Introduction It is recognised that community rapid response services can face difficulties in sourcing medicines to support end-of-life care (Butler and Holdsworth, 2013). Medicines used in the out-of-hours (OOH) period cannot usually be dispensed directly to the patient due to community pharmacies being closed. This can prevent the setup of syringe drivers and/or administration of prescribed stat doses. Here, an on-call pharmacy service was commissioned but not well integrated into pathways of care. Aim To optimise the treatment of palliative care patients in crisis, using an integrated pathway. Method A Rapid Process Improvement Workshop (RPIW) was used to map the process of managing a patient in crisis, and plan a more efficient pathway to access medicines across nursing, medical and pharmacy services. Results An integrated pathway was developed to facilitate best use of healthcare professional time to deliver palliative care (see below). An on-call pharmacy service is key to its delivery. In 2015/16, palliative care nurses were coordinating medicines supply for 95% pharmacy call-outs (n=38), since implementation of the new pathway in 2016/17 this has reduced to 42% (n=31). At baseline, it was estimated that sourcing medicines by nurses took four to five hours, the new service takes an average 49 min from call-out to patient delivery of required medicines. Conclusion Commissioning an on-call pharmacy service using an integrated pathway for patients in crisis enables efficient supply of medicines during the OOH period, optimising use of nursing, pharmacist and medical time to facilitate timely access to medicines for symptom management. Reference . Butler, C. and Holdsworth, L. (2013) 'Setting up a new evidence-based hospice-at-home service in England', International Journal of Palliative Nursing, 19(7), pp. 355–359


ABSTRACT The grasshopper fauna from Huascarán National Park and the valleys of "Callejón de Conchucos" and "Callejón de Huaylas", Perú, has been sampled during two surveys of the area in 2004 and 2008. In this paper, two new genera (Tiyantiyana n. gen. and Huaylasacris n. gen.) and six new species collected during the surveys are described: Tiyantiyana sunipenis n. gen, n. sp., Huaylasacris maxicerci n. gen, n. sp., Maeacris chilikuti n. sp., M. saytu n. sp., M. ayasqa n. sp. of the subfamily Melanoplinae and Orphulella chumpi n. sp. of the subfamily Gomphocerinae. Previous records on the highland grasshoppers of the Peruvian Andes were almost nonexistent. The new acridids described here were collected at the high-altitude puna grassland, between 3182 and 4660 m a.s.l. Puna is one of the most heavily modified natural regions of Peru. Since grasshoppers are a useful group for bioindication, it is important to acquire knowledge on their diversity in such environmental conditions. This paper includes many embedded links to images of type specimens, maps based on geo-referenced specimen data, and keys to species, all available at Orthoptera Species File Online (http://orthoptera.speciesfile.org).


Parliaments in Europe are the place where the representatives of citizens debate. They express the collective will through delegation and mandate. According to the origin of the word, used in England since the thirteenth century, parliaments are places for speaking, as well as the space for communication organized as much for internal use as for external interaction. The introduction of technologies (from the press to the radio and television) transformed the interaction between members of parliament and their constituents.


†Security and governance in Ghazni Province, Afghanistan are threatened by resource conflict dynamics: groups focus on exploiting lootable resources in the short term while weak institutions and conflict persist. Elements within the Afghan government and insurgent organizations alike expand their power and influence in this manner. Understanding how criminal organizations operate within the regional political economy is essential to reducing the leverage these networks, associated criminal syndicates, and corrupt government officials have on the community. We proffer three hypotheses for development and stability practitioners to monitor as transition approaches in 2014, as well as recommendations for mitigating the onset of resource conflict in Ghazni as the province experiences a downgrade in foreign security forces. Adopting effective, anti-insurgency policies will be fundamental to mitigating the malicious effects on the population and providing incentives for peace, rather than continuing conflict.


ABSTRACT This article is part of a Book Forum review of Sanjib Baruah's book In the Name of the Nation: India and its Northeast (2020). The Book Forum consists of individual commentaries on this text by five interested scholars, followed by a response by the author. The article may be read individually or alongside the other contributions to the Forum, which together constitute a comprehensive discussion of the themes and arguments in the book.


Escherichia coli (E. coli) are common and typically innocuous copiotrophic bacteria found in the mammalian gut microbiome. However, over the past 30 years, pathogenic E. coli have been responsible for several outbreaks of foodborne illness linked to contaminated produce. The introduction of Escherichia coli to an agricultural soil, via contaminated water, compost, or raw manure, exposes the bacterium to a medley of ecological forces not found in a mammalian gut environment. This study assesses a variety of abiotic and biotic soil factors that influence the ability of an "invasive" copiotrophic coliform bacterium to survive in compost-amended agricultural soil. The study included both field and laboratory components. In the lab experiment, a cocktail of rifampicin-resistant generic E.coli strains was added to sterile and non-sterile extracts of eight different composts and one soil sample from the field sites. E. coli abundance was monitored over a one-week period and composts were analyzed for their nutrient profile. In the field experiment, the same E. coli cocktail was sprayed on plots with the following treatments: 1) dairy windrow compost, 2) dairy vermicompost, 3) poultry windrow compost, or 4) no compost. E. coli abundance, soil water potential, soil temperature, extracellular enzyme activity, microbial respiration, phospholipid fatty acid biomarker abundance, and genetic sequencing of the microbial community were measured over a six-month field season. The lab experiment showed that E. coli were able to grow well in sterile compost extracts, without microbial competition for nutrients. Conversely, E. coli populations were only able to survive in non-sterile soil extracts. These results suggest that copiotrophic organisms adapted for high-nutrient environments may depend on the extracellular enzyme activity of native oligotrophic organisms to acquire sufficient nutrients to survive in soils. Results of the field experiment showed clear and interdependent effects of soil moisture and nutrient availability on microbial community dynamics and E. coli survival. Data suggest that saturated soils cause a decrease in microbial extracellular enzyme activity, and drying-rewetting cycles can cause respiration bursts, nutrient mineralization, and shifts in community composition. The saturation of soils, which mobilizes nutrients and may result in a decrease in competition from aerobic organisms, correlated directly with increased survival of E. coli. Additionally, amendment with ammonium-rich poultry compost resulted in the maintenance of high levels of E. coli throughout the field season. Despite an increase in microbial biomass from dairy vermicompost amendment, poultry compost was the only compost that had a significant effect on E. coli survival. The results suggest that nitrogen availability and water potential are strong drivers of E. coli's survival in soils. Correlations among abiotic factors, community composition, and E. coli survival reveal insights into the complex relationships that occur in disturbed agricultural soil environments. Further research on E. coli's response to targeted organisms, abiotic soil properties, and nutrient inputs could have implications for agricultural considerations in food safety and microbial ecology.


Black-box attack methods aim to infer suitable attack patterns to targeted DNN models by only using output feedback of the models and the corresponding input queries. However, due to lack of prior and inefficiency in leveraging the query and feedback information, existing methods are mostly query-intensive for obtaining effective attack patterns. In this work, we propose a meta attack approach that is capable of attacking a targeted model with much fewer queries. Its high queryefficiency stems from effective utilization of meta learning approaches in learning generalizable prior abstraction from the previously observed attack patterns and exploiting such prior to help infer attack patterns from only a few queries and outputs. Extensive experiments on MNIST, CIFAR10 and tiny-Imagenet demonstrate that our meta-attack method can remarkably reduce the number of model queries without sacrificing the attack performance. Besides, the obtained meta attacker is not restricted to a particular model but can be used easily with a fast adaptive ability to attack a variety of models.The code of our work is available at this https URL.


The advent of social markup languages and lightweight public data access methods has created an opportunity to share the social, documentary and system information locked in most servers as a mashup. Whereas solutions already exists for creating and managing mashups from network sources, we propose here a mashup framework whose primary information sources are the applications and user les of a server. This enables us to use server legacy data sources that are already maintained as part of basic administration to semantically link user documents and accounts using social web constructs.


Organizational controls have been recognized as an important aspect of the managers' organizational life. Managers exercise organizational controls to direct and motivate employees and external partners to behave in desired ways. The extant research on the effectiveness of outcome, behavior, and clan control remains equivocal. This dissertation therefore focuses on two research objectives that aims to improve the understanding related to the behavioral and performance consequences of outcome, behavior, and clan control. The first research objective was to meta-analyze the relationship between the three organizational controls and performance along with their performance effects in combination. The second research objective was to investigate the behavioral and performance consequences of the three organizational controls in NPD outsourcing.

The two research objectives were met by conducting three empirical studies. The first study elucidates the relationships of outcome, behavior, and clan control with various performance outcomes, as well as that they act as complements. The second study reveals the effect of outcome, behavior, and clan control on supplier flexibility in NPD outsourcing, and what effect this has on NPD project performance. The third study examines whether the three organizational controls can influence a supplier to adhere to the specified prescriptions such that it sometimes does not use its own idiosyncratic expertise (supplier mechanical compliance), and also restrict the intrinsic motivation of the supplier in NPD outsourcing.

Collectively, this dissertation informs managers and scholars about the behavioral and performance consequences of exercising organizational controls, both, in general and NPD outsourcing.


