In the context of climate change and the decrease of fossil fuels the production of renewable energies should be extended. The use of biomass is one option to help secure the energy supply. Based on the need for regional increase of biomass production for material and energetic use the research framework BEST - for the support of bioenergy regions - is being conducted since 2010. One focus of BEST is set on the development of regionally adapted concepts and innovative systems for the production of woody biomass taking into account ecological and economic effects. Research activities of BEST were linked to two bioenergy regions: the district of Gottingen (Ldk. Go.) located in Southern Saxony and the initiative "BERTA" (BioEnergy Region Thuringian cropping Area) in the center of the Thuringian cropping area. The subproject "Agroforestry and short rotation coppices" of BEST as the base of this study analyses innovative systems for the production of woody biomass.
Main goals of the study are:
(i) the development of regionally adapted concepts and innovative systems for the production of woody biomass within the land use systems short rotation coppice (SRC) and agroforestry (AF). SRC provide woody biomass with fast growing trees, like poplar or willow, on agricultural land. The combination of SRC rows and grassland or arable crops on the same agricultural site are called AF.
(ii) Establishment of practical SRC and AF study sites in both bioenergy regions Ldk. Go. and BERTA.
(iii) Soil ecological characterization of the study sites.
(iv) Deduction of practical recommendations.
Furthermore, the following subgoals were identified for achieving the main goals:
(i) provision, analysis and assessment of geological, climatic, soil physical and soil chemical data for the study sites in both bioenergy regions,
(ii) analysis of the nutritional status of the fast growing trees,
(iii) verification of success by gathering information on growth and yield, (iv) measurement and comparison of litter production, litter loss and nutrient release for the used clones,
(v) estimation of fluxes and pools of initial nitrogen cycling,
(vi) integrated assessment of suitability for the study sites concering KUP and AF.
Several disciplines (meteorology, soil science, geology, geography), data (long term data from the German Weather Service) and observations (detailed soil mapping, soil profiles, leaf nutrient content, buried bags, deposition) were used for evaluation of the study sites with fast growing trees (poplar clone "Max 1" and willow clone "Tordis").
For characterization of water supply climatic and soil physical data were used. Based on the results of the long term mean precipitation and the available water capacity of soil an establishment of SRC and AF in BERTA cannot be recommended. However, the planting of SRC and AF can fully be recommended in Ldk. Go. Geological and soil chemical data indicate good nutrient conditions for plant growth of poplar and willow. However, low initial biomass yields, with a maximum of 3.2 tatro ha -1 a -1 were calculated for both study sites with the help of allometric power equations. Survival rates and initial biomass yields were higher by poplar in comparison to willow. Especially the survival rates of willow (approx. 90 %) were higher than for poplar (maximum of 74 %).
Further litter production, decomposition and nutrient release was higher for poplar clone "Max 1" in comparison to willow clone "Tordis". Therefore, more nutrients are returned with poplar litter into the soil in comparison to willow.
Initial nitrogen (N) cycling, fluxes and pools of N and N use efficiency were analyzed for SRC and AF in both regions. Fluxes of mean Net-N-Mineralization (NNM) plus the measured atmospheric N bulk deposition were taken as the input terms. Using buried bags for NNM, no significant differences between SRC, AF and agricultural control plot were detected. Atmospheric N deposition was very similar for both regions (11 - 13 kg (N) ha -1 a -1 ).
Output terms for N were defined as the plant uptake in wood, including bark, plus the losses of N by nitrate leaching and N2O emissions. High nitrate leaching was especially determined immediately after establishment of SRC and AF but decreased towards the end of the observation period. Highest nitrate leaching was observed for willow in SRC on both study sites. Plant uptake of N in wood, including bark was highest in poplar SRC, mainly caused by higher nutrient contents and biomass yields in comparison to willow. N 2 O emissions for poplar SRC were determined up to a maximum of 2 kg ha -1 a -1 in both regions.
Initial N-budgets for all plots (considering the input and output fluxes) ranged between -14.7 kg (N) ha -1 a -1 and 22.5 kg (N) ha -1 a -1 for SRC and AF. In Ldk. Go., SRC and AF always showed positive N-budgets whereas in BERTA, negative N-budgets were calculated for SRC with willow and SRC with poplar. A positive N-budget indicates an accumulation of N despite of nitrate leaching, N-uptake in wood and N2O emissions.
Willow seems to be more efficient than poplar with respect to N use efficiency. A higher biomass production was observed for willow in comparison to poplar considering the same amount of nitrogen, which means willow is more effective in the use of nitrogen. Considering low stock of nitrogen in soil, willow is the most N-efficient system to produce woody biomass. Poplar should be used if the main goal is diminishing N eutrophication and yielding high woody biomass.
The study site in Ldk. Go. can be recommended for the establishment of KUP and AF considering natural characteristics and N-balance.


The gender earnings gap is an expanding statistic over the lifecycle. We use the LEHD Census 2000 to understand the roles of industry, occupation, and establishment 14 years after leaving school. The gap for college graduates 26 to 39 years old expands by 34 log points, most occurring in the first 7 years. About 44 percent is due to disproportionate shifts by men into higher-earning positions, industries, and firms and about 56 percent to differential advances by gender within firms. Widening is greater for married individuals and for those in certain sectors. Non-college graduates experience less widening but with similar patterns.


Adalimumab (ADA) is a biologic medication that dampens inflammatory pathways by binding to the cytokine tumor necrosis factor alpha. The US Food and Drug Administration has approved ADA as a medication for use in rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, Crohn's disease, psoriasis, and juvenile idiopathic arthritis. This year marks 10 years of clinical experience with ADA. Long-term extension studies of some of the initial clinical trials, as well as data from large patient registries, are demonstrating ongoing benefit for responders. Potential side effects such as increased risk of infection, lymphoma, congestive heart failure, and demyelination continue to be examined, as the available data are not unanimous in showing an increase in incidence. In balancing both the advantages and the disadvantages of using ADA, the drug's overall effectiveness and its availability for use in patients with hepatic or renal comorbidities are weighed against the high cost. ADA is expected to have a leading role in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and other inflammatory conditions for years to come. Future studies will need to address the optimal sequence of disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs and biologics to use, combinations of disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs and biologics, and head-to-head comparisons of biologics in clinical trials. For those who go into clinical remission on an anti-tumor necrosis factor medication, unanswered questions remain about identifying the patients who can maintain the remission off all drugs, or at least off injected medication. Given the cost of biologic drugs, even studies that increase the interval between drug doses in well-controlled patients could provide financial benefits.


From its earliest manifestations, copyright law has struggled to deal with the equitable and efficient division of value and control between creators and the enterprises that distribute their works. And for almost as long as copyright has existed, there has been concern about creators getting the short end of the stick in their dealings with distributors. Since 1909, Congress has sought to protect authors and their families by allowing them to grant their copyrights for exploitation and then, decades later, to recapture those same rights. After judicial interpretation of the 1909 Act frustrated this intent by upholding advance assignments of renewal terms, Congress spoke unambiguously in 1976: "Termination of the grant may be effected notwithstanding any agreement to the contrary . . . .†Yet recent decisions in the Ninth and Second Circuits have eviscerated that clear Congressional command by permitting a grantee to renegotiate the terms of the grant so as to frustrate recapture by the author's family. After critically analyzing these decisions, this article provides a comprehensive framework for restoring the integrity and clarity of the termination of transfer provisions.


The corporate governance systems of continental Europe have traditionally been quite different to those of the liberal market economies (e.g. the US and the UK). Company ownership has been dominated by incumbent blockholders, with a relatively minor role for minority shareholders and institutional investors. Business strategy has focused on the achievement of social stability - taking into account the interests of a broad group stakeholders - rather than the maximisation of shareholder value. However, since the mid-1990s, European corporations have adopted many of the characteristics of the Anglo-American shareholder model. Furthermore, such an increased shareholder-orientation has coincided with a significant role for the Left in European government. This presents a puzzle, as conventional wisdom does not usually conceive of the Left as an enthusiastic proponent of pro-shareholder capitalism. This book provides an analysis of this paradox by examining how economic factors have interacted with the policy preferences of political parties to cause a significant change in the European system of corporate governance. This book argues that the post-war support of the European Left for the prevailing blockholder-dominated corporate system depended on the willingness of blockholders to share economic rents with employees, both through higher wages and greater employment stability. However, during the 1990s, product markets became more competitive in many European countries. The sharing of rents between social actors became increasingly difficult to sustain. In such an environment, the Left relinquished its traditional social partnership with blockholders and embraced many aspects of the shareholder model. This explanation is supported through a panel data econometric analysis of 15 non-liberal market economies. Subsequent case study chapters examine the political economy of recent corporate governance change in Germany and Italy.


It is classic Christian theology that "ye cannot serve God and mammon." And yet, there are currently thirty-eight lawsuits pending that make the claim that not only does a for-profit corporation have religious rights, but also that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Women's Health Amendment's contraceptive coverage mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment by infringing on for-profit corporations' religious rights.This Note provides an in-depth look at the specific claims raised by for profit corporations challenging the contraceptive coverage mandate. Part I will first compare the legal standard under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act with the legal standard under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, an idiosyncrasy that stems from the Supreme Court's watershed decision of Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v Smith. Part I will also give a brief background of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), the Women's Health Amendment (WHA), and the contraceptive coverage mandate. Part II will provide a framework for analyzing the decisions issued so far, dividing the relevant arguments into three categories: corporations' religious rights, RFRA, and the Free Exercise Clause. Part II will use those categories as a structure for discussing the courts' analyses of the contraceptive coverage mandate. Lastly, Part III will address the three questions posed by these litigations using the categories developed in Part II, and will suggest that the key to answering these questions lies in recognizing the unrepresented but central interests of a third party in these lawsuits: the employees whose access to contraceptive services hangs in the balance.


