A centrifugal pump is a rotodynamic pump that uses a rotating impeller to increase the pressure of a fluid. The fluid enters the pump impeller along or near to the rotating axis and is accelerated by the impeller, flowing radially outward into a diffuser or volute chamber (casing), from where it exits into the downstream piping. Computational fluid dynamics deals with fluid mechanics that uses numerical methods and algorithms to solve and analyze problems that involve fluid flows. Computers are used to perform the calculations required to simulate the interaction of liquids and gases with surfaces defined by boundary conditions. However, since experiments are limited by the facilities and the costs, computational fluid dynamics is also used to complement the experiments. The lead times and costs of new designs may then be substantial reduced. To use the computational fluid dynamics the various tools are available among them few are commercial and few are open source. For commercial tools one has to pay a lot while for open source tool it is free ware. In this project work the analysis of centrifugal pump in commercial tool i.e. ANSYS and in open source i.e. Open FOAM is carried out. Numerical solutions of the rotor-stator interaction of Centrifugal Pump using ANSYS CFX and OpenFOAM-1.5-dev were investigated.


To solve complex real-world problems with reinforcement learning, we cannot rely on manually specified reward functions. Instead, we can have humans communicate an objective to the agent directly. In this work, we combine two approaches to learning from human feedback: expert demonstrations and trajectory preferences. We train a deep neural network to model the reward function and use its predicted reward to train an DQN-based deep reinforcement learning agent on 9 Atari games. Our approach beats the imitation learning baseline in 7 games and achieves strictly superhuman performance on 2 games without using game rewards. Additionally, we investigate the goodness of fit of the reward model, present some reward hacking problems, and study the effects of noise in the human labels.


The polarization properties of long-period gratings inscribed in highly birefringent photonic crystal fibers are investigated in the context of a multipole method analysis. It is demonstrated that by proper design such fibers may act as selective polarization elements, showing an ample separation of the resonance peaks corresponding to the two orthogonal polarization states. Furthermore, the infiltration of the fiber's capillaries with an isotropic liquid may lead to extensive tuning of the resonant wavelengths. A tuning efficiency of up to 10 nm/°C is demonstrated in the case of a typical infiltrated birefringent photonic crystal fiber.


Background The aim was to document the mortality of psychiatric patients within a service system characterised by a low beds-to-population ratio. Method All patients admitted to one psychiatric hospital were followed from date of first admission after 31 July 1980 until 31 December 1992 with regard to death, by linkage to the Norwegian Central Register of Persons. Age-adjusted total mortality rates and standardised mortality ratios (SMRs) compared with the general population were computed. Results Mortality rates were highest in men, and increased with age in both sexes. SMRs were highest in the younger age-groups, and the overall SMR was significantly higher for men than for women. Mortality was highest during the first year after admission for both sexes and was higher than in the general population in all diagnostic groups. Conclusions The mortality of psychiatric patients is still unsatisfactorily high, and men constitute a special high-risk group.


Atmospheric aerosol has significant impact on climate. It influences radiative transfer by scattering and absorbing sunlight and by changing the microphysical structure, lifetime, and amount of the clouds. Due to its short lifetime, the spatial and temporal distributions of tropospheric aerosol are highly inhomogeneous. Aircraft have proven to be an effective platform in characterizing the atmospheric aerosol. To maximize the potential and to reduce the artifacts associated with aircraft sampling, both improvements in existing instruments and developments of new instruments are required.

To increase the speed of submicron aerosol size distribution measurements, a mixing condensation nucleus counter (MCNC) has been developed. By carefully designing the mixing chamber and condenser, the response time of the MCNC was significantly reduced. Our experiments demonstrate that a differential mobility analyzer (DMA) coupled with the developed MCNC can measure complete aerosol size distributions in as little as 2 seconds.

The effects of bends and elbows on the diffusional losses of particle in nanometer range were studied. The results show that the effect of bends and elbows on particle diffusion loss is significant, and for Reynolds number smaller than 250, the enhancement of diffusion losses due to bends and elbows is sensitive to both the relative orientations of the bends and elbows and the lengths of straight tubing between them. Because of this sensitivity, direct calibration or simulation is required to assess nanoparticle penetration efficiencies for any flow system containing bends or elbows at low Reynolds number. When the Reynolds number exceeds 250, the enhancement is insensitive to the actual flow configurations. Experimental results are presented, which can be used for design of aerosol flow systems at Reynolds number larger than 250.

To minimize the airborne sampling bias, an advanced differential mobility analyzer (DMA) system for measuring submicron aerosol size distribution at ambient relative humidity, with special attention to implementation on aircraft, has been developed. The system includes an active RH controller, a cylindrical differential mobility analyzer (CDMA), and a condensation nucleus counter. A cascade controller consisting of two PID modules maintains the RH inside the CDMA at ambient RH by actively adding or removing water vapor from the air stream. The flows are controlled with feedback PID controllers, which compensate for the variation of pressure as the aircraft changes altitude. This system was integrated into the CIRPAS Twin Otter aircraft and used to measure ambient size distributions during the Aerosol Characterization Experiment-Asia (ACE-Asia), carried out from March to May, 2001, in Japan.

During the ACE-Asia experiment, the above DMA system, together with an aerodynamic particle sizer (APS), was used to characterize aerosol size distributions in East Asia during 19 flights on board of CIRPAS Twin Otter aircraft. Besides providing the aerosol size characteristics, the data were combined with chemical composition and aerosol mixing state measurements to predict the vertical profile of aerosol extinction, which was compared with those derived from simultaneous direct measurements of aerosol optical depth by the NASA 14-channel sunphotometer. Agreement between the predicted and derived aerosol extinction varies for different scenarios, but the discrepancies were generally within the calculated uncertainties.


Purpose The purpose of the paper was to use a virtual phantom to identify a set of radiomic features from T1‐weighted and T2‐weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain which is stable to variations in image acquisition parameters and to evaluate the effect of image preprocessing on radiomic features stability. Methods Stability to different sources of variability (time of repetition and echo, voxel size, random noise and intensity non‐uniformity) was evaluated for both T1‐weighted and T2‐weighted MRI images. A set of 107 radiomic features, accounting for shape and size, first order statistics, and textural features was used. Feature stability was quantified using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). For each source of variability, stability was evaluated before and after preprocessing (Z‐score normalization, resampling, gaussian filtering and bias field correction). Features that have ICC > 0.75 in all the analysis of variability are selected as stable features. Last, the robust feature sets were tested on images acquired with random simulation parameters to assess their generalizability to unseen conditions. Results Preprocessing significantly increased the robustness of radiomic features to the different sources of variability. When preprocessing is applied, a set of 67 and 61 features resulted as stable for T1‐weighted and T2‐wieghted images respectively, over 80% of which were confirmed by the analysis on the images acquired with random simulation parameters. Conclusion A set of MRI‐radiomic features, robust to changes in TR/TE/PS/ST, was identified. This set of features may be used in radiomic analyses based on T1‐weighted and T2‐weighted MRI images.


This paper examines the impact of the financial cycle on the capacity of the economy to deal with shocks, with a particular focus on fiscal policy in the euro area member states. It starts by measuring national financial cycles and investigating the synchronisation across them as well as their relationship to the medium-term business cycle. It finds that financial cycles tend to be synchronised but their amplitudes differ significantly across countries. Business cycles tend to be positively correlated with the financial cycle, but they usually are smaller. The paper then examines if and how the financial cycle affects international risk-sharing among euro area member states and finds that economic booms and busts are often associated with phases of financial integration and disintegration at the level of the euro area. Such developments are reflected in the degree of international risk-sharing, which turns out to behave procyclically. Lastly, the capacity of domestic fiscal policy to smooth asymmetric shocks in the euro area declines dramatically during recessionary phases of the domestic financial cycle. The paper concludes that macroprudential policies are an important tool for preventing excessive swings in the financial cycle, but they should be complemented by a central stabilisation mechanism, which can make both capital markets and fiscal policy more resilient to disruption associated with the financial cycle.