Vision-and-Language Navigation (VLN) requires an agent to follow natural-language instructions, explore the given environments, and reach the desired target locations. These step-by-step navigational instructions are crucial when the agent is navigating new environments about which it has no prior knowledge. Most recent works that study VLN observe a significant performance drop when tested on unseen environments (i.e., environments not used in training), indicating that the neural agent models are highly biased towards training environments. Although this issue is considered as one of the major challenges in VLN research, it is still under-studied and needs a clearer explanation. In this work, we design novel diagnosis experiments via environment re-splitting and feature replacement, looking into possible reasons for this environment bias. We observe that neither the language nor the underlying navigational graph, but the low-level visual appearance conveyed by ResNet features directly affects the agent model and contributes to this environment bias in results. According to this observation, we explore several kinds of semantic representations that contain less low-level visual information, hence the agent learned with these features could be better generalized to unseen testing environments. Without modifying the baseline agent model and its training method, our explored semantic features significantly decrease the performance gaps between seen and unseen on multiple datasets (i.e. R2R, R4R, and CVDN) and achieve competitive unseen results to previous state-of-the-art models.


The anatomopathological lesions of clinical cases of osteomyelitis in 21 adult alpacas, six tuis and three baby alpacas were described through clinical and pathological evaluation, determining the number, degree, and progression of the lesions. Alterations of the molar part, edentulous space, and incisive part of the buccal and lingual sides of the left and right mandibular body were observed. In all cases, the lesions appeared in the mandible, mostly on the left side. Osteomyelitis was predominantly severe in the youngest alpacas, where hyperostosis, rarefaction, necrosis, involvement, and sequestration develops in less time than in adults and tuis. Mild lesions were thickened in the left mandible, while moderate and severe lesions were multifocal on both sides, with ulcerations and fistulas directly related to the progression of lesions.


We propose a domain-level-based routing (DLR) algorithm for a multidomain WDM network with confidentiality constraints of interdomain connectivity and wavelength availability. This algorithm classifies all domains in the network into different groups with incremental levels according to the metrics that they are relative to the source and destination domains. The path computation is implemented in the ascending or descending direction of domain levels for domains within the determined domain set. The resultant route is calculated via the growth and pruning of an interdomain routing tree (IDRT). Three modes of growth and five modes of pruning are proposed to support the IDRT evolution. The DLR algorithm can be accomplished in a hierarchical path computation element (PCE) routing architecture, with the domain set determined and the IDRT calculated by the parent PCE and intradomain path computed by child PCEs. Simulation results indicate that the proposed DLR algorithm performs better than previous schemes in terms of blocking probability and resource utilization ratio, with slight signaling overhead and computation complexity increase.


Unit Hydrograph (UH) is used as one of methods to calculate design flood. UH is derivate from discharge and precipitation on watershed. The limitation of the data and places for UH brings about ideas to develop The Synthetic Unit Hydrograph (SUH). The Research and modeling of SUH to improve parameters of SUH (QP, TP, and TB), with the simple watershed physic characteristic : the watershed area (A), length of main stream (L), slope of mean stream (S), and factor of watershed type (FD).
Modeling the SUH parameters uses Regression Statistical Method with four variables of watershed in individual and combination of it. From the Research of four watershed variables, the variables A, L, and FD have strong linear influence (sensitive) to parameter of peak discharge, and the variables FD, A, and S sensitive to the parameter of peak time of SUH. The modeling result parameter of peak discharge QP = 0,20 . A0'73 with adjusted determination coefficient very high (R2 = 0,871), and the parameter of peak time TP = 1,17 . S0,'06 FD-0,92 with R2 = 0,922.
This research must develop with more data to rises the stability of model coefficient and definite the best model can be based on R2 and Sum Square of Error (SSE). The Research factor of watershed type (FD) has not discussed the influence of watershed geometric, position to parameter of peak time yet.


We illustrate how channel optimized vector quantization (COVQ) can be used for channels with both bit-errors and bit-erasures. First, a memoryless channel model is presented, and the performance of COVQ's trained for this channel is evaluated for an i.i.d. Gaussian source. Then, the new method is applied in implementing an error-robust sub-band image coder, and we present image results that illustrate the resulting performance. Our experiments show that the new approach is able to outperform a traditional scheme based on separate source and channel coding.


In 2014 USAID / Tanzania awarded the Tanzania Strengthening Police and Prison Comprehensive HIV Services (SPPCHS) project as an initiative under the AIDSFree project. The SPPCHS project worked with the Ministry of Home Affairs to design a peer education program for prisons to provide knowledge skills and tools to prevent and respond to tuberculosis (TB) and HIV in prisons. AIDSFree held two training of trainers (TOT) in Dodoma to train 55 prison officers from 26 prison facilities to train prison staff and inmates on the new peer education program. This report presents the findings from the resulting evaluations suggests some recommendations for future TOTs of this kind and summarizes the sessions delivered.


Background: Intraoperative evaluation of an ovarian mass is of crucial importance in its further management, accomplished by frozen section (FS) and scrape smear (SS) examination. Aim: To evaluate utility of SS over FS and to study scrape cytological features of a variety of ovarian neoplasms. Materials and Methods: The study comprised ovarian tumors studied over a period of 1 year (2014–2015) that were submitted for intraoperative assessment. SS and FS were examined and evaluated independently. The results were compared with final pathological diagnosis in each case, and cases with discordant diagnoses were reviewed. All the SSs of ovarian tumors were re-evaluated with Giemsa-stained smears, and cytological features were described. Results: The results of SS and FS were 100% concordant. On histopathology, of 81 cases, 43 were epithelial [(categorized further as serous, mucinous, or malignant mixed Mullerian tumor (MMMT)] along with subcategorization of benign, borderline, and malignant), 16 were germ cell (categorized as teratoma: mature/immature and yolk sac tumor), 11 were sex cord stromal tumors (fibroma, granulosa cell tumor, Sertoli–Leydig cell tumor), 8 cases were hemorrhagic cysts (torsion, endometroid, corpus luteal cyst, etc.), and 3 were metastasis. There were 61 benign, 2 borderline, and 18 malignant cases on FS and scrape. Combining all the values, sensitivity and specificity were 76% and 98.21%, respectively. The diagnostic accuracy in diagnosing malignant lesions was 91%. Conclusion: Adequate knowledge on cytohistological correlation of ovarian scrape cytology may phase out the use of cryostat in intraoperative diagnosis of ovarian neoplasms, and thus be a boon for resource-deprived settings.


The paper presents a model of adaptive behavior of an autonomous adaptive agent (an artificial organism) based on the semantic probabilistic inference and the functional system theory by P.K. Anokhin. The main distinction of this model is the possibility for automatic generation of new subgoals, which allows us to solve more complex multi-level tasks. An autonomous adaptive agent has been created on the basis of this model, and a number of experiments have been carried out in order to train it and to compare it with the existing approaches based on neural networks and reinforcement learning. The results of comparison have shown that the proposed model learns and acts more efficiently.


This scholarly project focused on implementing Team Strategies and Tools to Enhance Performance and Patient Safety (TeamSTEPPS) in an emergency room (ER). The aim of TeamSTEPPS is to improve patient outcomes by educating healthcare professionals on communication and teamwork skills. TeamSTEPPS teaches healthcare professionals leadership skills, shared mental models, mutual trust, and closed loop communication. The purpose of the scholarly project was to improve teamwork and communication. The study method was descriptive analysis of 51 pre and posttest questionnaires, specifically looking for increased knowledge of TeamSTEPPS tools. The participants included: ER physicians, ER nurses, ER certified nursing assistants/health unit coordinators, a pharmacy technician, public safety officers, and patient revenue management organization (PRMO). Further research is needed to evaluate how to significantly increase staff knowledge on TeamSTEPPS tools in a class setting.


Exam performance was compared for students who hand wrote questions designed to prepare them for daily lab activities in a senior level virology laboratory course versus those who answered questions created to mirror the written questions on-line. No significant difference was noted in exam scores on any of the three midterms, written final exam, nor the practical exam. Neither was there a significant difference in the quality of the laboratory reports turned in as evidenced by similar average scores over four years. These results indicate that using online pre-labs to prepare students for the laboratory sessions leads to equivalent learning as answering handwritten pre-lab assignments. Online pre-labs significantly reduced the amount of grading without reducing student learning, allowing a reduction in the number of teaching assistants required per section.


Host cell invasion by the Apicomplexa critically relies on regulated secretion of transmembrane micronemal proteins (TM‐MICs). Toxoplasma gondii possesses functionally non‐redundant MIC complexes that participate in gliding motility, host cell attachment, moving junction formation, rhoptry secretion and invasion. The TM‐MICs are released onto the parasite's surface as complexes capable of interacting with host cell receptors. Additionally, TgMIC2 simultaneously connects to the actomyosin system via binding to aldolase. During invasion these adhesive complexes are shed from the surface notably via intramembrane cleavage of the TM‐MICs by a rhomboid protease. Some TM‐MICs act as escorters and assure trafficking of the complexes to the micronemes. We have investigated the properties of TgMIC6, TgMIC8, TgMIC8.2, TgAMA1 and the new micronemal protein TgMIC16 with respect to interaction with aldolase, susceptibility to rhomboid cleavage and presence of trafficking signals. We conclude that several TM‐MICs lack targeting information within their C‐terminal domains, indicating that trafficking depends on yet unidentified proteins interacting with their ectodomains. Most TM‐MICs serve as substrates for a rhomboid protease and some of them are able to bind to aldolase. We also show that the residues responsible for binding to aldolase are essential for TgAMA1 but dispensable for TgMIC6 function during invasion.


