs of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from a main floor rotunda to a smaller, lower room where the text is cut from most of the captions. The photos were evidently deemed unpatriotic or offensive to a government bent on drilling for oil. "In these affairs," states Jackson, "no gun is needed. The victims do it all themselves. And the bullets never miss. (3) Protection of the commons function of public libraries and public museums requires recognition of subtle threats as well as the obvious. The full scope of the public sphere must be comprehended. While the suppression of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge exhibit and the attempts to censor the free speech rights of Robbins, Sarandon, Moore, and the Dixie Chicks have been widely discussed and analyzed, there is also ongoing suppression and erosion of the public sphere in libraries. A few examples from Florida illustrate the level of vigilance required to defend the commons function and to protect the public sphere. The Public Sphere and Florida's Libraries What if the Church and the State Are the mob that howls at the door! --William Butler Yeats, "Church and State," 1934 Fighting to Save the State Library of Florida Public library administrators in Florida meet annually at a conference sponsored by the State Library of Florida. The fall 2002 conference, held during the race for governor, was to have included Lance deHaven-Smith, a widely published and quoted professor of public administration at Florida State University, as a speaker on Florida trends. However, in an August 2002 column on Florida politics deHaven-Smith noted that Florida Republicans had been using "the state government itself against the Florida electorate." They had "become aggressive in punishing their critics, insisting on total loyalty from professional staff, drastically reducing civil service protections, and interjecting politics into the administration of Florida's public universities. …


In the mid-1980s the North Sea ecosystem experienced a climate-induced regime shift that has favoured decapods and detritivores in the benthos and jellyfish in the plankton over com- mercial fisheries. Here, we investigate changes among the Decapoda in the North Sea plankton over the last 60 yr. Decapods are important predators in the plankton and the benthos where they can influence productivity and structure communities. In the North Sea it has been suggested that a climate-driven increase in decapod abundance has been important in propagating the climate signal through the North Sea food web. We show that climate-induced changes in the Decapoda in the central and southern North Sea include the presence of new warm-water taxa, changes in the abun- dance and proportions of commercial species of shrimp, and an earlier occurrence of decapod larvae in the plankton compared with the period 1981-1983. Notable amongst the warm-water taxa appear- ing in the North Sea is the predatory swimming crab Polybius henslowii that can swarm in large numbers when conditions are favourable and that is known to exhibit range shifts in response to fluctuations in hydroclimatic forcing. We suggest that climate-induced changes among North Sea decapods have played an important role in the trophic amplification of a climate signal and the devel- opment of the new North Sea dynamic regime. Understanding these changes is likely to be impera- tive for a successful ecosystem-based approach to the future management of North Sea fisheries at a time of climate change.


Human monoclonal antibodies (Mabs) against the O antigens of Pseudomonas aeruginosa lipopolysaccharides (LPS) were produced by cell fusion between human tonsillar lymphocytes and P3-X63-Ag8-U1 (P3U1) mouse myeloma cells. To obtain human Mabs efficiently, 6 d culture supernatants of pokeweed-mitogen-stimulated lymphocytes (21 cultures from peripheral blood and 76 from tonsils) were assayed by ELISA. Five tonsillar lymphocytes which produced IgG antibody specific for P. aeruginosa LPS were preselected for fusion. The human Mabs, named P1-1 (IgG2, kappa), P5-1 (IgG2, lambda), P7-1 (IgG2, lambda), P8-1 (IgG2, lambda) and P10-1 (IgG2, kappa), bound with high specificity to Homma standard serotype strains A, E, B, G and I, respectively, and recognized O antigens. Each Mab showed opsonophagocytic killing activity of the corresponding serotype strain. Four of the Mabs caused agglutination at a very low concentration; a rather higher concentration of P7-1 was required for this effect. Although all the Mabs conferred type-specific protection against peritoneal infection, the strongly agglutinating Mabs provided better protection than the moderately agglutinating P7-1. The protective activity of P8-1 was estimated in compromised mice. A low dose (PD50 0.5-0.6 microgram per mouse) of P8-1 prevented subcutaneous infection in burned mice and peritoneal infection in leucopenic mice. All the hybridomas described here could be cultured in serum-free medium, and they have continued to secrete human Mabs for more than 14 months at rates of 10-20 micrograms per 10(6) cells in 24 h. These results suggested that these five human Mabs specific for O antigens might be useful in the prophylaxis and treatment of P. aeruginosa infections.


A comparison was made of ten different techniques for killing, fixing, and mounting Longidorus africanus Merny for microscopic study. The most satisfactory specimens were those killed by Seinhorst's method, fixed in FAA and mounted in glycerin by the slow method. Specimens killed by "gentle heat," fixed in FAA and mounted in glycerin were also acceptable as were those killed by hot formalin and mounted in glycerin or processed by Baker's method. Less satisfactory were: nematodes killed by "gentle heat," fixed in formalin and mounted in glycerin and specimens killed by vapor phase perfusion or by Hopper's lethal stain, both latter groups were mounted in glycerin after fixation in formalin. Killing with cold formalin, gradual heat (60 C for 15 min), or by storage in distilled water produced poorly defined specimens. Nematodes killed by hot formalin, and processed to glycerin by the slow method, maintained their live dimensions. Reduction in length occurred in specimens killed by cold formalin, by storage, or treated with solutions containing acetic or propionic acids. Nematodes processed by Baker's method increased in size. Other minor modifications occurred in specimens processed by the different methods. Esophageal definition was best in nematodes killed with formalin, hot or cold. There is no correlation between position of the posterior part of the esophagus and position of the onchiostyle.


Articulated deformable characters are widespread in computer animation. Unfortunately, we lack methods for their automatic fabrication using modern additive manufacturing (AM) technologies. We propose a method that takes a skinned mesh as input, then estimates a fabricatable single-material model that approximates the 3D kinematics of the corresponding virtual articulated character in a piecewise linear manner. We first extract a set of potential joint locations. From this set, together with optional, user-specified range constraints, we then estimate mechanical friction joints that satisfy inter-joint non-penetration and other fabrication constraints. To avoid brittle joint designs, we place joint centers on an approximate medial axis representation of the input geometry, and maximize each joint's minimal cross-sectional area. We provide several demonstrations, manufactured as single, assembled pieces using 3D printers.