The perceived hypothetical role of inflammation in carcinogenesis has been bolstered by epidemiological observations linking infections and chronic inflammatory conditions to cancer. Given their place as master regulators at the center of inflammation, NF-kappaB transcription factors were natural suspects in providing a mechanistic link between inflammation and carcinogenesis. Of major importance is the recognition that various effects of NF-kappaB on cancer initiation, promotion, and progression are cell-type, tissue and context specific, ascertainment of which was only possible due to recent advances in genetically dissectable mouse models of inflammation-linked cancer [Naugler WE and Karin M, 2008]. Therefore, an increasing number of compounds able to block NF-kappaB have been tested and have shown to suppress the growth of those cancer cells whose tumorigenicity depends on NF-kappaB activity [Karin M et al, 2002].
Malignant melanoma is an aggressive, therapy-resistant malignancy of melanocytes that exhibits constitutive activation of NF-kappaB which confers tumor survival capacity and escape from apoptosis.
The major aim of this work of thesis was to investigate the anti-carcinogenic effect on human melanoma cell lines of Yellow Extract (YE), the methanolic extract of the yellow fruits of Opuntia ficus-indica, indicaxanthin and Lauroside B (LB) a megastigmane glycoside isolated from Laurus nobilis L. leaves, and to clarify the mechanisms involved in their anti-cancer properties, particularly in relation to the transcription factor NF-kappaB.
Both the Yellow Extract and indicaxanthin extracted from the Opuntia Ficus-indica inhibited A375 human melanoma, A549 adenocarcinomic human alveolar basal epithelial and Caco-2 human colorectal adenocarcinoma cell growth, as evaluated by the MTT assay. The treatment with YE and indicaxanthin inhibited the three cell lines growth in a time- and concentration-dependent manner. To better understand the mechanisms of YE and indicaxanthin effects on human melanoma, we investigated the involvement of the transcription factor NF-kappaB. Treatment of A375 human melanoma cells with YE inhibited the high constitutive NF-kappaB activation as well as treatment with indicaxanthin in a time-dependent fashion. Moreover, A375 cells were treated with YE and indicaxanthin and analized with flow cytometry. Treatment of A375 cells with YE and indicaxanthin determined a time-dependent rise of the Annexin V positive cells, demonstrating that the antiproliferative effect of YE and indicaxanthin on A375 was due to induction of apoptosis and not just to a mere cytotoxic effect.
As for Lauroside B, a megastigmane glycoside isolated from Laurus nobilis L. leaves, we showed that it induces apoptosis in human melanoma cell lines. In fact, LB inhibited cell proliferation of three different human melanoma cell lines: A375, WM115 and SK-Mel-28, indicating that this compound has a broad spectrum of activity against human melanoma cell lines. Treatment of A375 cell line with LB induced cell-surface Annexin V binding thus demonstrating the ability of LB to induce apoptosis of A375 human melanoma cell line. We also investigated whether caspase-3, which is the main "effector" caspase in the apoptotic pathway, was activated following treatment of A375 cells with LB. We clearly observed a time-dependent degradation of both pro-caspase-3 and PARP (its substrate) following treatment of A375 cells with LB, thus supporting the data obtained by FACS analysis. To further investigate the mechanisms underlying the LB-induced apoptosis of human melanoma cells we analyzed, by western blot, the expression of IkappaB-alfa in the cytosolic fractions of A375 cells and, by EMSA, the NF-kappaB DNA-binding activity on A375 whole extracts. Our results clearly demonstrate that LB was able to inhibit, in a time-dependent fashion, both IkappaB-alfa degradation and constitutive NF-kappaB-DNA binding activity, suggesting that the apoptotic effect of LB may be partly mediated via reduction of NF-kappaB signaling. Another important result we obtained is the demonstration that exposure of human melanoma cells to LB negatively affected the expression of two anti-apoptotic genes, XIAP and c-FLIP, whose expression is regulated by NF-kappaB [Baud V and Karin M, 2009].
The present work of thesis demonstrates, for the first time, the pro-apoptotic activity of the Yellow Extract, indicaxanthin and Lauroside B against human melanoma cell lines and that this effect is associated to inhibition of constitutive NF-kappaB activation. These natural compounds may also represent potential chemotherapeutic agents against other malignancies that exhibit constitutive NF-kappaB activation and resistance to regular chemotherapy. Future studies will be needed to further elucidate the molecular mechanisms of action of these compounds as well as to address their effects in animal models, in order to promote their development as potential chemotherapeutic agents to treat human melanoma.


The paper analyses the evolution of rockets used to prevent hailstone formation in turbulent atmospheric conditions. After general definitions of the turbulent atmosphere and working hypotheses, a model of a uniform and linear turbulent atmosphere, obtained from analytical relations, is presented in detail. From this model, the components of velocity of turbulence are deduced as functions of time. Introducing the components of velocity into the model of simulation of the rocket flight, a fascicle of the trajectories is obtained. The fascicle is analysed as a statistical function in six different stages. The novelty in this work is in the technique used to model the turbulent atmosphere influence on unguided rocket flight.


In this paper, we present two novel Resource Allocation (RA) strategies based on the Signal-to-Leakage-plus-Noise-Ratio (SLNR) for the downlink (DL) of Coordinated Multi Point (CoMP) transmission in LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) system. The proposed RA strategies select the UEs that can efficiently share the same Resource Block (RB) without degrading the overall throughput by using the SLNR metric. In addition, we compare the proposed strategies to the RA based on the more common Signal-to-Interference-plus-Noise-Ratio (SINR) strategy. The SLNR-based RA is shown to provide significant gains in the overall system throughout that reach up to 80% and is shown to have even less complexity than the typical SINR-based RA, which makes it a very attractive choice for the implementation of CoMP in practical cellular systems.


The learner licence is an important component of the graduated driver licensing system. This research describes the driving and licensing experiences of learner drivers in Queensland and New South Wales licensed prior to the changes made to the system in mid-2007. The sample consisted of 392 participants who completed a telephone interview just after they obtained their provisional licence. The results suggest that learner drivers in the two states had many similar experiences when they were obtaining a learner licence. However, once a learner licence was obtained, there were differences in the amount of practice, the supervisor learners practised with, the type of vehicle they used and the amount of unlicensed driving. This paper provides important baseline descriptive data that can be used to measure the impact of the changes that were introduced to the learner licence phase in mid-2007 in both of these states.


Sustainability has become vitally important in recent decades, especially in developing countries with high
percentages of indigenous peoples and serious problems related to poverty in rural areas. In several countries of
Latin America, indigenous communities are valued for their unique features, cultural attractions and diversity of
their landscapes, however, these communities do not have many options for their subsistence. Ecotourism can
be a reliable source of sustainable economic development in regions with fewer options, given that the nature of
the ecotourism product can be founded upon the cultural and ecological capital of indigenous peoples, taking
place in biodiverse natural areas, employing vulnerable local groups, engaging with local businesses, and the
informal sector. This doctoral thesis critically assessed and examined the potential of ecotourism to support the
global sustainable development goals (SDGs) for ecological protection and poverty reduction in indigenous
communities of Latin America; with particular reference to two ecotourism projects led by the Hnahnu community
of El Alberto, state of Hidalgo in central Mexico. This research project analysed key literature concerning the
evolution of sustainable development on planning and policy-making towards the importance of indigenous
sustainability. Furthermore, by employing the tourism value chain analysis (TVCA) during the fieldwork research
it provides insights in the context of stakeholder engagement and ownership and documented benefits of
indigenous peoples informal participation within the ecotourism market. Also, through the TVCA, the impacts of
ecotourism strategies on the livelihoods of indigenous peoples are empirically evaluated, and the benefits that
these bring to achieve poverty reduction through sustainable development. The research findings suggest that
ecotourism represents a viable source of support for the achievement of the global SDGs in regions with few
other options, and that a good performance of the TVC can significantly improve ecotourism management and
foster sustainable development and poverty reduction within the process, providing as a refreshing counterexample
to several well-publicised failures, an account of an indigenous community that has succeeded in its
ecotourism projects against all odds. The conclusions relating to the sustainable development of the ecotourism
projects in indigenous communities were drawn into a conceptual framework based on key recommendations
that can assist the Hnahnu community of el Alberto to overcome constraints among their TVC and strengthen
their ecotourism endeavours. The lessons learned from the Hnahnu ecotourism projects can be also used by
other indigenous peoples in similar conditions, these include: the weight of community engagement in ecotourism
through indigenous inception as a local initiative, transparency and accountability; gender equality, effective
marketing; the role of the government; and the right involvement of the private sector.


The international financial crisis of 2008–09 exposed the strengths and weaknesses of the current paradigm of development in Latin America, a paradigm based on liberalized capital accounts and significantly improved macroeconomic conditions. This paper presents lessons derived from the crisis, not only for the region itself, but also for other developing countries that might seek economic growth in the context of greater integration to the international capital markets. Some of the lessons are not new but have been reinforced by the crisis, such as Latin America's imperative need for export diversification (not only in products but in partners). Other lessons break with longstanding myths about the region, such as its inability to undertake counter-cyclical policies—at least on the monetary side. Yet other lessons reflect new developments in the current growth paradigm, such as a renewed assessment of (1) the relative roles of foreign and domestic banks in shielding the financial system against external shocks and (2) the desirability of adopting blanket international financial regulations that do not account for a country's degree of development. Taken together, the lessons in this paper bring a new sense of optimism for growth in Latin America.


My study sought to combine two topics that have recently generated much interest among anthropologists. One of these topics is American Sign Language, the other is linguistic relativity. Although both topics have been a part of the literature for some time, neither has been studied extensively until the recent past. Both present exciting new horizons for understanding culture, particularly language and culture. The first of these two topics is the study of American Sign Language. The reason for its previous absence from the literature has to do with unfortunate prejudice which, for a long time, kept ASL from being recognized as a legitimate language. The second has to do with a specific case of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. This famous anthropological idea postulates that one's language guides the pattern of one's thought. Although proposed decades ago, little work has been done to validate or contradict the hypothesis, and that work which has been done has been plagued with methodological troubles. However, many scholars have recently begun looking into the hypothesis in the specific domain of space and made some exciting discoveries. Contrary to previous beliefs, not all languages use a relative system of describing space. Relative systems establish location relative to other objects, generally the ego. Absolute systems, in contrast, use cardinal directions. While both exist in many languages, speakers often heavily prefer one over the other (Levinson 1996). Comparing relative and absolute systems and how they affect cognition, researchers have obtained results showing affects on both memory and thinking (Lucy 1997). In particular, a cross cultural study of several languages revealed striking differences in thinking between languages using relative and absolute coordinate systems. Participants were shown objects or movements on one table, rotated 180 degrees, and then asked to pick the same object, movement, or arrangement. Speakers of relative languages chose based on left and right, speakers of absolute languages chose based on cardinal directions (Majid et al 2004). With all of the work that has been done in these two areas, it seems that the next logical step would be to combine these two areas. The study of how language shapes cognition seems particularly well suited for combination with the study of ASL. After all, signed languages have the unique trait that they utilize space in order to describe space. One cannot help but ask how this is affecting how the signer might internalize his or her concept of spatial reality differently than his or her speaking counterpart. I asked questions of six users of American Sign Language in order to ascertain whether their language describes location relatively or absolutely. These participants were recruited from a local Deaf club that I have been attending for over a year. I then replicated the study done by Majid, et. al. (2004) with users of ASL to see if the pattern discovered in this study carries over to manual languages. I predicted that ASL uses relative descriptions, and that the results for phase II would be similar to those found with speakers of relative languages in Majid, et al. (2004 ). While these predictions for the most part were verified, the more interesting result was that ASL turned out to use a special case of relative descriptions that will need to be the topic of further investigation.


