Motor actions are preceded by an efference copy of the motor command, resulting in a corollary discharge of the expected sensation in sensory cortex. These mechanisms allow animals to predict sensations, suppress responses to self-generated sensations, and thereby process sensations efficiently and economically. During talking, patients with schizophrenia show less evidence of pretalking activity and less suppression of the speech sound, consistent with dysfunction of efference copy and corollary discharge, respectively. We asked if patterns seen in talking would generalize to pressing a button to hear a tone, a paradigm translatable to less vocal animals. In 26 patients [23 schizophrenia, 3 schizoaffective (SZ)] and 22 healthy controls (HC), suppression of the N1 component of the auditory event–related potential was estimated by comparing N1 to tones delivered by button presses and N1 to those tones played back. The lateralized readiness potential (LRP) associated with the motor plan preceding presses to deliver tones was estimated by comparing right and left hemispheres' neural activity. The relationship between N1 suppression and LRP amplitude was assessed. LRP preceding button presses to deliver tones was larger in HC than SZ, as was N1 suppression. LRP amplitude and N1 suppression were correlated in both groups, suggesting stronger efference copies are associated with stronger corollary discharges. SZ have reduced N1 suppression, reflecting corollary discharge action, and smaller LRPs preceding button presses to deliver tones, reflecting the efference copy of the motor plan. Effects seen during vocalization largely extend to other motor acts more translatable to lab animals.


Equal opportunity ('EO') policy, practice and legislation has existed for a long time in the UK. Diversity Management ('DM'), seeing diverse workforces as a competitive strength, covering everyone in the workforce, being more gender neutral and inclusive of those traditionally excluded from organisations, has also come to the fore. However, discrimination within companies continues. Amongst the groups most affected are women, those from a BME background, and disabled people.
This thesis draws on an analytical framework that enables a holistic approach to studying the links between voice and EO and DM policies. This thesis incorporates four main types of voice workplace – minimal voice, dual voice, direct voice and indirect voice. It also disaggregates two of these four main types of voice workplace. Within the minimal voice category, this thesis distinguishes between the 'bleak house' approach and the 'limited approach' and within the dual voice category, this research differentiates between the 'co-existence approach' and the 'partnership approach'. This enables this thesis to take a fine grained analytical approach of the links between voice and EO and DM policies, as well as the links between EO and DM and workplace outcomes, measured by absenteeism and voluntary labour turnover (quits), on the other, within the various types of voice workplace. Voice is relevant to the debate because it hasn't been explored before and they could be an important means to covey employees preferences to employers, and can therefore potentially help to explain variation in the uptake of EO and DM in different workplaces.
To ensure that the results of this research reveal the attitude of workplaces to EO and DM policies this thesis will analyse EO and DM policies at a disaggregated level, covering not only a more diverse set EO and DM policies, but also examining a range of workplaces, not only large organisations, as previous studies have often done. The study focuses on three groups that are commonly discriminated against: women, BME groups and those with a disability. Such discrimination can take direct and indirect forms, therefore, policies monitoring recruitment and selection, and promotions for direct and indirect discrimination, and relative pay rates will be examined, for each of the three groups.
This study draws on data from the 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS 2011), the largest, most comprehensive study of workplace practices in the UK. The survey covers EO and DM policies in detail, enabling a nuanced analysis of both the voice factors and the workplace outcomes that they may be associated with. The thesis relies on the management survey in order to capture as many workplaces as possible. The analysis of the data relies on logistic regressions, as the outcome variables in both sets of regressions are dichotomous.
The first key finding from this research is that voice is associated with the greater adoption of EO and DM policies in workplace: the more voice a workplace has the more likely it is to have a range of EO and DM policies. For instance, workplaces with direct voice, indirect voice, and dual voice are more likely to have a range of policies compared to those workplaces with minimal voice. In addition, dual voice workplaces are frequently more likely to adopt EO and DM policies compared to all other types of workplace.
The second key finding of this research is that EO and DM policies are, on the whole, not associated with higher or lower levels of absenteeism and quits, indicating that, in most instances, EO and DM neither help nor harm establishments to any great degree. This suggests that existing theories could be amended.
The third important finding is that any statistically significant associations between EO and DM policies, on the one hand, and absenteeism and quits, on the other, depend upon the type of workplace within which the policies operate. For instance, the relationship between policies and outcomes is sometimes positive and statistically significant (albeit often only at the 10-per-cent level) amongst minimal voice workplaces. It is occasionally negative and statistically significant (at the one-per-cent level) amongst dual voice workplaces. This justifies the approach taken here; it also highlights key areas for future research.
The fourth key finding of this research is that there is a connection between high levels of labour turnover, amongst minimal voice workplaces, and the use of EO and DM policies. Again, this highlights areas that future research could examine.


