Visualisation is becoming increasingly important for understanding information, such as investigative data (for example: computing, medical and crime scene evidence) and analysis (for example, network capability assessment, data file reconstruction and planning scenarios). Investigative data visualisation is used to reconstruct a scene or item and is used to assist the viewer (who may well be a member of the general public with little or no understanding of the subject matter) to understand what is being presented. Analysis visualisations, on the other hand, are usually developed to review data, information and assess competing scenario hypotheses for those who usually have an understanding of the subject matter. Courtroom environments are morphing into cinematic display environments, the media consumed by an audience who are increasingly visually literate and media savvy (Heintz, 2002). There are a number of fundamental implications inherent in the shift from oral to visual mediation and a number of facets of this modern evidence presentation technology needs to be investigated and analysed. One of the primary issues of visualisation is that no matter how coherent the data, there will always be conjecture and debate as to how the information is/has-been visualised and, is it presented in an acceptable and meaningful way. This paper presents a range of examples of where forensic data has been visualised using various techniques and technology, the paper then examines aspects of the visual courtroom evidence presented and discusses some of the benefits and potential problems of implementing this technology. This paper is part two of a two-part series that aims to describe the use of, and provide guidelines for, the use of graphical displays in courtrooms.


Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are getting closer to becoming ubiquitous in everyday life. Although the researchers in the robotic domain have made rapid progress in recent years, hardware and software architects in the computer architecture community lack the comprehensive understanding of how performance, power, and computational bottlenecks affect UAV applications. Such an understanding enables system architects to design microchips tailored for aerial agents. This paper is an attempt by computer architects to initiate the discussion between the two academic domains by investigating the underlying compute systems' impact on aerial robotic applications. To do so, we identify performance and energy constraints and examine the impact of various compute knobs such as processor cores and frequency on these constraints. Our experiment show that such knobs allow for up to 5X speed up for a wide class of applications.


INTRODUCTION
Encouraging teaching practices such as problem-based learning (PBL) amongst undergraduate students within a lecture-based, system-based integrated curriculum is a challenge. Students are apprehensive about developing an organised framework for acquiring knowledge while lecturers are required to reframe their views on the educational process and their role as educators.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Lecturers and students in the Phase (Year) II programme were asked to fill questionnaires following the second and fourth PBL cases. The two sets of survey responses were compared to see whether the students' and teachers' perceptions had changed over the 5-month period.

RESULTS
Students' responses from both surveys (1 and 2) were similar in that a majority agreed that the PBL tutorials had encouraged the seeking of information (66% and 67%, respectively), had improved understanding (57% and 56%), integration (65% and 70%) and application (50% and 64%) of knowledge. However, the views given in the form of written comments, following their positive responses, were somewhat contradictory. A large number of students (38% and 40%) faced difficulties in getting involved in discussions during the PBL tutorial and a majority (73% and 82%) preferred the normal subject-based tutorials. The reasons given by approximately 20% of the students were that the subject-based tutorials were more efficient for obtaining information and/or that the information had been pre-selected by the lecturers. More than 80% of the lecturers (in both surveys) perceived that the students had identified the appropriate learning objectives and covered the subject matter. The percentage of lecturers who agreed that PBL tutorials encouraged rapport and teamwork amongst students had increased in the second survey, from 70% to 92% and 55% to 83% respectively.

CONCLUSION
Implementing PBL is not simply a matter of developing new teaching materials and new effective ways of presenting them. It requires a paradigm shift, a change in the roles of students and teachers, and time.


In recent years, design thinking and design research have proved indispensable in creating useful and usable solutions that both address human needs and create value for the client. Design research is the connective activity that helps us integrate specialized knowledge into meaningful solutions. We used a structured design process and various design research methods to facilitate the design and development of a software and hardware solution for a federal law enforcement agency to automate and standardize the processing and collection of a certain type of evidence. The methods we used were crucial in gathering the necessary evidence and presenting a synthesized, meaningful picture of the problems at hand to the client. This in turn led to a highly effective and collaborative partnership that resulted in a high-value application that helped standardize the current state of practice and advanced the mission of the federal law enforcement agency in the realm of intelligence gathering.


In this paper, we propose two new strategies to design efficient local search algorithms for the minimum vertex cover (MVC) problem. There are two main drawbacks in state-of-the-art MVC local search algorithms: First, they select a pair of vertices to be exchanged simultaneously, which is time consuming; Second, although they use edge weighting techniques, they do not have a strategy to decrease the weights. To address these drawbacks, we propose two new strategies: two stage exchange and edge weighting with forgetting. The two stage exchange strategy selects two vertices to be exchanged separately and performs the exchange in two stages. The strategy of edge weighting with forgetting not only increases weights of uncovered edges, but also decreases some weights for each edge periodically. We utilize these two strategies to design a new algorithm dubbed NuMVC. The experimental results show that NuMVC significantly outperforms existing state-of-the-art heuristic algorithms on most of the hard DIMACS instances and all instances in the hard random BHOSLIB benchmark.


The use of an effective workforce is the key to success
company, for it required the use of labor policy for
willing to work more productively in accordance with a predetermined plan. One factor for increased labor productivity is needed leaders who could provide motivation or encouragement to the employees. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of motivation
significant effect on work productivity of employees at PT. Polowijo Gosari Sidayu Gresik. The benefits of this research, especially for companies are as inputs of the motivating factors to work productivity employees are expected to be used as consideration in determining policies to motivate employees. Test instruments used in this study test the validity of a measure of the level of validity or the validity of an instrument, test This validity of using the product moment correlation method, and test the reliability is an index showing the extent to which an instrument can be trusted to measure an object. This reliability test using Cronbach alpha formula.
While analysis tools used in this study using the range
scale, multiple linear regression analysis, simple linear regression analysis. The hypothesis test in this study is the F test and t test Result of calculation with test equipment in the form of the F test shows that there are significant simultaneously motivation to morale, it can be seen from the calculated F value 67.76 larger than F table 2.41. and there is a partial influence of motivation
of morale, it can be seen from the t value greater than
on table t 2.021. F test results between the spirit of cooperation to work productivity shows that there simultaneous influence on the morale labor productivity, this can be seen from the calculated F value greater 43.592
from the F table. It can be concluded that in this study proved that the motivational effect on work productivity.
Suggestions for companies is to use the results of this study as consideration for corporate leaders to pay attention more information about the policy of giving salary to our employees, providing awards for employees who have a form of material or non-achievement material as well as health insurance and employee safety created a comfortable working environment, opportunity to participate in education and training should be improved.


The main purpose of this thesis is to identify, describe and interpret group processes occurring in tutorials in problem-based leaming. Another aim is to investigate if a combination of Steiner's (1972) theory of group work and Bion's (1961) theory of work and regression in groups may be a fruitful way to interpret and explain group dynamics in problem-based learning.Data have been collected trough a multi-strategy approach. The principal, as we11 as the preliminary, method for data gathering was qualitative. The quantitative method was used as a follow-up study. The data gathering methods used were less-structured observation, structured questionnaire and focused intewiews.The results disclose that it is possible to give a comprehensive and descriptive picture of the group processes that occur in tutorials. The results also show that a combination of Steiner's and Bion's theories may be a fruitfil way to describe, interpret and explain group dynarnics in tutorial groups. By combining the theories a new theoretical mode1 was created. The combination can be considered as a way of developing the theories and at the same time it offers a theoretical too1 for research purposes. The combination represents a new way of categorising group processes and can hopefilly provide a better understanding of interactional dynamics in groups and account for greater explanation value with respect to group processes.From a group research perspective the mode1 can be seen as my contribution to theory development. From a user perspective this knowledge may contribute valuable information. More, or deeper, knowledge of group processes that occurs in tutorials can provide tutors with means for better understanding of dynarnics in groups.


Conodont elements, consisting of crown and basal tissue are the well‐known fossilized hard parts of Conodonta (extinct marine chordates), but the taphonomic processes leading to decomposition or remineralization of the basal tissue are not well understood. Here we focus on the taphonomy of basal tissue, reviewing the published record and describing new material from Asia and Europe (248 occurrences globally). These include crown and basal tissue in conjunction, and isolated basal bodies showing different stages of preservation. Some isolated specimens resemble phosphate rings similar to those assigned to Phosphannulus universalis. High‐resolution biostratigraphy indicates that the lamellar type of conodont basal tissue is found in all facies and depositional environments. Other basal tissue types, described in the literature as tubular, mesodentine, spherulitic or lamellar with canalules, are limited to the early Palaeozoic and found exclusively in siliciclastic deposits (with the exception of spherulitic tissue). Although the stratigraphic record of basal tissue spans the range of Euconodonta (Cambrian–Triassic), this study shows that most of the isolated plate and ring‐like structures are derived from early Palaeozoic coniform conodonts. Basal tissue of platform‐type elements has a much more fragile shape and is therefore rarely preserved as a recognizable isolated unit.


Dextrous manipulation based on techniques for non-linear dimension reduction and manifold learning is an upcoming field of research and offers promising opportunities. Still, many problems remain unsolved and researchers are seeking for new representations that combine efficient learning of examples and robust generalisation to unseen situations. Here, we propose a manifold representation of hand postures, which due to its structural clarity lends itself to simple and robust manipulation control schemes. Focussing on cyclic movements, we describe extensions to the dimensionality reduction algorithm Unsupervised Kernel Regression (UKR) that allow to incorporate structural hints about the training data into the learning yielding task-related structures in the manifold's latent space. We present the resulting manifold representation and a simplified controller using this representation for manipulation in the example of turning a bottle cap in a physics-based simulation.