This is the sixth volume of Wesley's Journal to appear in the critical edition of The Works of John Wesley. Covering the decade from 1776 to the end of 1786, it contains three full "Extracts" of Wesley's Journal (18-20) and the beginning of his last (21). These materials describe--in Wesley's own words--a crucial period that helps define the shape of Methodist theology and organization. The issues surrounding the manner of John Wesley's leadership and the authority of the Conference within Methodism furnish the framework for this period. Wesley begins working with new leaders such as Thomas Coke and Francis Asbury and makes several crucial decisions regarding Methodism in America, including the matter of ordination. He also faces several continuing points of contention in Great Britain that threaten to disrupt the progress of the revival, such as the problems associated with the building of preaching houses and "fixing" them on the Methodist plan. At the same time, he describes examples of strong local revivals that continue to appear throughout the connection and he fulfills his plans for a new chapel on City Road in London. Several crucial events in 1784 define the continuing nature of Methodist organization, especially the legal establishment of the Conference.


Emotion Regulation is the process through which a person inflects their emotions consciously and unconsciously(Bargh, Williams, 2007; Rottenberg, Gross, 2003) to aptly respond to substantial/environmental demands(Gratz & Roemer, 2004).Emotion regulation is the development of emotion which is determined by which emotion we have, when we have them and how we express or experience it. With determining these emotions how a person achieves his/her goal is what we investigate in this study. Psychological flexibility has the capability to change behavior in such a way that it integrates the consciousness with open approach to one's thoughts and feelings which is a constant while pursuing a goal. Hayes (1999) suggested that the psychological flexibility benefits mental health by diminishing the impact of negative internal events and helping the person to clearly define and achieve the goals important to them. Emotional stability is the process of a person's personality trying to continually striving for greater level of emotional health, in both spheres; intra-physically and intra-personally.


The Oxford Handbook of International Environmental Law takes stock of the major developments in international environmental law, while exploring the field's core assumptions and concepts, basic analytical tools, and key challenges. It is intended to serve as an authoritative and indispensable overview of the field. Although the handbook focusses on international environmental law, it also examines the subject from a broader policy and theoretical perspective, drawing on insights from other disciplines such as political science, economics, and philosophy. It aims to strike a balance between practical preoccupations and critical or theoretical reflection. Each chapter examines an issue that is central to current scholarly debates or policy development. At the same time, the Handbook is structured as a whole to provide readers with both a 'bigger picture' of international environmental law and a more in-depth understanding of its preoccupations. This approach is particularly important at a time in the development of international environmental law when its fragmentation into increasingly specialized sub-fields obscures unifying themes and cross-cutting challenges. The Handbook consists of 47 chapters in seven parts. Part I sets the stage for the Handbook, indentifying overarching issues. Part II offers readers a range of theoretical lenses through which to analyze both the problems facing international environmental law and the solutions it may offer. Part III reviews the treatment of basic issues areas. Part IV analyzes the process of normative development in international environmental law. Part V will assess key theoretical concepts. Part VI examines the roles of various actors and institutions. And Part VII analyzes issues of implementation and enforcement. The Oxford Handbooks series is a major new initiative in academic publishing. Each volume offers an authoritative and state-of-the-art survey of current thinking and research in a particular subject area. Specially commissioned essays from leading international figures in the discipline give critical examinations of the progress and direction of debates. Oxford Handbooks provide scholars and graduate students with compelling new perspectives upon a wide range of subjects in the humanities and social sciences. Contributors to this volume - Dan Bodansky, Jutta Brunnee, Ellen Hey Peter Sand John Dryzek Benedict Kingsbury Jeffrey Dunoff Stephen Toope Alan Boyle Richard Stewart Steinar Andresen, Tora Skodvin Kyle Danish Scott Barrett Karin Mickelson Christopher Stone Ian Rowlands David Freestone Rosemary Rayfuse David Wirth Ulrich Beyerlin Pierre-Marie Dupuy Thomas Gehring Ellen Hey Naomi Roht-Arriaza & Jason Morrison Gunther Handl Jutta Brunnee Dan Tarlock Jonathan Wiener Daniel Magraw Dinah Shelton J.G. Merrills Jonas Ebbesson Daniel Bodansky Thilo Marauhn Peter Spiro Peter Haas Steven Ratner Russell Barsh Ludwig Kramer Geir Ulfstein Ron Mitchell Catherine Redgwell Laurence Boisson de Chazournes Jorgen Wettestad Jan Klabbers Malgosia Fitzmaurice Cesare Romano Dan Bodansky, Jutta Brunnee, Ellen Hey


Financial crises in emerging markets have led many observers to recommend abandoning fixed exchange rates and adopting more flexible regimes. Moreover, some recent research suggests that the correct exchange rate regime may have a significant effect on inflation and even economic growth. The estimated effect found in such studies, however, likely suffers from an upward bias, as countries which choose a given exchange rate regime have other hard-to-measure policies and attributes which also affect economic performance. Utilizing a recent data set on actual, as opposed to official exchange rate regimes, this article employs the difference-in-differences method, currently popular in applied microeconomics, to a set of emerging markets that switched to more flexible currency policies. Results indicate that, contrary to previous studies, exchange rates themselves exert no significant impact on inflation or output.


"Electronic Iran "introduces the concept of the Iranian Internet, a framework that captures interlinked, transnational networks of virtual and offline spaces.Taking her cues from early Internet ethnographies that stress the importance of treating the Internet as both a site and product of cultural production, accounts in media studies that highlight the continuities between old and new media, and a range of works that have made critical interventions in the field of Iranian studies, Niki Akhavan traces key developments and confronts conventional wisdom about digital media in general, and contemporary Iranian culture and politics in particular.Akhavan focuses largely on the years between 1998 and 2012 to reveal a diverse and combative virtual landscape where both geographically and ideologically dispersed individuals and groups deployed Internet technologies to variously construct, defend, and challenge narratives of Iranian national identity, society, and politics. While it tempers celebratory claims that have dominated assessments of the Iranian Internet, "Electronic Iran" is ultimately optimistic in its outlook. As it exposes and assesses overlooked aspects of the Iranian Internet, the book sketches a more complete map of its dynamic landscape, and suggests that the transformative powers of digital media can only be developed and understood if attention is paid to both the specificities of new technologies as well as the local and transnational contexts in which they appear.


Although Australian police were not the perpetrators of the profound violation of trust that characterises the refugee experience, they have the potential to be one of the key agencies in settlement to assist in the restoration of trust. This research explores the perspectives of police and refugees concerning police-refugee and refugee-police relations. The research was conducted in Tasmania, Australia, as a regional location settling refugees. The qualitative research involved 160 participants including police and members of seven of the African newly arrived refugee communities. The data was collected from 2006 to 2008, a time that was characterised by periods of negative media attention focusing on African refugees and debate about settlement in regional Australia.
The research offers an understanding of both the perspectives of police and the members of newly arrived African communities in regional Australia on factors that can influence interactions between them. The research reveals that an understanding of experiential difference and community dynamics is crucial. The data analysis identified three distinct themes affecting police-refugee relations: the process of transition for refugees, the timing of police interventions and individual/community dynamics, highlighting a need for police awareness of the refugee experience and how this awareness may then influence contact between police and refugees. The study also tackles the issues of reporting and racism from both the perspectives of police and the African refugee communities.The research explores ways to expand community involvement in a range of safety and crime prevention initiatives by increasing the flow of information between refugee communities and police, and improving feelings of safety and security for individual refugees, refugee communities and police. The study identifies principles to create, maintain and sustain positive police-refugee relationships that support the complex dynamics of settlement in regional Australia, with a focus on the vulnerability of refugees during stages of transition. It was found that using a number of targeted community policing strategies to support newly arrived refugee communities during initial settlement contributed to an increase in refugees' understandings of Australian law and that trust, perceived legitimacy in police, and cooperation were increased. The thesis also argues that police-refugee relationships are enhanced by a procedural justice framework and could be positively affected by restorative justice practices. Finally, the findings from this research can be translated into a series of practical applications that could have a positive impact on the effectiveness and efficiency of police work by increasing the capacity for community engagement, improving feelings of safety and encouraging reporting to police.