Whilst the amino acid sequence of a protein is determined by its gene sequence, the final structure and function are determined by posttranslational modifications (PTMs), including quality control (QC) in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and during passage through the Golgi apparatus. These processes are species and cell specific and challenge the biopharmaceutical industry when developing a production platform for the generation of recombinant biologic therapeutics. Proteins and glycoproteins are also subject to chemical modifications (CMs) both in vivo and in vitro . The individual is naturally tolerant to molecular forms of self-molecules but nonself variants can provoke an immune response with the generation of anti-drug antibodies (ADA); aggregated forms can exhibit enhanced immunogenicity and QC procedures are developed to avoid or remove them. Monoclonal antibody therapeutics (mAbs) are a special case because their purpose is to bind the target, with the formation of immune complexes (ICs), a particular form of aggregate. Such ICs may be removed by phagocytic cells that have antigen presenting capacity. These considerations may frustrate the possibility of ameliorating the immunogenicity of mAbs by rigorous exclusion of aggregates from drug product. Alternate strategies for inducing immunosuppression or tolerance are discussed.


A new scorpion species, Vaejovis trinityae sp. nov. is described. This small brown species is found along the Mogollon Rim above Strawberry, Arizona. This is the first description of a new species of the "vorhiesi" group scorpions whose DNA phylogenetic analysis was published (Bryson et al., 2013); based on DNA data, the new species is most related to V. lapidicola Stahnke and V. crumpi Ayrey et Soleglad. It represents one of the "twenty-seven geographically cohesive lineages inferred from the mtDNA tree". A unique characteristic of this species is that it exhibits arboreal behavior, being frequently found on Ponderosa pine trees


This new work provides a comprehensive and theoretically rich discussion of the law on cross-border insolvency. It engages with several current multi-billion dollar insolvencies such as those of Nortel Networks and Lehman Brothers to provide the reader with state of the art knowledge of the complex problems posed by transnational insolvency. As the number of transnational insolvencies grows due to prevailing economic conditions, practitioners are increasingly required to navigate the mass of legal rules applicable to cross-border insolvency situations. The associated challenges are heightened by the diversity of legal structures employed by modern business entities and a patchwork of costly, inefficient, and unpredictable national legal rules. The response has been a proliferation of international legal instruments such as the UNCITRAL Model Law and the the EU Insolvency Regulation, supplemented by judicial practice, adding further layers of complexity. Writing from an Australian perspective, the authors analyse this network of legal rules and subsequent case law. In addition, they explain the theoretical underpinnings of these rules in an accessible manner to build a solid foundation for practice, facilitate advanced reasoning, and enable the development of sophisticated arguments for law reform. Comparative case law from jurisdictions such as the United States and United Kingdom is also included. This book is highly relevant to insolvency practitioners faced with the recovery of assets located in different jurisdictions, transactional lawyers for whom knowledge of potential insolvency pitfalls is essential, and academics. It is invaluable for students at both undergraduate and postgraduate level seeking a sound understanding of this challenging area of law.


In a new and provocative book, Rob Vischer has challenged the neutral partisan conception of the lawyer and the legal profession's reductive presumption that all clients wish to pursue atomistic self-interest irrespective of the consequences to others. Vischer's use of the teachings of Martin Luther King, Jr. and of Christian theology as a foundation for an alternative, and richly relational, account of law practice is both inspiring and effective.To debunk the presumption that clients seek narrow self-interest, which the book argues is a powerful component of the neutral partisan conception, Vischer compellingly asserts that clients are relational beings often interested in pursuing objectives that take into account the impact of their conduct on other parties and the community. The book's main contribution is its development of a practical relational account of law practice pursuant to which lawyers can both represent clients loyally and follow a relational ethic. Based on Dr. King's teachings regarding human dignity, agape, personalism, justice and Christian realism, Vischer puts forward a vision of law practice that calls upon lawyers to treat clients and themselves as subjects in a partnership and to offer counseling to clients that does not shy away from engaging the hard moral dimensions of the clients' conduct.The book's relational framework could gain even greater traction if it offered reasons for practicing relationally not embedded in Christian theology. For example, Vischer's anthroreligious belief that we are all created as relational human beings leads him to indicate that if institutional, competitive and ideological barriers to relational practice were removed, lawyers and clients would inevitably act more relationally. The cultural dominance of atomistic individualism, however, suggests that even with barriers removed, lawyers and clients will need some additional persuasion before adopting relational perspectives. Similarly, the book's grounding of relationality in agapic love neglects the potential application of more open-textured concepts, such as mutual benefit, that might conceivably appeal more broadly to lawyers who do not share Vischer's theological convictions.


Since the commercialization of the Internet began over twenty years ago, we have been fascinated with the opportunities that computer-mediated environments present for human interaction. As a result, we have spent the last few decades researching the marketing and consumer behavior impact of consumers' interactions in digital environments.Now, as the consumer Internet of Things emerges, we find ourselves with renewed excitement as we consider the opportunities for consumer interaction in physical environments with objects that have brought the Internet with them into the real world. Just as the Internet was revolutionary because it enabled many-to-many communication through connected digital networks at unprecedented scale, the IoT is a revolutionary advance that brings the digital into the physical realm. Now, interaction is distributed not just virtually "on the Internet," but also everywhere in the real world where people actually live, work and play.What awaits us as we are able to interact with smart objects in our everyday lives, and these objects are able to interact with each other, often autonomously? What are the implications for human interaction and for consumer experience? Will new marketing approaches be required? In the course of thinking about these kinds of questions over the past few years, we realized we needed a new framework to help our thinking jell. We found that framework in assemblage theory. The smart home assemblage serves as the context for our theorizing, but we believe our approach generalizes to any consumer IoT assemblage.In the monograph linked above, we present an assemblage-theory based conceptual framework and its implications for consumer experience in the smart home. In 8 sections, we discuss the evolution of the Internet and the emergence of the consumer IoT, offer a lay version of assemblage theory, develop our framework and discuss the implications of our framework for research in UX, consumer experience, and marketing strategy. The last two sections offer some early practical insights derived from our theory and some perspective on where things might be going.


This paper reviews theoretical and observational material on form and function of natural networks appeared in somewhat disparate contexts from physics to biology, whose study is related to hydrologic research. Moving from the exact result that drainage network configurations minimizing total energy dissipation are stationary solutions of the general equation describing landscape evolution, we discuss the properties and the dynamic origin of the scale‐invariant structure of river patterns and its relation to optimal selection. We argue that at least in the fluvial landscape, nature works through imperfect searches for dynamically accessible optimal configurations and that purely random or deterministic constructs are clearly unsuitable to properly describe natural network forms. We also show that optimal networks are spanning loopless configurations only under precise physical requirements that arise under the constraints imposed by continuity. In the case of rivers, every spanning tree proves a local minimum of total energy dissipation. This is stated in a theorem form applicable to generic networks, suggesting that other branching structures occurring in nature (e.g., scale‐free and looping) may possibly arise through optimality to different selective pressures. We thus conclude that one recurrent self‐organized mechanism for the dynamic origin of fractal forms is the robust strive for imperfect optimality that we see embedded in many natural patterns, chief and foremost hydrologic ones.


Rather than treat investments as statistical objects to be optimally combined into portfolios, investors are increasingly interested in the environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) dimensions of their investments. Analysts traditionally evaluated these dimensions in qualitative ways, but many data providers are attempting to score these dimensions, effectively quantifying what was qualitative. For developed market equities, on the basis of one popular data provider's ESG assessment, we evaluate the evidence on whether portfolios of highly rated ESG stocks are materially different from their complements (non-ESG stocks) in their investment opportunity sets. It is obvious that ESG stocks differ from non-ESG stocks in their ESG dimensions, but we show that ESG stocks returns are also different. Although the total return-to-total risk of ESG stocks may be lower than that for non-ESG stocks, after factor-adjusting the returns and risks, portfolios of ESG stocks with positive alpha have return-to-risk features comparable to those of portfolios of non-ESG stocks with positive alpha. For portfolios without statistically significant alpha, the portfolios of ESG stocks have lower residual volatility than portfolios of non-ESG stocks. It should be possible, by factor-neutralizing portfolios, to build better beta with comparable alpha portfolios by using ESG factors. TOPICS: ESG investing, equity portfolio management, portfolio management/multi-asset allocation


In this work, a novel automatic 3D building reconstruction approach is proposed to extract accurate LoD1 building models from multi-view aerial images. The proposed approach consists of three main parts. The first step is to generate digital surface models (DSMs) from aerial images, which is implemented with the Smart3D software and can be replaced by other open-source multi-view stereo (MVS) algorithms as well. The second step is to produce structured 2D building footprints using combined deep learning and regularization. The initial building segmentation maps are obtained by the multi-scale aggregation fully convolutional network (MAFCN), which takes both the images and DSM as input, through supervised learning. The initial segmentation maps are further refined with another segmentation maps that are derived from the DSM. After that, the contour extraction and regularization technology are applied to produce structured building footprints. In the last step, the elevations of the top and base of each individual building are reliably estimated by adopting an adaptive terrain generation approach and the neighbourhood buffer analysis. The georeferenced building footprint polygons and the elevations of building top and base form the watertight LoD1 building models. The qualitative and quantitative evaluations in Jinghai District, Tianjin, China demonstrate the robustness and effectiveness of the proposed approach. * Corresponding author


The first volume in a new series of Easneye Lectures. A study of the relationship between the Muslim community and the West. Areas covered are: -- The idea of Islamic mission -- Conversion to Islam in the West -- Theological debate with Christianity -- Human Rights Issues -- Issues in Education -- Church -- State relationships


Taken prisoner in Java, Terence Kelly's captivity was full of incident. He was witness to barbaric cruelty and suffering particularly on the journey packed into a filthy cargo ship under atrocious and inhumane conditions. Once in Japan, he was a slave in the Hitachi shipyards where he got to know other Japanese and learn their language. His book reveals more about the psyche of his captors than other similar works. His Hiroshima camp was unique and was possibly the best camp in which the Japs held POWs. Many of the inmates were influential men, who knew the Far East and had held important posts. The interaction between POWs and captors was fascinating and his book offers a rare insight into the Japanese character, as unthinkable defeat and humiliation became a reality. Kelly's account of the A-Bomb attack and the chaos that followed it is fascinating and rare.