I. INTRODUCTION Who is the most powerful figure in the United States? While the possible answers may vary, even one as mighty as a Supreme Court Justice recognized that the most powerful person in America is the prosecutor.1 To mitigate the expansive power that adheres to the position, prosecutorial behavior is constrained in multiple ways.2 Yet, one important area has managed to avoid limitations thus far. The prosecutor's discretion in interpreting ambiguous statutes is a powerful tool as prone to abuse as any form of prosecutorial discretion. Meanwhile, a judicial canon of construction-the rule of lenity-is being scaled back at both the federal and state levels, leaving certain interests unprotected. This Note suggests a revival of the rule to resolve both the problem of unfettered prosecutorial discretion and concerns raised by a decline in lenity. The proposal requires prosecutors to apply the rule of lenity to ambiguous statutes before indictment in jurisdictions that limit or do not speak to judicial use of the rule. Part II examines the application of the rule of lenity in the judicial interpretation of penal statutes and discusses the nature, benefits, disadvantages, and current state of the rule as a canon of construction. Part III analyzes the scope of discretion exercised by prosecutors, particularly in bringing charges. Part IV introduces the proposal for incorporating the rule of lenity in the prosecutorial function, describes the benefits of adopting this proposal, and acknowledges and responds to potential criticisms. Part V sums up the argument for using the rule of lenity to limit prosecutorial reading of ambiguous statutes, thus confining excessive discretion. II. THE RULE OF LENITY A. Purposes and Benefits The rule of lenity is the strict construction of criminal statutes.3 By choosing the more restrictive meaning of the text, judges resolve ambiguities in the defendant's favor.4 For example, when faced with ambiguous language in a statute criminalizing the transfer of stolen motor vehicles, Justice Holmes chose the narrower and, consequently, more defendant-friendly interpretation that an airplane should not be included as a "vehicle" within the statute's ambit.5 The rule of lenity originated in England in the eighteenth century as a judicial creation to decrease the number of executions resulting from violations of the numerous capital offenses set by Parliament.6 The rule was applied by not only the judiciary, but prosecutors as well.7 In the United States, the rule serves a number of functions, including the constitutional principles of separation of powers,8 Due Process,9 Equal Protection,10 and providing for the legality11 of criminal statutes.12 Apart from constitutional considerations, disclosure of criminalization by lawmakers has been touted as a benefit of the rule.13 1. Separation of Powers In United States v. Wiltberger, Chief Justice John Marshall justified the rule of lenity's introduction into American law while noting that "[t]he rule that penal laws are to be construed strictly, is perhaps not much less old than construction itself."14 Writing for the Court, Marshall stated: [Strict construction of penal statutes] is founded on the tenderness of the law for the rights of individuals; and on the plain principle that the power of punishment is vested in the legislative, not in the judicial department. It is the legislature, not the Court, which is to define a crime, and ordain its punishment.15 As set out in Wiltberger, the dual purposes served by the rule of lenity, those of notice and legislative supremacy, are the primary traditional rationales for the rule under the common law.16 Legislative authority to deem certain acts criminal is dependent on giving credence to popular determination of which acts are perceived as criminal, so that individuals are not punished for acts the public did not intend to criminalize. …


This thesis critically examines the researcher's embedded practice of redesigning the ArtBase archive of net art in collaboration with digital arts organization Rhizome.
Net art challenges the notion of artworks as single, self-contained objects. To be performed and experienced, net art depends upon alignments between hardware and
software environments, network protocols, as well as user interactions. Therefore, the archive of net art operates as a network of relations between users—including staff, artists, programmers, academics—and digital infrastructure. This networked condition
complicates a redesign of the archive's interface, but also opens opportunities to rethink the agency of users within opaque, digital institutional environments.
To explore and expand the potential for informed user interaction and intervention, this research develops an original framework for the design of born-digital archives: Model–Database–Interface (MDI). MDI traces and makes visible the links between data model, database software, and user interface, reflecting processes of institutional and community-based classification, use, and maintenance.
This thesis demonstrates how MDI applies design prototypes, data visualizations, and user workshops to open up underlying data structures and processes to inspection and intervention. Further, it discusses how the ArtBase redesign adopts a linked open data
(LOD) model to support ongoing user engagement and collaboration. Thereby MDI is positioned as a conceptual and methodological framework that centers user
participation and critical meaning-making beyond the redesign's completion.
The development of MDI as well as its application in LOD environments, make distinctive contributions to interface design theory and practice. This study also
contributes to the field of digital archiving by reimagining the ArtBase interface as a site
for infrastructural inversion and user collaboration. Reaching beyond the particular case of net art, the strategies discussed in this thesis are applicable to a variety of digital interface contexts that place value on the role of user agency.


This essay argues that an account of vocation that ties one's work with divine calling stands counter to the biblical witness of calling in the New Testament. Rather than calling to a particular profession, the biblical account of calling is to a unique way of living that is to exemplify the followers of Christ. Therefore, the re-enchantment of medicine is not accomplished when one makes the practice itself sacred simply by imagining it as one's divine calling. Rather, the sacredness of medicine is rooted in the character of the physician whose daily decisions and patient interactions are the outcomes of virtues inculcated in worship, prayer, Bible study, and all other practices that mark the life of faith. Thus, the practitioner avoiding burnout asks not "Am I called to be a physician?" but "How as a physician in the daily practice of medicine might I exemplify my calling to Christ-likeness?"


The best known analytical model of swimming was originally developed by Lighthill and is known as the large amplitude elongated body theory (LAEBT). Recently, this theory has been improved and adapted to robotics through a series of studies ranging from hydrodynamic modeling to mobile multibody system dynamics. This article marks a further step towards the Lighthill theory. The LAEBT is applied to one of the best bio-inspired swimming robots yet built: the AmphiBot III, a modular anguilliform swimming robot. To that end, we apply a Newton–Euler modeling approach and focus our attention on the model of hydrodynamic forces. This model is numerically integrated in real time by using an extension of the Newton–Euler recursive forward dynamics algorithm for manipulators to a robot without a fixed base. Simulations and experiments are compared on undulatory gaits and turning maneuvers for a wide range of parameters. The discrepancies between modeling and reality do not exceed 16% for the swimming speed, while requiring only the one-time calibration of a few hydrodynamic parameters. Since the model can be numerically integrated in real time, it has significantly superior accuracy compared with computational speed ratio, and is, to the best of our knowledge, one of the most accurate models that can be used in real-time. It should provide an interesting tool for the design and control of swimming robots. The approach is presented in a self contained manner, with the concern to help the reader not familiar with fluid dynamics to get insight both into the physics of swimming and the mathematical tools that can help its modeling.


This is the definitive guide to X-parameters, written by the original inventors and developers of this powerful new paradigm for nonlinear RF and microwave components and systems. Learn how to use X-parameters to overcome intricate problems in nonlinear RF and microwave engineering. The general theory behind X-parameters is carefully and intuitively introduced, and then simplified down to specific, practical cases, providing you with useful approximations that will greatly reduce the complexity of measuring, modeling and designing for nonlinear regimes of operation. Containing real-world case studies, definitions of standard symbols and notation, detailed derivations within the appendices, and exercises with solutions, this is the definitive stand-alone reference for researchers, engineers, scientists and students looking to remain on the cutting-edge of RF and microwave engineering.


Frugivores feed on fruits and nectars that contain different types of sugars in different proportions, which provide these animals with energy. Wahlberg's epauletted fruit bat (Epomophorus wahlbergi) has a high glucose intake irrespective of sugar concentration of nectar. It is not known how these bats regulate their blood plasma glucose concentrations in order to avoid the negative effects associated with hyperglycemia. Fruit bats have a high amount of sugar intake in a short period of time which could cause a glucose challenge and it is therefore necessary to determine whether these bats are able to regulate their blood plasma glucose concentrations within normal concentrations. This study investigated the diel variations in blood plasma glucose concentrations of E. wahlbergi. Epomophorus wahlbergi's blood plasma glucose concentration was lower (5.24 ± 0.38 mmol/l) at 18:00 before feeding and increased during/after feeding (8.19 ± 1.24 mmol/l) but bats appeared to regulate it within limits. Their range in concentrations was higher than the normal mammalian blood plasma glucose concentrations range. Consequently these bats appear to regulate their blood plasma glucose concentration, although at a range higher than normal mammalian levels, and thus reduce the negative consequences associated with hyperglycemia.