Inter-professional collaborations are invaluable relationships which can prevent the social exclusion of children and young people and are now a common feature of welfare policies worldwide. Drawing on a four year study of the skills and understanding required of practitioners in order to establish the most effective interagency collaborations, this comprehensive text Gives examples from practitioners developing inter-professional practices allow readers to reflect on their relevance for their own work. (1) Emphasises what needs to be learnt for responsive inter-professional work and how that learning can be promoted (2) Examines how professional and organisational learning are intertwined (3) Suggests how organisations can provide conditions to support the enhanced forms of professional practices revealed in the study (4) Reveals the professional motives driving the practices as well as how they are founded and sustained.

Full of ideas to help shape collaborative inter-professional practice this book shows that specialist expertise is distributed across local networks. The reader is encouraged to develop the capacity to recognise the expertise of others and to negotiate their work with others. This book is essential reading for practitioners in education and educational psychology or social work, and offers crucial insights for local strategists and those involved in professional development work. The book also has a great deal to offer researchers working in the area of cultural historical activity theory (CHAT). The four year study was framed by CHAT and offers a well-worked example of how CHAT can be used to reveal sense-making in new practices and the organizational implications of enhanced professional decision-making. As well as being important contributors to the developing CHAT field, the five authors have worked in the area of social exclusion and professional learning for several years and have brought inter-disciplinary strengths to this account of inter-professional work.


In modern society, blood donor motivation and recruitment is a fundamental part of health care delivery. Well defined and documented programmes exist throughout the world but new ideas are always welcome. The situation in the Sudan is different and much remains to be done by way of comparison with elsewhere. This thesis outlines the objectives of a study, how it was supported, sponsored and achieved. It describes briefly the geography of the Sudan, the source of Sudanese economy, climate, culture and historical backgrounds. The problems of existing services in the Sudan are reviewed and a brief account of the demographic characteristics of the Sudanese population is given. Two surveys done in West of Scotland and in the Sudan are described in detail. This work discloses and compares the positive motives that enhances giving of blood and the negative motives that hinders its donation. The comparison is between an Eastern Society with a voluntary motivation not fully activated because of lack of understanding and awareness of the need to give blood voluntarily for strangers and Western Society with a well established voluntary system of donation. An addition to this research was the investigation into the immunity to tetanus and hepatitis in the Sudanese population. An estimate of the percentage of individuals with detectable levels of hepatitis A and B antibodies and tetanus antibodies is included since there is a need to establish a plasmapheresis programme as part of a good Blood Transfusion Service for the procurement of specific immunoglobulin's. This work has revealed major differences between the West of Scotland and the Sudan and suggestions are made for their resolution. The main conclusion and comparison are summarised in Chapter 7. It is hoped that many of the suggestions in this thesis can be introduced in the Sudan at an early date.


In this paper, I offer an expansionist view of the Frickerian central case of testimonial injustice, citing examples from the South Asian context. To defend this expansionist position, I provide an argument in three parts. First, I argue that credibility deficit and credibility excess are entangled with each other in such a way that often, one produces the other. Secondly, I contend that we should not say that systematic testimonial injustice is a consequence of credibility deficit only because of the entanglement between them. I also contend that for being the central case of testimonial injustice, identity prejudice should not be necessarily negative; it can be positive as well. Propounding a twofold condition of the status of a knower, the last part claims that testimonial injustice occurs when one of the two conditions remains unmet.


Clostridium difficile is considered one of the most important pathogens in both, hospital and community settings. This pathogen is responsible for most antibioticassociated colitis in hospitals and a major cause of morbidity and mortality within the elderly. Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) usually appears as a result of antibiotic therapy, which disrupts the normal gut flora. Clostridium difficile infection presents itself in two very distinct ways, it can be either asymptomatic, with the infected person acting as a carrier, or symptomatic, where patients may experience a broad range of symptoms depending on their severity. Symptoms range from mild diarrhea to severe complications such as pseudomembranous colitis, toxic megacolon, bowel perforation, sepsis and death. Conventional treatment of CDI consists on antibiotic treatment with vancomycin or metronidazole. However, the number of recurrences after using these treatments is growing exponentially. New molecules such as fidamoxicin have been included in treatment guidelines but still; the cases of recurrent CDI continue to grow. As a result, a novel therapy has emerged: fecal microbiota transplants (FMT). It is a procedure in which fecal matter, or stool, is collected from a tested donor, mixed with a saline or other solution, strained, and placed in a patient by colonoscopy, endoscopy, sigmoidscopy or enema. With its efficacy being proven constantly study after study, it is only a matter of time for health organizations worldwide to include it in the guidelines for rCDI treatment.


Measurements of objective room acoustical parameters via computer‐aided acquisition of impulse responses have become standard practice in the acoustics community, and the number of dedicated computer programs for performing this task has multiplied over the past years. Notwithstanding this significant advance, two problematical areas remain, both of which can be linked to the closed and stand‐alone nature of most applications. First, it is very difficult to track discrepancies between the results given by various programs down to individual elements or algorithms. Second, the closed nature of most of the programs inhibits the definition and refinement of new acoustical criteria which take account of our increasing understanding of human perception. To address these problems, and in order to foster more research into the correspondence between the objective description and the subjective evaluation of room acoustical quality, the authors feel that measurement programs will have to become more open, allowing the user to check individual algorithms and define new criteria in a straightforward manner. An outline of such an open, modular, measurement program, using the Matlab environment, will be given.


Food is increasingly central to consumer culture today. From fine dining restaurants to farmers' markets, stainless steel kitchenware to celebrity chef cookbooks, there is a stylish array of culinary commodities available for fashioning our identities. Yet this occurs at a time when commodity consumption more generally is under greater question as a site of self-making, with the rise of anti-consumerist sentiment. This article examines how people negotiate these issues in their identity formation, by focusing on those for whom food is central to their sense of self: 'foodies'. I draw on theories of consumption, identity and material culture, in particular the work of Daniel Miller, to examine ethnographic research undertaken with foodies in Melbourne, Australia.


Temporal-intensity contrast is crucial in intense laser-matter interaction to circumvent the undesirable expansion of steep high-density plasma prior to the interaction with the main pulse. Nonlinear elliptical polarization rotation in an argon filled hollow-core fiber is used here for cleaning pedestals/satellite pulses of a chirped-pulse-amplifier based Ti:Sapphire laser. This source provides ∼35  μJ energy and sub-4-fs duration, and the process has >50% internal efficiency, more than the most commonly used pulse cleaning methods. Further, the contrast is improved by 3 orders of magnitude when measured after amplifying the pulses to 16 TW using non-collinear optical parametric chirped pulse amplification with a prospect to even further enhancement.


Energy conservation can mitigate significant issues such as climate change and fuel poverty, yet the determinants of this behaviour are poorly understood. It is important to understand the antecedents of energy conservation in order to effectively stimulate this behaviour in society. Traditional models have focused on normative and intentional processes to explain environmental behaviour, but have proven largely unsuccessful for predicting energy use. Considering that day-to-day energy behaviour is likely to be habitual and context dependent, models such as the Comprehensive Action Determination Model (CADM, Klockner & Blobaum, 2010), which have integrated these factors with more traditional antecedents of behaviour, may better account for people's actions. The early research in this thesis tests the application of this model to energy saving behaviour using a mixed-methods approach. Findings show that such a model is suitable to account for the drivers of energy behaviour, particularly because of the important role of habits and situational influences on this behaviour. Although this model can successfully predict daily energy behaviours that involve the routine curtailment of household energy use, one-off energy efficiency investment behaviours are unlikely to be determined by the variables considered by the CADM. That is, these behaviours may be more dependent on people's understanding of the energy consumption in their household, or their energy literacy. Therefore, the second part of this thesis investigates the cognitive processes that inform conscious energy judgements to explore the antecedents of this energy literacy. The studies in this thesis uncover an unprecedented variety of energy judgement heuristics in this decision-making process, and these heuristics are further investigated, again using various methods. This thesis concludes that, to maximally facilitate energy conservation, the habitual and situational antecedents of energy saving behaviour, as captured in such frameworks as the CADM, need to be considered alongside the cognitive processes that shape people's energy literacy when designing effective energy conservation interventions that target both routine and non-routine actions.


Background— Stroke is a leading cause of death around the world. Improving the quality of stroke care is a global priority, despite the diverse healthcare economies across nations. The American Heart Association/American Stroke Association Get With the Guidelines-Stroke program (GWTG-Stroke) has improved the quality of stroke care in 790 US academic and community hospitals, with broad implications for the rest of the country. The generalizability of GWTG-Stroke across national and economic boundaries remains to be tested. The Taiwan Stroke Registry, with 30 599 stroke admissions between 2006 and 2008, was used to assess the applicability of GWTG-Stroke in Taiwan, which spends ≈1/10 of what the United States does in medical costs per new or recurrent stroke. Methods and Results— Taiwan Stroke Registry, sponsored by the Taiwan Department of Health, engages 39 academic and community hospitals and covers the entire country with 4 steps of quality control to ensure the reliability of entered data. Five GWTG-Stroke performance measures and 1 safety indicator are applicable to assess Taiwan Stroke Registry quality of stroke care. Demographic and outcome figures are comparable between GWTG-Stroke and Taiwan Stroke Registry. Two indicators (early and discharge antithrombotics) are close to GWTG-Stroke standards, while 3 other indicators (intravenous tissue plasminogen activator, anticoagulation for atrial fibrillation, lipid-lowering medication) and 1 safety indicator fall behind. Preliminary analysis shows that compliance with selected GWTG-Stroke guidelines is associated with better outcomes. Conclusions— Results suggest that GWTG-Stroke performance measures, with modification for ethnic factors, can become global standards across national and economic boundaries for assessing and improving quality of stroke care and outcomes. GWTG-Stroke can be incorporated into ongoing stroke registries across nations.