This essay examines the graffiti that covers the portion of the West Bank's segregation wall that traverses Bethlehem. That the majority of the representations covering the wall are intended for international rather than local consumption complicates the prevalent tendency in the literature on this wall to align these representations homogenously with resistance. More than resisting a specific regime, many of these images enter into global conversations about the circulation of power. Images of resistance scripted and consumed by those who observe suffering from afar are juxtaposed to Palestinian engagements with the wall, which is frequently represented allegorically or not represented at all.


We demonstrate a reconfigurable quantum dot gate architecture that incorporates two interchangeable transport channels. One channel is used to form quantum dots and the other is used for charge sensing. The quantum dot transport channel can support either a single or a double quantum dot. We demonstrate few-electron occupation in a single quantum dot and extract charging energies as large as 6.6 meV. Magnetospectroscopy is used to measure valley splittings in the range of 35-70 microeV. By energizing two additional gates we form a few-electron double quantum dot and demonstrate tunable tunnel coupling at the (1,0) to (0,1) interdot charge transition.


The study examines how the Nigerian newspapers report flood disaster. Media plays crucial role in disaster risk reduction. Its reportage of flood disaster issues aids readers' understanding of the activities that make them vulnerable and what to do to mitigate the risk. Also, it prepares them for effective management of disaster when it occurs and moulds people's beliefs and perception about disaster risk reduction. Through framing, media assists people to draw "cognitive map" and influences behaviours.  Two Nigerian, English language newspapers ( Punch and Trust) were selected for the study based on circulation and credibility. The contents of the hard copies of the newspapers published from January 1 – December 2012 were analysed.  The study reveals that the media was least active (18.56%) in creating awareness and educate populace before disaster occurrence. However, it was very active (81.44%) during and after flood occurrence. This shows that Nigerian media is not proactive in its reportage of flood disaster but reactive. The study recommends that media should see itself as a key stakeholder in disaster risk reduction and active participants in reducing disaster risk. These can be achieved by employing disaster risk reduction and proactive frames through disseminating information about disaster risk reduction, early warning and educating populace before disaster occurrence. More collaboration activities with other stakeholders and sustained campaign against activities that make society vulnerable to disaster are also recommended. These may help people to understand the urgent need to safeguard their society from the increasing spate of flood disaster.


BACKGROUND
Outcomes of diabetes care are unequal and the NHS has a duty to consider reducing inequality in healthcare outcomes.

AIM
To quantify trends in socioeconomic inequality and diabetes outcomes.

DESIGN AND SETTING
Whole-population longitudinal study of 32 482 neighbourhoods (Lower Layer Super Output Areas [LSOAs]) in England between 2004/2005 and 2011/2012.

METHOD
Slope indices of inequality (SIIs) between neighbourhoods of great and little deprivation were measured annually for: glycated haemoglobin control in people with diabetes; emergency hospitalisation for diabetes; and amenable mortality from diabetes.

RESULTS
From 2004/2005 to 2011/2012 glycaemic control improved in all social groups, regardless of deprivation level, although inequality was unchanged as measured by the SII (0.04, 95% confidence interval [CI] = -0.43 to 0.52). Diabetes-related amenable mortality improved in all social groups, but decreased at a faster rate in neighbourhoods of greater deprivation. Inequality in diabetes-related amenable mortality improved, with the SII falling by 2.68 (95% CI = 1.93 to 3.43), resulting in 594 (95% CI = 420 to 767) fewer deaths. In contrast, emergency hospitalisations for diabetes increased in all social groups, with faster growth in neighbourhoods of greater deprivation. The socioeconomic gradient increased with the SII widening by 19.59 admissions for diabetes per 100 000 (95% CI = 16.00 to 23.17), resulting in an increase of 5991 (95% CI = 5084 to 6899) excess admissions associated with socioeconomic inequality during the study period.

CONCLUSION
In diabetes, mortality declined faster, but emergency hospitalisation grew faster in more deprived neighbourhoods. Unequal growth in emergency hospitalisation for diabetes is likely to be partly due to increased diabetes prevalence and patients living longer, but may also be due to overuse of glycaemic control medication.


Three main streams of evolutionary algorithms (EAs), probabilistic optimization algorithms based on the model of natural evolution, are compared in this article: evolution strategies (ESs), evolutionary programming (EP), and genetic algorithms (GAs). The comparison is performed with respect to certain characteristic components of EAs: the representation scheme of object variables, mutation, recombination, and the selection operator. Furthermore, each algorithm is formulated in a high-level notation as an instance of the general, unifying basic algorithm, and the fundamental theoretical results on the algorithms are presented. Finally, after presenting experimental results for three test functions representing a unimodal and a multimodal case as well as a step function with discontinuities, similarities and differences of the algorithms are elaborated, and some hints to open research questions are sketched.


The transition from primary to secondary school has been identified as a time that requires further investigation. In particular there is a need to include the experiences of disabled young people, and their parents. With the introduction of the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 (ASL) it is envisaged that school experiences and transitions should improve for these young people.

Two groups of participants were recruited via the Cerebral Palsy Register for Scotland, both including parents and young people. The first group was made up of families completing the transition prior to the introduction of the ASL act, and the second group after it. Data was obtained via individual interviews with both parents and young people.

Little difference was found between the transitional experiences of the first and second group. When discussing the transition parents explained how they chose a secondary school for their child to attend. The majority of parents wanted their child to attend the local school, a view supported by the young people themselves.

The main concern identified by this work for both parents and young people is that of mobility. This work also contributed to the knowledge of coping mechanisms, and revealed that parents draw on past transitional experiences of their child as a means to cope with this move.

For many of the young people this transition marks a change in their own personal identity. Throughout the move the young people became more aware of how others perceived them, and how they wished to be portrayed.

Overall both parents and young people felt they had had a positive transitional experience, despite many encountering problems during it. How these problems were overcome was significant to the overall view they formed of the transition. From this work it would suggest that the ASL act has had little impact on this transition.


ABSTRACT In a criminal investigation a variety of people potentially involved in the crime are often expected to remember their actions and whereabouts at the time of the event, and then to corroborate their recollection so that they can be ruled out as suspects. In other words, people are often expected to have an alibi to prove their innocence. Despite the often crucial role played by alibis, however, surprisingly little empirical research has been conducted on the issue from either a legal or a psychological perspective. This article reviews some of the legal issues regarding the evaluation of alibis in the justice system, and then goes on to discuss two relevant psychological aspects: (1) people's ability to accurately recall what they were doing at specific times in the past and (2) people's ability to adequately weigh alibi evidence in light of the many other factors involved in a case (e.g., race and socioeconomic status of the suspect, time since the event occurred). The article concludes with an optimistic prognosis on the future of alibi research. Investigating people's claims about their actions and whereabouts at the time an event took place is a common theme in crime dramas and standard operating procedure in real cases. In any given case, odds are that several innocent people and at least one guilty person will provide police with a story that may be subsequently corroborated, not corroborated, or proven to be an outright fabrication when the claim is investigated. Although it seems a simple matter that such alibis can contribute directly to determining the guilt or innocence of an individual, there are many relevant legal and psychological issues that have not been addressed in any organized way until recently. In its strictest sense, an alibi implies that an individual could not have committed the crime, as it would be physically impossible for him or her to have been in two places at the same time. But there is some confusion over whether the term "alibi" should be used merely for a person's claim that they were somewhere else (e.g., "his alibi is that he was in Winnipeg at the time of the murder in Moncton, but we'll see if it checks out"), a defence strategy that forces the trier of fact to weigh the claim against other evidence (e.g., "there is one witness who puts him near the scene at the time of the crime and another who puts him 20 kilometres away at the same time"), or if the term should be reserved for a claim that has been corroborated so that the person is no longer a suspect in the case (e.g., "he has an alibi for the night in question, so he must not be the offender"). This article looks at all three uses of the term and addresses issues relating to each case. Legal Issues Regarding Alibis Although some courts and legal scholars have addressed the issue of alibis, they have not done so in any systematic way. Connelly (1983), for example, discusses the distinction between an alibi that is judged to be false versus one which is proven to be so, as well as the acceptable inferences to be drawn about the guilt of the accused based on these false alibis. While jurors can use an alibi as corroborating evidence, an individual is not to be convicted solely on the basis of no alibi, or even on the basis of a fabricated alibi. Eldridge (1978) argues that ideally alibis should be considered as just another piece of evidence, despite the possible subtleties involved in judges and/or jurors determining the quality of an alibi (e.g., the credibility of those providing supporting testimony, their relationship to the accused, the ease with which supporting physical evidence could have been fabricated). In the United Kingdom, Devlin (1976) attempted to differentiate between different types of alibis, in response to the question of when eyewitness evidence should be relied upon. Based upon the Devlin classification, if an alibi is deemed to be clearly false (fabricated), it could be considered supporting evidence to the identification. …