Through an analysis of eighteen family history interviews conducted with elderly women from Istanbul, this article examines the nature of the relationships between mothers- and daughters-in-law in Turkey between 1923 and the 1940s. This period marks the foundation of the republic and the Kemalist reforms that transform the way of life in society. The theory of narrative identity and the definition of family as a group of people who narrate the same story from generation to generation form the backbone of this study. The main themes of the interview data point out a kind of power relationship similar to Foucault's understanding of power and its use in everyday life. Thus, a social constructionist/hermeneutic position is adopted which integrates seemingly different theoretical conceptualizations like narrative identity, Foucault's concept of power, and Bourdieu's concepts of economic and cultural capital.


BACKGROUND Perioperative regional anaesthesia may protect from persistent postsurgical pain (PPSP) and improve outcome after total knee arthroplasty (TKA). OBJECTIVES Aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of regional anaesthesia on PPSP and long-term functional outcome after TKA. DESIGN A web-based prospective observational registry. SETTING Five Italian Private and University Hospitals from 2012 to 2015. PATIENTS Undergoing primary unilateral TKA, aged more than 18 years, informed consent, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) physical status classes 1 to 3, no previous knee surgery. INTERVENTION(S) Personal data (age, sex, BMI and ASA class), preoperative pain assessed by numerical rating scale (NRS) score, and risk factors for PPSP were registered preoperatively. Data on anaesthetic and analgesic techniques were collected. Postoperative pain (NRS), analgesic consumption, major complications and patient satisfaction were registered up to the time of discharge. PPSP was assessed by a blinded investigator during a phone call after 1, 3 and 6 months, together with patient satisfaction, quality of life (QOL) and walking ability. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Experience of PPSP according to the type of peri-operative analgesia. RESULTS Five hundred sixty-three patients completed the follow-up. At 6 months, 21.6% of patients experienced PPSP, whereas autonomy was improved only in 56.3%; QOL was worsened or unchanged in 30.7% of patients and improved in 69.3%. Patients receiving continuous regional anaesthesia (epidural or peripheral nerve block) showed a lower NRS through the whole peri-operative period up to 1 month compared with both single shot peripheral nerve block and those who did not receive any type of regional anaesthesia. No difference was found between these latter two groups. Differences in PPSP at 3 or 6 months were not significantly affected by the type of anaesthesia or postoperative analgesia. A higher NRS score at 1 month, younger age, history of anxiety or depression, pro-inflammatory status, higher BMI and a lower ASA physical status were associated with a higher incidence of PPSP and worsened QOL at 6 months. CONCLUSION Continuous regional anaesthesia provides analgesic benefit for up to 1 month after surgery, but did not influence PPSP at 6 months. Better pain control at 1 month was associated with reduced PPSP. Patients with higher expectations from surgery, enhanced basal inflammation and a pessimistic outlook are more prone to develop PPSP. TRIAL REGISTRATION Clinicaltrials.gov identifier: NCT02147730


Cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) is the only ATP binding cassette (ABC) protein that functions as an ion channel. The clinical importance of CFTR lies in the fact that its malfunction causes the lethal genetic disease, cystic fibrosis (CF). Like other ABC proteins, CFTR contains four canonical domains— two transmembrane domains (TMDs) that form the ion permeation pathway and two nucleotide binding domains (NBDs) that utilize the free energy from ATP-hydrolysis to drive the gating cycle. The prevailing model in the field dictates that ATP hydrolysis and the gating cycle are strictly coupled. In this study, we have identified a post-hydrolytic state by using non-hydrolytic ATP analogs as baits. As this state may accommodate an ATP molecule to initiate another hydrolysis reaction without the necessity of gate closure, a non-integral stoichiometry between ATP hydrolysis and gating cycle is posited. This hypothesis was reaffirmed by studying a mutant CFTR that allows us to visualize ATP hydrolysis. Based on our new findings, we proposed an energetic coupling model for CFTR gating. Importantly, understanding the gating mechanism of CFTR may help us to decipher the pathogenesis of CF at a molecular level. We discovered that the most common CF-associated mutant, ∆F508-CFTR, destabilizes the NBD dimer, which likely links to its low open probability. Furthermore, the energetic coupling model could explain the action of the now clinically applied CF potentiator, Vx-770 (Kalydeco).


A sediment core from a peat bog on Dimnoy at Sunnmore, western Norway has been investigated in order to search for volcanic ash horizons. A new volcanic ash with a geochemistry more or less identical to the rhyolitic component of the Vedde Ash, but some 2500 C-years older was found. The ash geochemistry was determined by wavelength dispersive spectral electron microprobe analysis (WDS-EMPA). The ash is here named the Dimna Ash. It was found in a palaeo-lake with typical late glacial stratigraphy with grey sand and silt at the base followed by brownish Allerod mud below grey Younger Dryas silt. The Vedde Ash bed is very pronounced in the sediment sequence and is up to 48 cm in thickness near a basin inlet. A series of AMS dates from terrestrial plant remnants confirms the age of the late glacial stratigraphy. The Dimna Ash is invisible to the naked eye and was detected through the application of a density separation technique. It was found near the base of the lacustrine sequence, about 120 cm below the base of the Vedde Ash. The Dimna Ash is concentrated in a zone with two distinct peaks, 20 cm apart. The lowermost peak has an ash particle density of 10 600 and the uppermost 12 900 grains pr. cm. The lowermost AMS dates, yielding the ages 12 780 ± 60 and 12 840 ± 70 C BP (approx. 15 100 calendar years BP) lie 25 cm above the uppermost density peak. These datings are minimum ages for the volcanic eruption that produced the Dimna Ash. Ash grains with similar geochemical signature have also been found in the sediments between the Dimna and the Vedde Ash, although in much smaller quantities. These ash grains might represent reworking of the Dimna Ash. The possibility that the Dimna Ash could have been deposited on the inland ice and then washed out into the basin during deglaciation can not be ruled out. Nine shards of volcanic ash of a different geochemical composition were analyzed from a zone more than 50 cm high. This zone was stratigraphically above the Dimna Ash, but below the Vedde Ash. The geochemistry of the shards is similar to the Borrobol Ash previously found in Scotland and Sweden. Even though a well defined Borrobol Ash layer was not found in this work this proves that there might be a potential for one or more such layers existing also at Sunnmore.


This paper examines the characteristics of youth at-risk and the complexity and meanings found in educational-therapeutic discourse according to the existential approach of logotherapy. Possible directions for therapeutic work are suggested in line with the intersubjective approach. This paper is divided into four parts: Part 1 examines the characteristics of at-risk adolescents; Part 2 discusses the resources and basic assumptions of the existential approach of; Part 3 focuses on the intersubjective approach, its sources, and its main insights; and Part 4 describes the main practical insights and meanings achieved in the intersubjective encounter between the adolescent and the educational-therapeutic worker, underpinned by a combination of the above-mentioned approaches. The basic assumption is that therapeutic discourse, according to this combined method, will facilitate a gradual process of change and improvement in a safe and contained environment where positive meaning in life is poured into an encounter to produce a partnership of reciprocity, enabled by curiosity, openness, responsibility, and mutual creativity. This process enables adolescents to find existential meaning, allowing them to develop functional abilities in different life domains (familial, academic, occupational, social, leisure, etc.) in the present and future and motivating them to act to change their reality.


This thesis deals with- various aspects of broadband horizontal solar
irradiance. Quality control of measured datasets are identified and analysed. It
was found that solar irradiance datasets may contain significant errors. These
sources of errors were divided in two categories, the inherent instrument
errors and operation related errors. Methods of assessing the quality of the
datasets were evaluated and found to be unsatisfactory. A new method was
hence developed to quality control the solar irradiance data.
The quality control procedure consists of two tiers of tests. The first tests are
physical tests that identify and remove data points that are physical
impossibilities. The second tier tests consist of the creation of a mathematical
envelope of acceptance in a sky clarity index domain. This envelope of
acceptance is based on multiples of standard deviations of the weighted
mean of clearness index to diffuse ratio. The available datasets in this study
were thus quality controlled to remove any obvious outliers.
Modelling the solar resource is an important tool for engineers and scientists.
Such models have been developed since the second half of the 20th century.
Some models rely on one or two meteorological parameters to estimate the
solar irradiance, while other models are more complex and require a far
greater number of points. Two of these models have been analysed and
evaluated. The two models are all-sky, broadband solar irradiance models.
The first model analysed is the Meteorological Radiation Model, or MRM. This
model is in fact a sunshine based model, with atmospheric turbidity taken into
account as well. The beam irradiance component was found to be acceptable
given the number of inputs required by the model. Any extra parameters
would increase the complexity of the model, without noticeable improvements.
The regressions were modified to take into account sunshine fraction banding.
However the diffuse irradiance was identified as one which had the potential
III
for improvement. Thus, in the present work an attempt has been made to
develop improved models. The new model was found to be far superior to the
older, original model, thus the name Improved Meteorological Radiation
Model, IMRM.
The second type of model investigated is the cloud based radiation model.
This type of model is simple to use and rely on regressions between
irradiation, solar altitude angle and the cloud cover. Careful analysis of the
cloud distribution reveals certain flaws in the current regressions. New
regressions were formulated and the result was a model superior to all its
predecessors.
Clear-sky modelling is important for maximum load calculations; however,
there is no method of extracting with accuracy clear-sky broadband data.
Clear-sky identification techniques were evaluated and a new method was
devised. These new datasets were used on four clear-sky models, MRM,
Page's Radiation Model, PRM, Yang's radiation model and Gueymard's
REST2 model. It was found that using this new method of extracting extremeclear-
sky data, the models performed better than when using quasi-clear-sky
data.
Solar radiation modelling is not an end by-itself, it must serve a purpose for
engineers in their applications. Napier University has installed a 160m2
photovoltaic facility in 2003. A 27 -year solar radiation dataset was available
for Edinburgh, to do feasibility calculations for the project; however this
dataset contained gaps in the data. The cloud radiation model developed in
this study was utilised to this end. In addition a complete life cycle analysis
was performed on the project, and it was found that with an average efficiency
at around 12%, the facility will payback its embodied energy in eight years,
and based on a relatively conservative forecast of energy prices, the financial
payback is set at under 100 years.