In this chapter we questioned the link between conventional modes of knowledge extraction and local societies' continuous marginality with regard to global knowledge and power networks. We reexamined the participatory, action and learning approaches intrinsic to adaptive collaborative management research in relation to forests. We also addressed the issues of interactivity, power, and science in participation. Using case studies from Indonesia and Cameroon, we illustrated how social science methods could go beyond just extracting information from local actors to serve as valid platforms for learning interactively and for negotiating meanings, powers, and representation. In that light, the scenarios that we see as the most promising lie with models of social facilitation in which scientific procedures are embedded into interactive methodologies to produce critical interactive knowledge.


Mesencephalic
astrocyte-derived neurotrophic factor (MANF) is a neurotrophic factor widely
expressed in mammalian tissues and exerts critical protective effects on
neurons and other cell types in various disease models, such as those for
diabetes. However, to date, the expression and roles of MANF in the cornea,
with or without diabetic keratopathy (DK), remain unclear. Here, we demonstrated that MANF is abundantly expressed in normal corneal
epithelial cells, however, MANF expression was significantly reduced in both unwounded
and wounded corneal epithelium in STZ-induced type 1 diabetic C57BL/6 mice. Recombinant MANF significantly promoted normal and
diabetic corneal epithelial wound healing and nerve regeneration. Furthermore,
MANF inhibited hyperglycaemia-induced endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress and ER
stress-mediated apoptosis. Attenuation of ER stress with 4-phenylbutyric acid (4-PBA)
also ameliorated corneal epithelial closure and nerve regeneration. However,
the beneficial effects of MANF and 4-PBA were abolished by an Akt inhibitor and
Akt-specific siRNA. Finally, we revealed that the
subconjunctival injection of MANF-specific siRNA prevented corneal epithelial
wound healing and nerve regeneration. Our
results provide important evidence that hyperglycaemia-suppressed MANF
expression may contribute to delayed corneal epithelial wound healing and
impaired nerve regeneration by increasing ER stress, and MANF may be a useful
therapeutic modality for treating DK.


This Pilbara report is a companion report to the remoteFOCUS report titled 'Fixing the Hole in Australia's Heartland: How Government needs to work in remote
Australia'. It is specific to the Pilbara region in Western Australia, however, it draws on the national conversation, analysis and findings of the remoteFOCUS project...In short the remoteFOCUS report confirms the initial diagnosis outlined in the remoteFOCUS Prospectus 'remoteFOCUS: Revitalising Remote Australia' that remote Australia is in dire trouble, and that the way governments engage with,
administer and govern remote Australia is at the heart of the problem. The plethora of programs, plans and interventions, the disconnection and uncoordination
between the tiers of government and the dissatisfaction and disengagement of remote citizens, attest to this reality.
The Pilbara on first glance appears to be at the other end of the remote Australia spectrum being unique in its environment and economic features and the scale and
nature of the challenges and change it faces. Yet it shares much in common with all of remote Australia when it comes to matters of governance.
The remoteFOCUS report clearly shows that there is a uniformity of diagnosis from the community, government and academe that change is needed and despite well intentioned attempts to respond to this concern, efforts have continually fallen short. The public service has responded by working harder and endeavouring to respond in a more coordinated way. And while the focus of considerable effort
across remote Australia has been to address Aboriginal disadvantage, the diagnosis is not unique to them, and affects all residents of remote Australia. This is an issue
of about how governments work – not something caused by the people of remote Australia. Systemic change is needed.


Background. Fish communities can support or hinder water quality management. Sulejów Reservoir, which is situated on the Pilica River in Central Poland, serves as a strategic reserve of drinking water for the Łódź Agglomeration. Precise knowledge of the long-term dynamics of the structure of the fish community, what was the aim of this study, is important for proper management to slow the eutrophication of the reservoir and prevent toxic algal blooms. Materials and methods. To determine fish species composition, multimesh gill nets with mesh sizes ranging from 11 to 80 mm were used. From 1993 to 2015, gillnetting was conducted 1–2 times per month from June through November in two representative parts of the reservoir, and principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to explore the temporal variation in fish community structure expressed as the relative contribution of each species to the total fish biomass. Results. Dominance fluctuated among four species in the fish community: common bream, Abramis brama (Linnaeus, 1758); roach, Rutilus rutilus (Linnaeus, 1758); white bream, Blicca bjoerkna (Linnaeus, 1758); and pike-perch, Sander lucioperca (Linnaeus, 1758). PCA revealed three principal components with eigenvalues larger than one that explained 73.3% of the observed variance in the temporal changes in fish community composition. A negative correlation was found between pike-perch biomass and roach biomass (r = 0.82), while a positive correlation was observed between the biomass of pike-perch and that of common bream (r = 0.73). Consequently, there was a highly negative correlation between the biomasses of common bream and roach (r = 0.80). Furthermore, an interesting temporal pattern was observed; from 1993 to 2000, the fish community was dominated by common bream and pike-perch but then shifted towards domination by roach and white bream, despite declining phosphorous and carbon concentrations. Recently, this trend has been reversed, and a more balanced fish community structure has been established. Conclusion. Fish community succession, which is usually reported to be a one-directional process in reservoirs, i.e., from a riverine fish or percid-dominated to a cyprinid (bream)-dominated state, was more ambiguous in Sulejów Reservoir. This was likely a consequence of both restoration issues related to decreasing nutrient loads and the influence of zebra mussel, Dreissena polymorpha invasion on the trophic relations in the reservoir.


Receptor 4 is a microbe associated molecular pattern receptor well known for it's sensitivity to bacterial lipopolysaccharides (LPS). LPS is assembled within diverse Gram-negative bacteria, many of which are human or plant pathogens. It is a component of the outer membrane of Gram-negative bacteria and consists of lipid A, a core polysaccharide and an O-polysaccharide of variable length (often more than 50 monosaccharide units). LPS is a potent activator of the innate immune response in hu-mans, causing reactions including fever, headache, nausea, diarrhoea, changes in leukocyte and platelet counts, disseminated intravascular coagulation, multiorgan failure, shock and death. All these reactions are induced by cytokines and other endogenous mediators which are produced after interaction of LPS with the humoral and cellular targets of the host. In macrophages and dendritic cells, LPS-mediated activation of TLR4 triggers the biosynthesis of diverse mediators of inflammation, such as TNF-alpha and IL6, and activates the production of co-stimulatory molecules required for the adaptive immune response. In mononuclear and endothelial cells, LPS also stimulates tissue factor production. These events are desirable for clearing local infections, but when these various mediators and clotting factors are overproduced, they can damage small blood vessels and precipitate shock accompanied by disseminated intravascular coagulation and multiple organ failure.