The Rufous Treecreeper (Climacteris rufa), Yellow-plumed honeyeater (Lichenostomus ornatus) and the Western Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria griseogularis) are focal species and were investigated to assess the impacts of climate change and severe habitat fragmentation on the genetics and viability of remaining populations. This study was located within the west Australian wheatbelt where 93% of the native vegetation, including 97% of the York gum, wandoo and salmon gum woodlands have been cleared for agriculture (Saunders, et al., 1989) and where climate modelling predicts hotter and dryer weather conditions (CSIRO, 2005, IOCI, 2002). The Dryandra woodlands contains the largest native vegetation remnants in the central wheatbelt with a combined area of 28 066 ha and provides habitat for a diverse assemblage of flora and fauna many of which are in Decline, Threatened or Specially Protected (NWC, 1991).

The effects of habitat loss and fragmentation on the gene flow and population structure on the Rufous Treecreeper, was assessed within the Dryandra woodlands and across a range of fragmented habitat spanning approximately 100 km. Microsatellite and mitochondrial DNA data was applied to a spatial genetic and phylogeographic analysis. AMOVA shows genetic variation to be higher within populations (78%) than among populations (22%) and populations did not conform to Hardy Weinberg Equilibrium. This infers gene flow exceeds genetic drift across the region and the presence of migration between remnant habitats. Isolation by Distance was not found within Dryandra or across the region and infers the effective dispersal distance of the Rufous Treecreeper exceeds the geographical distance of sampling sites. However a Mantel's Test found a correlation (r=0.316, p=0.004) with a distance of 28kms, within the Dryandra woodlands. A Spatial Autocorrelation of microsatellite DNA found a genetic structure of up to approximately 25kms (V=0.55) and beyond the Dryandra woodlands, shows genetic discontinuities where dispersal is more likely to occur. Landscape interpolation of genetic distance shows high genetic differentiation within the Dryandra woodlands and decreasing in an easterly direction where habitat size decreases and the distance between habitat increases. The Maximum Difference Delaunay Triangulation shows population boundaries of 12 populations within the woodlands including 3 central populations that are 1.3 km apart. A Bayesian Computation of microsatellites found a Continent-Island pattern of population structure across a distance of 85 km. Ritland's Kinship Coefficient found dispersal patterns amongst populations within the Dryandra woodlands and a genetic neighbourhood size of about 1.7 km. Loiselle's Kinship Coefficient found a unidirectional pattern of migration from the woodlands to smaller, isolated habitats with a maximum dispersal distance of 48 km. A Landscape Interpolation of male and female Rufous Treecreepers show a female bias in dispersal from Dryandra, with higher genetic divergence patterns in isolated remnants where habitat and nesting hollows are limiting.

Rufous Treecreeper mitochondrial DNA (partial cytochrome b gene) data was applied to the Mantel's Test and found no correlation in Dryandra or the surrounding area but did show a positive correlation at a distance of 500kms and infers at least 2 different bioregions within this distance for this species. Results from the Interpolation and Principal Component Analysis show genetic variation decreasing with increasing distance from Dryandra in an easterly and southerly direction. The highest divergence patterns were found in Dryandra, North Yilliminning, Wickepin and Commondine Reserve. Genetic patterns with high similarity were found in Dongolocking and Highbury sites south- east of Dryandra and are most likely remnant populations that once belonged to a larger, continuous population or gene pool. A geographical distribution of shared mitochondrial haplotypes found a historical range prior to land clearing of approximately 85kms. A genealogy study based on coalescence found the earliest ancestral haplotypes belonged to Dryandra, North Yilliminning and Wickepin populations and should be prioritised for long term conservation purposes. Also, novel sequences of partial cytochrome b gene for the Yellow-plumed Honeyeater and Control Region for the Western Yellow Robin was resolved for further research.

The ecological niche and distribution of the Rufous Treecreeper was assessed using a distance based Redundancy Analysis (db-RDA) and a Habitat Suitability study. The db-RA found slope and aspect explained 29.16% (p= 0.04) of the genetic variation (phi) of mitochondrial DNA, which infers a relationship between landscape features and historical divergence patterns. Since old growth Eucalyptus wandoo trees are a critical habitat requirement for nesting hollows (Rose, 1993) a georeferenced (GIS) habitat suitability map was constructed from a vegetation survey (Coates, 1995) to show the distribution of E.wandoo and Rufous Treecreepers within Dryandra. Also using demographic information of the Rufous Treecreeper from a previous study (Luck, 2001) and RAMAS GIS (Akcakaya, 2002), it was estimated that the Dryandra contained enough suitable habitat for a maximum of 158 populations or 1 106 individuals.

The impact of climate change on the Dryandra woodlands and the Rufous Treecreeper was measured by annual rainfall measurements (BOM, 2011), satellite imagery of tree foliage cover of each sampling site and mist net capture recapture data. This study found a declining trend in rainfall patterns and in 2010, the annual rainfall (277.4mm) fell below the minimum climatic range (350mm) of E.wandoo forests. Based on climate modelling (CSIRO, 2005) the predicted reduction rainfall will eventually will negatively impact these forests by inducing a permanent state of drought. A critical threshold of 7.73% foliage cover was found, where foliage cover does not appear to recover foliage cover beyond 11.53% after a reduction to 7.73% in 2003. This indicates a critical threshold of percentage tree canopy cover for the E. wandoo in Dryandra. A linear regression found a significant relationship (p = 0.036) between previous year's rainfall and percentage foliage cover. This delayed response to rainfall is explained by the defence mechanisms of E.wandoo that provide this species with drought tolerance (Veneklaas & Manning, 2007). A logistic regression (GLM) found foliage cover within the same year to be a significant predictor (p = 0.039) of Rufous Treecreeper captures. Therefore declining rainfall patterns and tree canopy cover have a direct impact on the abundance of Rufous Treecreepers.

The apparent survival rate estimate for the Rufous Treecreeper was 0.65 (SE 0.13) and 0.303 (SE 0.08) for the Yellow-plumed Honeyeater. Alternate modelling is required for the Yellow-plumed honeyeaters to account for their varied seasonal dispersal patterns and the Western Yellow Robin data could not be used for this demographic study because of small sample size. During 1997 and 1999 adult survival rates for Rufous Treecreepers within Dryandra was 0.76 (Luck (2001) and show the Rufous Treecreepers within the Dryandra woodlands are continuing to decline. A comparison of the two survival rates shows there is a reduction of 0.11 within an 8 year period (a single generation), which coincided with a 5.16% decrease in mean foliage cover during sampling times. This study concludes that climate change is negatively impacting E.wandoo forests and that tree foliage cover is not only a significant predictor in determining the presence of Rufous Treecreepers within the Dryandra woodlands, but also effects the short term survival and long term viability of this focal species.


The Disaster Research Center (DRC) was founded in 1963. In the more than a decade of continuous operation since then it has engaged in a variety of different studies. But the basic focus has remained the same.

 At the time of its founding the Center set as its major research objective the analyzing of emergency organizations and their response to as well as prior planning for large scale community emergencies, particularly where a natural disaster agent is involved. This focus was taken becausewhile there had been prior studies of disaster reponses, they had primarily focused on the victims. Particularly no attention had bben given to the activities of the emergency organizations in the community, even though the actions of scuh groups generally determine the efficiency and effectiveness of the reactions in the emergency period. In a basic sense, this focus on organizations during the emergency period has continued to be the major focus in most of the studies undertaken by the Center.


This study explored the concept of social capital in higher education contexts by investigating student discussion forum activity and academic performance. To address these aims online discussion forum logs, student marks and teaching delivery method (blended or fully online) data were extracted from the universities learning management system (LMS). Student social network centrality measures were then calculated from the course discussion activity and correlated against student academic performance for each delivery mode. Drawing on social capital and social network theories the analyses identified that in comparison to low performing students the high-performing group held more central positions in their networks and tended to establish dense social connections with students of a similar academic ability. It was also observed that the relationships formed in blended teaching units were of a greater intensity and reciprocity than those established in fully online teaching units indicating a higher level of social capital was reached. This difference in the amount of available social capital between the two teaching modes suggests that students in blended units have comparatively greater access to resources embedded within the network, which in turn can be mobilised to assist them in their academic endeavours.


The paper investigates cooperative control strategi es for spacecraft formations, also in case platforms are not homogeneous but differs in a ttitude control actuators. Specifically, either a common inertial or a time-varying pointing are considered as requirements for a formation of spacecraft, controlled either entirely by reaction wheels or partly by wheels and partly by thrusters. Two control strategies, namely the classical leader-follower or a more cooperative one, also labelled as behavioural based , where the kinematic state of each spacecraft is known to the others and enters in the ir command loop, are applied. In order to actually compute the actions, two controllers are c onsidered: a classical proportionalderivative (PD) and an optimal one using the variab le gain state dependent Riccati equation (SDRE). Numerical simulations to validate the approach are presented and, within this implementation, SDRE approach shows to succeed even in cases when PD fails.