Adolescents comprise 30% of the Philippine population, and are directly implicated in the country's development prospects. However, adolescence, as a developmental period, has been treated unsystematically and virtually neglected in Philippine psychology research (Ventura, 1981). While this situation has changed in recent years, the extent to which research on Filipino adolescents has grown remains undetermined. This review addresses the gap by providing a comprehensive evaluation of the status of research on Filipino adolescent development from 1983 to the present. A total of 147 scholarly published and unpublished papers were examined in terms of their themes, bibliographic features (i.e., year published/completed; source of report), sampling characteristics (i.e., participants' age, gender, SES, study setting, sampling size and method), and methodological elements including research objectives, design and procedures. The results indicate that adolescence research has indeed grown exponentially since the early 80's, mostly concentrating on socio-emotional aspects and problems of the youth. In this body of research, school-going middle to late adolescents from urban areas appeared to be overly-sampled in large groups through convenience sampling. Lastly, fully a quarter of studies were found to be only incidentally about adolescent development. Recommendations therefore focused on the utility of the developmental perspective in analyzing and interpreting data from youth research, the need for clearer definitions of Filipino adolescence, and the call for wider dissemination of scholarly works on the lives of the Filipino youth.


In this study, composite nanofibers of polyacrylonitrile (PAN) and polyaniline (PANI) were successfully produced by electrospinning technique and the effects of different dopants such as camphorsulfonic acid (CSA), dodecylbenzene sulfonic acid (DBSA) and dodecylbenzene sulfonic acid sodium salt (DBSANa+), and different solvents such as dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) and N,N′-dimethylformamide (DMF) on the properties of PAN/PANI composite nanofiber webs have been investigated. It has been observed that nanofibers produced from DMSO generally had larger fiber diameters and higher breaking strength than nanofibers produced from DMF. CSA could dope better than DBSA(iso) and DBSANa+. CSA resulted in the highest conductivity when DMSO was used while it resulted in lower conductivity in DMF. The insulator PAN became a semiconductive material with the incorporation of CSA-doped PANI. The highest electrical conductivity obtained was 10−6 S/cm which is in the range suitable for electrostatic discharge applications.


Forests are crucial to the livelihoods of millions of poor people in developing countries. Yet quantitative approaches to estimate the economic value of forest products and other environmental resources at householdlevel across different sites have only recently been developed and experiences on using such methods are only presently emerging. This paper presents methodological experiences from using a structured household survey approach to estimate household forest dependency in two high altitude areas in Central Nepal. Area and village level background and contextual information was collected using qualitative techniques; this was followed by a structured household (n = 180) survey conducted over a full year from December 2005 to December 2006. Households were randomly selected and inter alia subjected to quarterly income surveys. The emphasis in this paper is on investigating whether own-reported value data is valid and reliable. It is concluded that it is reasonable to use households ownreported values as these estimates produced aggregated unit values with acceptable properties.


Chinese President Xi Jinping launched the Silk Road Economic Belt component of the One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative at Kazakhstan in 2013. OBOR is a development strategy and framework that focuses on connectivity and cooperation among countries primarily in Eurasia. It consists of two main components, the land-based 'Silk Road Economic Belt' (SREB) and ocean-going 'Maritime Silk Road' (MSR). This book studies the equilibrium or balance between overland and maritime trade routes of OBOR.This book has two major sections. The interpretive section examines contemporary media narratives related to the OBOR initiative and how contemporary commentators appropriate narratives about historical events related to the maritime Silk Road to interpret current policy agendas and legitimize diplomatic or economic exchanges. In terms of institutional studies, the chapters related to Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) will look at the issues facing the Bank in its quest in forming a new world platform for multilateral development financing.The other section, the empirical case study of the publication highlights the fact that Euro-China High Speed Rail (HSR) and Central Asia-China HSR are not viable at the moment as passenger volume is not sufficient to justify the HSR line. This section examines the overland route of the OBOR and looks at recent Chinese HSR history and conventional sub-high speed rail technology development, and identifies technical & economic criteria determining the appropriate technology for a certain line. The chapter in this section will use the developed criteria to analyze the various rail linkage projects currently under study in the OBOR framework, highlight the economic, bureaucratic and geo-political challenges that these projects likely face and lay down conditions that will determine the outcome of these projects.


The protocols in this article describe the construction of a mutant DNA polymerase library using error‐prone PCR (epPCR) as a method for gene randomization, followed by screening of the library using two different approaches. The examples described use an N‐terminally truncated form of the thermostable DNA polymerase I of Thermus aquaticus (Taq DNA polymerase), namely Klentaq (KTQ), and protocols are included for the identification of variants with (1) increased DNA lesion‐bypass ability and (2) enhanced selectivity for DNA match/mismatch recognition. The screening assays are based on double‐stranded DNA detection (using SYBR Green I) which can be carried out using standard laboratory equipment. The described assays are designed for use in a 384‐well plate format to increase screening throughput and reduce material costs. For improved accuracy and ease of liquid handling, the use of an automated liquid handling device is recommended. Curr. Protoc. Chem Biol. 2:89‐109. © 2010 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.


Why is there no Milton Friedman today? The new structure of things—or lack of structure—makes it hard for someone to emerge as a focal representative of classical liberalism. But every day, innumerable souls breathe new vitality into the cogent perspective that Friedman and others gave to human civilization.


This thesis intends to explore the argument among scholars as to whether Aquinas merely Christianises (baptises) Aristotle's concept of eudemonia in his moral philosophy or whether he substantially develops and transforms it beyond what Aristotle originally presents in his main ethical works of Nicomachean Ethics, Magna Moralia and the Eudemian Ethics.
It is true that Aquinas relies on and uses a number of Aristotle's ethical views, yet he is able to develop and transcend Aristotle. However, the aim of this thesis is to demonstrate that Aquinas does not only adopt or incorporate Aristotle's concept of eudaimonia (happiness) into his moral philosophy, but he goes beyond what Aristotle envisages in his ethics. For Aristotle, happiness is the reward for the virtuous activity of the rational soul, the highest good (end) to which all things aim. However, for Aquinas, happiness is the participation in
the beatific vision of the First and Final Act, he calls God. Happiness, for Aquinas, in the proper sense of the word, cannot be attained in this life since no created goods can satisfy the unsearchable wants and desires of the human being in this life. Hence, Aquinas transcends Aristotle's moral, socio-political, natural and temporary kind of happiness to develop his metaphysical, ontological, theological and supernatural kind of happiness.
Chapter one introduces and sets the boundaries of the thesis. Chapter two explores the debate among scholars as to whether Aquinas Christianises Aristotle's concept of eudaimonia or not. Chapter three examines the fundamental principles in Aristotle's ethics (moral Philosophy) with the emphasis on understanding the human being. Chapter four explores Aristotle's overview of the concept of eudaimonia (happiness). Chapter five looks at Aquinas' basic moral philosophical framework with the emphasis on human nature as well as
the participation in the "Divine" Nature. Chapter six examines Aquinas' concept of virtue, which is a development of Aristotle's virtue ethics. Chapter seven investigates Aquinas' notion of happiness, as he goes beyond Aristotle's eudaimonia. Chapter eight concludes and highlights the standpoint of this thesis.


The C programming language was devised in the early 1970s as a system implementation language for the nascent Unix operating system. Derived from the typeless language BCPL, it evolved a type structure; created on a tiny machine as a tool to improve a meager programming environment, it has become one of the dominant languages of today. This paper studies its evolution.


Please cite this article as: Veerachari U et al., Anti-oxidative activity of Cassia L. species of Southern India. American Journal of PharmTech Research 2019. Anti-oxidative activity of Cassia L. species of Southern India Usha Veerachari*, Bopaiah AK, Senthilkumar U, Jyothi SG, Somashekariah BV, Ravikanth G. 1.Department of Life Sciences, Jain University, Bengaluru-560027, India. 2.Department of Botany, St. Joseph's College PG and Research Centre, Bengaluru560027, India. 3.Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, Srirampura, Jakkur Post, Bengaluru-560064, India. 4.School of Ecology and Conservation, University of Agricultural Sciences, GKVK, Bengaluru560065, India. 5. Department of Biochemistry, BMS College for Women, Bengaluru-560004, India. ABSTRACT To establish a comparative account within the taxa by assessing its anti-oxidative property and mapping it with the morphometric characters. The methanolic leaf extracts of 12 Cassia L. species were screened for their antioxidant activity using 1,1-diphenyl-2-picryl hydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging assay and reducing power capability with reference to standard Ascorbic acid. Chamaecrista kleinii exhibited strong antioxidant activity with IC50 2.17 μg mL, followed with Senna auriculata (IC50 11.51 μg mL ) and Senna polyphylla (15.17 μg mL). Highest reducing ability was observed in Senna auriculata extract with 0.676 nm absorbance. The correlation observed between the reducing power and DPPH radical scavenging assay supports the contribution of the phytoconstitutents like phenolics and flavonoids towards managing oxidative stress. The present study reveals the beneficiary effects of the selected plants by virtue of their antioxidant activity that can be harnessed in drug formulations.