Nashif et al. [Vibration Damping (Wiley, New York, 1985)] present a ''modal strain energy method'' (MSEM) that has seen increased use in the finite element community to estimate modal loss factors in elastic–viscoelastic structures. The method enables one to predict dynamic response without explicitly accounting for hysteretic damping in the free vibration analysis. Despite its wide usage, there does not seem to have been prior formal analyses of its validity. The presentation will report such a test of MSEM predictions for a two‐degree‐of‐freedom system in which the two masses are connected by dissipative and elastic elements. The evaluations explore the dependence of MSEM on basic parameters characterizing stiffness, inertia, and damping. The main conclusion is that MSEM is very accurate if dissipation within the viscoelastic substructure is sufficiently low. Raising either the inertia or stiffness of this part of the system seems to enhance the accuracy of MSEM for a fixed value of its damping factor.


We propose a novel reversible jump Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulated annealing algorithm to optimize radial basis function (RBF) networks. This algorithm enables us to maximize the joint posterior distribution of the network parameters and the number of basis functions. It performs a global search in the joint space of the parameters and number of parameters, thereby surmounting the problem of local minima. We also show that by calibrating a Bayesian model, we can obtain the classical AIC, BIC and MDL model selection criteria within a penalized likelihood framework. Finally, we show theoretically and empirically that the algorithm converges to the modes of the full posterior distribution in an efficient way.


Our world is open-ended, non-stationary, and constantly evolving; thus what we talk about and how we talk about it change over time. This inherent dynamic nature of language contrasts with the current static language modelling paradigm, which trains and evaluates models on utterances from overlapping time periods. Despite impressive recent progress, we demonstrate that Transformer-XL language models perform worse in the realistic setup of predicting future utterances from beyond their training period, and that model performance becomes increasingly worse with time. We find that, while increasing model size alone -- a key driver behind recent progress -- does not solve this problem, having models that continually update their knowledge with new information can indeed mitigate this performance degradation over time. Hence, given the compilation of ever-larger language modelling datasets, combined with the growing list of language-model-based NLP applications that require up-to-date factual knowledge about the world, we argue that now is the right time to rethink the static way in which we currently train and evaluate our language models, and develop adaptive language models that can remain up-to-date with respect to our ever-changing and non-stationary world. We publicly release our dynamic, streaming language modelling benchmarks for WMT and arXiv to facilitate language model evaluation that takes temporal dynamics into account.


Rhizoctonia spp. are the main causal agents of root and crown rot on sugar beet. In this study, isolates of Rhizoctonia spp. were obtained from diseased sugar beet in Iran over 2 years. Of 68 isolates, 61 were R. solani and 7 were R. cerealis. The anastomosis group (AG) of all isolates was determined on glass slides against the testers. Characterization of intraspecific groups (ISGs) of R. solani isolates revealed that, of 61 isolates, 43 were AG2-2 IIIB and 18 were AG2-2 IV. Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analyses were used to investigate genetic structure of Rhizoctonia populations. Principal coordinate plots and cluster analysis differentiated R. solani from R. cerealis isolates and separated the R. solani isolates belonging to different ISGs. AFLP data indicated that the R. solani and R. cerealis populations are not clonal. Analysis of molecular variance in AG2-2 IIIB isolates showed that geographic region was the main factor determining genetic structure of the populations. Sampling year had no significant effect on the genotypes. Pathogenicity tests on Beta vulgaris 'FD0432' revealed that R. solani AG2-2 IIIB and AG2-2 IV isolates were more virulent than R. cerealis.


Each year, more than 65 million people in the United States (29% to 39% of the population) provide care for a chronically ill, disabled, or elderly family member or friend.1 Such caregivers, who help with both basic life functions and managing medical care, are critical to helping people maintain their health and remain in their communities.2 Many chronically ill and older people also have loved ones who, distinct from caregivers, serve as "care partners." These care partners do not provide day-to-day care or serve as surrogate decision makers but do help navigate health care—facilitating communication with physicians, discussing complex issues requiring shared decision making, and assisting with challenging self-management tasks. The care partner or partners may include a spouse, parent, friend, or relative who assists with health, perhaps across geographic distance.


Software fault prediction means identification of the faultprone parts in the software. This enables to focus testing activities on those software modules that are predicted as fault-prone. As can be seen in literature, many soft computing techniques are employed to make more accurate predictions previously. However, software fault prediction has not become routine activity in the software development process, because most of employed methods require historical data to train the model. In fact, collection of the historical data is not a simple job and also collected data represents the project which was observed. It may not be reusable for different projects. To overcome these problems, use of Mamdani type fuzzy inference system to predict software fault prone modules is suggested in this study. Another reason is to eliminate the disadvantages sourced from the small size of data. In this study, object oriented metrics are preferred because of widespread use of object oriented technologies. Experimental results show that fuzzy inference systems are successful and can be competitive with methods previously employed in the literature.


Motivated by recent progress in producing metastable metallic binary alloy films and nanoclusters through atomic deposition techniques, we propose a simple, analytically solvable model of a growing Ising-type one-dimensional chain whose kinetics are determined by random addition of two atomic species and by compositional relaxation restricted to the surface. Solutions are presented for the influence of the external flux on both surface segregation and compositional short-range correlations in the bulk, which is frozen. Despite the simplicity of the model, these results can help to understand opposing trends in surface segregation and bulk short-range order, revealed in recent experiments and simulations for fcc-type nanoalloys.


This collection of hard-hitting and highly readable essays reflects Gombrich's preoccupation with the central questions of value and tradition in our culture. He confronts - with characteristic incision and erudition - some of the most urgent issues that challenge today's students of art and civilization. His topics include a series of radical proposals for the reform of higher education, an assault on the notion of relativism and a heartfelt plea for the conservation of our cities, alongside thought-provoking and engaging studies of the works of Oskar Kokoschka, Abram Games, Saul Steinberg and Henri Cartier-Bresson.


Patterning technology on the paper based on wettability difference for paper‐based devices has attracted significant attention for its low cost, easy degradability, and high flexibility. Here, conductive lines are rapidly prepared by patterned wettability‐assisted bar‐coating for low cost paper‐based circuits. It is found that 7 s plasma treatment time for acquiring wettability difference is optimal, which resulted in not only effective splitting of the liquid film but also highly consistent line width with mask. Moreover, low retention force of hydrophobic surface is imperative for self‐confinement of the ink into hydrophilic areas, especially for ink with high solid content. The sheet resistance of patterns can reach 5 Ω ◻−1 after 980 nm laser sintering when using 50 wt% solid content ink with 110 cP viscosity. The geometries of line patterns, i.e., line width and spacing, can be readily tuned by varying the designed size of mask patterns. As‐prepared conductive patterns show good conductivity even after 500 bending cycles at 2 mm bending radius. It is believed that this study will provide deeper understanding of wettability difference‐assisted patterning process and represents a general strategy for selective wetting, especially for high viscosity ink.