The use of appropriate parenting educational strategies to support young mothers is a neglected research topic. How young mothers are best supported to cope as parents is not discussed in depth in the literature. Currently service provision caters in the main for 'older' mothers and the focus and methods used are not necessarily culturally relevant to teenage mothers' lifestyles or needs. A review of the current literature indicates that adequate parenting education and support is necessary to help young parents to become good parents. This thesis presents the findings from an exploratory qualitative study which examines parenting in relation to young mothers. The Tameside and Glossop Positive Parenting Programme' (Taylor, 1997) was chosen because it was developed for and is currently being used in the same area as the sample in this study.
The intention of this study was to analyse :parenting services and the needs of young mothers and to explore how the two relate to each other. The focus of this exploratory study was on the perceptions of the professional and non-professional people who work with young mothers.
The aims of the study were to: (1) achieve a critical appreciation of parenting in general and the needs of young mothers; (2) elicit the opinions and experiences of facilitators regarding a parenting programme (Tameside and Glossop Positive
Parenting Programme) and the needs of young mothers and the 'daily issues' young mothers face; (3) elicit the perspectives of young mothers on their needs and the 'issues' they face in their daily lives; (4) develop a focused understanding of how
useful the Tameside and Glossop Positive Parenting Programme is for young mothers and how it could be further developed to provide greater support.
Semi structured interviews were conducted with new (n=9) and experienced (n=7) facilitators of parenting education programmes and also with young mothers (n=3). The interview data were analysed using a thematic network technique. Common themes emerged which provided valuable insight into parenting in relation to young mothers. The key themes for new and experienced facilitators were: (1) the significance of support networks; (2) young mothers expectations of what being a mother involves; (3) similarities and differences between young mothers and older mothers; (4) parenting support can be adapted to suit young mothers; (5) the impact of parenting education on staff; and (6) positive aspects of young mothers and parenting
The key themes for the interviews with young mothers were: (1) a sense of pride in their baby; (2) having a baby encouraged maturity in the mother; (3) fitting the baby into their existing life; (4) embarrassment and negative experiences since having the baby; (5) social support since having a baby; (6) planning for the future; (7) confidence in caring for children; and (8) young mums and making services more accessible.
The results highlight how currently service provision does not fully meet the needs of young mothers in relation to parenting because parenting services are designed to meet the needs of 'older' mothers. There were distinct differences between the views of facilitators (primarily these focused on negative views of young mothers) and the views of young mothers (which focused onmany positive aspects of young motherhood and young mothers getting on with their lives).
In conclusion it can be seen that no one method of parenting education will suit all young mothers. Individual assessment is a key concept when addressing individual needs particularly since the young mothers in the study do not see themselves as the same as older mothers


In the last 30 years there has been increasing interest in ways of changing organizations in a manner that enhances creativity and innovation. One of the principle reasons for this is the increased pressure brought about by global competition. In high-wage economies, maintaining a high level of creativity and innovation is an obvious way of adding value. In developing economies, creativity and innovation offer ways of moving up the value chain. The organizational-change approaches used to achieve this end are many and various, ranging from structural and cultural changes through idea and people development to the management of innovation, process improvement, and organizational renewal.

In organizations it is common for creativity to be associated with the front end of the creative-process research and development (R&D) and ideas. Innovation tends to be associated with the development phase, where creative ideas are developed into working models, and when used in conjunction with creativity and innovation, entrepreneurship is often associated with the business of bringing new products and services to market. However, use of these terms varies and "creativity" is also associated with management approaches that aim to draw out the creativity in all employees. "Innovation" is sometimes used in a broader sense to cover the R&D, development, and marketing of new products. "Entrepreneurship" is also particularly associated with setting up small businesses and the wider process of bringing creative ideas and innovative products into being.


This Article examines the increased importance of norms in the law and economics of exchange. By studying how private parties bring order despite the absence of a coercive state and the idea of a norm as the result of an exchange that originates in the brain to accommodate all competing costs, one can better understand how modern states, private agreements, public laws, and market economies work in conjunction with the norms and human behavior patterns that underlie all communities. These institutions of norms, public law, private law and agreements, the state, and markets are all alternative and complementary ways of (and sometimes substitutes for) addressing the same problem of social ordering to maximize welfare. The core argument is that parties are driven by cost minimization to select the best mix of institutional supports for the facilitation of exchange and that cost minimization strategy should guide courts in determining whether to provide legal sanctions to norms.


Making sophisticated, robust, and safe sequential decisions is at the heart of intelligent systems. This is especially critical for planning in complex multi-agent environments, where agents need to anticipate other agents' intentions and possible future actions. Traditional methods formulate the problem as a Markov Decision Process, but the solutions often rely on various assumptions and become brittle when presented with corner cases. In contrast, deep reinforcement learning (Deep RL) has been very effective at finding policies by simultaneously exploring, interacting, and learning from environments. Leveraging the powerful Deep RL paradigm, we demonstrate that an iterative procedure of self-play can create progressively more diverse environments, leading to the learning of sophisticated and robust multi-agent policies. We demonstrate this in a challenging multi-agent simulation of merging traffic, where agents must interact and negotiate with others in order to successfully merge on or off the road. While the environment starts off simple, we increase its complexity by iteratively adding an increasingly diverse set of agents to the agent zoo as training progresses. Qualitatively, we find that through self-play, our policies automatically learn interesting behaviors such as defensive driving, overtaking, yielding, and the use of signal lights to communicate intentions to other agents. In addition, quantitatively, we show a dramatic improvement in the success rate of merging maneuvers from 63% to over 98%.


This research was conducted at Badan Amil Zakat National Central Sulawesi Province (BAZNAS) to know the collection of zakat and infak fund and its distribution. In this study data collection using survey sample method that only records a small part of the object of research and for each element is investigated in depth which operations. Through this research it is known that: National Amil Zakat Agency of Central Sulawesi Province collects zakat funds limited to Civil Servants and Officials in Provinsi environment. Excluding Civil Servants and Officials in Town and Regency in Parovinsi Central Sulawesi. Also excluding entrepreneurs and the general public. Zakat issued by Civil Servants and Officials is Zakah on Income, not zakat mal or zakat treasure. So that collected by the Amil Body is zakat based on the amount of salary and other income for one year. So the treasures of vehicles, gardens, houses, jewelry and others are not subject to zakat.Besarnya earnings collected 2.5 percent equivalent to 85 grams of gold. Zakat is collected through the collecting unit of zakat (UPZ) in each institution. DPD and SKPD in Central Sulawesi Province. Zakat is channeled to mustahik with the consideration of fulfilling basic necessities mustahik


Jamming attack is quite serious threat for Mobile networks that collapses all necessary communication infrastructure. Since mobile nodes in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANET) communicate in a multi-hop mode, there is always a possibility for an intruder to launch a jamming attack in order to intercept communication among communication nodes. In this study, a network simulation has been carried out in order to explore and evaluate the possible impacts of jamming attack on MACAW protocol. Ad-hoc network modelling is used to provide communication infrastructure among mobile nodes in order to modelling the simulation scenarios. In simulation model, these nodes have used AODV routing protocol which is designed for MANET while second scenario contains simulated MACAW node models for comparison. On the other hand, this paper is the first study that addresses performance evaluation of MACAW protocol under a constant Jamming Attack. The performance of MACAW protocol is simulated through OPNET Modeler 14.5 software.


Nazarbayev University (NU) in Astana, Kazakhstan, is planning to build a new multi-MV, ∼10 to several hundred GW/cm2 ion accelerator facility which will be used in studies of material properties at extreme conditions relevant to ion-beam-driven inertial fusion energy, and other applications. Two design options have been considered. The first option is a 1.2 MV induction linac similar to the NDCX-II at LBNL, but with modifications, capable of heating a 1 mm spot size thin targets to a few eV temperature. The second option is a 2 - 3 MV, ∼200 kA, single-gap-diode proton accelerator powered by an inductive voltage adder. The high current proton beam can be focused to ∼1 cm spot size to obtain power densities of several hundred GW/cm2, capable of heating thick targets to temperatures of tens of eV. In both cases, a common requirement to achieving high beam intensity on target and pulse length compression is to utilize beam neutralization at the final stage of beam focusing. Initial experiments on pulsed ion beam neutralization have been carried out on a 0.3 MV, 1.5 GW single-gap ion accelerator at Tomsk Polytechnic University with the goal of creating a plasma region in front of a target at densities exceeding ∼1012 cm-3.


This thesis explores the nature of contemporary sculptural practices in relation to the
broader field of installed sculpture (which deploy articulated, interrelated, but autonomous
components) and in the context of recent approaches to both curation and display. The
artistic work and attendant commentary constitute a response to the issues of sculptural
agency and display raised by both the practice-based outcomes and key works of several
contemporary artists: Gabriel Kuri, Gedi Sibony, Melanie Counsell, Marc Camille
Chaimowicz and Michael Dean. In a number of exhibitions 'post-installation' practices and
the function of 'montage' sculpture is examined. Through outlining the current landscape of
sculptural production and medium specificity a progressive notion of the monument is
established. The sculptural artwork is seen to retain a political resistance, as both art-object
and thing in the world. An assessment is made of how sculptures produce space within and
through their exhibition context, directly related to the production of space as a whole (a
social morphology posited by Henri Lefebvre). Applying a conception of time in reference
to spatial production opens up the artwork's potential to draw on complex codes of
mnemonic function, which can potentially generate emancipatory agency from ideological
issues in late-capitalism. Re-readings of key installed works by Marc Camille Chaimowicz
and Mark Dean, through contexts derived from Nietzsche and Mark Fisher, reveal how
sculptures can activate specific mnemonic codes, or collective memory. Such art works
utilise a 'forgetful memory' – a reflexive process of positing, junking and reimagining
relationships to cultural information. The body of artistic work produced for this research,
intertwined with its critical reflection, makes an original contribution to knowledge by
interrogating theoretically and experientially the potentials of 'the sculptural', as part of the
plural production of art and exhibition-making. By means of practice and its outcomes, the
research engages the current dynamics of spatial production and radicality of sculptural
objecthood. The work examines the complex relationships between social memory and
historicity, with which sculpture in an exhibition environment can engage.