Growing transistor counts, limited power budgets, and the breakdown of voltage scaling are currently conspiring to create a utilization wall that limits the fraction of a chip that can run at full speed at one time. In this regime, specialized, energy-efficient processors can increase parallelism by reducing the per-computation power requirements and allowing more computations to execute under the same power budget. To pursue this goal, this paper introduces conservation cores. Conservation cores, or c-cores, are specialized processors that focus on reducing energy and energy-delay instead of increasing performance. This focus on energy makes c-cores an excellent match for many applications that would be poor candidates for hardware acceleration (e.g., irregular integer codes). We present a toolchain for automatically synthesizing c-cores from application source code and demonstrate that they can significantly reduce energy and energy-delay for a wide range of applications. The c-cores support patching, a form of targeted reconfigurability, that allows them to adapt to new versions of the software they target. Our results show that conservation cores can reduce energy consumption by up to 16.0x for functions and by up to 2.1x for whole applications, while patching can extend the useful lifetime of individual c-cores to match that of conventional processors.


General purpose relation extractors, which can model arbitrary relations, are a core aspiration in information extraction. Efforts have been made to build general purpose extractors that represent relations with their surface forms, or which jointly embed surface forms with relations from an existing knowledge graph. However, both of these approaches are limited in their ability to generalize. In this paper, we build on extensions of Harris' distributional hypothesis to relations, as well as recent advances in learning text representations (specifically, BERT), to build task agnostic relation representations solely from entity-linked text. We show that these representations significantly outperform previous work on exemplar based relation extraction (FewRel) even without using any of that task's training data. We also show that models initialized with our task agnostic representations, and then tuned on supervised relation extraction datasets, significantly outperform the previous methods on SemEval 2010 Task 8, KBP37, and TACRED


IN THIS YEAR'S TOP 10 TECH CARS, as in the global auto industry at large, the Great Disconnect becomes more obvious. On the one hand, virtually every carmaker offers models that deploy technology in unabashed pursuit of energy efficiency and reduced environmental impact. In our group of honorees this year, the Tesla Model 3 and the charming Kia Niro hybrid fit in this category. Yet for all the talk of a Tesladriven tipping point in electric transportation, EVs still make up a 0.5 percent drop in the global ocean of new cars. So in the real world-well, at least in the United States, where Washington is actually looking to weaken fuel economy standards and where a record two-thirds of buyers are choosing an SUV, pickup, or other light truck-today's automotive innovation is arguably more about utility, horsepower, and performance.


Protection from import competition was a defining feature of the birth of the Australian federation in 1901. For the next 70 years, the extent of protection grew, and broadened from mainly tariffs to also involving import licencing after World War II. There was a one-off 25% across-the-board cut in tariffs in 1973 and some dismantling of agricultural subsidies, but that was followed by the re-imposition of import quotas for the most-protected manufactured goods. Then a new reformist government began, in the mid-1980s, a long process of dismantling all protection as part of an overall economic reform program that also involved de-regulation, privatization and moving to a flexible exchange rate. The rewards included three decades of faster economic growth and an unprecedented rise in Australians' living standards. This paper provides a history of economic thought on the pros and cons of protectionism for the small, distant, natural resource-rich Australian economy and a survey of the literature on the extent, effects and political economy reasons behind the growth of Australian protection and its eventual dismantling.


As a new spread spectrum system, an ultra wideband-impulse radio (UWB-IR) has attracted much attention in high speed indoor multiple access radio communications. Since the UWB-IR system repeats and transmits pulses for each bit, the UWB-IR system is considered as a coded scheme with a simple repetition block code. As an error correcting code, turbo-codes proposed by C. Berrou et al. in 1993 have attracted much attention beyond the field of coding theory, because the performance is very close to the Shannon limit with practical decoding complexity. In this paper, we propose an adaptive internally turbo-coded UWB-IR (AITC-UWB-IR) system. The proposed system employs a turbo code in addition to a repetition block code and shares the transmission bandwidth adaptively between them. We evaluate the performance of the AITC-UWB-IR by theoretical analysis and computer simulation. From our numerical and simulation results, we show that the BER of the AITC-UWB-IR is superior to that of the SOC-UWB-IR on an AWGN channel when the bit rate is high. We also showed that the AITC-UWB-IR system using low rate turbo codes improves the BER on an AWGN channel and a real Gaussian fading channel. Consequently, we confirm that for the same bit rate, we had better make the code rate of turbo codes lower and make the number of repetitions of the repetition codes smaller to achieve the better BER.


Under non-exponential discounting, we develop a dynamic theory for stopping problems in continuous time. Our framework covers discount functions that induce decreasing impatience. Due to the inherent time inconsistency, we look for equilibrium stopping policies, formulated as fixed points of an operator. Under appropriate conditions, fixed-point iterations converge to equilibrium stopping policies. This iterative approach corresponds to the hierarchy of strategic reasoning in Game Theory, and provides ``agent-specific'' results: it assigns one specific equilibrium stopping policy to each agent according to her initial behavior. In particular, it leads to a precise mathematical connection between the naive behavior and the sophisticated one. Our theory is illustrated in a real options model.


Patterns in white mica (muscovite, paragonite, and phengite) Al-Si chemistry (Tschermak substitution) were examined for the Archean Kanowna Belle and Sunrise Dam gold deposits in the Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia, using short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectrometry of drill core samples. Both of these deposits represent greenschist-facies, structurally controlled, >10-Moz gold systems with broadly similar host rocks and superimposed metasomatic hydrothermal alteration halos that extend for up to 3 km from the economic zone. However, zonation toward gold mineralization at Kanowna Belle is associated with increasingly longer wavelength white mica, whereas Sunrise Dam comprises the opposite pattern. The study also found that gold mineralization at Kanowna Belle is associated with quartz, chalcopyrite, and pyrite with negative δ 34 S values and a relative lack of carbonate, chlorite, and paragonite (Na-rich white mica), whereas gold mineralization at Sunrise Dam is associated with paragonite as well as carbonate, Fe-rich chlorite and pyrite with positive δ 34 S values and a relative lack of quartz and chalcopyrite. Thermodynamic numerical modeling revealed that these contrasting patterns in white mica Tschermak substitution (and associated alteration mineralogy) can be explained by two different types of ore fluids, namely (1) oxidized, alkaline, and silica-rich at Kanowna Belle; and (2) reduced, acid, Fe-rich and silica-poor at Sunrise Dam, though the sources of these contrasting fluids are less clear. Importantly for explorers, spectral measurement (using drill core, field, airborne, and potentially satellite hyperspectral SWIR data) of gradients (especially within a given geologic unit) in white mica absorption wavelength (Tschermak substitution) represents a potential vectoring tool for the discovery of new Archean hydrothermal gold systems.


Nationally framed assessment and planning assists coordination of resource management activities across jurisdictional boundaries and provides context for assessing the cumulative effects of impacts that can be underestimated by local or regional studies. However, there have been significant shortcomings in the existing spatial frameworks supporting national assessment and planning for Australia's rivers and streams. We describe the development of a new national stream and nested catchment framework for Australia that includes a fully connected and directed stream network and a nested catchment hierarchy derived using a modified Pfafstetter scheme. The directed stream network with associated catchment boundaries and Pfafstetter coding respect all distributary junctions and topographically driven surface flow pathways, including those in the areas of low relief and internal drainage that make up over half of the Australian continent. The Pfafstetter coding facilitates multi-scale analyses and easy tracing and query of upstream/downstream attributes and tributary/main stem relationships. Accompanying the spatial layers are 13 lookup tables containing nearly 400 attributes describing the natural and anthropogenic environment of each of the 1.4 M stream segments at multiple spatial scales (segment, sub-catchment and catchment). The database supplies key spatial layers to support national water information and accounting needs and assists a wide range of research, planning and assessment tasks at regional and continental scales. These include the delineation of reporting units for the Australian Water Resources Assessment, the development of an ecohydrological environment classification for Australian streams and the identification of high conservation value aquatic ecosystems for northern Australia.


Apache Mahout is a library for scalable machine learning (ML) on distributed dataflow systems, offering various implementations of classification, clustering, dimensionality reduction and recommendation algorithms. Mahout was a pioneer in large-scale machine learning in 2008, when it started and targeted MapReduce, which was the predominant abstraction for scalable computing in industry at that time. Mahout has been widely used by leading web companies and is part of several commercial cloud offerings. In recent years, Mahout migrated to a general framework enabling a mix of dataflow programming and linear algebraic computations on backends such as Apache Spark and Apache Flink. This design allows users to execute data preprocessing and model training in a single, unified dataflow system, instead of requiring a complex integration of several specialized systems. Mahout is maintained as a community-driven open source project at the Apache Software Foundation, and is available under https://mahout.apache.org. c ©2020 Robin Anil, Gokhan Capan, Isabel Drost-Fromm, Ted Dunning, Ellen Friedman, Trevor Grant, Shannon Quinn, Paritosh Ranjan, Sebastian Schelter, Özgür Yılmazel. License: CC-BY 4.0, see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Attribution requirements are provided at http://jmlr.org/papers/v21/18-800.html. Anil, Capan, Drost, Dunning, Friedman, Grant, Quinn, Ranjan, Schelter, Yılmazel


The Calendar Access Protocol (CAP) described in this memo permits a
Calendar User (CU) to utilize a Calendar User Agent (CUA) to access an
iCAL-based Calendar Store (CS). At the time of this writing, three
vendors are implementing CAP, but it has already been determined that
some changes are needed. In order to get implementation experience,
the participants felt that a CAP specification is needed to preserve
many years of work. Many properties in CAP which have had many years
of debate, can be used by other iCalendar protocols. This memo defines
an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community.