Information and communication technologies (ICT) are changing the way people interact with each other. Today, every physical device can have the capability to connect to the Internet (digital presence) to send and receive data. Internet connected cameras, home automation systems, connected cars are all examples of interconnected Internet of Things (IoT). IoT can bring benefits to users in terms of monitoring and intelligent capabilities, however, these devices collect, transmit, store, and have a potential to share vast amount of personal and individual data that encroach private spaces and can be vulnerable to security breaches. The ecosystem of IoT comprises not only of users, various sensors, and devices but also other stakeholders of IoT such as data collectors, processors, regulators, and policy-makers. Even though the number of commercially available IoT devices is on steep rise, the uptake of these devices has been slow, and abandonment rapid. This paper explains how stakeholders (including users) and technologies form an assemblage in which these stakeholders are cumulatively responsible for making IoT an essential element of day-to-day living and connectivity. To this end, this paper examines open issues in data privacy and security policies (from perspectives of the European Union and North America), and its effects on stakeholders in the ecosystem. This paper concludes by explaining how these open issues, if unresolved, can lead to another wave of digital division and discrimination in the use of IoT.


Quantile and expectile regression models pertain to the estimation of unknown quantiles/expectiles of the cumulative distribution function of a dependent variable as a function of a set of covariates and a vector of regression coefficients. Both approaches make no assumption on the shape of the distribution of the response variable, allowing for investigation of a comprehensive class of covariate effects.
This paper fits both quantile and expectile regression models within a random effects framework for dependent/panel data. It provides asymptotic properties of the underlying model parameter estimators and suggests appropriate estimators of their variances-covariances matrices. The performance of the proposed estimators is evaluated through exhaustive simulation studies and the proposed methodology is illustrated using real data. The simulation results show that expectile regression is comparable to quantile regression, easily computable and has relevant statistical properties. In conclusion, expectiles are to the mean what quantiles are to the median, and they should be used and interpreted as quantilized mean.


The paper quantifies the impact of timing differences that emerge in the case of discrepancies between accounting and tax rules on the corporate tax burden. The objective of the paper is to investigate the effect of the accelerated deductibility of company expenses via provisions for future liabilities on the multi-period effective average corporate tax rate (EATR). In the investigation, pension provisions and so-called "other provisions" are taken into account and a multi-period backward-looking measure of the tax burden based on corporate cash flows is developed. The investigated companies are divided into several subgroups according to their size and multi-period cash flow. Under the current tax law, the highest tax burden among companies with positive cash flows is observed for medium-sized firms, at 33%. For small and large enterprises, the burden takes values of 24% and 25% respectively. A different situation is observed among firms with negative cash flows- in general, the EATRs are noticeably higher in this case. Under the current tax law, the average effective tax rates are 60% for all firms and 38%, 45% and 51% for medium-sized, small and large corporations respectively.If changes are made to the ways provisions for future payments are treated under tax regulations, a slight reduction may be observed in the multi-period average effective tax burden. In general, the timing effects of the deductibility of provisions lead to an average change in the effective tax rate from –1 percentage point (in the case of small companies with positive cash flows) to –4 percentage points (in the case of small entities with negative cash flows and medium-sized entities with positive cash flows). Although the differences in the median tax burden may seem to be slight, they are statistically significant.


While college and university administrators tend to be conscious of the need to integrate financial and budgetary considerations into institutional plans, there are other equally important concerns to weave into planning. Real integrated plans proclaim not only what the organization will invest in and improve on, but also, what it will cease doing. Priority-setting, done properly, includes decisions about shutting down non-priority activities, yet most institutional plans in higher education shy away from such considerations. Mindful of the hard choices that must be made in genuinely integrated plans, college and university leaders must be careful to compose planning teams with diverse sets of participants whose ownership of the plan lends overall legitimacy to the process, and to the plan, itself.


(ABSTRACT) We consider a continuous time dynamic pricing model where a seller needs to sell a single item over a finite time horizon. Customers arrive in accordance with a Poisson process. Upon arrival, a customer either purchases the item if the posted price is lower than his/her reservation price, or leaves empty-handed. After purchasing the item, some customers, however , will return the item to the seller at an exponential rate for a full refund. We assume that a returned item is in mint condition and the seller can resell it to future customers. The objective of the seller is to dynamically adjust the price in order to maximize the expected total revenue when the sale horizon ends. We formulate the dynamic pricing problem as a dynamic programming model and derive the structural properties of the optimal policy and the optimal value function. For cases in which the customer's reservation price is exponentially distributed, we derive the optimal policy in a closed form. For general reservation price distribution, we consider an approximation of the original model by discretizing both time and the allowable price set. We then present an algorithm for numerically computing the optimal policy in this discrete time model. Numerical examples show that if the discrete price set is carefully chosen, the expected total revenue is nearly the same as that when the allowable price set is continuous.


Wideband compressive receivers are an attractive application niche for analog high temperature superconductive (HTS) microwave filters. Chirp filters form the basis of compressive receivers, implementing a chirp-transform algorithm in the analog domain for real-time spectral analysis. HTS tapped-delay-line chirp filters are an enabling technology for instantaneous bandwidths greater than 1 GHz, and have evolved sufficiently to support dispersive delays as long as 40 ns with multigigahertz bandwidths and time-bandwidth products in excess of 100. Long dispersive delays have been obtained using a bonded/thinned-wafer technique to fabricate YBa/sub 2/Cu/sub O7-/spl delta// stripline devices on 5-mil-thick, 2-in-diameter LaAlO/sub 3/ substrates. These filters have produced better than -18-dB error sidelobes. In addition, a 3-GHz-bandwidth HTS compressive cueing receiver was recently delivered to the Naval Research Laboratory to be flown on the high temperature superconductor space experiment (HTSSE), and demonstrations have been performed combining HTS chirp filters with conventional compressive-receiver hardware. A novel compressive cryoreceiver architecture is proposed combining HTS, cryoelectronic, and advanced high-speed semiconductor technologies. The proposed receiver will rival the sensitivity of a narrowband receiver while providing unprecedented sideband instantaneous frequency coverage. Future developments will extend the bandwidth capability. Detailed comparisons are made to an all-digital receiver and to channelized-filter receiver architectures. An HTS compressive receiver is projected to be clearly superior in overall size, weight, and power. Applications include electronic warfare and dynamic molecular spectroscopy for remote sensing.