The study outlined in this article describes the use of cognitive strategies designed to aid the comprehension of Indonesian texts. It also examines the contributions of such strategies to students' comprehension scores. The participants were 97 students who had completed and passed the reading course. In collecting the research data, the researcher used a reading comprehension test instrument in the form of a cloze test, as well as a Likert scale questionnaire. The cloze test was used to measure the students' ability to understand the texts, while the questionnaire was used to obtain information about cognitive strategies used by students in comprehension of the texts. Data collection of the comprehension test results and understanding strategy data are performed sequentially over the same day. Research data are described and analyzed by product moment correlation technique. The research found that students' scores in cloze tests ranged from A to D. This score indicates that students have varying abilities in reading comprehension. The research findings also showed that students used various cognitive strategies in understanding text reading. The results of the correlation analysis showed that the use of cognitive strategy has a positive or negative contribution to the results of reading comprehension depending on the accuracy of the selection strategy in accordance with the text he read.


In this thesis we present third-order corrections to perturbative quantities in inclusive lepton-hadron and lepton-photon deep-inelastic scattering (DIS) and study the resummation of leading contributions to quantities at large values of the scaling variable x.

We provide up to third-order the coefficient functions for DIS via the exchange of a scalar-�phi directly coupling only to gluons, realised effectively in the Standard Model
by the Higgs boson in the heavy top quark limit, and N_f effectively massless flavours. The functions are shown to exhibit a double-logarithmic enhancement in the large-x
limit, with a similar enhancement of leading contributions in the small-x region unlike for the small-x behaviour of the Higgs boson. Consequently in the small-x region, the
scalar-phi� probe no longer represents the Higgs boson in the heavy-top limit.

The third-order corrections to the photon-parton splitting functions are presented in the MS_bar factorization scheme and the results are also transformed to the DIS_gamma scheme to allow for a physical form of the non-perturbative initial distributions beyond the leading order. They are shown to exhibit a double-logarithmic enhancement in the large-x region. The third-order contributions to the coefficient functions for the photon structure functions F2^gamma and FL^gamma are presented along with the contributions to the scalar-phi counterpart F�phi^gamma up to O(�alpha_em alpha_s^2 ) for electromagnetic and strong coupling constants
�alpha_em and �alpha_s respectively. In each case, the expressions also display a double-logarithmic enhancement in the large-x region. Our results presented for lepton-photon DIS then facilitate the evolution of parton densities within the photon allowing us to obtain the inhomogeneous contributions to the photon structure function F2^gamma up to next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) accuracy in both the MS_bar and DIS_gamma factorization schemes.

The two-loop results for the coefficient functions for F�phi are used to construct the physical evolution kernels for the system (F2, F�phi) of flavour-singlet structure functions,
and are shown to be single-logarithmically enhanced at large-x. The conjecture that this feature persists, in conjunction with the large-x behaviour of the participating splitting and coefficient functions, allows for the prediction of the double-logarithmic contributions
to the fourth-order singlet splitting functions. These predictions, when used in the construction of the analogous single-logarithmically enhanced physical evolution
kernels for the system (F2, FL), yield analogous predictions of the double-logarithmic contributions to the fourth-order longitudinal coefficient functions. The corresponding photonic physical kernels for (F2^gamma , Fphi^gamma) and FLns^gamma are constructed and lead to predictions
of the leading contributions to the fourth-order photon-parton splitting functions and the coefficient function for FLns^gamma respectively.

Finally, we turn our attention to the large-x resummation of the double-logarithmic contributions to some of the perturbative quantities in lepton-hadron and lepton-photon
DIS via two separate methods. The first method, namely using the iterative structure of the unfactorized partonic structure functions, was only employed for resummation to next-to-leading logarithmic (NLL) accuracy and for the quantities in lepton-hadron DIS. The second method uses the functional forms in dimensional regularization of the real- and virtual-emission contributions to the unfactorized partonic structure functions together with the Kinoshita-Lee-Nauenberg (KLN) cancellations required by the mass-factorization theorem, and allows for resummation to next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic (NNLL) accuracy. The second method was applied to quantities in both lepton-hadron and lepton-photon DIS resulting in new resummations to NNLL for the following quantities: P_qg, P_gq, C_2,g, C_phi�,q, C_L,g, P_qgamma and C_2,gamma.


Cosmopoiesis means world-making, and in this erudite, polemical book, Professor Mazzotta traces how major medieval and Renaissance thinkers invented their worlds through utopias, magic, science, art, and theatre. The Renaissance is usually read from a Cartesian or Hegelian (via Burckhardt) perspective. It is viewed as a time of individualities or it is studied in terms of disembodied ideas and abstract forms. Mazzotta calls for a new approach: the necessity to study the Renaissance in terms of the ongoing conversation of the arts and sciences. His is an encyclopedic grasp that takes into consideration literature, philosophy, politics, history, and theology. The book's theoretical premise lies in the thought of the eighteenth-century Italian philosopher, Giambattista Vico. Vico's own reading of the Renaissance, available in his New Science, is obliquely, yet clearly reproposed as the alternate interpretive key for opening up the deeper imaginative concerns of this extraordinary period of Western history. By a series of rigorous textual analyses that range from Poliziano to Ariosto, from Machiavelli to Bacon, to Shakespeare and Cervantes, .Cosmopoiesi.s highlights the ongoing dialogue between literature and philosophy (or literature and science, or, in Vichian terms, philology and philosophy) in some of the central texts of the time. In this dialogue across time and the barriers of space, the esthetic world - the world of the pastoral, romances, epics, utopian fictions, the theatre, and the lyric - far from signalling an evasion from history, is steadily and vitally engaged with the most pressing exigencies of the time. Consistently, the analyses conducted in .Cosmopoiesis. come to grips with these exigencies: the power of science, the relationship between politics and science, and the emergence of a new ethics in the midst of the secretive techniques by new elites in their exercise of political power. Above all, these central texts argue for a necessary reconstitution of the unity of knowledge, for the .encyclopedic. compass of the arts and sciences. The retrieval of this unity is made possible by reclaiming a role for the esthetic or contemplative mode of thought which underlies and shapes the most creative achievements in the world of making.


Fick, Damon R. Ph.D., Purdue University, August 2008. Experimental Investigation of a Full-Scale Flat-Plate Reinforced Concrete Structure Subjected to Cyclic Lateral Loading in the Inelastic Range of Response. Major Professors: Michael E. Kreger and Mete A. Sozen. Reinforced concrete flat-plate construction is a popular building type because of the simple formwork required for construction and the clearance that is provided for mechanical and electrical equipment. During the period 1950 through 1980, buildings using the flat-plate for the lateral-force resisting system have been built in seismic regions. The displacement response of these structures during credible earthquakes results in concentrations of shear, flexure, and torsion at the slab-column connection that can lead to brittle failures. Proper evaluation of this response is a matter of importance for the economy and for public safety. Included in this study is the (a) construction, instrumentation, and cyclic lateralload testing of a full-scale three-story flat-plate structure, (b) development of analysis methods to determine the limiting strength and drift capacities of flatplate structures, and (c) the definition of a hysteresis model to estimate the dynamic response of the flat-plate structure subjected to selected strong ground motions.


Since the start of the 1990s, Central Asia has been the main purveyor of migrants in the post-Soviet space. These massive migrations due to social upheavals over the last twenty years impact issues of governance; patterns of social adaptation; individual and collective identities; and gender relations in Central Asia. This volume raises the importance of internal migrations, those at a regional, intra-Central Asian, level, labor migrations to Russia, and carries us as far away to the Uzbek migrants based in Istanbul, New York, or Seoul, as well as to the young women of Tashkent who head to Germany or France, and to the Germans, Greeks, and Jews of Central Asia who have returned to their "ethnic homelands". Contributors include Aida Aaly Alimbaeva, Stephanie Belouin, Adeline Braux, Asel Dolotkeldieva, Olivier Ferrando, Sophie Hohmann, Nafisa Khusenova, Erica Marat, Sophie Massot, Saodat Olimova, Sebastien Peyrouse, Luisa Piart, Madeleine Reeves, Elena Sadovskaya.


In this investigation, we consider wireless powered relaying systems, where energy is scavenged by a relay via radio frequency (RF) signals. We explore hybrid time switching-based and power splitting-based relaying protocol (HTPSR) and compare performance of Amplify-and-Forward (AF) with Decode-and-Forward (DF) scheme under imperfect channel state information (CSI). Most importantly, the instantaneous rate, achievable bit error rate (BER) are determined in the closed-form expressions under the impact of imperfect CSI. Through numerical analysis, we evaluate system insights via different parameters such as power splitting (PS) and time switching (TS) ratio of the considered HTPSR which affect outage performance and BER. It is noted that DF relaying networks outperform AF relaying networks. Besides that, the numerical results are given to prove the optimization problems of PS and TS ratio to obtain optimal instantaneous rate.