Risks mean cases of uncertainty of project, the impact of which is realized as a threat (negative aspect) and/or opportunity (positive aspect). The traditional viewpoint on risk is a negative viewpoint that implies damages, loss and harmful consequences. Judgments such as this on risk merely emphasize on risks management and pay less attention to opportunities management. It is clear that some uncertainties might be profitable for the project; as in many cases, it could be the source of loss. In a developed attitude, focus is made on a common process that could address the integrated management of both opportunities and risks to aim at maximizing the positive effects- opportunities-, and minimizing negative effects- risks-. Therefore, existence of causal-effect relations between risks, relationship, effects of risks and opportunities on each other and variety of strategies in facing risks gives no alternative for risk management team than taking integrated management of risks and opportunities. In another word, reaction to risks, with respect to risks and/or relevant opportunities, separately, will be never effective. In this paper, for the purpose of integrated management of risks and opportunities, the stages of quality analysis and reactions to risk are combined. The method which is used for reaction towards risk is a procedure based on dynamic system. Dynamic system is highly important among uncertainties due to considering the type and intensity of effects. By using dynamic system and attention to the relationship between uncertainties (risks/ opportunities), reaction to risk and decision making on employing suitable strategies to face risks will be more precise and accurate.


Alloy 718 is a unique superalloy that has been in use for a number of years. It also has the distinction to be utilized throughout the aerospace and general industrial communities. The applications for this material are often very unique and require tailoring of the microstructure and subsequently the mechanical properties to meet these specific needs. To support optimization of Alloy 718 mechanical properties and performance, considerable work has been conducted by the materials community to develop materials and manufacturing process models to aid in the simulation and prediction of the microstructure and mechanical properties of components produced from this alloy. This paper will review various modeling and simulation tools and applications to Alloy 718. This complex alloy is continuing to see optimization efforts through the use of modeling and simulation to support new and enhanced application requirements.


There has been a major development in the industry of mobile phone devices during the last few years. From being only a device which could make phone calls and send text messages, the smartphones of today have become just as powerful as a computer with a wide range of functionality. With this development, the mobile operating systems have become far more advanced and are now similar to what we have in the desktop computer environment, creating a market for 3rd party software developers and service providers. The aim of this thesis is to gain an understanding of the market of mobile operating systems for smartphones, and to investigate the dynamics in the ecosystem surrounding these operating systems. An exploratory research of six major actors in this market and an analysis of the different competitive strategies and approaches have been conducted. In addition, a dynamic model using John D. Sterman's business dynamics framework has been developed. The model serves as a basis for a set of simulation runs in order to examine the effect of different characteristics in a competitive setting. Based on the analysis and the model simulations, the following is proposed: 1. Controlling app distribution and providing additional services are found to be important factors in the mobile OS market based on three reasons: increased revenue, increased control over customers and as a necessary competitive feature. 2. Gaining an advantage in one of three characteristics – additional services, apps or device selection – is enough to affect the outcome of the competition. 3. With a low selection of devices, it is important to become a market leader in terms of additional services or apps. 4. In order to gain a significant lead in market share compared to a competitor, a large selection of devices is important.


The Cloud computing concept offers dynami cally scalable resources provisioned as a service o v r the Internet. Economic benefits are the main driver for the Cloud, since it promises the reduction of capital expenditure (CapEx) and operational expenditure (Op Ex). In order for this to become reality, however, there are still some challenges to be solved. Amongst the se are security and trust issues, since the user's data has to be released to the Cloud and thus leaves the protec tion-sphere of the data owner. Most of the discussi ons on these topics are mainly driven by arguments related o organizational means. This paper focuses on tec hni al security issues arising from the usage of Cloud ser vices and especially by the underlying technologies used to build this cross-domain Internet-connected collabor ation.


Iran Keywords 1 ABSTRACT During recent years, tendencies towards Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are growing both in service and manufacturing organizations .Service organizations have invested considerable resources in the implementation of ERP systems for integrating information, improving services quality and more customers satisfaction ,even using solutions initially targeted for manufacturing companies. service operations, however build up a suitable potential in using ERP. Healthcare is one of the most important fields in services. Implementation of ERP solution in the healthcare haven't been done yet in Iran, Although This type of organizations should have integrated their information and make them available in real-time. The aim of this thesis is to study the way of ERP Implementation for Integrating Information ,Reducing high ERP Implementation costs and Identifying risk factors in healthcare centers .This research has focused on Modeling of ERP implementation. In that purpose, this model is helpful for managers to make a decision about implementing ERP in their organizations and diagnose risks


Advances in Computational Mathematics publishes high quality, accessible and original articles at the forefront of computational and applied mathematics, with a clear potential for impact across the sciences. The journal emphasizes three core areas: approximation theory and computational geometry; numerical analysis, modelling and simulation; imaging, signal processing and data analysis. This journal welcomes papers that are accessible to a broad audience in the mathematical sciences and that show either an advance in computational methodology or a novel scientific application area, or both. Methods papers should rely on rigorous analysis and/ or convincing numerical studies.


Regine Lai University of Maryland Abstract This study provides empirical evidence for Heinz's (2010) Subregular Hypothesis, which predicts some gaps found in the typology of phonotactic patterns are due to learnability. More specifically, only phonotactic patterns with specific computational properties are humanly learnable. The present study compares the learnability of two long-distance harmony patterns which differ typologically (attested vs. unattested) and computationally (Strictly Piecewise vs. Locally Testable) using the artificial language learning paradigm. The results reveal a general bias towards learning the attested, Strictly Piecewise pattern, exactly as the Subregular Hypothesis predicts.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is related to inflammation and oxidative stress. Probiotics and prebiotics are considered anti-inflammatory and antioxidative factors. In this study, we evaluated the effects of probiotic and/or prebiotic on oxidative stress and inflammatory markers in patients with NAFLD.

METHODS AND STUDY DESIGN
Seventy-five NAFLD subjects were divided into four groups. The first group received a pro-biotic capsule of Bifidobacterium longum (B.L) and Lactobacillus acidophilus (L.A) (2 × 107 CFU/day), the second group received prebiotic (10 g/day inulin), the third group received pro-biotic and prebiotic, and the fourth group received placebo, for three months. Anthropometric, inflammatory and oxidative/ anti-oxidative indices were measured in all patients before and after the intervention.

RESULTS
We showed that consumption of pro- and/or prebiotic compared to placebo is able to significantly decrease body weight, body mass index, waist and hip circumferences, tumour necrosis factor-α and increase serum levels of total antioxidant capacity in patients with NAFLD (p<0.01). There were not any significant differences between probiotic, prebiotic and co-administration of them on the mentioned parameters. Co-administration of pro- and prebiotic caused significant decrease of high-sensitive C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) compared to the placebo and other groups (p<0.01). Interlekin-6 and malondialdehyde were not significantly different among groups at the end of study.

CONCLUSIONS
Probiotic or/and prebiotic supplementation can be effective for improvement of some anthropometric, inflammatory and oxidative indices in patients with NAFLD. Co-administration of pro- and prebiotic is more effective than probiotic and prebiotic alone in modifying hs-CRP in patients with NAFLD.


This paper investigates the factors associated with firms' financial reporting choices and their economic impact on the cost of equity capital for the Malaysian listed firms over the period of 2000-2007. We find that there is a negative association between financial reporting quality choice and the number of shareholders, industrial competition, capital intensity and leverage. We also find that firms choosing to provide financial information of higher quality enjoy a lower cost of equity capital using implied cost of equity capital estimates. These findings suggest that those firms in emerging markets which provide higher quality of financial reporting reduce information risk, and these firms also obtain significant economic benefits.


Pseudotachylitic breccias and shock deformation features related to the 2.02 Ga formation of the Vredefort dome by meteorite impact were overprinted by a static metamorphic event, the intensity of which decreased from granulite-facies ( T ≥700 °C) in the center of the dome to greenschist-facies ( T ≤400 °C) around its margins. Geobarometric estimates of 0.2–0.3 GPa for the metamorphic parageneses indicate some 8–11 km of erosion since the impact event. The strong lateral thermal gradient implied by these P-T results is attributed to the combined effects of differential uplift of mid-crustal rocks heated along a pre-impact geotherm and increased shock heating of the target crust toward the center of the impact structure. We suggest that the exceptionally high grade of metamorphism in the center of the dome may, in part, reflect an elevated regional geothermal gradient of ∼25 °C/km in the target crust due to lingering thermal effects related to the 2.05–2.06 Ga Bushveld magmatic event.


The information technology (IT) organization has two major products: the effective processing of transactions and the provision of information. For the past several decades, transaction processing, exemplified recently by enterprise resource planning software, has received the bulk of IT's attention. True, there have been decision support, executive support, knowledge management, and balanced scorecard systems put in place in most major corporations. But these, and other information providing capabilities, have almost entirely been done in a one-off manner. Despite the fact that, in most companies today, processes are redesigned before transaction processing systems are built, a full-scale process-based design of the information needs of an organization is rare. This paper presents such an approach at Fleet Bank. The paper suggests that processes underlying the use of information in an organization should be clearly defined before systems in this area are implemented. The success factors for doing this are noted.