Objective: Our aim was to determine the efficacy of laparoscopic cholecystectomy in symptomatic patients with ultrasound negative and abnormal gallbladder ejection fractions; Patients with gallbladder ejection fractions less than 35% on hepatobiliary scan were offered laparoscopic cholecystectomy. Methods: Between January 1995 and January 2001, 1564 patients underwent laparoscopic cholecystectomy at our institution: 256 were confirmed to have acalculous gallbladder disease by pathology report and reconfirmation of abnormal hepatobiliary scan data. A 30-day postoperative follow-up was obtained by retrospective medical record review. For this study, we contacted all 256 patients by mail questionnaire and followed up on nonresponders with telephone interviews; we also reviewed hospital records to verify preoperative symptom patterns. The survey was completed by 154 patients (60%): 48 (31%) by mail and 106 (69%) by telephone interviews. The study included 115 (75%) female and 39 (25%) male patients, and the average age was 42 years (range, 13 to 95). All hepatobiliary laboratory parameters were normal pre- and postoperatively. The survey was completed in December 2001, 1 to 5 years postoperatively (mean 3years). Results: Preoperatively, 142 patients (92%) had right upper quadrant pain, 114 (74%) had nausea, 88 (57%) had vomiting, 120 (73%) had heartburn, and 118 (77%) had food intolerance. In a 30-day postoperative period, these numbers had reduced to 48 (37%), 14 (9%), 8 (5%), 22 (14%), and 34 (22%), respectively. The patient responses documented for this survey (mean 3 years postoperatively) were as follows: 93% had no recurrence of symptoms, 96% were satisfied that they had laparoscopic cholecystectomy, and 95% stated that they would recommend laparoscopic cholecystectomy to other patients. Conclusion: This study shows that patients with acalculous gallbladder disease benefit from laparoscopic cholecystectomy.


Purpose/aim This study is about environmental protection and energy conservation in the China vehicle market. Based on that, we focus on and comparison of combustion vehicles with hybrid vehicles.Design/method/approach Data was collected through questionnaire. The analysis includes a description of the sample and chi-square tests. We analyze two different particular engines (combustion engine vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles) and our single environment. We compare these two engine vehicles, and analyze the trends of the market. We use scientific data and existing theories to analyze the vehicles, including "lifecycle costs" "CO2 emissions", "Greenhouse gas", "Consumers perception", "Full Costing", "PPC (Production Possibilities Curve)", "Supply Demand Curve", and "Green Taxes".Findings We conclude that hybrid engine vehicles are environmentally friendly and energy conserving, but they have higher lifecycle costs. The analysis also shows that different ages, education levels and regions affect the customers' preferences for these two kinds of vehicles.Originality/value Our original idea is the problems of hybrid vehicles and how to support and popularize hybrid vehicles depends on the exact national conditions and policies implemented. However, consumers might not be able to accept the "environmental protection and energy conservation" concept immediately, because it's difficult to change the consumption concept of a generation or culture. Therefore, the government should carry out policies that are suitable for their local region to update the consumption concepts of the consumers and promote the new energy vehicles. Thus, the goal of environmental protection and energy conservation can be reached.


There has been much discussion worldwide on parenting after parental separation, especially on the desirability for the children involved of equally shared care (co-parenting) and the feasibility of legal arrangements in which the children alternate their residence between their parents' houses (residential co-parenting). Much is unclear about how residential co-parenting affects children and therefore how the legislator and practitioners should deal with this arrangement. Divided Parents, Shared Children seeks to answer three questions to further understand the phenomenon of co-parenting and to provide the legislator, the courts and parents with possible solutions: What kind of legal framework exists in England and Wales, the Netherlands and Belgium with regard to (residential) co-parenting and what can these countries learn from each other's legal systems? Does residential co-parenting occur in the three countries discussed, and if so how predominant is it? Should these jurisdictions encourage or discourage residential co-parenting through legal action? To answer these questions, this book uses not only legal data, from both empirical and literature research, but also sociological, psychological and demographic studies into residential arrangements and their effect on children.


Objective: The aim of this study was to examine growth in UK and Croatian women following childbirth and to identify correlates of personal growth after birth, specifically focusing on sociodemographic, obstetric and coping variables. Background: Childbirth is a significant and challenging life event for many women with the potential for both positive and negative psychological changes. Research is increasingly exploring growth in different cultures. No studies have explored growth in Croatian women following childbirth. Methods: UK (N = 193) and Croatian (N = 160) women who had given birth within the last two years completed online questionnaires measuring growth, depression, posttraumatic stress symptoms and coping strategies. Results: Approximately 44% and 35% of UK and Croatian women, respectively, reported a moderate level of growth after childbirth. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that younger women in both countries reported more growth. In the UK sample, coping strategies were related to higher growth. In the Croatian sample, higher posttraumatic stress symptoms and the avoidant coping strategy of denial were associated with higher levels of growth. Conclusion: This study suggests that many women report positive changes as a result of their birth experience. Further research is needed to explore how cultural elements are manifested in the experience of growth.


I. Introduction Since the political revolutions of 1989, the Central and Eastern European states have embraced judicial review as a means of promoting the supremacy of constitutional values and protecting fundamental rights. Nearly all Central and Eastern European nations have established constitutional courts modeled after the constitutional courts in Western Europe. Although their judges are not popularly elected, constitutional courts across Europe have jurisdiction to review and invalidate parliamentary legislation. Because they have the power to veto through constitutional review the policy choices of popularly elected representatives in parliament, European constitutional courts have been criticized as anti majoritarian. This Note first compares the European and U.S. models of judicial review and suggests reasons why Western Europe, after World War II, and Central and Eastern Europe, after 1989, chose to adopt concentrated systems of judicial review. Second, it examines the jurisdictional mandates of Central and Eastern European constitutional courts(2) and compares them with the jurisdictional structures of their French and German counterparts. Third, it discusses the antimajoritarian objection to European constitutional review, addressing arguments on both sides of the academic debate. Finally, this Note identifies several practical strategies that Central and Eastern European nations might pursue to minimize the antimajoritarian objection. II. The European Model of Constitutional Review A. The European and U.S. Models Compared Judicial review, or a court's power to invalidate a legislative or executive act on grounds of its unconstitutionality,(3) is structured differently in Europe than in the United States. The most significant difference between review in the two regions is that the European model features a concentrated, or centralized, system of review. Under a system of concentrated judicial review, constitutional review is exercised only by specialized courts that have been specifically created to decide constitutional issues. Thus, while the U.S. system of diffuse judicial review authorizes all courts to consider the constitutionality of legislation, the European model concentrates the power of judicial review in one tribunal.(4) With few exceptions,(5) European constitutional courts decide only constitutional questions; they do not adjudicate non-constitutional litigation between adverse parties.(6) Constitutional courts are created expressly by provisions in European constitutions,(7) and they are independent of ordinary judicial structures. In fact, the provisions establishing constitutional courts usually are separate from those regulating the ordinary judiciary.(8) While ordinary European courts generally are not permitted to exercise judicial review of constitutional questions, these courts may be allowed to refer such issues to constitutional courts for decision, and they subsequently are bound by constitutional court rulings.(9) The second major difference between the European and U.S. models of judicial review is that the European constitutional courts possess jurisdiction to practice abstract review. Abstract review is not dependent on litigation involving a statute; rather, the court considers the constitutionality of an item of legislation in principle. When constitutional courts practice abstract review, they need not examine the factual circumstances of a specific case.(10) By contrast, the U.S. model permits courts to review constitutional issues only in the context of ripe adversarial lawsuits where parties have standing to bring a challenge.(11) In sum, judicial review in the United States is incidental to ordinary litigation, whereas European constitutional courts may decide constitutional issues in the abstract. As a result, doctrines of standing vary in the European and U.S. models. U.S. courts will decide constitutional issues only if individual litigants have "a personal stake in the outcome of the controversy,"(12) whereas public officials - who may lack a "personal stake" in the sense of the U. …