In this paper, we examine the problem of stochastic sorting, which is also known as sorting with errors, or sorting under a stochastic environment. We introduce a new concept of filtering the stochastic "signals" using deterministic filters, which, in turn, attenuate any errors which occur during the comparison of individual pairs of values. We show that these deterministic filters, which can be used by standard sorting algorithms to achieve stochastic sorting, significantly increase the probability that the lists will be sorted correctly. We introduce two such filters called the Majority filter, and its optimized variant, the Optimal Majority filter. They have been compared for accuracy and computational complexity. More detailed comparisons which involves these and other deterministic filters, and their stochastic versions are found in [15].


type="main"> The UK received its first sovereign credit ratings in 1978. Despite having required financial assistance from the International Monetary Fund only 18 months earlier, the British government managed to secure 'triple-A' ratings from both Standard and Poor's and Moody's. Both assessments of creditworthiness reflected improving economic conditions but also British efforts to influence the sovereign ratings process. The Bank of England and the Treasury sought guidance from American investment banks to prepare for the ratings process and then controlled the flow of information available to the rating agencies accordingly, stressing the strengths of the national economy and downplaying the weaknesses. The British government subsequently launched its first bond issue in the New York market to high levels of investor demand. Consideration of these achievements complements the historiography concerning Britain's economic fortunes in the late 1970s. Scrutiny of events also offers a rare glimpse into the confidential sovereign ratings process. Both agencies relied on a combination of quantitative and qualitative evaluations of the UK. In addition, this article highlights the existence of a unique period in the history of sovereign credit ratings. From 1974 to 1985, the ratings industry enjoyed a cautious revival focused principally on 'triple-A' borrowers.


The molecular phylogeny of the subfamily Dolichopodinae (Diptera : Dolichopodidae) is reconstructed based on 79 species of 7 dolichopodine genera as ingroup, and 10 non-dolichopodine species from different genera as outgroup. A Bayesian analysis based on a mitochondrial DNA dataset consisting of 1702 characters (COI : 810; 12S : 366; 16S : 526) was carried out. Genital and non-genital morphological characters from a hitherto unpublished data matrix (based on 57 Dolichopodidae species) were used to explain and support the lineages hypothesised by our molecular phylogenetic analysis. The monophyly of the subfamily Dolichopodinae, and of the genera Dolichopus and Gymnopternus, was confirmed. The molecular analysis yielded nine species groups in Dolichopus that were proposed in previous studies using COI and Cyt-b. No evidence was found to support a clade including Dolichopus, Ethiromyia, and Gymnopternus. The genus Hercostomus proved polyphyletic with respect to Poecilobothrus, Sybistroma, and Gymnopternus. The following lineages were represented by strongly supported clades: Hercostomus germanus species group, H. vivax species group, H. nigrilamellatus species group, H. plagiatus species group, H. longiventris species group, H. fulvicaudis species group, and Poecilobothrus, Gymnopternus, Tachytrechus and Sybistroma (including Hercostomus nanus and H. parvilamellatus). Two clades that were previously established on the basis of morphology were confirmed in our phylogenetic analysis: (i) Poecilobothrus and the flower-feeding Hercostomus germanus species group, and (ii) the H. longiventris lineage and Sybistroma. In most cases, the groups identified in the molecular analysis could be supported and explained by morphological characters. Species of the Hercostomus germanus species group, Poecilobothrus, the Hercostomus longiventris species group, and a Sybistroma subclade have a similar microhabitat affinity.


JAK2 V617F has been identified as a constitutive activating mutation in approximately half of patients with myelofibrosis (MF). MF, a myeloproliferative disorder comprised of primary myelofibrosis and the clinically indistinguishable entities of post-polycythemia vera or post essential thrombocythemia MF, has been reported to have a median survival of 4 years [Dupriez et al. (1996) Blood88:1013–18]. No effective therapies exist for patients with MF. XL019 is a potent, highly selective and reversible inhibitor of JAK2 which may have utility in treating MF, by ameliorating hepato-splenomegaly, constitutional symptoms, and progressive anemia. The objectives of this phase 1 study include safety evaluation, preliminary assessments of efficacy using International Working Group (IWG) response criteria for MF, and evaluation of pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic endpoints. Pharmacodynamic evaluations include quantitative PCR for peripheral blood JAK2 V617F allele burden and erythropoietin-independent colony formation. In addition, plasma and fixed blood samples are being collected to evaluate changes in protein biomarkers and JAK2 signaling pathways. To date, XL019 has been studied in 21 patients over multiple dose levels ranging from doses of 25 mg to 300 mg using different schedules of administration (3 weeks on, 1 week off; QD; and QMWF). Median age was 64 years (range, 47–87 years) and 16 patients (76%) carried the JAK2V617F mutation. Additionally, one patient had a MPLW515F mutation in the absence of a JAK2 mutation. No treatment-related hematologic adverse events (i.e. thrombocytopenia, anemia, neutropenia) have been observed to date. Reversible low-grade peripheral neuropathy (PNP) was observed in 7/9 patients treated at daily doses of ≥100 mg (Grade 1: 5 patients; Grade 2: 2 patients). XL019 doses below 100 mg using 2 different dosing schedules are currently being evaluated. To date, XL019 has resulted in reductions in splenomegaly and leukocytosis, stabilization of hemoglobin counts, improvements in blast counts, and resolution or improvement in generalized constitutional symptoms. The median spleen size in 15 patients measured below the costal margin by palpation was 14cm (range, 3–26cm). Three of 15 patients with palpable splenomegaly at baseline were JAK2 V617F mutation negative and did not experience spleen size reduction. Twelve of 12 (100%) evaluable patients with an activating mutation (JAK2 V617F: 11 patients; MPLW515F: 1 patient) experienced reduction in spleen size and 5 (42%) had a ≥50% decline from baseline. Ten of 11 patients with JAK2V617F activating mutations and baseline constitutional symptoms, reported improvements in generalized constitutional symptoms which include pruritus and fatigue. No significant non-hematologic or hematologic toxicity has been observed at the current dose level. On 25 mg dosing schedules, no signs of PNP have been observed with a follow-up period of up to 4 months. Overall, XL019 has demonstrated encouraging clinical activity and is generally well tolerated.


Abstract Objective: The present study evaluated whether the poorer baseline performance of cochlear implant (CI) users or the technical and/or physiological properties of CI stimulation are responsible for the absence of masking release. Design: This study measured speech reception thresholds (SRTs) in continuous and modulated noise as a function of signal to noise ratio (SNR). Study sample: A total of 24 subjects participated: 12 normal-hearing (NH) listeners and 12 subjects provided with recent MED-EL CI systems. Results: The mean SRT of CI users in continuous noise was −3.0 ± 1.5 dB SNR (mean ± SEM), while the normal-hearing group reached −5.9 ± 0.8 dB SNR. In modulated noise, the difference across groups increased considerably. For CI users, the mean SRT worsened to −1.4 ± 2.3 dB SNR, while it improved for normal-hearing listeners to −18.9 ± 3.8 dB SNR. Conclusions: The detrimental effect of fluctuating maskers on SRTs in CI users shown by prior studies was confirmed by the current study. Concluding, the absence of masking release is mainly caused by the technical and/or physiological properties of CI stimulation, not just the poorer baseline performance of many CI users compared to normal-hearing subjects. Speech understanding in modulated noise was more robust in CI users who had a relatively large electrical dynamic range.


7238 Background: Wound seeding by tumor cells in the course of malignant disease is a well-documented phenomenon. Mesothelioma is one of the malignancies notoriously known to manifest symptomatic tumor seeding along tissue tracks from thoracoscopy, chest tube or needle drainage of pleural effusion, or needle or open pleural biopsy. Prognosis of this disease is grave and survival is usually short. However, when a patient develops gross seeding presenting with a symptomatic chest wall mass from malignant mesothelioma, the pain is typically excruciating. Unfortunately treatment options at that point in time are very limited and mostly ineffective. In an attempt to prevent the development of wound seeding after a diagnostic or therapeutic procedure in the management of mesothelioma, we piloted a treatment program by irradiating the site of the wound using single dose electron beam and the results are presented.

METHODS
Eight patients with ages ranged form 52 to 80 years received chest wall irradiation to a total of 12 sites in an attempt to prevent wound seeding by tumor. All had a history of exposure to asbestos and a tissue diagnosis of mesothelioma. All patients received radiation therapy within 30 days after the procedure and all sites were treated with a 5-cm diameter cone. A single dose of 15 Gy using either 10 MeV or 12 MeV electron beam was delivered.

RESULTS
All but one patient have died with a median follow-up of 4 moths (range 2 to 16 months). No patient developed wound seeding by tumor cells. There was no treatment related complication.

CONCLUSIONS
In this small series, it appears that prophylactic radiation therapy is effective in preventing wound seeding by tumor cells along tissue tracks in the management of mesothelioma. However, in view of the facts that mesothelioma is a rare tumor and the true incidence of wound seeding is unknown, a large-scale study on a multi-institutional level will be needed to assess the value of this unique treatment modality. No significant financial relationships to disclose.


The first permanent molar as the first permanent tooth in the mouth and with a general insufficient oral hygiene of the children, is commonly subject to significant compromise which may arise due to caries or endodontic complication, or from developmental anomalies such as hypoplasia. Compromised teeth with questionable prognosis may result in short- and long-term clinical dilemmas. The aim of this research is to highlight the factors that require careful consideration when a compromised UFPM is detected and the importance of timely UFPM extraction to ensure the mesial drift of the upper second permanent molar (USPM) to fulfill the space of the extracted UFPM without any orthodontic intervention. For this purpose 52 heavily destructed UFPMs were extracted at age of 10.5 years old, 44 (84.6%) USPMs erupted exactly distal to the second premolar while only 7 (13.4%) USPMs erupted 1 mm distal to the second premolar. Clinically it is recommended to extract the heavily destructed upper first molars at age of 10.5 years old to ensure the complete closure of the extraction space by the passive mesial drift of upper second permanent molar.