Abstract Background A call centre usually represents the first contact of a customer with a given company. Therefore, the quality of its service is of key importance. An essential factor of the call centre optimization is the determination of the proper number of operators considering the selected performance measure. Results of previous research show that this can be done using the queueing theory approach. Objectives: The paper presents the practical application of the stochastic queueing models aimed at optimizing a Slovenian telecommunication provider's call centre. Methods/Approach: The arrival and the service patterns were analysed, and it was concluded that the call centre under consideration can be described using the M/M/r {infinity/infinity/FIFO} queueing model. Results: An appropriate number of operators were determined for different peak periods of the working day, taking into consideration the following four performance measures: the expected waiting time, the expected number of waiting customers, the probability that a calling customer will have to wait, and the call centre service level. Conclusions: The obtained results prove the usefulness and applicability of the queueing models as a tool for a call centre performance optimization. In practice, all the data needed for such a mathematical analysis are usually provided. This paper is aimed at illustrating how such data can be efficiently exploited.


Hazardous natural flows such as snow-slab avalanches, debris flows, pyroclastic flows and lahars are part of a much wider class of dense gravity-driven granular free-surface flows that frequently occur in industrial processes as well as in foodstuffs in our kitchens! This paper investigates the formation of oblique granular shocks, when the oncoming flow is deflected by a wall or obstacle in such a way as to cause a rapid change in the flow height and velocity. The theory for non-accelerative slopes is qualitatively similar to that of gasdynamics. For a given deflection angle there are three possibilities: a weak shock may form close to the wall; a strong shock may extend across the chute; or the shock may detach from the tip. Weak shocks have been observed in both dense granular free-surface flows and granular gases. This paper shows how strong shocks can be triggered in chute experiments by careful control of the downstream boundary conditions. The resulting downstream flow height is much thicker than that of weak shocks and there is a marked decrease in the downstream velocity. Strong shocks therefore dissipate much more energy than weak shocks. An exact solution for the angle at which the flow detaches from the wedge is derived and this is shown to be in excellent agreement with experiment. It therefore provides a very useful criterion for determining whether the flow will detach. In experimental, industrial and geophysical flows the avalanche is usually accelerated, or decelerated, by the net effect of the gravitational acceleration and basal sliding friction as the slope inclination angle changes. The presence of these source terms necessarily leads to gradual changes in the flow height and velocity away from the shocks, and this in turn modifies the local Froude number of the flow. A shock-capturing non-oscillating central method is used to compute numerical solutions to the full problem. This shows that the experiments can be matched very closely when the source terms are included and explains the deviations away from the classical oblique-shock theory. We show that weak shocks bend towards the wedge on accelerative slopes and away from it on decelerative slopes. In both cases the presence of the source terms leads to a gradual increase in the downstream flow thickness along the wedge, which suggests that defensive dams should increase in height further down the slope, contrary to current design criteria but in accordance with field observations of snow-avalanche deposits from a defensive dam in Northwestern Iceland. Movies are available with the online version of the paper.


What are software developers doing during a change task? While an answer to this question opens countless opportunities to support developers in their work, only little is known about developers' detailed navigation behavior for realistic change tasks. Most empirical studies on developers performing change tasks are limited to very small code snippets or are limited by the granularity or the detail of the data collected for the study. In our research, we try to overcome these limitations by combining user interaction monitoring with very fine granular eye-tracking data that is automatically linked to the underlying source code entities in the IDE. In a study with 12 professional and 10 student developers working on three change tasks from an open source system, we used our approach to investigate the detailed navigation of developers for realistic change tasks. The results of our study show, amongst others, that the eye tracking data does indeed capture different aspects than user interaction data and that developers focus on only small parts of methods that are often related by data flow. We discuss our findings and their implications for better developer tool support.


In this paper a method is presented to control a holonomic mobile robot with singularities. The robot has 3 castor wheels, each wheel actuated by its angular velocity only. Using the proposed approach, singular wheel configurations are escaped without adding steering actuation to any wheel. The wheel coupling equation (WCE) virtually actuates the steering angular velocity of one wheel through controlling the actuated angular velocities of the other two wheels. Basing on the WCE and a cascaded control structure a standard wheel velocity controller is used to control the velocity of the robot. Simulations and practical experiments are carried out to illustrate the performance of the proposed approach and controller


Due to revised phylogenies and newly discovered biogeographic distributions, scientific binomials are being amended continuously. Problematic is that wildlife protection legislation tends not to keep pace with these reappraisals, creating a wide range of legislative loopholes and potentially compromising ability to prosecute illegal wildlife trade (IWT). This serious and growing international problem proves particularly challenging in China because binomials used on China's national legislation have not been updated since 1989, alongside the enormous issues of IWT in this megadiverse nation. Here, we focus especially on mammals, because these support lucrative criminal markets and receive the greatest international policing efforts; however, all protected taxa are vulnerable to this misnaming ambiguity. To date, the names of 25 threatened species, including 18 mammals, have become incongruent with Chinese law. Additionally, two primate species, newly discovered within China, have not yet been incorporated into Chinese law. A further six mammalian species are known by different synonyms between Chinese law and CITES, hindering international policing and compilation of data on IWT. Taxonomic revisions similarly undermine legislation in other megadiverse countries; posing a critical risk to wildlife protection worldwide. We recommend that scientific binomials must be updated systematically across all 181 CITES signatory nations.


Mind maps, i.e. the spatial organization of ideas and concepts around a central topic and the visualization of their relations, represent a very powerful and thus popular means to support creative thinking and problem solving processes. Typically created on traditional whiteboards, they represent an important technique for collaborative brainstorming sessions. We describe a camera-based system to analyze hand-drawn mind maps written on a whiteboard. The goal of the presented system is to produce digital representations of such mind maps, which would enable digital asset management, i.e. storage and retrieval of manually created documents. Our system is based on image acquisition by means of a camera, followed by the segmentation of the particular whiteboard image focusing on the extraction of written context, i.e. the ideas captured by the mind map. The spatial arrangement of these ideas is recovered using layout analysis based on unsupervised clustering, which results in graph representations of mind maps. Finally, handwriting recognition derives textual transcripts of the ideas captured by the mind map. We demonstrate the capabilities of our mind map reading system by means of an experimental evaluation, where we analyze images of mind maps that have been drawn on whiteboards, without any further constraints other than the underlying topic. In addition to the promising recognition results, we also discuss training strategies, which effectively allow for system bootstrapping using out-of-domain sample data. The latter is important when addressing creative thinking processes where domain-related training data are difficult to obtain as they focus on novelty by definition.


Abstract The Panel on Plant Health performed a pest categorisation of Septoria malagutii, the causal agent of annular leaf spot of potato, for the EU. The pest is a well‐defined fungal species and reliable methods exist for its detection and identification. S. malagutii is present in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela. The pest is not known to occur in the EU and is listed as Septoria lycopersici var. malagutii in Annex IAI of Directive 2000/29/EC, meaning its introduction into the EU is prohibited. The major cultivated host is Solanum tuberosum (potato), but other Solanum species including wild solanaceous plants are also affected. All hosts and pathways of entry of the pest into the EU are currently regulated. Host availability and climate matching suggest that S. malagutii could establish in parts of the EU and further spread mainly by human‐assisted means. The pest affects leaves, stems and petioles of potato plants (but not the underground parts, including tubers) causing lesions, leaf necrosis and premature defoliation. In some infested areas, the disease has been reported to cause almost complete crop loss with favourable weather conditions and susceptible potato cultivars. The introduction of the pest into the EU would potentially cause impacts to potato production. The main uncertainties concern the host range, the maximum period the pest survives on host debris in soil, the maximum distance over which conidia of the pest could be dispersed by wind‐driven rain and the magnitude of potential impacts to the EU. S. malagutii meets all the criteria assessed by EFSA for consideration as potential Union quarantine pest. The criteria for considering S. malagutii as a potential Union regulated non‐quarantine pest are not met, since the pest is not known to occur in the EU.


The interrelationship between endodontic and periodontal diseases has been a subject of speculation, confusion and controversy for many years. Pulpal and periodontal problems are responsible for more than 50% of tooth mortality today. An Endo‐Perio lesion can have a varied pathogenesis which ranges from quite simple to relatively complex one. These lesions often present challenges to the clinician as far as diagnosis and prognosis of the involved teeth are concerned. It is very essential to make a correct diagnosis so that the appropriate treatment can be provided. To make a correct diagnosis the clinician should have a thorough understanding and scientific knowledge of these lesions and may need to perform restorative, endoontic or periodontal therapy, either singly or in combination to treat them. Therefore, this paper will highlight the diagnostic, clinical guidelines and decision‐making in the treatment of these lesions from an endodontist's point of view to achieve the best outcome. KEYWORD: endoontic or periodontal therapy.


Book synopsis: Over a century ago, William James proposed that people search through memory much as they rummage through a house looking for lost keys. We scour our environments for territory, food, mates, and information. We search for items in visual scenes, for historical facts, and for the best deals on Internet sites; we search for new friends to add to our social networks, and for solutions to novel problems. What we find is always governed by how we search and by the structure of the environment.

This book explores how we search for resources in our minds and in the world. The authors examine the evolution and adaptive functions of search; the neural underpinnings of goal-searching mechanisms across species; psychological models of search in memory, decision making, and visual scenes; and applications of search behavior in highly complex environments such as the Internet. As the range of information, social contacts, and goods continues to expand, how well we are able to search and successfully find what we seek becomes increasingly important. At the same time, search offers cross-disciplinary insights to the scientific study of human cognition and its evolution. Combining perspectives from researchers across numerous domains, this book furthers our understanding of the relationship between search and the human mind.