This thesis proposes a formal model for a federation of relational databases with possibly heterogeneous schemas. The Federation Model is comprehensive enough for: (i) capturing the diversity of schemas arising in practice, allowing a symmetric treatment of data and schema, and (ii) capturing the complete space of dimensional representations of data, fully exploiting the n logical dimensions structured along the three physical dimensions implicit in the relational model--row, column, and relation. An n-dimensional query language called nD-SQL is also proposed. This language makes use of the Federation Model and is capable of: (a) resolving schematic discrepancies among a collection of relational databases or data marts with heterogeneous schemas, and (b) supporting a whole range of multiple granularity aggregation queries like CUBE, ROLLUP, and DRILLDOWN, but, to an arbitrary, user controlled, level of resolution. In addition, nD-SQL can express queries that restructure data conforming to any particular dimensional representation into any other. The semantics of nD-SQL is downward compatible with the popular SQL language. The thesis also proposes an extension to relational algebra, capable of restructuring, called restructuring relational algebra (RRA). (Abstract shortened by UMI.)


In recent years, the development of information and communication technologies has notably improved the water management processes, but the technologies for water quality control still leave much scope for improvement. Specially, in situ and inline water monitoring has an increasing interest in order to take decisions at real time. The main drawbacks of the current portable meters are their high cost and their high power consumption. In this paper, it is proposed a portable compact meter for measuring simultaneously oxidation-reduction potential, conductivity, temperature, and amperometric parameters like chlorine. This system includes microsensors fabricated with microelectronic technologies, and a commercial temperature sensor, all them allowing a very low power consumption. Validation of the system has been carried out using standard solutions and comparing the results with commercial sensors. The response characteristics of sensors, in terms of sensitivity and repeatability, showed good agreement with those obtained with standard equipment using the same microelectrodes.


A DISTRIBUTED PARAMETERS MODEL FOR THE SOLAR CELL Fred M. Stuber In order to find a method for calculating the optimal gridding of p-n junction solar cells, a distributive-circuitelement model has been derived. It consists of a chain of T elements. They have a resistance in the series path. The shunt paths consist of the diode together with the series resistance, the shunt resistance and the current source. The parameters in the model can be derived from the measurements of the cell under reverse biased, forward biased and illuminated conditions. The model has been employed to derive the optimum stripe separation. This conforms with the prevalent design practice.


"The Canadian Modernists Meet" is a collection of new critical essays on major and rediscovered Canadian writers of the early to mid-twentieth century. F.R. Scott's well-known poem "The Canadian Authors Meet" sets the theme for the volume: a revisiting of English Canada's formative movements in modernist poetry, fiction, and drama. As did Scott's poem, Dean Irvine's collection raises questions - about modernism and antimodernism, nationalism and antinationalism, gender and class, originality and influence - that remain central to contemporary research on early to mid-twentieth-century English Canadian literature. "The Canadian Modernists Meet" is the first collection of its kind: a gathering of texts by literary critics, textual editors, biographers, literary historians, and art historians whose collective research contributes to the study of modernism in Canada. The collection stages a major reassessment of the origins and development of modernist literature in Canada, its relationship to international modernist literature, its regional variations, its gender and class inflections, and its connections to visual art, architecture, and film. It presents a range of scholarly perspectives, drawing upon the multidisciplinarity that characterizes the international field of modernist studies.


"Turkey, Islam, Nationalism, and Modernity" reveals the historical dynamics propelling two centuries of Ottoman and Turkish history. As mounting threats to imperial survival necessitated dynamic responses, ethnolinguistic and religious identities inspired alternative strategies for engaging with modernity. A radical, secularizing current of change competed with a conservative, Islamically committed current. Crises sharpened the differentiation of the two streams, forcing choices between them. The radical current began with the formation of reformist governmental elites and expanded with the advent of 'print capitalism', symbolized by the privately owned, Ottoman-language newspapers. The radicals engineered the 1908 Young Turk revolution, ruled empire and republic until 1950, made secularism a lasting 'belief system', and still retain powerful positions. The conservative current gained impetus from three history-making Islamic renewal movements, those of Mevlana Halid, Said Nursi, and Fethullah Gulen. Powerful under the empire, Islamic conservatives did not regain control of government until the 1980s. By then they, too, had their own influential media. Findley's reassessment of political, economic, social and cultural history reveals the dialectical interaction between radical and conservative currents of change, which alternately clashed and converged to shape late Ottoman and republican Turkish history.


High grain yield is a prerequisite in the release of wheat genotypes intended for production under high input and capital-intensive cultures such as is practiced in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe experiences shortages of wheat grain due to limited irrigation facilities and also due to the tropical nature of its climate, which confines wheat production to the dry, winter months, under costly irrigation regimes.

Breeding programmes serving wheat production systems which target high grain yields, such as is required in Zimbabwe should aim to generate elite wheat germplasm which carries high frequency of high yielding genotypes. Such breeding programmes should conduct efficient variety screening techniques during the promotion of advanced breeding material into replicated variety evaluation stages. This should ensure maintenance of high grain yield performance in the subsequent advanced variety testing for the purposes of variety release.

It is not feasible to evaluate a very large number of wheat lines in statistically designed experiments, under the constraints of time, resources and space. Thus only a limited number of accessions are, in time, advanced into preliminary statistically designed field experimentation with the rest being discarded. The historical dilemma facing wheat breeders has been the identification of reliable selection criteria for high grain yield performance during early breeding generations (McGinnis and Shebeski, 1968; Knott, 1972), and later in the screening of homozygous lines for advanced testing (Fischer and Kertesz, 1976; Ellison, Latter and Anttonen, 1985; Sharma, 1993). Wheat scientists have hitherto failed to identify simple plant characteristics which relate closely to grain yield potential at field crop densities. Reasons for this vary from the low additive genetic variances relative to the environmental and error variances that these simple plant traits are associated with (Fischer and Kertesz, 1976.), to the genotype x environment interaction and the presence of allometric relationships (Grafius, Thomas and Banard, 1976). The need to establish reliable criteria to screen homozygous wheat lines prior to replicated trial testing should continue to be addressed. One solution suggested has been the use of small (micro) or hill plots for early yield testing (Frey, 1965; Jensen and Robson, 1969; Briggs and Shebeski, 1971; Ellison, et al., 1985). Such plots attempt to simulate to some degree, the competitive environment of a crop, given the usual limitation on seed during early testing (Fischer and Kertesz, 1976).

The utility of morpho-physiological traits; biomass, grain mass and harvest index of single row or hill plots as indicators of yielding ability has produced varying results. Fischer and Kertesz (1976) found a strong phenotypic correlation between microplot and field crop grain yield of spring wheat in Northwest Mexico. The relationships of biomass and harvest index of microplots with grain yield of large plots were not included in their investigation. Relationships of the three morpho-physiological traits; biomass, grain mass and harvest index of thinly seeded plots with grain yield in commercial stands were evaluated for hard red winter wheat in the Southern Great Plains of USA by Sharma and Smith (1987). Grain mass followed by harvest index of thinly seeded plots was strongly correlated with grain yield in field crop stands. Biomass of thinly seeded plots was only moderately correlated with grain yield of commercial stands. This investigation did not however discriminate the effectiveness of the three selection criteria over different plant structure. In a later study by Kramer, Van ooijen and Spitters (1982), moderate to strong genetic correlation between grain yield of microplots of various sizes and mean grain yields in replicated trials of spring wheat in Wageningen, The Netherlands, were obtained.

Strong associations were encountered at wide inter-row spacing than at narrow-row spacing, suggesting that the widening of inter-row spacing of micro plots may be advantageous. Again the other two selection criteria, biomass and harvest index of microplots, were not examined in their study and the influence of plant stature on the relationships of microplot grain yield and large plot grain yield, were not ascertained.

Sharma (1993) used short stature spring wheat genotypes and correlation between biomass of microplots at the F3 generation and grain yields of corresponding genotypes in replicated trials in the following year in Rampur, Nepal, under a production culture similar to that practiced in Zimbabwe. The correlated response was higher at a high productivity system. Sharma's 1993 study showed a negative relationship between biomass and harvest index. Grain mass and harvest index of microplots as selection criteria for high grain yield performance were not evaluated.

The evolution of the influence of plant stature on the relationship between biomass and harvest index of spaced plants with grain yield performance in replicated trials was attempted by McVetty and Evans (1980) in either tall or short stature groups of winter wheat cultivars. Harvest index of spaced plants was strongly correlated with grain yield among tall genotypes but biomass of spaced plants was effective among the short statured genotypes. Grain mass of spaced plants was not included as a selection criterion. More over the selection units were not in the form of microplots, but were spaced plants. It is evident that previous studies have not systematically and concurrently evaluated the effectiveness of the three morpho-physiological traits, biomass, grain mass (earmass) and harvest index (HI) of microplots, as selection criteria for high field crop grain yield performance for the purpose of establishing their relative selection efficiency. Plant stature appears to influence the nature and degree of correlated responses of grain yield to the different auxiliary traits in question. Hence, it is important to discriminate the relative selection efficiencies of the three criteria by plant height strata.