The purpose of this
community based
research
project is to conduc
t an
in depth analysis
of best
practices of care coordination in other communities
in order to provide a few key
practices that may work and be implemented
in
the
Rockbridge
area
.
In order to do so, this
project
will examine
init
iatives in other communities while also
interviewing
indi
viduals and
organizations in Rockbridge
involved in promoting
healt
h
and health
care. Speaking with
individuals in the community will give a better indication of
the level of care
coordination
currently in place and evaluate which strategies would be most feasible
and effective in
the
Rockbridge
area
. As such, this report will
take
into account community perspectives, community
resources and the current literature. [From Introduction]


Red Gentleman and White Savages: Indians, Federalists, and the Search for Order on the American Frontier. By David Andrew Nichols. (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2008. Pp. 291. Cloth, $39.50.)The Promise of Progress: The Life and Work of Lewis Henry, Morgan. By Daniel Noah Moses. (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2009. Pp. 332. Cloth, $47.50.)Reviewed by Brian ConnollyThe relationships between whites and Indians - political, cultural, social, economic; bathed in varying degrees of violence and sentimentality - have long held scholars' attention. How best to approach such encounters - how to figure the roles of violence, assimilation, negotiation, and power - has vexed scholars for just as long. Was the frontier a "middle ground" of contested, imperial negotiations or a site of violent dispossession, where whites unceremoniously expropriated land and life from indigenous populations? How does the emergent discipline of ethnography, intimately implicated in these relations, contribute to and challenge the expansion of the liberal, democratic nation-state?Two recent works approach these questions from quite different perspectives. David Andrew Nichols's Red Gentleman and White Savages: Indians, Federalists, and the Search for Order on the American Frontier traces the political conflicts between the federal government, white settlers, and Indians in the trans- Appalachian West. In a sense, Nichols's book can be read as a prehistory to Daniel Noah Moses's biography of the nineteenth-century polymath Lewis Henry Morgan, whose ethnography as universal history of humanity found both its origins and its site of empirical research among the Iroquois on the vanishing frontier of western New York. In privileging the force of private property, both authors offer compelling insights on the mechanisms through which interactions with Indians, and attempts to make sense of them, contributed to the expansion of the United States as both nation and experiment in liberalism.In Red Gentleman and White Savages, Nichols offers a political history of Indian-white interactions in the trans- Appalachian West that takes treaty making as its central subject. The book is organized around four discrete groups: representatives of a weak federal government, frontier settlers, Woodland Indian chiefs, and Indian warriors. As the book develops, Nichols deploys the groups homologously - the federal government and chiefs often have similar aims and methods, namely engagement in treaties and the establishment of order on the frontier - even if they imagine often radically different ends of this process. Conversely, white settlers and warriors, while never engaged by similar motives, were both nonetheless more prone to violence, less inclined toward diplomacy, and, in the eyes of the former group, sources of disorder. Indeed, as these four groups vie directly and indirectly with one another for authority and some sense of contested order, what Nichols makes abundantly clear is that this is a history of absent sovereignty. If so, it is also the history of the massive, yet always contested, dispossession of land by the confluent and conflicting triumvirate of white settlers, state, and federal governments.Chapters 1 and 2 examine a series of treaties that followed in the wake of independence, and Nichols outlines competing claims to authority and the fragility of federal authority on the frontier. In the power vacuum left by the defeat of the British, claims to authority by the Continental Congress, state governments, and private companies were greeted by most Indian chiefs by a desire to deal with only one authoritative body, just as they had dealt with the British prior to the war. Yet such would not be the case. In this atmosphere, Woodland Indians held the balance of power; some tribes willing to negotiate, others not, as evidenced by the formation of several pan-Indian federations. Thus, despite several treaties, the United States held little real power, even if this situation did produce a tenuous peace. …


Multi-functional devices have become progressively attractive in integrated complex systems. Real-time storage of thermal signals in organic memory has been achieved with micro-contact printed core–shell nanoparticles floating on plastic substrates. Herein, a micro-contact printed Au core Pd shell (Au@Pd) bimetal nanoparticle monolayer is designed as the charge trapping layer in a self-encapsulated top-gated memory device. The thermal memory device exhibits a low working voltage of 105 s, stable endurance characteristics over more than 103 repeated program/erase cycles and good mechanical properties during bending cycling tests. The memory properties under various thermal signals are carefully analyzed, and it is found that the devices also show reliable retention capability of pulse thermal signals. Our findings not only demonstrate top-gated flexible organic transistor based devices to sense various environmental thermal signals, but also confirm their applications for the real-time storage of temperature sensing signals as well as more complex thermal related integrated circuits.


What makes a species able to colonize novel environments? This question is key to understand the dynamics of adaptive radiations and ecological niche shifts, but the mechanisms that underlie expansion into novel habitats remain poorly understood at a genomic scale. Lizards from the genus Anolis are typically tropical and the green anole (Anolis carolinensis) constitutes an exception since it expanded into temperate North America from subtropical Florida. Thus, we used the green anole as a model to investigate signatures of selection associated with colonization of a new environment, namely temperate North America. To this end, we analyzed 29 whole genome sequences, representing the entire genetic diversity of the species. We used a combination of recent methods to quantify both positive and balancing selection in northern populations, including FST outlier methods, machine learning and ancestral recombination graphs. We naively scanned for genes of interest and assessed the overlap between multiple tests. Strikingly, we identified many genes involved in behavior, suggesting that the recent successful colonization of northern environments may have been linked to behavioral shifts as well as physiological adaptation. These results were robust to recombination, gene length and clustering. Using a candidate genes strategy, we determined that genes involved in response to cold or behavior displayed more frequently signals of selection, while controlling for local recombination rate and gene length. In addition, we found signatures of balancing selection at immune genes in all investigated genetic groups, but also at genes involved in neuronal and anatomical development in Florida.


Objective: To examine the cross-sectional associations between generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and major depressive disorder (MDD), their comorbidity, and hypertension. Methods: Participants (n = 4180) were drawn from a cohort of men who were members of the U.S. army during the Vietnam war era. Occupational, sociodemographic, and health data were collected from military service files, telephone interviews, and medical examinations. Hypertension status was defined by the presence of one of the following: self-reports at interview of either a physician-diagnosis or taking antihypertensive medication; or an average systolic blood pressure ≥140 mm Hg or an average diastolic blood pressure ≥90 mm Hg at the medical examination. One-year prevalence of GAD and MDD was determined, using Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Third Edition criteria. Results: In separate regression models adjusting for age and then additionally for place of service, ethnicity, marital status, alcohol consumption, smoking, body mass index, household income, and education grade, both GAD and MDD were related positively to hypertension. In age-adjusted and fully adjusted models comparing comorbid GAD/MDD, GAD alone, MDD alone, and neither condition, comorbidity showed the strongest relationship with hypertension. Conclusion: Depression has been the main focus for research on mental health and physical health outcomes. The present results suggest that future research should pay equal attention to GAD and, in particular, the comorbidity of GAD and MDD. BMI = body mass index; GAD = generalized anxiety disorder; MDD = major depressive disorder.


A statistical relationship between spring Arctic sea ice concentration (SIC) and Chinese summer rainfall is identified using singular value decomposition (SVD). Results show that decreased (increased) spring SIC in the Arctic Ocean and the Greenland Sea corresponds to increased (decreased) summer rainfall in northeast China and central China between the Yangtze River and the Yellow River (28°–36°N); and decreased (increased) rainfall in south China. Corresponding summer 500 hPa height anomalies show a Eurasian wave train structure, which originates in northern Europe and extends southeastwards to northeast China, and a south‐north dipole structure over East Asia south to Lake Baikal. Such a spatial distribution of 500 hPa height anomalies and corresponding summer rainfall anomalies cannot be entirely attributed to the impact of East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) variability. The spring Arctic SIC provides a complementary precursor for Chinese summer rainfall variability. The combined impacts of both spring Arctic SIC and Eurasian snow cover on the Eurasian wave train may explain their statistical linkage.


Three marine sediment cores in Adventfjorden, west Spitsbergen, Svalbard, were analyzed for granulometry and benthic foraminifera (>125 μm). Summer water temperature and salinity, as well as suspended solid concentration, were measured. The benthic foraminifera from Adventfjorden are comprised of 46 species belonging to 37 genera. The observed succession of these follows the general distribution pattern of near-shore Svalbard species. The most near-shore Cribroelphidium excavatum clavatum is followed by the more distant Spiroplectammina earlandi, Ammotium cassis, Labrospira crassimargo and Recurvoides turbinatus . Present summer salinity and temperature show no major changes near the sea floor along the Adventfjorden transect. The benthic foraminiferal assemblages appear to be related to different sedimentation regimes, and varied through time with changes in sedimentation. The assemblage changes during ~1959–1963 and ~1977–1987 seem to be linked to local conditions, especially summer precipitation in the area. Conditions causing the possible poor carbonate preservation in Adventfjorden could be due to the reduced sedimentation rates and/or descent of brines produced by sea-ice formation, coupled with decay of organic matter, but not directly to the influence of low-saline water.