For the third time in the modern era, a triad of key Supreme Court decisions represents a milestone in American arbitration. In this highly controversial "Third Arbitration Trilogy," the U.S. Supreme Court aggressively expands the "revealed" penumbra of substantive arbitration law under the Federal Arbitration Act and shores up the bulwarks of private, binding dispute resolution under standardized contracts of adhesion binding employees and consumers. In Stolt-Nielsen S.A. v. AnimalFeeds International, 130 S. Ct. 1758 (2010), the Court, against the backdrop of an international commercial contract scheme and a unique procedural scenario, draws upon the wellspring of divined "federal substantive law" under the FAA to pronounce limits on the ability of arbitrators - or courts - to promote public policies supporting class actions. Many understood Stolt-Nielsen, correctly, as a portent of the Court's eventual curtailment of state-law-based policies against enforcement of contractual waivers of the ability to participate in a class action when coupled with an agreement to arbitrate. In Rent-A-Center, West v. Jackson, 130 S. Ct. 2772 (2010), the Court declares that public policies promoting enforcement of arbitration agreements effectively trump the authority of courts to deny or limit the enforcement of arbitration agreements "upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the revocation of any contract" - or, more precisely, to police arbitration agreements for unconscionability. Once again, the Court majority "discerns" new Federal substantive law surrounding the FAA. It employs a unique variation on the principle that arbitration agreements are separable from the contracts of which they are a part, aggressively interprets Court precedents transferring from courts to arbitrators authority to resolve enforceability issues, and segregates the determination a contract has been "made" in a formalistic sense from consideration of defenses to its enforceability and validity.In AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 131 S. Ct. 1740 (2011), the Court once again addresses the interface between pro-arbitration policies under the FAA and the countervailing, limiting force of unconscionability doctrine. Yet again, a majority finds pro-arbitration federal policy circumscribes judicial authority to police arbitration agreements under state law. In this case, the result is to enforce a term in the arbitration agreement waiving the consumer's right to bring a contractual claim as part of a class action.Its staunchest adherents may insist that the Court's actions are necessary to effectively promote pro-arbitration policies under the FAA (announced and repeatedly reinforced by the Court since the mid-1980s) while ensuring that lower courts be measured and precise in the handling of countervailing defenses. In its zeal to further its evolving vision of the FAA, however, the Court has eliminated key safeguards aimed at ensuring fundamental fairness to consumers and employees in arbitration. The Court's most recent decisions have placed dramatic new limits on judicial oversight of arbitration agreements, making the U.S. a relative "outlier" among global sovereigns. The Court's extreme and inflexible posture adds momentum to Congressional efforts to dramatically restrict the use of predispute arbitration agreements. Unfortunately, these legislative responses, like the Court's decisions, lack a solid empirical foundation. As with the Court's jurisprudence, there is no guarantee that they will produce the best possible solution for employees and consumers.Good decisions about the public or private resolution of employment and consumer disputes depend upon a commitment to obtain and act upon better information about the operation of specific forms of arbitration in specific transactional settings, along with comparative data respecting court processes. Recent empirical scholarship has moved us closer to this goal, but much remains to be done. In assessing process options, policy-makers should consider the potential future role of statutory due process standards for arbitration, regulated arbitration, and arbitration that gives individuals the option of proceeding to court. To the extent public tribunals are necessary, it should not be assumed that the court system as presently structured is the most effective way of addressing consumer or employment disputes. It may be appropriate to develop public consumer tribunals or administrative employment tribunals such as those that exist in some other countries.In assaying public and private process choices, special attention should be given to the opportunities afforded by online dispute resolution (ODR). Finally, effective policy-making in these arenas cannot ignore the primary hot-button issue, the role of class or collective action.


This study provides an investigation of the nomological net for the seven primary assessment center (AC) dimensions identified by Arthur, Day, McNelly, and Eden (Personnel Psychology, 56, 125–154, 2003). In doing so, the authors provide the first robust estimates of the relationships between all primary AC dimensions with cognitive ability and the Big 5 factors of personality. Additionally, intercorrelations between AC dimensions based on sample sizes much larger than those previously available in the meta-analytic literature are presented. Data were obtained from two large managerial samples (total N=4985). Primary data on AC dimensions, personality, and cognitive ability interrelationships were subsequently integrated with meta-analytic data to estimate incremental validity for optimally and unit-weighted AC dimension composites as well as overall AC ratings over psychometric tests of personality and cognitive ability. Results show that unit- and optimally weighted composites of construct-based AC dimensions add incremental validity over tests of personality and cognitive ability, while overall AC ratings (including those obtained using subjective methods of data combination) do not.


We expand the classical model of a two-player game to select the best strategies, whose action is expected to maintain the values of a certain variable on the neutral level. By inserting fuzzy sets as payoff values in the game matrix we facilitate the procedure of formulations of payoff expectations by players. Instead of making difficult decisions about the choice of accurate numerical entries of the matrix the players are able to use words, which should simplify a communication between them when designing the preliminaries of the game. The players also have the possibility of making a ranking of their favorite strategies.


Abstract The concepts of platytrabia/platybasia and tropibasia/tropitrabia in gnathostomes are reviewed. The terms platytrabia and tropitrabia refer to developmental states of the embryonic trabecular cartilages that can be determined only by ontogenetic studies. The terms platybasia and tropibasia originally had this meaning, but have subsequently taken on additional descriptive connotations involving morphological features in the prechordal part of the adult chondrocranium. However, platybasia and tropibasia are not synonymous with platytrabia and tropitrabia. In gnathostomes, platytrabia usually gives rise to a platybasic adult condition (but not invariably; e.g., Lepisosteus), and tropitrabia usually gives rise to the tropibasic condition (modern elasmobranchs may be an exception). Thus, ontogeny does not provide an absolute guide to the adult condition, nor does adult morphology provide an accurate means to assess the prior ontogenetic condition in gnathostomes. Platybasia and tropibasia are regarded here as useful morphological terms that can be applied to fossils or to extant forms for which ontogenetic data are not available (although it may still be possible to reach some ontogenetic conclusions, based on morphological observations). A well-preserved but disarticulated fossil symmoriiform shark braincase from the Pennsylvanian of Arkansas is described under the informal generic designation "Cobelodus", using digital reconstructions made from a high-resolution computerized-tomography (CT) scan. The braincase is morphologically tropibasic and clearly represents a departure from the common platybasic pattern found in elasmobranchs (e.g., Tamiobatis, Cladodoides, Orthacanthus). The contribution made by the embryonic polar cartilage in "Cobelodus" was probably extensive (unlike in modern gnathostomes), as in the platybasic Paleozoic shark Cladodoides. Thus, tropibasia in "Cobelodus" seems to be superimposed on an already-specialized pattern of cranial morphology found in some early platybasic elasmobranchs. The basicranial arterial circuit in "Cobelodus" was highly modified, and its internal carotids could not have communicated with the cranial cavity via the bucco-hypophyseal chamber as in other elasmobranchs. Internal carotids either were absent or met the efferent pseudobranchials within the orbit before the combined vessel entered the cranial cavity via the orbital cartilage, but the arrangement was certainly not osteichthyan-like (where the combined internal carotid/efferent pseudobranchial arteries pass through the basisphenoid pillar). "Cobelodus" and many other Paleozoic sharks possessed a postorbital palatoquadrate articulation (possibly strengthened by ligaments above the articulation in "Cobelodus"), on cartilage presumably formed in the embryonic lateral commissure. This arrangement differs from that in amphistylic hexanchiform sharks, where the lateral commissure is absent and there is no postorbital arcade; the postorbital articulation is located instead on the primary postorbital process (an outgrowth of the supraorbital shelf). Hexanchiforms are the only extant elasmobranchs with a postorbital articulation, but do not occupy a basal position in modern morphological and molecular phylogenetic analyses. Amphistyly in hexanchiforms is therefore viewed as a derived state rather than a highly conserved feature. No hyomandibular facet has been identified in "Cobelodus", suggesting that its epihyal had only a ligamentous connection to the braincase. However, previous suggestions that symmoriiforms were aphetohyoidean (with a complete hyoidean gill slit and "unmodified" hyoid arch) are not supported by morphological evidence. The systematic classification of symmoriiform sharks is in disarray. Symmoriiforms collectively are probably monophyletic, but within them only the family Falcatidae is characterized convincingly by synapomorphies. Remaining symmoriiforms have been traditionally classified as "stethacanthids" and "symmoriids", based respectively on the presence or absence of a spine-brush complex, but that distinction seems artificial because no undisputable "brushless male symmoriids" or "brushed female stethacanthids" have been documented and because sex-linked dimorphism of the spine-brush complex has been demonstrated only in falcatids. The braincase in Cladoselache shares some unusual features with "Cobelodus", suggesting that Cladoselache and symmoriiforms are closely related, but it has yet to be determined whether Cladoselache was morphologically platybasic or tropibasic.