The Golem is a creature formed by a rabbi out of mud or clay (although it can
be made of wood). It is an enduring and favourite subject in Jewish folklore,
and it has proved invaluable in its power to reflect the vicissitudes of history.
The Golem can take many forms, but is always powered by a magic or holy
word. The tale usually ends with the destruction of the creature, but hints of
its probable return usually haunt and disrupt any sense of finality. The most
famous and enduring version of the story was set in the Prague Ghetto, and
was a favourite subject for German Expressionist artists. This is because it
reflected a time when the old and the new combined in uncanny and
disturbing ways. The Golem story was popular with Romantic writers like
E.T.A. Hoffmann, who were similarly reacting to a world that was changing
under the influence of Enlightenment thinking and war. Sigmund Freud's
famous essay, 'The Uncanny', ('Das Unheimliche') of 1919, used
Hoffmann's classic Golem tale, The Sandman, as its central focus, though
Freud was never to acknowledge its Jewish origins.


Experimental implementations of continuous optical time domain Fourier transformation based on time lenses and optical orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) system are carried out. Such a system is verified through 100-km transmission of 10-Gb/s non-return-to-zero (NRZ) intensity-modulated direct-detection (IM-DD) without any dispersion compensation. The system's bit error rate (BER) and power penalty are 10-12 and 4 dBm, respectively.


Section 13 of the interim Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act 200 of 1993 provided as follows: 'Privacy. - Every person shall have the right to his or her personal privacy, which shall include the right not to be subject to searches of his or her person, home or property, the seizure of private possessions or the violation of private communications.'


Abstract: The recent enlargement of the European Union (EU) to 10 states, occurred on 1 May 2004, has been surrounded – both in academic and political circles – by two contrasting discourses. The first, prior to enlargement, foresaw dramatic consequences had the expansion not been accompanied by a serious, large-scale effort to reform its institutions. The second, subsequent to enlargement, tended on the contrary to downplay these predictions: despite the little ambition of the Treaty of Nice – so the argument goes – the entry of several new members has not altered the nature of the system, if not for some minimal logistic aspects. In fact, a serious, retrospective assessment of the EU after enlargement has not been performed by its own institutions; researchers who embarked on this exercise raise serious caveats about the significance of their data; political leaders complain that reform is badly needed in an enlarged EU and practitioners report a widespread tendency towards a more informal decision-making process. This study intends to contribute to this debate by developing standards and providing new evidence for a more comprehensive assessment. Results are surprising.


Web recommendation services bear great importance in e-commerce and social media, as they aid the user in navigating through the items that are most relevant to her needs. In a typical web site, long history of previous activities or purchases by the user is rarely available. Hence in most cases, recommenders propose items that are similar to the most recent ones viewed in the current user session. The corresponding task is called session based item-to-item recommendation. Generating item-to-item recommendations by "people who viewed this, also viewed" lists works fine for popular items. These recommender systems rely on item-to-item similarities and item-to-item transitions for building next-item recommendations. However, the performance of these methods deteriorates for rare (i.e., infrequent) items with short transaction history. Another difficulty is the cold-start problem, items that recently appeared and had no time yet to accumulate a sufficient number of transactions. In this paper, we describe a probabilistic similarity model based on Random Fields to approximate item-to-item transition probabilities. We give a generative model for the item interactions based on arbitrary distance measures over the items including explicit, implicit ratings and external metadata. We reach significant gains in particular for recommending items that follow rare items. Our experiments on various publicly available data sets show that our new model outperforms both simple similarity baseline methods and recent item-to-item recommenders, under several different performance metrics.


The King James Bible has saturated the English language in idioms with a frequency that is both remarkable and surreptitious.  This article reveals that the language of spirituality is a persistent and often unrecognized presence in every aspect of most everything in which we engage ourselves because unbeknownst to most people, according to Nicolson, it "is speaking through us" (Nicolson 43).  This article examines the abundance of spiritual archetypes in children's fantasy literature and utilizes Carl Jung's theory of the "collective unconscious" to investigate the possible reasoning for this abundance.  It then delves into Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting , with a discussion of her inadvertent use of the archetype of Death, in order to further explicate the concept of a universal psyche.  It concludes with an exploration of Michel Foucault's concept of the Panopticon in order to explain the possible ramifications of spiritual archetypes in children's fantasy literature.


In the course of the medical curriculum, medical students are trained to recognise diagnoses. They classify these in their minds, together with detailed information on laboratory and imaging tests, as collections of diagnoses. The downside of this could be overdiagnosis. This paper describes some of the faces of overdiagnosis. American writer and physician Abraham Verghese eloquently describes one of these: the e-doctor looking at a computer screen to see what is wrong with the patient, rather than starting with a thorough clinical bedside evaluation. Other examples include the finding of small sub-segmental pulmonary emboli by increasingly sensitive spiral CT scanning. Finally, this paper describes a possible answer to overdiagnosis: prognostic research, notably answering questions such as 'what additional diagnostic testing will truly improve my patient's prognosis, given their current presentation of signs and symptoms?'


The article sought to assess the Personal Development impact of four different kinds of extra-curricular activities on a group of 149 high school seniors. A t-statistic was computed for Personal Development Test scores between individuals in four different kinds of such activities and those not so involved. It included (1) Sports, (2) Music, (3) Leadership, and (4) Others. Leadership and Music type activities tended to produce the greatest change in Personal Development ********** Personal Development The Personal Development Test (PDT) is based solidly on the Global Assessment Functioning Scale developed by the America Psychiatric Committee and used in the two year long validation study in relation to health and effectiveness of adolescent youth. It is described in detail in the DSM-III-R (1987), and later retained in the DSM-IV (1994). Changing the "Global Functioning" concept to "Personal Development" is based largely on the work of Rogers (1945) and Maslow (1954) in Third Force Psychology (Cassel, 2002), and the work of Bandura (1997) because it relates more specifically to the growth and leadership development of youth. For an example of it's effectiveness, the PDT discerns well between typical individuals and both Delinquents and Prison Inmates. Group Involved in Study There were 149 High School Seniors tested near the end of the senior year of high school in Tennessee. They ranged in age from 14 to 25 years with a mean age of 18.75 and a standard deviation of 0.92 years. It included 87 females ranging in age from 14 to 25 years, with a mean age of 18.71 years, and a standard deviation of 1.09 years; and 62 males ranging in age from 18 to 20 years, with a mean age of 18.81 years, and a standard deviation of 0.62 years. A t-statistic was computed between the 87 females and 62 males with only two of the 8 part scores on the PDT showing a statistically significant difference: (1) LOC (Locus of Control & Decision Making)r = 0.002 favoring Females(Females=72.37, and Males=66.39); (2) SYM (Sympathy)r = 0.001 favoring females (Females=65.75, and Males=57.55). The Means and SDs for the PDT scores of this Senior Group simulated closely the Norm Group described for the PDT construction. The correlations of PDT scores resemble closely those in the standardization manual for the PDT, with only the "Conformity" score being lower (0.469). The Confluence Score, which depicts the creditability of Test Taker as well as test results, is statistically significant with all PDT scores except for "Assertiveness" (ASS) which was (0.074). Impact of Extra-Curricular Activities The data contained in Table 2 below depicts the scores on The Personal Development Test for high school seniors who have been involved in organized Extra-Curricular Activities with other seniors not so involved. There was no statistically significant difference for the PERMAT portion of the PDT test. But there was a statistically significant difference for the SOCINT portion based on the Sign Test at the 01 level of confidence. There was no significant difference in CON score and the GPA (Horst, 1966; and Downie & Heath, 1959). Impact of Leadership Experience The data contained in Table 3 below displays the impact of High School Seniors' Experiences involving real Leadership Roles as an integral part of high school learning. Typically, such experiences include elected officers in organized groups as well as classes and other organizations, and typically considered as "extra-curricular" activities, as being somewhat similar to sports, band, debating clubs, etc. Since all three of the Total Scores, and every one of the Part Scores except for "Assertiveness" (ASS) favored the "Leadership" group, based on the Sign Test there is a statistically Significant relationship at the 0.01 level of confidence in favor of the Leadership Group. …


Student Approaches to Learning (SAL) differentiates between student learning objectives/behaviours that are focused on the memorization of course content (surface approach) or the construction of meaning and comprehension (deep approach). For nearly five decades, researchers have explored Student Approaches to Learning (SAL) as an important framework for understanding, evaluating and guiding learning and instruction. An evidently robust and generally relevant construct, SAL has spawned numerous instruments to capture its Deep and Surface approaches, most notably the Study Process Questionnaire (SPQ) and its successor the Revised Two-Factor SPQ (R-SPQ-2F). Despite its history, there are few comprehensive reviews of its utility. Here we present the results of a systematic review of the literature describing how deep and surface approaches to learning are associated with different assessment practices. This paper uses vote counting to investigate the relationship between assessment practices and students' approaches to learning. After a systematic search of the literature over 1,482 abstracts were reviewed, from which 21 articles were selected and 53 voting scores were extracted. Several assessment types were grouped and analyzed to help explain the voting results. Pedagogical implications and suggestions for further research are discussed.