Abstract Budget restrictions often limit the number of possible maintenance activities in a road network each year. To effectively allocate resources, the rate of road pavement deterioration is of great importance. If two maintenance candidates have an equivalent condition, it is reasonable to maintain the segment with the highest deterioration rate first. To identify such segments, finite mixture models were applied to road condition data from a part of the M4 highway in England. Assuming that data originates from two different normal distributions – defined as a 'change' distribution and an 'unchanged' distribution – all road segments were classified into one of the groups. Comparisons with known measurement errors and maintenance records showed that segments in the unchanged group had a stationary road condition. Segments classified into the change group showed either a rapid deterioration, improvement in condition because of previous maintenance or unusual measurement errors. Together with additional information from maintenance records, finite mixture models can identify segments with the most rapid deterioration rate, and contribute to more efficient maintenance decisions.


A field survey was performed to assess horizontal and vertical misalignments and their structural effects in some selected buildings in Irbid City, Jordan. Fifty-two building units were selected as representative of the construction practice of residential buildings in Jordan after the Gulf War during the nineties. Buildings in the inventory were low-rise with one to four stories above ground. Story height ranged typically from 2.80 to 3.30 m. Field measurements for misalignments in the exterior elements of twentyone buildings were collected. Twelve of these buildings have concrete-backed stone masonry walls that serve as bearing walls, and nine buildings have skeletons which serve as reinforced concrete frames in-filled with hollow concrete blocks. Also, field measurements for misalignments in the interior elements of thirty-one buildings with skeletons of reinforced concrete frames filled in with hollow concrete blocks have been collected using the concept of the intersection algorithm. Average values of measured misalignments for every type of construction are compared with the tolerances according to the Jordanian Standards, General Technical Specifications for Buildings, and ACI Standards. All measured misalignments exceed the tolerances in both standards except for the vertical alignment of the interior reinforced concrete frames filled in with hollow concrete blocks. The maximum values for the ratio between the measured misalignments and the tolerances were in the exterior concretebacked stone masonry walls, which reached 31.5 for the horizontal misalignment, and 3.4 for the vertical misalignment, according to the Jordanian Code. The reason for the different ratios between the interior and the exterior misalignments is due to more difficult environmental conditions for outside construction compared with inside construction. The value 3.4 for vertical misalignment compared with 31.5 for horizontal misalignment reflects the importance of using checking and surveying equipment (such as level and plumb) for every stone course (25 cm height), while lines and other checking equipment are used for horizontal distances which range between 12 and 15 m. Moreover, misalignment sensitivity analysis was carried out for a typical reinforced concrete frame, which consisted of three spans continuous beam and four-story height, for the purpose of studying its effect on the static actions in the plane frame. Results indicated that horizontal misalignments have negligible effect on the static actions, however, vertical misalignment starts to have an effect at a value of 2.5% (e.g., at 3% vertical misalignment and 2.5% horizontal misalignment the required ratio of steel in the column has increased from 0.0100 to 0.0219).


This book presents the latest numerical solutions to initial value problems and boundary value problems described by ODEs and PDEs. The author offers practical methods that can be adapted to solve wide ranges of problems and illustrates them in the increasingly popular open source computer language R, allowing integration with more statistically based methods. The book begins with standard techniques, followed by an overview of "high-resolution" flux limiters and WENO to solve problems with solutions exhibiting high-gradient phenomena. Meshless methods using radial basis functions are then discussed in the context of scattered data interpolation and the solution of PDEs on irregular grids. Three detailed case studies demonstrate how numerical methods can be used to tackle very different complex problems. With its focus on practical solutions to real-world problems, this book is useful to students and practitioners in all areas of science and engineering, especially those using R. R Code is available for download from the book's home page.


The main purpose of this study is to investigate temperature preference for habitat of three species of oceanic sea skaters, Halobates micans, H. germanus and H. sericeus. For each of the three species, we examined the relationship between population density and surface water and air temperatures in the sampling sites during three science cruises in the tropical to temperate zone of the Pacific Ocean. A higher density of H. micans was observed in sites with higher water and air temperatures at 28℃ - 30℃ than that at site with lower temperatures of 23℃ - 28℃. A higher density of H. germanus was observed in sites with extremely high temperatures of 29.6℃ and 30℃ than that in sites with moderately high temperatures of 28℃ - 29℃ in the Pacific Ocean, while a relatively high density was observed in sites with a wide range of temperatures from 24℃ - 30℃ in the southern hemisphere Pacific Ocean. The relatively low temperature preference of 23℃ - 28℃ exhibited by H. sericeus may be related to its size as the smallest among the three species and its relatively wide latitudinal distribution ranging up to 40?N.


The use of anthropomorphic animal characters is pervasive in animation, but there has been little examination of how and why these are created, and how a viewing audience understands them. This Practice-based PhD examines how a re-defining of anthropomorphic and zoomorphic representation might bring a new impetus to the use of animal imagery within contemporary animation practice.
An initial stage of research was to define the term anthropomorphism both as a visual language within animation practice and in the wider contexts of scientific and philosophical discourse. Social and psychological aspects are discussed, recognising this form of hybrid representation throughout the development of human culture.
Links with Human Animal Studies disciplines raised the question of relating anthropomorphism to negative aspects of anthropocentrism and this led to a second stage of the research that explores ways of working with anthropomorphism that do not promote an anthropocentric bias. This is firstly achieved through the devising of a new theoretical approach to character analysis that is based on the recognition of perceptual aesthetic and sensual animal qualities in human-led , animal-led and design-led anthropomorphic characters, rather than a reliance on conceptual symbolic referencing of human experiences, goals, and narratives. Moving into the practice and influence from historical animation work provides impetus for a move away from character and narrative based work. Experimental animation techniques are used to create rhythms and patterns of abstracted animal and human imagery. This new work is based on contemporary ecological ideas that discuss relationships between humans and animals as interconnected species, thus providing a second way of lessening of anthropocentric bias in the subject matter. Having a starting point of aesthetic and sensual responses to actual experiences with animals is an important factor and live action film is re-animated to create digitally manipulated rhythms of colour, texture, movement and sound. The practical research outcomes are animation samples that evidence the coming together of experimental digital techniques and contemporary ecological subject matter.
An action research model was devised for the research to enable the integration of theory and practice, and reflection on theory and practice to have an important influence on the practical outcomes. The approach taken was dependent on experience as a creative practitioner and as a teacher helping others to develop a sustainable creative practice, in allowing an open and intuitive discovery of ideas from both theoretical and practical explorations to create a flow through the research. The combination of theoretical and practical research undertaken provides an impetus towards the creation of future animation work using an anthropomorphic visual language redefined as zooanthropomorphic animation .
The submission includes outcomes of a written thesis and links to practical animation work.


The main aim of labour market activation policies is to bring jobless people from unemployment or inactivity into work or, at the very least, to influence the employment prospects of the unemployed positively. Activation schemes typically make benefit receipt conditional upon job search activities, acceptance of available job offers and participation in training activities. This article addresses the appropriate role of the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) in the establishment of activation in South Africa. It focuses on a number of principled and practical considerations and constraints that challenge the use of activation mechanisms, such as the fragmentation of the existing legal and institutional frameworks, the lack of available employment opportunities and human rights considerations. It is argued that the limited and short-term impact of the UIF, its strong labour-market orientation and its inability to appropriately contribute to preventing and combating unemployment or to reintegrate the unemployed into the labour market all point to the urgent need to reform the UIF. The gaps in the current unemployment insurance system are highlighted, as is the need to enhance the relationship between the unemployment insurance system and (appropriate) activation measures. The role of existing social security and employment creation initiatives in this dynamic is also considered. In particular, the absence of a link between those excluded from the UIF and the activation mechanisms introduced by the Skills Development Act 97 of 1998 is underscored. Proposals contained in the Employment Services Bill are also evaluated. It is suggested that an expanded form of employment services provision, incorporating a network of labour centres, ought to receive prioritisation in the South African context. This must be coupled with a move to consolidate the various available governmental databases in terms of which unemployed persons may register as job-seekers. The creation of an enabling framework to achieve such goals would require a variety of legislative changes, some of which are discussed in the article.


In the past 20 years the average scale of hog operations has expanded more than fourfold, and some of the new large-scale hog feeding operations have been opposed by residents in some communities. While the environmental effects of such production have been relatively well studied, less examined are its potential positive effects on local labor markets and economies. Existing estimates based on production-function and input-output analysis imply that each additional 1000 hogs in inventory in a county generates between 3 and 7 local jobs. In this paper we adopt an econometric approach instead, to estimate the effects of changes in hog production on changes in both farm and non-farm outcomes. We find that total county employment increases by less than previously reported, with about two additional jobs being created per 1000 head of hogs in inventory.


The classification of a new epoch in planetary history as the 'Anthropocene' is fundamentally changing the way we understand our political systems. Given the inherently political nature of human societies, the Anthropocene also has to be understood as a global political phenomenon. The paper elaborates on how the Anthropocene is changing societal interdependence relationships, and sketches foundations of an emerging new paradigm in the social sciences, 'Earth System' governance. The notion of Earth System governance is developed as both an analytical and a normative research problem that is of fundamental relevance for the disciplines of political science and governance studies.