It is expected in the study that if the confounding effects of plant stature may be removed by stratifying populations into uniform plant height strata at the advanced stages of segregation, hill plot characters such as biomass, grain mass or HI, may be more reliable in their indications of grain yield potential of wheat genotypes. Further more, if the single ear progenies are propagated in wide rows and in ideal conditions of growth, characterized by uniform soils, uniform crop establishment and uniform moisture status, it is assumed that environmental component of variation in the expression of the three single ear-to-row progeny attributes, would be minimised.

Efficient utility of auxiliary traits as selection criteria for grain yield requires information on the mode of inheritance and inter-relationships of the selection traits and the responding trait in the actual environmental conditions intended for their application. Thus inheritance and mutual association studies on grain yield and the auxiliary traits used in this study should be conducted under the wheat production conditions of Zimbabwe.

The hypotheses tested in this study were:

1. The effectiveness of indirect selection for grain yield of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) using auxiliary triats; biomass, earmass and harvest index of single-ear progeny plots is similar in the three selection criteria and is not influenced by height of the plant.

2. The mode of inheritance of grain yield of spring wheat and those of its related traits; biomass, earmass, HI, number of productive tillers and plant height under the irrigated and heavily fertilized culture in Zimbabwe, are predominantly additive in expression and are environmentally stable.

The above hypotheses were tested by the following objectives:

1. To measure the direct selection response of grain yield of spring wheat genotypes in replicated trials at two locations.

2. To measure and discriminate the relative selection efficiencies of single-ear progeny traits; biomass, earmass and HI in the indirect selection for grain yield of wheat over different plant height strata.

3. To ascertain correlated responses to selection among the selection traits by measuring phenotypic and genotypic correlations among them.

4. To study the inheritance of grain yield and the related traits; biomass, earmass, HI, number of productive tillers and plant height, under Zimbabwean irrigated conditions over two locations.


The min-plus theory of greedy shapers has been developed after Cruz's results on the calculus of network delays. An example of greedy shaper is the buffered leaky bucket controller. The theory of greedy shapers establishes a number of properties; for example, re-shaping keeps original arrival constraints. The existing theory applies in all rigor either to fluid systems, or to packets of constant size such as ATM. For variable length packets, the distortion introduced by packetization affects the theory, which is no longer valid. Chang has introduced the concept of packetizer, which models the effect of variable length packets, and has also developed a max-plus theory of shapers. In this paper, we start with the min-plus theory, and obtain results on greedy shapers for variable length packets which are not readily explained with the max-plus theory of Chang. We show a fundamental result, namely, the min-plus representation of a packetized greedy shaper. This allows us to prove that, under some assumptions, re-shaping a flow of variable length packets does keep original arrival constraints. However, we show on some examples that if the assumptions are not satisfied, then the property may not hold any more. We also demonstrate the equivalence of implementing a buffered leaky bucket controller based on either virtual finish times or on bucket replenishment.


Global warming has resulted in the melting of glaciers in the southeastern region of Tibet. This study used the InSAR time series obtained from ALOS PALSAR data to investigate the melting glacier over Southeast Tibet during 2007 2010 with the small baseline subset (SBAS) technique. Additionally, GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) gravity field model issued by the Center for Space Research (CSR) was used to extract the equivalent water height (EWH) with the deduction of glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA). The results revealed that the monitoring results by InSAR were basically consistent with the EWHs from GRACE. The glacier deformation in the study area presents a downward trend overall. From the InSAR measurements, a 900km2 area within the belt subsided -1.6 cm yr-1 during 2007 2010, and the subsidence exceeded -24 cm yr-1 in some regions. On the other hand, as an auxiliary data source, the monitoring result of GRACE is large space scale and comprehensive, the rate is about -0.01 cm yr-1 from GRACE. With the variations of glacier shape obtained from MODIS (moderate-resolution imaging spectroradiometer) data, the changing rate of surface temperature was about 0.014°C yr-1. The surface temperature change is negatively correlated with the rate of the glacial subsidence with the correlation coefficient of -0.237, which reflects that the melting glacier is influenced by the temperature rising to a certain extent. Article history: Received 28 January 2018


The decision to become a teacher is a noble and rewarding choice but it presents individuals with many challenges. Trainee teachers are often overwhelmed by the amount of knowledge they are expected to acquire in order to be an effective teacher. Embedding eSkills in Initial Teacher Training (ITT) aims to alleviate one of the challenges - that of integrating the effective use of technology into their teaching. By embedding eSkills into the teacher training process it is possible to build confidence in teachers and help them feel comfortable with the technology, in turn enabling them to identify when and where to use technology to enhance the learning process, a vital skill in 21st century learning. This paper provides an overview of the eSkills programme and explains how it was embedded in ITT programmes.


As technology evolves and globalization continues, the need for reasonably priced roaming services has never been higher. In 2007, the European Commission (EC) introduced a first set of regulatory decisions to cap the maximal additional roaming fee end users have to pay for calling. In the years after, additional price caps have been introduced for SMS and data, initially only for end users, in a later stage also for the inter-operator tariff. The final step, named Roaming Like at Home (RLAH), will start to take effect in June 2017, from then end users will pay the same price (for voice, SMS and data) when roaming like in their domestic country. The effect of RLAH on the business case of each mobile operator is hard to predict, as the different national markets are extremely heterogeneous and operators face large discrepancies in terms of roaming usage due to different traveling patterns and various other reasons that cannot be harmonized (geography, economics, working force, usage history, etc.). Furthermore, competition in the telecom market will no longer be a purely national matter, as the decision to abolish roaming tariffs will expose operators to other players within Europe. This paper aims at providing insights in the effect of RLAH for both the end user as well as the mobile operators. Following a literature survey approach, including a detailed overview of the roaming regulation process from 2007 up to now, the paper discusses possible effects the RLAH initiative might trigger, going from lower wholesale prices for mobile operators to higher retail prices for end users. Additionally, as the European Commission strives for a single European market, this paper presents a number of technical solutions (carrier portability, software-based SIMs, cross-border IMSI) that pose an alternative for roaming and explains how these may impact cross-border competition both positively and negatively. The solutions are assessed against two axes: (1) generating the best possible outcome for the end customers (in all countries), and (2) ensuring the best level playing field for (virtual) mobile operators in Europe, which will of course involve tradeoffs on different levels.


### Clinical trials

In the past 2 years, a number of landmark clinical trials have been published which further our understanding and clinical management of patients with atrial fibrillation (AF). Two of the major goals in the treatment of this condition include reducing progression or recurrence of the arrhythmia and decreasing the risk of cardiovascular events, thereby improving quality of life and decreasing morbidity. Following on from a large body of evidence from preclinical studies, small clinical trials and meta-analyses suggesting that blockade of the renin–angiotensin system has beneficial effects on the pathophysiology of AF,1 two large multicentre, placebo-controlled, randomised trials were conducted to determine the effects of angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs) on AF.

The first of these trials, published in 2009, tested the hypothesis that the ARB valsartan could reduce the recurrence of AF in patients with underlying cardiovascular disease, diabetes or left atrial enlargement and a history of documented AF, in addition to established treatments.2 A total of 1442 patients were enrolled into the study—722 assigned to the valsartan group (target dose 320 mg) and 720 to the placebo group. The investigators found that treatment with valsartan had no significant effect on AF recurrence (AF recurrence 51.4% in the valsartan group and 52.1% in the placebo group, p=0.73) over a relatively short follow-up period of 1 year.

The second large ARB randomised controlled trial (RCT) published this year evaluated whether irbesartan would reduce the risk of cardiovascular events in patients with AF.3 Patients with a history of risk factors for stroke and a systolic blood pressure of at least 110 mm Hg were randomly assigned to receive either irbesartan (target dose of 300 mg once daily) or placebo. Patients for this study were already enrolled in one of two other AF trials looking at clopidogrel plus aspirin versus aspirin alone or versus oral …


The majority of all gas measurement used in the world today is performed by two basic types of meters, positive displacement and inferential. Positive displacement meters, consisting mainly of diaphragm and rotary style devices, generally account for lower volume measurement. Orifice, ultrasonic and turbine meters are the three main inferential class meters used for large volume measurement today. Turbines are typically considered to be a repeatable device used for accurate measurement over large and varying pressures and flow rates. They are found in a wide array of elevated pressure applications ranging from atmospheric conditions to 1440 psig. Turbine meters have also become established as master or reference meters used in secondary calibration systems such as transfer provers. A significant number of both mechanical and electrical outputs and configurations have become available over the past 50 years of production.


Testing is essential in developing a successful complex engineering product. System level integration and testing can use between 35% and 50% of development resources. External factors such as legislation and customer requirements drive essential testing whilst internal factors such company experience, affordability and organisational practice profoundly affect the overall testing plan. The main objective of this paper is to understand how testing is integrated into the product development process and how different types of testing are scheduled across the stages of product development. The paper reports a case study in a diesel engine company where the balance of virtual and physical testing is a key concern in reducing design time and cost. Integrating physical and virtual testing is more than process optimisation of time and cost. It contributes to recasting the design process in response to changes in customer requirements as well as to design changes which arise during testing. The importance of dependencies across components, subsystems and tests is highlighted using a model using design structure matrices and the advantages of integrating physical and virtual testing are analysed particularly in facilitating task overlap to reduce product development duration.