One of the most distinctive features of Nazi society was the increasingly radical division of its members into "national comrades" and "community aliens." The former were to be protected by the state and encouraged to procreate, while the latter were seen as political, social, racial, or eugenic threats and were to be ruthlessly eliminated from society. With the start of the Second World War, various nonlethal forms of discrimination against these "community
aliens" were gradually replaced by policies geared to physical annihilation, culminating above all in the extermination of the European Jews. In view of a crime of this previously unimaginable magnitude, it is hardly surprising that when historians started in earnest to examine the genocidal policies of the Nazi dictatorship in the 1960s they focused on the development and administration
of the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question," as the Nazis called it.
But in the last two decades, the fate of other "community aliens" in the Third
Reich, such as the Roma and Sinti ("Gypsies"), slave laborers, and the disabled, has been investigated too.
Some historians have also begun to examine those who deviated in various
other ways from the norms of society, people who were often classified in the
Third Reich, and indeed before, as "asocials." There was never an agreed definition as to who these people were, and the term was used to stigmatize a vast variety of nonnormative behavior. According to a 1938 directive by the head of the German security police, Reinhard Heydrich, any person could be classified
as "asocial" who "demonstrates through conduct opposed to the community
. . . that he does not want to adapt to the community." During the Third
Reich, such vague statements served as the basis for the persecution of juvenile delinquents, criminal offenders, vagrants, prostitutes, and homosexuals, among many others. Certain groups were simultaneously classified as racial and social outsiders and thus suffered "dual racism." This was true in particular for the Sinti and Roma, who had been persecuted for their way of life long before the Nazi "seizure of power" in 1933. Historical research into the fate of the "asocials" has produced some valuable insights into the treatment of members of these marginal groups in the Third Reich, many of whom died in SS concentration or extermination camps. Yet despite this growing interest, the most comprehensive of all the extermination programs directed against "asocials" in the Third Reich has never been investigated. From late 1942 onward, over twenty thousand offenders classified as "asocial" were taken out of the state penal system and transferred to the police for "annihilation through labor." At least two-thirds of them perished in concentration camps. But in the historical literature this program has either been dealt with in passing or completely ignored.
Why have historians neglected the murder of state prisoners? There appears
to be a reluctance to focus on offenders against the law in the Third Reich, unless their offences can be seen in some way as forms of political or social protest. In contrast to the racially or politically persecuted, not all common criminals can be described merely as innocent victims, and the often brutal behavior of criminal Kapos in concentration camps probably further alienated historians from dealing with the criminals. Another factor that explains the poor state of research is the inaccessibility of source material. Leading officials in the Ministry of Justice made sure that most files relating to the "annihilation
through labor" of state prisoners were pulped before the end of the war.8 Yet
individual documents have survived, scattered around various archives in Germany. They can be complemented by information gained from individual prisoner files, as well as from unpublished documents and testimonies collected in numerous postwar legal investigations. None of these criminal investigations ever led to the conviction of the prison officials involved—another reason for the lack of historical interest. Finally, German legal history after the war spread
the myth that the legal administration had rejected or even resisted the Nazi
regime. State penal institutions, if dealt with at all, were described as safe havens that had "nothing to do with the concentration camps." Thus, until today, historians have largely ignored the state prison system and its inmates. This article will first describe the origins of the decision in 1942 for the extermination of certain state prisoners. Then the actual process of transfer will be investigated in detail, examining issues such as the background of the
transferred inmates and the participation of prison officials. The article will also deal with the fate of the state prisoners after their transport to the Nazi concentration camps and the radicalization of policy against the prisoners remaining
in the state penal institutions. Exploring these issues contributes to
our knowledge of the treatment of deviants in the Third Reich.
But this article will also address some wider issues concerning the nature of the Nazi dictatorship, such as the origins of extermination policies in the Third Reich. In recent years, a number of historians have argued that it was time to move beyond the "sterile debates" between so-called intentionalist historians, who focused on the murderous will and ideology of the Nazi leaders, above all Hitler, and so-called structuralist historians, who pointed to the dynamic and uncoordinated interactions between different agencies of the Nazi dictatorship that led to a "cumulative radicalization" (Hans Mommsen). Various historians have now put forward a synthesis of both positions, while ground-breaking empirical research into the "final solution" has posed new questions and provided new answers. Still, many of the more recent studies of Nazi genocide continue to explore central issues first raised in the debates between intentionalists
and structuralists such as Hitler's role in extermination policy, the interaction between regional officials and the decision makers in Berlin, and the role of racial ideology versus more material motives in Nazi mass murder. This study of the "annihilation through labor" of state prisoners addresses some of these general issues.
It will also shed new light on the relation between the judiciary and the
police in the Third Reich. The postwar portrait of a passive or even anti-Nazi
judiciary has not gone unchallenged. Still, many historians continue to describe the judicial authorities and the police as having been in a constant state of conflict. They describe the Third Reich as a "dual state," split between the "prerogative state" and the "normative state." The latter was the traditional state apparatus, ensuring that normal life was ruled by legal norms. However, in matters that were thought to touch on the interest of the state, the "prerogative state" could override these legal norms, above all through the agency of the police, locking up all political, racial, and social suspects in SS concentration
camps without trial. Thus, state attorneys and the police are seen as competing institutions of prosecution, while state penal institutions and concentration camps are described as competing institutions of confinement. A detailed investigation of the transfer of state prisoners can help to establish how far this picture of the "dual state" stands up to critical scrutiny.


This study aimed to evaluate changes in beige adipocytes at different times of melatonin administration, in the morning (ZT01) or in the evening (ZT11), at 30 mg/kg daily by gavage for 7 weeks or continuously with drinking water in the ter m of high-calorie diet-induced obesity (HCD). Melatonin received at ZT11 or with drinking water resulted in an increased area of the browning zone in the subcutaneous white adipose tissue (sWAT), even in rats with HCD (compared with Control or HCD, respectively). The b eige adipocyte and lipid droplet area after melatonin use were reduced compared to those with HCD and Control, in all administration modes (group ZT01 showed smaller changes compared to ZT11 or with drinking water groups). The fibrosis level decreased and significan tly differed in HCD ZT01, HCD ZT11, and HCD water compared to that in HCD; moreover, the lowest value determined in HCD water, reached the control parameters. Furthermore, the IL-1b and IL-8 level was decreased in the HCD groups under melatonin treatment at ZT11 or with drinking water compared to that in HCD. The obtained results suggest that melatonin promotes sWAT browning in rats with diet-induced obesity and influences morphological signs of normal rats depending on the time of administration. Different funct ional activity of beige adipocytes was observed after melatonin was used depending on the time of administration, resulting in heat p roduction and lipolysis (the relative mass of visceral fat was likewise diminished). More rapid browning was observed when melatonin trea tment was performed at 1 h before lights-off (ZT11) or continuously via drinking water. Melatonin acted on beige adipocytes of obese rats through changing some parameters such as the area of adipocytes and lipid drops, the number of lipid drops, the relative area b rowning of sWAT, and the level of tissue fibrosis.


In the light of the recent research interest in emulsion formation, this PhD thesis seeks to expand the current body of knowledge regarding the role of various emulsifiers on emulsion formation mechanisms. This study is particularly relevant to the food industries, where formulated emulsions often result in complex microstructures. Therefore, controlling the production processes requires knowledge regarding the effect of individual constituents on the final product. The experimental investigation presented here examines emulsion behaviour during processing. Attempts have been initially focused on the development of a technique (reflectance technique), and subsequently a methodology, to investigate droplet size evolution during processing. This technique is based on the relationship between reflected light from the emulsion and the droplet size, at any given dispersed phase volume fraction, and emulsifier type. Consequently, measurements of the 'light reflectance' during the process can be used to determine the droplet size evolution in real-time. This technique was applied to the study of emulsification in batch mixing systems. The developed methodology was used to investigate the effect of various operating parameters and formulations on the droplet size evolution during processing. These parameters include: the emulsifier type (surfactants, proteins, solid particles and mixed emulsifier systems) and concentration; hydrodynamic condition of the process; and the dispersed phase volume fraction. It was shown that using emulsifiers results in a higher droplet break-up frequency at the early stages of the process. The break-up frequencies remained the same in the presence of a range of emulsifier concentrations. Out of all the emulsifiers used, silica particles showed II the lowest droplet break-up frequency. This is because the interfacial tension is not affected when silica particles are adsorbed on the interface of droplets. It was further shown that the final droplet size is mostly affected by the extent of droplet break-up, whilst droplet coalescence has minimal influence. Therefore, using a higher concentration of emulsifier results in a lower final droplet size, as a consequence of higher adsorption rate of remaining emulsifiers in the aqueous phase, which in turn increases the droplet break-up frequency through decreasing the interfacial tension. This hypothesis was demonstrated by using solid particles in emulsification which showed similar final droplet size to the experiment in the absence of added emulsifier, since interfacial tension is not affected by their adsorption. It is demonstrated that the droplet coalescence cannot be completely suppressed by the presence of surfactants (Tween 20) or proteins (sodium caseinate or WPI), due to the desorption of these emulsifiers from the interface. On the other hand, droplet coalescence was arrested in the presence of solid particles, since their adsorption can be considered an irreversible phenomenon. When the dispersed phase volume fraction was increased up to 50 %, a minimum was observed in the droplet break-up frequency at the dispersed phase volume fraction of 20 %. This was caused by the influence of two opposing factors; the increase in the dispersed phase volume fraction dampens the energy dissipation in the system, which tends to decrease the droplet break-up. In contrast, larger droplets are involved in break-up phenomena at higher dispersed phase volume fractions, which promote the droplet breakup. Increasing the dispersed phase volume fraction, on the other hand, resulted in a decrease in droplet coalescence, caused by an increase in the dampening effect of the dispersed phase, which decreases the energy dissipation in the system.