Although the Sherman Act was enacted over a century ago, antitrust enforcers, policy makers, and scholars have largely circumvented the morality of antitrust crimes. Its absence is remarkable given the vigorous debate over the appropriate civil and criminal penalties for antitrust violations. Under the continued influence of the Chicago-school's neoclassical economic theories, antitrust analysis is primarily concerned with economic efficiency. Since terms like morality and evil are judgmental, not descriptive, they are deemed outside the discourse of economic theory's self-described positivism. But antitrust analysis is not beyond the judgmental. Over the past thirty years, while antitrust's civil remedies have remained relatively unchanged, the criminal penalties for price fixing, bid rigging, and other Sherman Act antitrust violations have soared - from a misdemeanor to a felony punishable by up to ten years imprisonment. If the criminal laws reflect society's moral judgments, then antitrust and morality ultimately are intertwined. This article provides a background of antitrust violations and the flawed economic theory of optimal deterrence that has played a critical role in shaping the criminal sanctions for Sherman Act violations. Despite the escalation in antitrust's criminal penalties, there is no clear evidence that optimal deterrence has been achieved. The article next introduces morality and asks what role morality could play in the field of antitrust, if optimal deterrence alone is insufficient to effectively deter violations. After examining under a three-part standard whether antitrust crimes can indeed be deemed immoral, the article weighs some of the benefits and risks of supplementing antitrust crimes with a moral component and the risks of the current course - namely, ignoring morality.


Daniel Corkery was the most influential and provocative cultural critic of the early Irish Free State. Since the 1960s, Corkery's name, however, has become increasingly synonymous with a narrow-gauge nationalism that, in the eyes of many, has sought to stifle an emerging 'modern' Ireland. This publication makes the case for a reassessment of Corkery's cultural criticism, and reveals that the commonplace depiction of a parochial and racist Corkery, while not entirely groundless, is based on a reading of his critical writings that is both selective and reductive. Corkery's cultural criticism is viewed in this book, not as the product of a backward-looking and insular nationalism, but as intellectual work within an international context of anti-colonialism. This collection of Corkery's writings is a testimony to the sheer productivity of his eighty and more years. This book brings together oft-cited published material, that is no longer easily available, and unpublished manuscripts from the Corkery archive. The result is an edited collection that both reveals the central and recurring concerns of Corkery's critical writings, and offers a unique insight into his wide-ranging cultural interests. Included in the collection are key chapters from The Hidden Ireland and Synge and Anglo-Irish Literature, newspaper articles, literature reviews, a previously-unpublished essay and a radio broadcast. The book concludes with a selection of contemporary responses to Corkery's critical writings. This section of the book clearly indicates the strong reactions, both positive and negative, that his work originally elicited and allows the reader to situate Corkery within the intellectual debates of his day.


This paper explores the significance of shifting cultural understandings of gay men and lesbians in the Supreme Court's majority, concurring and dissenting opinions in the landmark sodomy case Lawrence v. Texas. By examining the legal authorities in which the case's various opinions are grounded, the article shows that the differing positions taken by the Court reflect radically diverging views on the significance of homosexuality in contemporary culture. Beyond the rather easy observation that the Supreme Court justices are speaking different languages in the Lawrence opinion, the article contends that the rhetoric of the majority and dissent converge on at least one critical point: both acknowledge that sodomy prohibitions do not simply outlaw certain acts, but profoundly affect groups of people, that is, bisexuals, lesbians, and gay men. This notion was, until recently, hotly contested. But the article shows that the moment for the status/conduct debate about homosexuality seems to have passed, and that even those in favor of allowing states to proscribe gay sex concede that such laws uniquely resonate for a specific subset of the citizenry. This new-found consensus makes sense of Justice Kennedy's far-reaching majority opinion, but complicates enormously the dissent. The article argues that Justice Scalia's dissent is undone by its own position - once it acknowledges the existence of homosexuals, it becomes almost impossible to explain how gay-specific sodomy statutes are not an affront to their dignity. The essay also suggests that the majority opinion is suffused with an implicit but unacknowledged understanding of anti-gay prejudice. Contending that direct acknowledgment of the pernicious effects of racist bigotry was a crucial component in Brown v. Board of Education to which Lawrence has been compared, the essay argues that Lawrence cannot be similarly sea-changing if it is not also understood to introduce the concept of homophobia to the Court and to the larger public.


This paper considers the resonance phenomena observed on cables connected to power converters, evaluating theoretically and experimentally the voltage amplification due to resonance on these cables. The experimental study was effectuated on cables typically used on industrial applications. Factors restricting resonance-due amplifications are considered, as well as the conditions under which resonance issues may rise in such systems.


In the 70s the concept burn-out appeared in psychological literature on the helping professions. The concept has since then been ascribed several meanings, and critical voices have been raised against the lack of clarity and consensus in the definitions. The aim of this article was to critically examine the thinking on the concept of burn-out. The helping professionals--nurses, welfare officers, psychologists, medical doctors, etc.--have expanded rapidly since the 60s. It is stated that the issues on which burn-out researchers focus deserve the attention of social scientists in general. The major limitation in the literature on burn-out is that there is little analysis of the role of society and social conditions in producing the phenomenon. It is suggested that sociological analyses may have a contribution to make here.


Summary Background: Using traditional assessment procedures, prior research demonstrated that deficiencies in gait and balance occur in the later stages of dementia. Objective: We tested the hypothesis that an automated system capable of detecting path tortuosity (irregular movement) in elders would show that greater tortuosity was associated with greater cognitive impairment, potentially allowing early detection of dementia over time as tortuosity levels slowly increased. Methods: An ultra-wideband sensor network using wireless transponders measured daytime locomotion to an accuracy of 20 cm in 14 elderly residents in an assisted living facility (ALF) as they traversed a shared living area while performing daily activities such as going to a dining area, conversing and watching television. Transponder location was updated at 0.4 sec intervals while in motion and revealed large individual differences in activity patterns. Results: Fractal dimension (Fractal D), a measure of movement path tortuosity (directed vs. irregular or apparently aimless locomotion) was significantly and negatively correlated with cognitive status as measured by the Mini Mental State Examination administered to each participant at the study's end. Conclusions: Previous studies of locomotion in laboratory settings that have demonstrated gait variability increases with poor cognitive status have necessarily controlled various components of gait. The present results demonstrate that directional changes and other locomotion components can be studied by monitoring free movements in normal living settings over time. Implications for assessment and management of dementia-related wandering are discussed.


Charges in this case arose out of a lengthy police investigation in Ontario of three individuals allegedly involved in a variety of criminal enterprises. The investigation resulted in a 31-count indictment based on a number of sections of the criminal code. Minh Khuan Mac was named in seven of the charges and, in 1997, was convicted in an Ontario court on five counts relating to the manufacturing and selling of forged credit cards (Regina v. Minh Khuan Mac, 1997). The five charges were all laid under Section 396(b) of the Criminal Code of Canada (1984) that reads as follows: 369. Exchequer bill paper, public seals, etc.--Every one who, without lawful authority or excuse ... (b) makes, offers or disposes of, or knowingly has in his possession, any plate, die, machinery, instrument or other writing or material that is adapted and intended to be used to commit forgery ... is guilty of an indictable offence. That police investigators had found materials and machines capable of being used to manufacture forged credit cards was not in dispute. The court also heard evidence that the defendant could be said to be "in possession" of these materials and machines, and that he was intending to use them to commit forgery. However, questions were raised at trial about the meaning of the word "adapted" as used in the above section of the Criminal Code of Canada. Specifically, defence counsel claimed that the use of this word meant that it was an essential element of the offence that the "plate, die, machinery, instrument or other writing or material" that was the subject of the charge be altered in some way. This would be a crucial finding since, in this case. none of the evidence (with one possible exception) recovered by the police and introduced into court had been altered in any way. Based on the above argument, defence counsel put forward a motion for a directed verdict of not guilty. The presiding judge in the case (Judge Feldman) disagreed, however, stating: In my view, where machines or other materials for forgery are usable for both illegal and legal purposes without any modification or alteration, then the most logical and rational meaning to be given to the word "adapted" in s. 369(b) is "suited" and not "altered"... I therefore find that there is no requirement that any of the charged material be modified or altered in order to form the basis for a conviction under the section (Regina v. Minh Khuan Mac, 1997). As such, Judge Feldman instructed the jury to interpret the word "adapted" to mean "suitable for" and the defendant was duly convicted. An appeal was subsequently launched in which lawyers for Minh Khuan Mac cited a number of grounds for appeal, including the claim that Judge Feldman erred when she instructed the jury that the word "adapted" in Section 369(b) meant "suitable for". They argued that the correct meaning was "altered so as to be suitable for", and since four of the five charges on which convictions were registered involved material and machinery which was suitable for making forged credit cards, but which had not been altered in any way, those convictions should be overturned. The case was heard in the Ontario Court of Appeal, and judgement given on February 6, 2001 (Regina v. Mac, 2001). Doherty J.A. wrote the unanimous judgement for the three-judge panel that sat to hear the case, and considered at some length the meaning that should be given to the word "adapted" in Section 369(b). The judgement pointed out that an impressive list of authorities hold that any ambiguity in the interpretation of criminal statutes must be "resolved by choosing the meaning which is most favourable to the accused." This assertion was reinforced by quotations from three decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada, ending with the comments of Lamer C.J.C. in Regina v. McIntosh (1995, p.495) who, when speaking for the majority, said: The Criminal Code is not a contract or a labour agreement. …