Immunoglobulin Cα gene encodes a constant region of heavy-chain of IgA antibody, and the hinge region is located between CH1 domain and CH2 domain. The hinge region functions to increase efficiency of antigen binding by varying distance between two antigen recognition sites. The constant region of IgA has been considered to be conservative, but we previously reported that immunoglobulin Cα genes of great apes showed evolutionary hypervariability mainly in the hinge region (Kawamura and others, 1990). To know whether this hypervariability is also the case among Old World monkeys, we carried out PCR-SSCP analysis for macaque, baboon, and leaf monkey. The result clearly showed evolutionary hypervariability in the hinge region among Old World monkeys. Adding to this inter-species variability, intra-species variabilities were also observed in multiple species such as rhesus macaque, crab-eating macaque, Assamese macaque, and hamadryas baboon. Furthermore, polymorphism was likely shared by multiple macaque species (trans-species polymorphism). These results suggest the indispensability of hypervariability in the hinge region for these animals. Some kind of positive selection, like the overdominance at the MHC loci (Klein and others, 1993) might be responsible for this hypervariability.


Background Simulation of adverse outcomes (SAO) has been described as a technique to improve effectiveness of root cause analysis (RCA) in healthcare. We hypothesise that SAO can effectively identify unsuspected root causes amenable to systems changes. Methods Systems changes were developed and tested for effectiveness in a modified simulation, which was performed eight times, recorded and analysed. Results In seven of eight simulations, systems changes were effectively utilised by participants, who contacted anaesthesia using the number list and telephone provided to express concern. In six of seven simulations where anaesthesia was contacted, they provided care that avoided the adverse event. In two simulations, the adverse event transpired despite implemented systems changes, but for different reasons than originally identified. In one case, appropriate personnel were contacted but did not provide the direction necessary to avoid the adverse event, and in one case, the telephone malfunctioned. Conclusions Systems changes suggested by SAO can effectively correct deficiencies and help improve outcomes, although adverse events can occur despite implementation. Further study of systems concepts may provide suggestions for changes that function more reliably in complex healthcare systems. The information gathered from these simulations can be used to identify potential deficiencies, prevent future errors and improve patient safety.


Modern Process Philosophy began when Alfred North Whitehead realized that existence is primarily vibratory, not points but processes. Vibrations are best understood as sound waves, or through using auditory metaphors rather than visual ones. Our Universe is more like music than matter, but how does this help us better understand it? In this paper I use the example of the large ocean current oscillators that help drive our climate systems to reveal the more effective nature of auditory approaches. Through an auditory approach, we can better understand the ways these oscillations constrain and interact with other levels of oscillations as well as how they might be destroyed by other levels. This can then lead to us extending our ethics to the conservation of these oscillations.


In this history of the black peasants of Amazonia, Oscar de la Torre focuses on the experience of African-descended people navigating the transition from slavery to freedom. He draws on social and environmental history to connect them intimately to the natural landscape and to Indigenous peoples. Relying on this world as a repository for traditions, discourses, and strategies that they retrieved especially in moments of conflict, Afro-Brazilians fought for autonomous communities and developed a vibrant ethnic identity that supported their struggles over labor, land, and citizenship. Prior to abolition, enslaved and escaped blacks found in the tropical forest a source for tools, weapons, and trade--but it was also a cultural storehouse within which they shaped their stories and records of confrontations with slaveowners and state authorities. After abolition, the black peasants' knowledge of local environments continued to be key to their aspirations, allowing them to maintain relationships with powerful patrons and to participate in the protest cycle that led Getúlio Vargas to the presidency of Brazil in 1930. In commonly referring to themselves by such names as "sons of the river," black Amazonians melded their agro-ecological traditions with their emergent identity as political stakeholders.


Polyethylene (PE) frits were used to quantify sulphur in copper and its alloys by isotope dilution combined with LA-ICP-MS as an alternative approach to conventional sample preparation: the copper samples were spiked, the spiked samples were dissolved, the resulting solutions were absorbed in the PE frits and finally the PE frits were analysed by LA-ICP-MS. A prerequisite for such a support material is a low sulphur blank and thus PE was selected for this purpose. The absorption efficiency of the PE frits was studied for varying sulphur amounts ranging from 2 μg S to 80 μg S showing that more than 99.5% of the loaded sulphur was absorbed by the frit. The so prepared PE frits were measured by LA-ICP-MS and yielded a good linearity (R2 = 0.999) for the sulphur ion intensities corresponding to sulphur amounts up to 40 μg S; the associated sensitivity is approximately 3.4 × 104 cps μg−1 for 32S. For the validation of the developed procedure the reference materials BAM-M376a, BAM-228 and BAM-227 were applied such that 2 μg S, 5 μg S and 11 μg S were absorbed in the PE frits, respectively. These samples were pre-quantified for the adsorbed sulphur amount by external calibration LA-ICP-MS yielding sulphur amounts of 0.9 μg, 5.1 μg and 8.5 μg (quantified for 32S only), respectively. Relative standard deviations of the isotope ratios were below 5% in average (n = 3 lines) in all cases (except for the pure spike solution). These samples were then analysed by LA-ICP-IDMS and the measurement results were validated by comparing them with the results obtained by conventional ICP-IDMS. The obtained relative expanded measurement uncertainties ranged between 10% and 26%. Pearson's coefficient was used to express the correlation between both techniques; the obtained value was 0.999 demonstrating a strong correlation. Contrary to most published LA-ICP-IDMS procedures, the developed procedure enables SI-traceability for the measurement results. The metrological traceability to the SI for the sulphur mass fractions in copper was established by an unbroken chain of comparisons, each accompanied by an uncertainty budget. Thus, the measurement results are considered reliable, acceptable and comparable within the stated measurement uncertainty. The metrological traceability chain from the kg down to mass fraction in the samples obtained by LA-ICP-IDMS is presented as well.


Abstract. This work proposes an approach for semantic classification of an outdoor-scene point cloud acquired with a high precision Mobile Mapping System (MMS), with major goal to contribute to the automatic creation of High Definition (HD) Maps. The automatic point labeling is achieved by utilizing the combination of a feature-based approach for semantic classification of point clouds and a deep learning approach for semantic segmentation of images. Both, point cloud data, as well as the data from a multi-camera system are used for gaining spatial information in an urban scene. Two types of classification applied for this task are: 1) Feature-based approach, in which the point cloud is organized into a supervoxel structure for capturing geometric characteristics of points. Several geometric features are then extracted for appropriate representation of the local geometry, followed by removing the effect of local tendency for each supervoxel to enhance the distinction between similar structures. And lastly, the Random Forests (RF) algorithm is applied in the classification phase, for assigning labels to supervoxels and therefore to points within them. 2) The deep learning approach is employed for semantic segmentation of MMS images of the same scene. To achieve this, an implementation of Pyramid Scene Parsing Network is used. Resulting segmented images with each pixel containing a class label are then projected onto the point cloud, enabling label assignment for each point. At the end, experiment results are presented from a complex urban scene and the performance of this method is evaluated on a manually labeled dataset, for the deep learning and feature-based classification individually, as well as for the result of the labels fusion. The achieved overall accuracy with fusioned output is 0.87 on the final test set, which significantly outperforms the results of individual methods on the same point cloud. The labeled data is published on the TUM-PF Semantic-Labeling-Benchmark.


Background: Altering target cell apoptosis is one of the challenging ideas of biotechnological applications. There are several applications of over expressing Bcl-xL anti-apoptotic protein from recombinant protein production to DNA vaccination strategies. The aim of the present study is to evaluate the anti-apoptotic efficacy of Bcl-xL expressing dual promoter plasmid system as a candidate to be used for recombinant protein production and DNA vaccination approaches. For this purpose, Bcl-xL anti-apoptotic protein gene was inserted in a dual expressing vector system in frame with EGFP (enhanced green fluorescence protein) after IRES (internal ribosomal site). The plasmid has a multiple cloning site after CMV (cytomegalovirus promoter) left empty to be inserted a biopharmaceutical protein gene region or DNA vaccine antigens. Results: In order to determine the anti-apoptotic efficacy of Bcl-xL inserted dual expressing vector, BHK-21 cells were transfected both with this plasmid and empty vector as control. Apoptosis was stimulated by several apoptosis inducing agents and serum deprivation in the transfected cells for 48 hrs. Cells expressing Bcl-xL protein in frame with EGFP were determined by flow cytometry as an indicator of cell viability. Additionally, apoptosis were determined by intracellular cleaved Casp 3 staining in Bcl-xL expressing EGFP positive cells. The dual expression plasmid bearing Bcl-xL anti-apoptotic protein prolonged the cell survival rate and protected cells from apoptosis upon apoptosis induction by doxorubicin and camptothecin in which the anti-apoptotic efficacies are inhibited through over expressing of Bcl-xL. pIRES2EGFP/Bcl-xL transfected cell ratio was significantly higher compared to empty vector transfected cells (P Conclusion: In conclusion, it was shown that in vitro transient expression of Bcl-xL efficiently inhibited apoptosis induced by serum deprivation, doxorubicin and camptothecin. Thus, the dual expression plasmid bearing Bcl-xL anti-apoptotic protein could be a good candidate for recombinant protein production and DNA vaccination applications.