End-to-end Spoken Language Understanding (SLU) models are made increasingly large and complex to achieve the state-ofthe-art accuracy. However, the increased complexity of a model can also introduce high risk of over-fitting, which is a major challenge in SLU tasks due to the limitation of available data. In this paper, we propose an attention-based SLU model together with three encoder enhancement strategies to overcome data sparsity challenge. The first strategy focuses on the transferlearning approach to improve feature extraction capability of the encoder. It is implemented by pre-training the encoder component with a quantity of Automatic Speech Recognition annotated data relying on the standard Transformer architecture and then fine-tuning the SLU model with a small amount of target labelled data. The second strategy adopts multitask learning strategy, the SLU model integrates the speech recognition model by sharing the same underlying encoder, such that improving robustness and generalization ability. The third strategy, learning from Component Fusion (CF) idea, involves a Bidirectional Encoder Representation from Transformer (BERT) model and aims to boost the capability of the decoder with an auxiliary network. It hence reduces the risk of over-fitting and augments the ability of the underlying encoder, indirectly. Experiments on the FluentAI dataset show that cross-language transfer learning and multi-task strategies have been improved by up to 4:52% and 3:89% respectively, compared to the baseline.


This chapter about antithrombotic therapy during percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is part of the seventh ACCP Conference on Antithrombotic and Thrombolytic Therapy: Evidence Based Guidelines. Grade 1 recommendations are strong and indicate that the benefits do, or do not, outweigh risks, burden, and costs. Grade 2 suggests that individual patients' values may lead to different choices (for a full understanding of the grading, see Guyatt et al, CHEST 2004;126:179S-187S). Among the key recommendations in this chapter are the following: For patients undergoing PCI, we recommend pretreatment with aspirin, 75 to 325 mg (Grade 1A). For long-term treatment after PCI, we recommend aspirin, 75 to 162 mg/d (Grade 1A). For long-term treatment after PCI in patients who receive antithrombotic agents such as clopidogrel or warfarin, we recommend lower-dose aspirin, 75 to 100 mg/d (Grade 1C+). For patients who undergo stent placement, we recommend the combination of aspirin and a thienopyridine derivative (ticlopidine or clopidogrel) over systemic anticoagulation therapy (Grade 1A). We recommend clopidogrel over ticlopidine (Grade 1A). For all patients undergoing PCI, particularly those undergoing primary PCI, or those with refractory unstable angina or other high-risk features, we recommend use of a glycoprotein (GP) IIb-IIIa antagonist (abciximab or eptifibatide) [Grade 1A]. In patients undergoing PCI for ST-segment elevation MI, we recommend abciximab over eptifibatide (Grade 1B). In patients undergoing PCI, we recommend against the use of tirofiban as an alternative to abciximab (Grade 1A). In patients after uncomplicated PCI, we recommend against routine postprocedural infusion of heparin (Grade 1A). For patients undergoing PCI who are not treated with a GP IIb-IIIa antagonist, we recommend bivalirudin over heparin during PCI (Grade 1A). In PCI patients who are at low risk for complications, we recommend bivalirudin as an alternative to heparin as an adjunct to GP IIb-IIIa antagonists (Grade 1B). In PCI patients who are at high risk for bleeding, we recommend that bivalirudin over heparin as an adjunct to GP IIb-IIIa antagonists (Grade 1B). In patients who undergo PCI with no other indication for systemic anticoagulation therapy, we recommend against routine use of vitamin K antagonists after PCI (Grade 1A).


Timely and accurate feedback on athlete performance is a key contributing factor to improving that athletic performance. For alpine skiers, feedback usually comes in the form of video, coach's comments, and the timing system. Video and coach's comments come well after the performance (usually many hours) and are subjective. The timing systems give only one or a few data points which represent as many as 50 gates, making it too general as a training tool. The aim of the present article is to describe the development of a real‐time performance measurement and feedback system for training alpine skiers using Optical Navigation Technology and to present the results of field work done with alpine ski racers. In order to understand the special needs of alpine skiers, the first section of this article describes what racers and recreational skiers consider to be the ideal turn. One of the key characteristics of this ideal turn is the lack of lateral displacement. This article explores a new method for precisely measuring lateral displacement, converting that measured displacement into audible feedback which is in turn fed back to the skier in real‐time. Lastly, the results of a field study are presented in which the perceived benefits of real‐time feedback were demonstrated with 100% of the subjects stating that real‐time feedback had definitely or probably helped them better understand their carving skills and 83% of subjects stating that the real‐time feedback definitely or probably helped them improve their carving skills after only one two‐hour session.


Vertisols are complex soils with high clay content (>30%), high shrink–swell potential, and microrelief features known as gilgai We applied field and laboratory electrical‐resistivity measurements to characterize seasonal wetting and drying of a Texas Vertisol, and to quantify the effects of gilgai and cracks on seasonal hydrodynamics of the soil. Thirty‐two multielectrode resistivity‐profiling lines were collected along the same profile from 1 May 2005 to 22 Apr. 2006, using combined dipole–dipole and Schlumberger electrode configurations. The profiles were 17.5 m long and intersected two sets of microlows and microhighs of the gilgai. The resistivity data were inverted using the RES2DINV program and the inverted data were corrected for temperature. We measured variations of resistivity with soil moisture in the laboratory and the results were used to calibrate the field data. To evaluate the resistivity results, in situ measurements of soil moisture were made using auger sampling. During the wetting cycle, three distinct soil moisture regimes were recognized in the upper 1.4 m of the Vertisol: an upper zone (0–0.5‐m depth), which is the most dynamic with regard to wetting and drying; a middle zone (0.5–1.1 m), which is relatively saturated and less dynamic; and a lower zone (below 1.1 m), which is relatively less saturated compared with the middle layer. The saturation of the middle layer appears to be enhanced by preferential flow through cracks. Also, the microrelief topography exercises a control on spatiotemporal variations in soil moisture in that the microhighs dry faster than the microlows.


In the UK, the vast majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether the study of a joint rather than a single honours degree had an impact on employment outcomes six months after graduation.,The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the highly skilled graduate employability of the joint honours students. The authors established whether there were any differences inherent in completing a joint honours degree in a post-1992 higher education institution, by nation within the UK or within a Russell Group higher education institution.,The authors found an approximately consistent 3 per cent point negative gap nationally in the highly skilled employment rates of joint compared with single honours graduates. This gap was at its lowest in the highly selective Russell Group universities (−1.52 per cent points) and highest in post-1992, vocationally oriented universities (−7.13 per cent points) and in Northern Ireland universities (−12.45 per cent points). Joint honours graduates of Scottish universities fared well, with a +3.09 per cent point advantage over the national average for joint honours. The authors found that universities that had a higher proportion of joint honours graduates generally had a lower employability gap between their joint and single honours graduates.,This study focussed on joint honours degrees in the UK where the two or three principal subjects fall into different JACS subject areas, i.e. the two or three subjects are necessarily diverse rather than academically cognate. Future work will consider the class of joint honours degrees where the principal subjects lie within the same JACS subject area, i.e. they may be closer academically, although still taught by different academic teams. This grouping will include, for example, pairs of foreign languages, some social sciences pairings such as politics and sociology, and pairings such as history and theology from the historical and philosophical subject area.,The potential disbenefits of studying for a joint honours degree are apparent in this study. Joint honours students may face organisational, academic and cultural challenges that require a positive, conscious and sustained effort to overcome, on both the part of the student and the higher education institution. In particular for graduates of the post-1992 universities, it appears that there is a negative relative impact on highly skilled employment. This impact is lessened if the university is Scottish (four-year degrees with in-built breadth of study) or where the proportion completing joint honours degrees is relatively high.


Increasing popularity of extensively-organized and decentralized Peer-to-Peer (P2P) architecture emphasizes on the need to come across an overlay structure that can provide efficient content discovery mechanism, accommodate high churn rate and adapt to failures in the presence of heterogeneity among the peers. Since the 2-layer hierarchical models improves the P2P by offering some benefits to P2P paradigm and got popularity thereby, hierarchical models are brought into the account of current P2P researchers and still the process is under development. Many designs so far are introduced in hierarchical model like some hierarchical models has CAN or Kademlia algorithm inside them as DHT algorithm. A fundamental task of Peer-to-Peer applications is to find the peer efficiently that stores a desires data item. In our research work, we used 3-layers hierarchical model with distributed database architecture in different layer, each of which is connected through its root. The peers are divided into three categories according to their physical stability and strength. They are Ultra-superpeer, Superpeer and Ordinary Peer and we assign these peers to first, second and third level of hierarchy respectively. Peers in a group in lower layer have their own local database which hold as associated Superpeer in middle layer and access the database among the peers through user queries. In our 3-layer hierarchical model for DHT algorithms, we used an advanced Chord algorithm with optimized finger table which can remove the redundant entry in the finger table in upper layer that influences the system to reduce the lookup latency. Our research work finally resulted that our model really provides faster search since the network lookup latency is decreased by reducing the number of hops. The peers in such network then can contribute with improve functionality and can perform well in P2P networks.


Novel DNA microarray technologies enable the monitoring of expression levels of thousands of genes simultaneously. This allows a global view on the transcription levels of many (or all) genes when the cell undergoes specific conditions or processes. Analyzing gene expression data requires the clustering of genes into groups with similar expression patterns. We have developed a novel clustering algorithm, called CLICK, which is applicable to gene expression analysis as well as to other biological applications. No prior assumptions are made on the structure or the number of the clusters. The algorithm utilizes graph-theoretic and statistical techniques to identify tight groups of highly similar elements (kernels), which are likely to belong to the same true cluster. Several heuristic procedures are then used to expand the kernels into the full clustering. CLICK has been implemented and tested on a variety of biological datasets, ranging from gene expression, cDNA oligo-fingerprinting to protein sequence similarity. In all those applications it outperformed extant algorithms according to several common figures of merit. CLICK is also very fast, allowing clustering of thousands of elements in minutes, and over 100,000 elements in a couple of hours on a regular workstation.