Almost three years into his administration, observers continue to debate the nature of President Obama's overall foreign policy approach. What is the "Obama doctrine"? Some say it is a policy of international engagement. Some point to Libya, and suggest that the Obama doctrine is one of humanitarian intervention multilaterally and at minimal cost. Some look to today's fiscal constraints and say that it is all about insolvency. Some describe the Obama doctrine as a version of traditional great power realism, coming after the crusading idealism of the Bush years. Others respond that Obama has no foreign policy strategy at all--that he is simply making it up as he goes along. Each interpretation has a certain kernel of truth, but each is also seriously flawed and incomplete. Barack Obama does in fact have an overarching foreign policy strategy, going back several years in spite of recent upheavals, but its basic organizing principle is neither engagement, nor intervention, nor insolvency, nor realism per se. The centerpiece of Obama's overall for eign policy strategy is the concept of accommodation. Specifically, the president believes that international rivalries can be accommodated by American example and by his own integrative personal leadership. The problem is not that Obama has no grand strategy. The problem is that it is not working. Obama's grand strategy Any grand strategy or overall foreign policy strategy does several things. First, it specifies certain national goals or ends. Second, it identifies the policy instruments or means by which national goals will be pursued. These instruments might include, for example, diplomatic commitments, military intervention, foreign aid, and/or economic sanctions. Any viable strategy must ensure that means and ends are well matched. Commitments must not exceed capabilities. Yet strategy--unlike say, sculpture--also recognizes that our targets are animate objects, with the ability to respond, make choices, and fight back. Consequently, effective foreign policy strategists must and do strike a fine balance. On the one hand, they need to know what they want. On the other, they must be flexible as to how exactly they pursue it, given the inevitable surprises resulting from pushback by other actors within the international system. The primary ends and means of Obama's foreign policy strategy can be inferred from both his actions and his words, which have been broadly consistent since his election to the White House. To begin, his chief policy interest is not in the international realm at all, but in the domestic. Obama's leading motivation for becoming president, as he himself has said, was not simply to get elected, much less to focus on foreign affairs, but to "remake America." He aims at and has already achieved dramatic liberal or progressive reforms in numerous domestic policy areas such as health care and financial regulation. This focus on liberal domestic reform has several implications for American grand strategy, as Obama well knows. First, it means that resources must be shifted in relative terms from national security spending to domestic social and economic spending--a shift clearly visible in recent federal budgets. Second, it means steering clear of partisan political fights over national security that might detract from Obama's overall political capital. Third, it means that potentially costly new international entanglements must for the most part be avoided. Sometimes these three imperatives are in tension with one another. For example, in the autumn of 2009, Obama was tempted to begin winding down America's military engagement in Afghanistan, yet at the same time wanted to avoid appearing weak on terrorism. So he settled on an approach that called for temporary U.S. escalation in Afghanistan, resolved by subsequent disengagement beginning in July 2011. That approach was hardly optimal militarily, but it was the least bad policy for Obama in domestic political terms given his overarching priori ties. …


The purpose of the study was to examine the factors which
influence students' decision to take up the role of an art student in
secondary schools in Nigeria and propose ways to advance the study of art
in secondary education. Pedagogy tells that children in elementary
schools are very interested in art education, but when they leave primary
school and enter secondary school, this enthusiasm changes quickly and
students no longer show interest in art education. Researches in art
education also show that only a fraction of the teenage population which
attend secondary schools choose art education in the WASC and the GCE
examinations. A very few students carry over art interest into adult life.
A play of factors is at work in deciding the change in behaviour. The
study critically examined the factors and their influences on students'
choice of art education.
The research was in three phases: (1) a general survey on
students' background experiences in art teaching, people's attitude
towards art and the position of art in education; (2) a case study of art
education in some selected secondary schools; and (3) another case study
of art education in a particular institution, chosen on the basis of the
strength of its art department. The research involved fifteen states,
secondary schools, teachers, students, principals and administrators. The
research procedures revolved around structured interviews, observations,
questionnaires and documentary resources.
The analyses of the data provided the following: (1) The
decision to study art as a major subject was the result of a number of
different forces which not only conflicted with each other, but reflected
the tendency of divergence between the values of artists and those of the
society as whole. Sometimes the decision to take art instead of science
was based on a lack of sufficiently good marks in the areas relevant to
science. The selection of the subject was by no means uniquely due to
outstanding performance in art because art students who gave art as their
best subject had none the less considered careers in other fields. Others
both gave a subject other than art as their best and considered other
careers. This provided the probability of other sorts of motivation towards
and away from the role of an art student. Some students who opted for art
hoped to reconcile its values with the socially dominant ones, which
stressed such needs as earning capacity, job security, and occupational
prestige. Others had enough encouragements in the social milieu, in the
family and in the school. (2) There were traditional assumptions about the
role of art in society and in education, which pushed the works of artists
and the works of the art teachers down the list of social and educational
priorities. (3) Some of the issues which confronted students were to do
with long-established attitudes towards art and art education.
Based on the findings of the study, it is recommended that:
(1) Quality of education and life-long education cannot be achieved by
only focussing on high standards of literacy and numeracy through a
specialised curriculum; by choosing between science or art, vocational
qualification or education for leisure. All need to be equally represented
in a well balanced curriculum. Each stands to gain through being taught
in conjunction with the others. Those talented in art can be successful
in the sciences and vise versa. What children and adolescents need is a
varied general education, which sees the acquisition of knowledge and
practical skills as integral parts of development. Attitudes towards
art and art teachers need to be improved. The deep-rooted attitude and
the collary of this - that the subject is less significant - are issues
which need to be campaigned against.


Bacterial Isolate no. J7A was isolated from Jubany Station, Antarctica and it has the capability to reduce the heavy metal molybdenum (molybdate) to molybdenum blue in a solid medium agar, pH 7 at 10°C, after for 4 days of incubation. Isolate J7A was identified as Gram-negative and gamma-Proteobacterium Strain Dr.Y1 through moleculare phylogenetics analysis of the sequenced 16s rRNA gene. The optimization studies were carried out to optimize the production of molybdenum blue. The combination of 1% (w/v) glucose, 0.3% (w/v) ammonium sulphate, 0.1% (w/v) of yeast extract, 30mM molybdate, and low phosphate medium at pH 7 give the optimum production of Molybdenum blue. Partial purification and characterization were conducted on molybdenum reducing enzyme with anion exchange chromatography using Macro-Prep High-QTM column and gel filtration chromatography using Agilent ZorbaxTM (GF-250) column. Three bands were visualized on the gel filtration fraction at 39, 36 and 33 kDa using the SDS polyacrylamide-gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) suggesting that purification was not achieved. In enzyme kinetic studies, NADH serves as the substrate for electron donor and 12-MP act as the substrate for electron acceptor. The Km and Vmax for NADH were 0.4838 mM and 21.51 units/mg enzyme respectively. While the values for 12-MP were 5.347 mM and 64.04 units/mg enzyme respectively. The characterization of Mo-reducing enzyme studies were carried out at the optimum pH of 7.5 using 50mM Tris-HCl at 15°C. The enzyme is stable at -20°C for six days in Tris-HCL buffer at pH 7.5.


Alzheimer's disease (AD) has become a leading public health issue due to our nation's burgeoning aging population. These issues are further complicated by the fact that neither preventive measure and effective treatment nor definitive in vivo diagnostic tool for this burdensome disease is currently available. Genetic, biochemical, and neuropathological data argue that Aβ amyloidosis, which originates from the Aβ amyloidogenic processing of a metalloprotein- amyloid precursor protein (APP), is the key event in AD pathology. However, neurochemical factors that impact upon this age-dependent protein disorder in brain are not well recognized. Considerable evidence is mounting that dyshomeostasis of the redox-active biometals, Cu and Fe, and oxidative stress contribute to the neuropathology of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Present data suggest that metals can interact directly with Aβ peptide, the principle component of Aβ amyloid that is one of the primary lesions in AD. The binding of metals to Aβ modulates several physiochemical properties of Aβ that are thought to be central to the pathogenicity of the peptide. First, we and others have shown that metals can promote the in vitro aggregation into tinctorial and disordered protein- Aβ amyloid. Studies have confirmed that insoluble amyloid plaques in post-mortem AD brain are abnormally enriched in Cu, Fe, and Zn. Conversely, metal chelators dissolve these proteinaceous deposits from post- mortem AD brain tissue and attenuate cerebral Aβ amyloid burden in APP transgenic mouse models of AD. Second, we have demonstrated that redox-active Cu(II), and to a lesser extent, Fe(III), are reduced in the presence of Aβ with concomitant production of reactive oxygen species (ROS)- hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and hydroxyl radical (OH•). These Aβ/metal redox reactions, which are silenced by redox-inert Zn(II), but exacerbated by biological reducing agents, may lead directly to the widespread oxidation damages observed in AD brains. Moreover, studies have also shown that H2O2 mediates Aβ cellular toxicity and increases the production of both Aβ and amyloid precursor protein (APP). Third, the 5'untranslated region (5'UTR) of APP mRNA has a functional iron-response element (IRE) which is consistent with biochemical evidence that APP is redox-active metalloprotein. Hence, the redox interactions between Aβ, APP, and metals may be at the heart of a pathological positive feedback system wherein Aβ amyloidosis and oxidative stress promote each other. The emergence of redox-active metals as key players in AD pathogenesis strongly argues that amyloid-specific metal-complexing agents and antioxidants be investigated as possible disease-modifying agents for treating this horrible disease. In addition, the AD diagnosis currently relies on behavior- based tests- e.g., Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). However, it is not specific for AD as many factors may lead to memory impairment and cognitive failure. The only definitive diagnosis for AD is the post-mortem examination of brain tissue for cerebral Aβ amyloidosis, the neuropathological hallmark of AD (2,3). Thus, development of in vivo amyloid imaging agents can not only provide definitive AD diagnostic tools but also speed up the preclinical and clinical assessment of novel AD therapeutic agents targeting Aβ amyloid. In summary, study of AD metallobiochemistry cements a solid foundation for discovering novel theranostic agents of AD.