The authors examined the level and structure of the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems-Circumplex version (IIP-C; L. M. Horowitz, L. E. Alden, J. S. Wiggins, & A. L. Pincus, 2000) before and after 20 sessions of acute-phase cognitive therapy for depression (N = 118), as well as associations with the Schedule for Nonadaptive and Adaptive Personality (L. A. Clark, 1993b) and the Social Adjustment Scale--Self-Report version (M. M. Weissman & S. Bothwell, 1976). Interpersonal problems had a 3-factor structure (Interpersonal Distress, Love, and Dominance), with the latter 2 factors approximating a circumplex, both before and after therapy. Interpersonal Distress decreased and social adjustment increased with therapy, but the Love and Dominance dimensions were relatively stable, similar to personality constructs. Social adjustment related negatively to Interpersonal Distress but not to Love or Dominance. Personality pathology related broadly to Interpersonal Distress and discriminantly to Love and Dominance. These findings support the reliability and validity of the IIP-C and are discussed in the context of personality theory and measurement.


Finance research suggests that firms cater to investors' time-varying preference for low-priced stocks by managing nominal share prices. We show that the existing empirical tests of such catering use highly persistent data that may lead to finding significant relations between variables that are actually independent (spurious regression bias). We revisit the catering hypothesis applying five estimation techniques that reduce the effects of data persistence. Adjusted for persistence, the data offer little evidence that stock splits respond to catering incentives. There is some, although mixed, evidence that catering incentives affect the firms' choice of the post-split prices and the IPO prices.


Rail track geometric irregularities are the concrete embodiment of track structure deterioration, and give an expression to the comprehensive performance of track members. Quality Index (TQI) could reflect the change of track geometry state. It is a time series changed with time. In this paper, the Gray-Weibull model is developed to model over TQI and compared with conventional non- equidistant GM (1,1) model. Effectiveness of the prediction model is validated by the actual data of Ning-Hang Line K219.2~K219.4 unit section. The results show that the Gray-Weibull model is with higher prediction accuracy, which guides the maintenance of railway track.


This paper investigates the geometrical properties of real world games (e.g. Tic-Tac-Toe, Go, StarCraft II). We hypothesise that their geometrical structure resemble a spinning top, with the upright axis representing transitive strength, and the radial axis, which corresponds to the number of cycles that exist at a particular transitive strength, representing the non-transitive dimension. We prove the existence of this geometry for a wide class of real world games, exposing their temporal nature. Additionally, we show that this unique structure also has consequences for learning - it clarifies why populations of strategies are necessary for training of agents, and how population size relates to the structure of the game. Finally, we empirically validate these claims by using a selection of nine real world two-player zero-sum symmetric games, showing 1) the spinning top structure is revealed and can be easily re-constructed by using a new method of Nash clustering to measure the interaction between transitive and cyclical strategy behaviour, and 2) the effect that population size has on the convergence in these games.


Current child support laws are based on false assumptions about families that fail to reflect family complexity and the realities of parenting. As a result, the federal goals of child support laws are not met. New federal child support goals should be centered on the needs of poor families and multiple families and should consider more of the resources available to the families. Multiple families are families where at least one existing parent has a child with a different partner. Federal child support laws ignore the way that children in multiple families compete for the limited resources of their parents. States lack guidance about how to choose between the two policy ways to allocate child support among families, "first family first" or "equalization." This Article argues that the federal government should provide guidance to the states in answering the question of who bears the cost of subsequent families; this article proposes a new theory of child support, "limited equalization," which makes an explicit policy choice in favor of existing families. Limited equalization includes five new child support goals: (1) an explicit policy choice about supporting multiple families giving a preference to existing families; (2) attention to the demographics of the families that need child support; (3) an expanded definition of parenting and the duty of support; (4) attention to poverty prevention; and (5) attention to gender equality. Limited equalization re-envisions the goals of child support and provides a mechanism to examine all of the circumstances and realities of the families in calculating child support awards. This major structural change attempts to address the complexities of child support, particularly in multiple families, while giving preference to existing families.


Technology doesn't flow smoothly; it's the big surprises that matter, and Yale computer expert David Gelernter sees one such giant leap right on the horizon. Today's small scale software programs are about to be joined by vast public software works that will revolutionize computing and transform society as a whole. One such vast program is the "Mirror World." Imagine looking at your computer screen and seeing reality--an image of your city, for instance, complete with moving traffic patterns, or a picture that sketches the state of an entire far-flung corporation at this second. These representations are called Mirror Worlds, and according to Gelernter they will soon be available to everyone. Mirror Worlds are high-tech voodoo dolls: by interacting with the images, you interact with reality. Indeed, Mirror Worlds will revolutionize the use of computers, transforming them from (mere) handy tools to crystal balls which will allow us to see the world more vividly and see into it more deeply. Reality will be replaced gradually, piece-by-piece, by a software imitation; we will live inside the imitation; and the surprising thing is--this will be a great humanistic advance. We gain control over our world, plus a huge new measure of insight and vision. In this fascinating book--part speculation, part explanation--Gelernter takes us on a tour of the computer technology of the near future. Mirror Worlds, he contends, will allow us to explore the world in unprecedented depth and detail without ever changing out of our pajamas. A hospital administrator might wander through an entire medical complex via a desktop computer. Any citizen might explore the performance of the local schools, chat electronically with teachers and other Mirror World visitors, plant software agents to report back on interesting topics; decide to run for the local school board, hire a campaign manager, and conduct the better part of the campaign itself--all by interacting with the Mirror World. Gelernter doesn't just speculate about how this amazing new software will be used--he shows us how it will be made, explaining carefully and in detail how to build a Mirror World using technology already available. We learn about "disembodied machines," "trellises," "ensembles," and other computer components which sound obscure, but which Gelernter explains using familiar metaphors and terms. (He tells us that a Mirror World is a microcosm just like a Japanese garden or a Gothic cathedral, and that a computer program is translated by the computer in the same way a symphony is translated by a violinist into music.) Mirror Worlds offers a lucid and humanistic account of the coming software revolution, told by a computer scientist at the cutting edge of his field.


This page contains information about cleanups in Texas, including Brownfields, Land Revitalization, Superfund Redevelopment Initiative, RCRA cleanups, and Superfund Sites.


HISTORICAL OVERVIEW Historically, African American nurses have had three strikes against them. They were Black, female and in a profession still striving for equality and respect within the medical community. The quest for respect and acceptance has been an uphill battle all the way, but fortunately things are moving in the right direction. The history of nursing in America as taught in our schools usually begins with the story of Florence Nightingale and her assistants during the Crimean War. But women of all cultures have nursed the sick from time immemorial. Nursing was simply another aspect of family life. If by chance one became particularly adept at the task, word of these skills became known throughout the community and that person was called upon in special circumstances. When I attended nursing school during the 1950's, the history and struggles of Black nurses were accorded a few pages, if any at all, in most texts. According to Althea Davis in her book, Early Black American Leaders in Nursing: (2) Nursing history as presented in the past taught only selected aspects of nursing history while excluding Black nursing leaders and Black nurses experience, as evidenced in nursing history texts. On rare occasions these texts included fleeting attention to or inaccurate information about Black nurses. But nurse historians and historians have begun to fill the void. Over time as values changed and legislation was enacted, nursing texts began to include a broader and more enlightened scope of information about the Black nurse and her struggle for acceptance into the larger professional medical community. Nevertheless, the history of Black nurses cannot be told in isolation, since cultural values of the time heavily impacted the struggle. In 1776, the statement by our founding fathers, "all men are created equal," did not apply to women. For most of the 19th century wives were considered little more than property. Women were considered unsuitable for intellectual pursuits, thus marriage and childbearing were deemed their primary function. Females of the time had few options, and were denied the right to vote until passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920. (3) LEGISLATION AND BLACK AMERICANS The Black population of slaves, however, had no rights at all. Indeed in the Dred-Scott decision of 1857, the Supreme Court held that Blacks were not citizens of the United States and thus were not entitled to enjoy constitutional rights. Later, for purposes of determining the number of legislators each state could send to the House of Representatives, the Constitution in 1787, declared a slave as 3/5 a person. (4) During Reconstruction, however, the Fourteenth Amendment (1868) extended citizenship to African Americans with governmental protection. But that promise was negated with the Supreme Court decision of Plessy v. Ferguson, which stated the principle of "separate but equal" did not violate the Constitution. This decision forced African Americans to remain second-class citizens by allowing the South to continue to enforce segregation by law in schools, housing, jobs, transportation, public parks, and public hospitals. After Plessy, the rights of Blacks were placed at the mercy of state governments for the next fifty years. (5) CARE OF THE SICK Nursing during early times was simply the care of the sick by family members, or by slaves in the South. Some religious orders assumed that burden as their calling, specifically the Sisters of Mercy, who had charge of Illinois' first hospital in 1849. (6) By and large, however, before the turn of the century "nurses," both Black and White, were untrained. Their care consisted of comfort measures, poultices and wraps of heat and cold plus the compounding of herbs and potions to help their patients. …


We define the class of games called simulation-based games, in which the payoffs are available as an output of an oracle (simulator), rather than specified analytically or using a payoff matrix. We then describe a convergent algorithm based on a hierarchical application of simulated annealing for estimating Nash equilibria in simulation-based games with finite-dimensional strategy sets. Additionally, we present alternative algorithms for best response and Nash equilibrium estimation, with a particular focus on one-shot infinite games of incomplete information. Our experimental results demonstrate that all the approaches we introduce are efficacious, albeit some more so than others. We show, for example, that while iterative best response dynamics has relatively weak convergence guarantees, it outperforms our convergent method experimentally. Additionally, we provide considerable evidence that a method based on random search outperforms gradient descent in our setting.