Background/Context Achieving academic readiness is difficult in high-stakes testing environments (HSTEs) and even more challenging for English Language Learners with Learning Disabilities (ELLD). Transforming classroom cultures to emphasize the development of competence and motivationally supportive practices could moderate some of the potentially deleterious effects of a HSTE on ELLD. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study This qualitative case study explored the impact of All Learners Learning Every Day (ALL-ED)—a mastery-oriented teacher professional development (PD) program—on ELLD's readiness to tackle challenges in HSTEs. Setting The study was conducted at an international high school in the south Bronx, NY. Participants Participants included three classroom teachers (one general education English teacher, one general education math teacher, and one special education teacher) and 13 students. Intervention This study examines the impact of instructional routines (small group discussions and self-regulation) on ELLD in a HSTE. Research Design A qualitative case study was used to examine the impact of instructional routines in a specific context from multiple perspectives. Data Collection and Analysis Data were collected throughout the school year including student drawings, student and teacher interviews, and researcher memos. A protocol for analysis and interpretation was used to explore student conceptualization through drawing. Using constant comparison analysis, in-vivo codes were organized into meaningful themes and then sorted into two perspectives of self-reflection called "student experiences" and communication to others called "student advice to teachers." Paralleling the student interviews, in-vivo codes were used to determine key words and phrases for each teacher and common across teachers. Findings/Results The first research question investigated the impact of HSTE on ELLD's motivation to learn. The following themes emerged; student feelings relate to perception of understanding, classroom conversation and confidence, individual teacher conferences, curriculum clarity (goals, activities, quality), comparisons to other students, and expectations of progress are success. The second research question investigated the impact of ALL-ED routines in HSTE. Five key practices were identified that aided in establishing a mastery-oriented and supportive learning environment. Conclusions/Recommendations This study elucidates tensions among limited time, the complexity of coordinating effective instructional practices across teacher teams, and spe-cific instructional needs of ELLD in HSTE. Perspectives from the students challenge our understanding of the finish line in the race to acquire language, content knowledge, and skills in school by suggesting that all assessments be placed within a cycle of learning and feedback that together along with many other experiences provide evidence of growth and academic competence.


We study the implications of credit market frictions for the dynamics of corporate capital structure and the risk of default of corporations. To do so, we develop a dynamic capital structure model in which firms face uncertainty regarding their ability to raise funds in credit markets and have to search for investors when seeking to adjust their capital structure. We provide a general analysis of shareholders' dynamic financing and default decisions, show when Markov perfect equilibria in financing and default barrier strategies exist, and when uniqueness can be achieved. We then use the model to generate a number of novel testable implications relating credit market frictions to target leverage, the pace and size of capital structure changes, creditor turnover, and the likelihood of default.


This study presents the analysis of one of the major contemporary transformational forces - the Internet of Things (IoT), which significantly influences the future development of all spheres of life. The purpose of the research is to identify the potential economic effects of IoT implementation in different markets. To achieve this goal, the following tasks are consistently solved in the study: identification and classification of the main IoT applications markets; detection, assessment and analysis of the economic effects of the IoT in the selected segmentswithin the proposed classification; formation of future directions of IoT development. Based on the combination of such methodological approaches as technology life cycle and technology adoption life cycle, perspectives of the IoT development are set out.The technology life cycle is viewed through the prism of the methodology of the research company Gartner (the Gartner Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies), based on establishing a consensus among a wide range of assessments of leading experts in the field of information and communication technologies. Comparison of the two methods and expert assessments allows us to conclude that, according to the methodology of technology adoption life cycle, the Internet of Things is of interest only for a group of "early adopters."


Managed entry agreements (MEAs) comprise a variety of instruments to reduce uncertainty arising from incomplete information on budget impact, cost-effectiveness, use in real life, and access to new therapies. MEAs have a number of advantages and limitations and are sometimes faced with scepticism among decision-makers. Their uptake and use – particularly financial MEAs - has been fast in many European Union Member States and beyond. The use of MEAs highlights their significance as a conduit for satisfying a number of policy imperatives while mitigating risk and the limitations of current approaches to coverage decisions, including health technology assessment (HTA), in securing reasonable prices and addressing uncertainties around therapeutic effect in real life. Despite the large number of agreements implemented, little information is available on their impact. The little amount of available information is hampering cross-country learning and the ability of patients to engage in the process. Despite their proliferation, MEAs should not become a quick-fix solution to addressing the risk and uncertainty arising from the introduction of new therapies; instead, they should be integrated into a process of managed introduction of new therapies starting with horizon scanning and forecasting activities, proceeds to HTA assessment and continues with post-marketing studies and surveillance.


Online reviews in which users publish detailed commentary about their experiences and opinions with products, services, or events are extremely valuable to users who rely on them to make informed decisions. However, reviews vary greatly in quality and are constantly increasing in number, therefore, automatic assessment of review helpfulness is of growing importance. Previous work has addressed the problem by treating a review as a stand-alone document, extracting features from the review text, and learning a function based on these features for predicting the review quality. In this work, we exploit contextual information about authors' identities and social networks for improving review quality prediction. We propose a generic framework for incorporating social context information by adding regularization constraints to the text-based predictor. Our approach can effectively use the social context information available for large quantities of unlabeled reviews. It also has the advantage that the resulting predictor is usable even when social context is unavailable. We validate our framework within a real commerce portal and experimentally demonstrate that using social context information can help improve the accuracy of review quality prediction especially when the available training data is sparse.


Today's mobile applications require constant adaptation to their changing environments, or contexts. Technological advances have increased the pervasiveness of mobile computing devices such as laptops, handhelds, and embedded sensors. The sheer amount of context information available for adaptation places a heightened burden on application developers as they must manage and utilize vast amounts of data from diverse sources. Facilitating programming in this data-rich environment requires a middleware that provides context information to applications in an abstract form. In this paper, we demonstrate the feasibility of such a middleware that allows programmers to focus on high-level interactions among programs and to employ declarative abstract context specifications in settings that exhibit transient interactions with opportunistically encountered components. We also discuss the novel context-aware abstractions the middleware provides and the programming knowledge necessary to write applications using it. Finally, we provide examples demonstrating the infrastructure's ability to support differing tasks from a wide variety of application domains. Index Terms—Context-awareness, middleware, mobile ad hoc networks, programming abstraction.


Cosmic background (CB) radiation, encompassing the sum of emission from all sources outside our own Milky Way galaxy across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, is a fundamental phenomenon in observational cosmology. Many experiments have been conceived to measure it (or its constituents) since the extragalactic Universe was first discovered; in addition to estimating the bulk (cosmic monopole) spectrum, directional variations have also been detected over a wide range of wavelengths. Here we gather the most recent of these measurements and discuss the current status of our understanding of the CB from radio to γ-ray energies. Using available data in the literature, we piece together the sky-averaged intensity spectrum and discuss the emission processes responsible for what is observed. We examine the effect of perturbations to the continuum spectrum from atomic and molecular line processes and comment on the detectability of these signals. We also discuss how one could, in principle, obtain a complete census of the CB by measuring the full spectrum of each spherical harmonic expansion coefficient. This set of spectra of multipole moments effectively encodes the entire statistical history of nuclear, atomic, and molecular processes in the Universe.