The article examines how the roles of state institutions and state owned enterprises have been changed in Ireland since its independence, with special regard to the role of state ownership and crisis management. The history of planning and social partnership, the courses of nationalisation and privatisation and the problem of damaging the state are discussed as well. The author concludes that the crisis has not resulted in the strengthening of the developmental or welfare role of the state, the evolution of a "developmental welfare state" has become less likely in Ireland in the course of crisis management. Another lesson is that the state can manage certain bad assets of the private sector in a way that yields a profit to the public. There are other costs of the crisis management, however, which are to be paid by the people and result in a decrease of state ownership and a shrinking of the welfare systems.


I investigate complementarity games played on graphs, which model negative externalities embedded in structures of interaction. On the complete graph, the traditional economic analysis applies: the number of agents playing one strategy is proportional to its payoff. I show that, in general and contrary to coordination games, the structure crucially influences the equilibria. On an important class of graphs, called bipartite graphs, the equilibria do not depend on strategies' payoffs. On certain highly asymmetric graphs, an increase in the payoff of a strategy even decreases the number of agents playing this strategy. In most cases, equilibria do not maximize welfare.


In this paper the author compares the original branches of the Civil Law group and Common Law group. The reason being that, with relatively few exceptions, these are the systems that have been exported to Africa and which still dominate the African legal scene. Therefore, when I refer to the Civil Law, I have Western Civil Law in mind, and when I refer to the Common Law, English law serves as the prototype. Of course, the comparative law discipline should not stop at classifying laws but should also assist in comparing them in detail. The comparison of laws, subsequent to their classification, constitutes the field of micro-comparative law.


Management Education and Humanities argues that management teachers and researchers seem to be increasingly dissatisfied with the way managers are usually educated in western countries. It claims that educational practices and methods would greatly benefit from reflection on the implicit assumptions and paradigms behind those practices, and debates the role that humanism and humanities might play in the formation of new managerial elites.


A role for p53-related modulation of neuronal viability has been suggested by the finding that p53 expression is increased in damaged neurons in models of ischemia and epilepsy. These findings were recently extended with the demonstration that mice deficient in p53 ("knock-out" mice) exhibit almost complete protection from seizure-induced brain injury, whereas wild-type mice display significant neuronal cell loss in the hippocampus and other brain regions. Because the p53 knock-out mice used in the latter study expressed a global p53 deficiency in all cell types, it was not possible to conclude that protection was conferred by the exclusive absence of p53 in neurons. Therefore, in the present study, we determined whether p53 expression in isolated neurons is directly coupled to a loss of viability associated with excitotoxic challenge. Primary cultures of hippocampal or cortical neurons were derived from animals containing p53 (+/+, +/−) or those deficient in p53 (−/−). p53-Deficient neurons appeared identical to wild-type neurons with respect to morphology, neurofilament expression, and resting levels of intracellular calcium. Neurons containing at least one copy of p53 were severely damaged by exposure to kainic acid or glutamate. Cell damage was assessed by direct cell counting and by nuclear morphology after propidium iodide staining of DNA. In contrast, neurons deficient in p53 (−/−) exhibited little or no damage in response to excitotoxin treatment. Despite their divergent outcomes, p53 (+/+) and p53 (−/−) neurons demonstrated similar sustained elevations in intracellular calcium levels triggered by glutamate exposure. Restoring p53 expression to p53-deficient neurons, using adenovirus-mediated transduction, was sufficient to promote neuronal cell death even in the absence of excitotoxin. These results demonstrate a direct relationship between p53 expression and loss of viability in CNS neurons.


This article describes some of the recent research into the capacity value of wind power. With the worldwide increase in wind power during the past several years, there is increasing interest and significance regarding its capacity value because this has a direct influence on the amount of other (nonwind) capacity that is needed. We build on previous reviews from IEEE and IEA Wind Task 25a and examine recent work that evaluates the impact of multiple‐year data sets and the impact of interconnected systems on resource adequacy. We also provide examples that explore the use of alternative reliability metrics for wind capacity value calculations. We show how multiple‐year data sets significantly increase the robustness of results compared to single‐year assessments. Assumptions regarding the transmission interconnections play a significant role. To date, results regarding which reliability metric to use for probabilistic capacity valuation show little sensitivity to the metric. WIREs Energy Environ 2017, 6:e226. doi: 10.1002/wene.226

publisher-specific, author manuscript: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions


Biofouling is a major problem shared among all maritime sectors employing submerged structures where it leads to substantially increased costs and lowered operational lifespans if poorly addressed. Insight into the ongoing processes at the relevant marine locations is key to effective management of biofouling. Of specific concern for the marine renewable energy (MRE) sector is the fact that information on biofouling composition and magnitude across geographies is dispersed throughout published papers and consulting reports. To enable rapid access to relevant key biofouling events the present work describes a European biofouling database to support the MRE sector and other maritime industries. The database compiles in one document qualitative and quantitative data for challenging biofouling groups, including non-native species associated with MRE and related marine equipment, in different European Ecoregions. It provides information on the occurrence of fouling species and data on key biofouling parameters, such as biofouling thickness and weight. The database aims to aid the MRE sector and offshore industries in understanding which biofouling communities their devices are more susceptible to at a given site, to facilitate informed decisions. In addition, the biofouling mapping is useful for the development of biosecurity risk management plans as well as academic research.


In forming a strategy to deal with the severe economic downturn, President-elect Obama and his evolving brain trust of economic advisers should recall the largely successful and innovative efforts by the federal and state governments to avoid a projected steep post–World War II recession – in particular, the key role of higher education. Demand for higher education generally goes up during economic downturns. Expanding higher education funding and enrollment capacity may be as important as any other policy lever to cope with an economic downturn, including funding for infrastructure. Yet most state and local governments are in the midst of wholesale cutting of their budgets. Some 75 percent of all students in the US are in public institutions. Feeling the effects of repeated cuts in budgets, many multicampus public systems are threatening to cap enrollment despite growing demand. Would it be smart to constrict access to higher education just when unemployment rates are potentially peaking? An exploratory Commission on Higher Education, not unlike what President Harry Truman formed in 1946, but with more urgency and possibly an initial budget, might provide a larger vision and contemplate a range of options. Short-term and immediate policies could include significant directed subsidization via state governments of the public higher education sectors; a large increase in federal Pell Grants for low-income students, already severely under-funded relative to demand; greatly expanded resources for direct loans; the possibility of a one-time grant for middle-income students to attend a participating public or accredited private institution; for some targeted age groups, federal unemployment compensation could be tied to enrollment access to an accredited higher education institution; and support of public college and university building programs as part of any new infrastructure investment program. Long-term goals should include an assessment of the overall health of the U.S.'s still famous, but strained, higher education system and what national and state goals might be conjured. Globally, those nations that resort to uncoordinated and reactionary cutting of funding, and reductions in access, will find themselves at a disadvantage for dealing with impact of the worldwide recession, and will lose ground in the race to develop human capital suitable for the modern era.


Long-term nominal interest rates in a number of inflation-targeting small open economies have tended to be highly correlated with those of the United States. This observation has recently lent support to the view that the long end of the yield curve is determined abroad. We set up and estimate a micro-founded two-block small open economy model to study the co-movement of long-term nominal interest rates of different currencies. The expectations hypothesis together with uncovered interest rate parity, which both hold in our model, can account for much of the co-movement of interest rates observed in the data.


The overall aim of our study in South Africa has been to make proposals about the future land use of Helenvale, a degraded township north of Port Elizabeth. The intention has been to create a dense housing area with high accessibility and well functioning public facilities and public transport. This includes analyzing the area's building structure, internal and external connections and linkages, nodes for services and public transport, greenery and public spaces. A proposal was then made about the future land use and development. It also includes making suggestions on a smaller scale of the spatial layout of streets and blocks within the area. The focus of our proposal has been how to increase the density of Helenvale, to improve the spatial linkages and public transport and to create defined public spaces and facilities. The final part of the project presents two individual proposals on a smaller and more detailed scale. We have each focused on different neighborhoods within the area and suggested a future land use. The first step of our project has been to study the different policies and documents established by the municipality. This was essential in understanding the planning issues they are dealing with and their intentions for the future development for different parts of the municipality. These documents have also had a significant impact on our proposal. Information about the physical structure of Helenvale was collected during our two months of field work in the township through inventory and interviews with residents. We studied the existing physical environment of housing, public space and connections within the area and to the surroundings. Another important part of the inventory was to make observations concerning public life and social activities. To analyse the structure of Helenvale we have studied different methods and theories of Kevin Lynch, Jane Jacobs and Jan Gehl. We also did a SWOT-analysis to identify conflicts of interest and needs of the area as well as possibilities and potential opportunities. Based on own observations, the different methods, inventory made in the area, interviews with residents and the municipal guidelines we created four keywords for our proposal. The keywords are Densification, Public Space, Accessibility and Integration. We have based our suggestions for the future development and upgrading of Helenvale on these core themes.


Why do even well-educated people often understand so little about maths - or take a perverse pride in not being a 'numbers person'? In his now-classic book "Innumeracy", John Allen Paulos answers questions such as: why is following the stock market exactly like flipping a coin; how big is a trillion; how fast does human hair grow in mph; and, can you calculate the chances that a party includes two people who have the same birthday. Paulos shows us that by arming yourself with some simple maths, you don't have to let numbers get the better of you.