Carved into the mountains of northern China, the Buddhist cave temples of Xiangtangshan were the crowning cultural achievement of the sixth-century Northern Qi dynasty. Once home to a magnificent array of limestone sculptures, the caves were heavily damaged during the first half of the twentieth century, and much of the work housed there was lost to the international art market. The exhibition Echoes of the Past - co-organized by the University of Chicago's Smart Museum of Art and the Smithsonian Institution's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery - draws upon the findings of a multiyear research project headed by Katherine R. Tsiang at the University of Chicago's Center for the Arts of East Asia. Using such twenty-first-century technologies as 3-D scanning, Tsiang and an international team of technicians and scholars have identified many of the dispersed sculptures from Xiangtangshan in an effort to shed new light on the original beauty and meaning of the cave temples. This exhibition catalog features entries with full-color illustrations of the works in the exhibition, as well as six new essays discussing the artistic, historical, and religious significance of the caves and their sculptures and recent research dedicated to their digital reconstruction.


Here, with the aim of obtaining insight into the intriguing selectivity of G-quadruplex (G4) ligands toward cancer compared to normal cells, a genetically controlled system of progressive transformation in human BJ fibroblasts was analyzed. Among the different comparative evaluations, we found a progressive increase of DNA damage response (DDR) markers throughout the genome from normal toward immortalized and transformed cells. More interestingly, sensitivity to G4 ligands strongly correlated with the presence of a basal level of DNA damage, including at the telomeres, where the chromosome ends were exposed to the DDR without concurrent induction of DNA repair activity, as revealed by the lack of 53BP1 recruitment and telomere aberrations. The link between telomere uncapping and the response to G4 stabilization was directly assessed by showing that a partial TRF2 depletion, causing a basal level of telomere localized DDR, rendered telomerized fibroblasts prone to G4-induced telomere damage and anti-proliferative defects. Taken together these data strongly indicate that the presence of a basal level of telomere-associated DDR is a determinant of susceptibility to G4 stabilization.


Concerned about the low academic ability of public school teachers, in the 1990s and 2000s, some states increased licensing stringency to weed out low-quality candidates, while others decreased restrictions to attract high-quality candidates. We offer a theoretical model justifying both reactions. Using data from 1991–2007 on licensing requirements and teacher quality—as measured by the selectivity of teachers' undergraduate institutions—we find that stricter licensing requirements, especially those emphasizing academic coursework, increase the left tail of the quality distribution for secondary school teachers without significantly decreasing quality for high-minority or high-poverty districts.


Access to post-secondary education, specifi cally in the technical, two-year institution area, is a topic of growing interest in the country. Funding agencies, such as NSF, via the Advanced Technological Education Program (ATE), are supporting initiatives and research aimed at increasing the number of technicians and engineers and improving science, mathematics performance, and technological literacy among pre-college populations. This study focused on projects and programs awarded under the NSF-ATE program. It aimed to understand their approaches to K-12 engineering and technology education. Forty eight percent of the 2009 spring-summer active awards with K-12 components were identifi ed. Through a mixed-method design, 49 NSF-ATE award representatives responded to an online survey, and fi ve were interviewed after their online responses were analyzed. Results show that "pathways to increase the number of engineers and technicians" was the most prevalent goal, that their activities were more informational than instructional, that and their concerns concentrated primarily on their evaluations.


Gravity's Rainbow begins with the sound of a rocket that blasts London near the end of the Second World War, and ends with the scene of a Los Angeles theater on which a rocket is falling in the middle of the Cold War. Rockets do not respect national borders. Gillian Beer explores how the advent of the technology of the aeroplane early in the twentieth century significantly affected the idea of the British nation. Although its emphasis is on Woolf, Beer's study includes insightful comments on other modernist writers as well. Gertrude Stein, for example, understood "the formal reordering of the earth when seen from the aeroplane–a reordering which does away with centrality and very largely with borders" (Beer 265). Moreover, Beer observes, the military use of the aeroplane unsettled the British idea of the nation as a "safe fortress" or "fortress-island" (266).


The study of the impact of toxic substances on organisms is currently being given great attention, while the studies of the positive effect of low doses of these substances on the organisms (the so-called hormesis) also constantly appear. A typical hormetic response in plants is caused, in particular, by non-essential, toxic and trace elements. Although the knowledge about mechanisms of hormesis is growing, the phenomenon is not sufficiently explained so far. Some trace elements, such as arsenic, mercury and cadmium, can be powerful elicitors of activation of plant defence mechanisms against various types of stressors, but their practical application as hormesis agents is limited due to the fear for the environment and to the narrow range between stimulatory and toxic concentrations. More thorough biochemical, molecular and biological analyses can help clarify other mechanisms of hormesis, which may extend possible practical applications.


Background/Aims: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is not rare in kidney transplant (KT) recipients. Interferon (IFN)-based therapies are generally contraindicated because IFN can induce severe rejection of the allograft. Here, we report five cases those who underwent therapy with direct-acting antiviral drugs (DAAs) after KT and evaluated their clinical outcomes.
Patients/Methods: The five patients [the median age; 55 (49- 71) years, 3 males], were treated with NS5A and NS3 proteasetargeted DAA (daclatasvir, DCV and asunaprevir, ASV) therapy for 24 weeks after KT. The immunosuppressants prescribed were corticosteroids/mammalian target of rapamycin, tacrolimus, and mycophenolate mofetil or azathioprine.
Results: In all cases, the acquired HCV was serological type 1 with the L31 or Y93 wild-type strain and the median HCV RNA level was 6.5 (5.7-6.7) log IU/mL. The median estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) was 39 (30-58) mL/min/1.73 m2. All treated cases achieved a sustained virological response (SVR). Therapeutic drug monitoring of tacrolimus required slight adjustments of the tacrolimus dose. Regarding adverse events, a low-grade fever and mild renal dysfunction were observed in one case at 3 months. Despite withdrawing the treatment, this case still achieved SVR. The other cases showed no severe adverse events in liver or renal function.
Conclusions: An IFN-free regimen of DCV/ASV therapy provided high tolerability and effectiveness in HCV-positive KT recipients, even under immunosuppressive conditions


An Adaptive-Hybrid Redundancy (AHR) mitigation strategy is proposed to mitigate the effects of Single Event Upset (SEU) and Single Event Transient (SET) radiation effects. AHR is adaptive because it switches between Triple Modular Redundancy (TMR) and Temporal Software Redundancy (TSR). AHR is hybrid because it uses hardware and software redundancy. AHR is demonstrated to run faster than TSR and use less energy than TMR. Furthermore, AHR allows space vehicle designers, mission planners, and operators the flexibility to determine how much time is spent in TMR and TSR. TMR mode provides faster processing at the expense of greater energy usage. TSR mode uses less energy at the expense of processing speed. AHR allows the user to determine the optimal balance between these modes based on their mission needs and changes can be made even after the space vehicle is operational. Radiation testing was performed to determine the SEU injection rate for simulations and analyses. A Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) was used to expedite testing in hardware.