Exosomes are enclosed compartments that are released from cells and that can transport biological contents for the purpose of intercellular communications. Research into exosomes is hindered by their rarity. In this article, we introduce a device that uses centrifugal force and a filter with micro-sized pores to generate a large quantity of cell-derived nanovesicles. The device has a simple polycarbonate structure to hold the filter, and operates in a common centrifuge. Nanovesicles are similar in size and membrane structure to exosomes. Nanovesicles contain intracellular RNAs ranging from microRNA to mRNA, intracellular proteins, and plasma membrane proteins. The quantity of nanovesicles produced using the device is 250 times the quantity of naturally secreted exosomes. Also, the quantity of intracellular contents in nanovesicles is twice that in exosomes. Nanovesicles generated from murine embryonic stem cells can transfer RNAs to target cells. Therefore, this novel device and the nanovesicles that it generates are expected to be used in exosome-related research, and can be applied in various applications such as drug delivery and cell-based therapy.


Turbot (Scophthalmus maximus) is a high value fish that is much favoured in many market segments such as white tablecloth restaurants. Aquaculture of turbot started first in Scotland in the 1970s, but from the early 1980s the expansion in production volume and number of farms took place in Galicia, Spain. Still the main production takes place in Galicia with modest culture in France, Portugal, Denmark, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Norway and Wales. This picture may change due to plans for substantial expansion of production in Portugal. As a consequence, aquaculture's share of the market will dominate compared to the contribution from the wild fishery. The purpose of this report is to analyse current developments and make a forecast of future trends in turbot production and markets. There are important developments in farming technology that may impact on future supply and cost of production. On this background, we will analyse the future sustainability of turbot farming from a technological as well as economic point of view. Acknowledgement We are grateful to Dr. Jose Manuel Fernandez Polanco for valuable assistance.


This study investigates how categorization of food is formed around participants' experiences in their daily lives in spontaneous face-to-face conversations between Japanese native speakers. Building on previous studies on categorization in conversation analysis and cognitive psychology, this study examines how participants collaboratively share, negotiate, and create categories through talk about familiar and unfamiliar food in the emerging interaction. The analyses demonstrate that participants deploy socio-culturally categorized food in order to co-construct their temporal/ spatial concepts, identity, and personal/ social events, and that they utilize categorized food in order to achieve mutual understanding on unfamiliar food in talk-in-interaction. This study sheds light on the cognitive and interactional processes involved in the activity of categorization for group solidarity through conversational practices in social interaction.


The histogram is widely used as a simple, exploratory way of displaying data, but it is usually not clear how to choose the number and size of the bins. We construct a confidence set of distribution functions that optimally deal with the two main tasks of the histogram: estimating probabilities and detecting features such as increases and modes in the distribution. We define the essential histogram as the histogram in the confidence set with the fewest bins. Thus the essential histogram is the simplest visualization of the data that optimally achieves the main tasks of the histogram. The only assumption we make is that the data are independent and identically distributed. We provide a fast algorithm for computing the essential histogram and illustrate our method with examples.


This work studies the experiences, challenges, and strategies of people with dyslexia when using social media. We interviewed 11 people with dyslexia to understand their gen- eral experiences with reading and writing content on Facebook. The interview study findings highlight the challenges they face when writing content on Social Networking Sites (SNSs), and their strategies for mitigating these challenges. Following up on this, we surveyed 492 participants, among whom 67 self-reported as having dyslexia. The survey results confirm challenges with and strategies for writing unique to people with dyslexia, although they also suggest that better writing support on SNSs may be more broadly beneficial.


Section 1983, enacted in 1871, famously provides a damages remedy against state and local government officials and local governments for violations of constitutional rights. But it was only in 1951, in the seminal decision of Tenney v. Brandhove, a legislative immunity case involving an admitted Communist, that the Supreme Court for the first time expressly interpreted the language of section 1983. Ten years later, in 1961, the Court handed down another seminal section 1983 decision: Monroe v. Pape involved a section 1983 claim brought by an African-American alleging police misconduct. Both cases pitted two influential Supreme Court justices and FDR appointees, Felix Frankfurter and William Douglas, against one another in majority and dissenting opinions. Justice Frankfurter was an unremitting advocate of federalism, deference to politically accountable bodies, and judicial restraint. In contrast, Justice Douglas was an ardent proponent of individual rights who had relatively little concern for federalism.I tell of the birth of section 1983 jurisprudence through the stories of these two cases. Their stories are contained in the papers of Justices Frankfurter and Douglas and in their majority and dissenting opinions. They are also contained in the parties' petitions for certiorari and briefs and in Monroe's oral argument. Finally, these stories can only be understood against the background of the political and social settings in which Tenney and Monroe arose. The Cold War and anti-Communist sentiment situate Tenney while the Civil Rights movement and the post-Brown era situate Monroe.These stories are of interest both to section 1983 scholars and to historians of civil rights and constitutional law. First, Justice Frankfurter played an outsized role in both decisions. Second, these decisions demonstrate that the early and deep tension between individual rights and federalism — a tension that began with the Fourteenth Amendment and continues to this day — was present at the very beginning of the development of the Supreme Court's section 1983 jurisprudence. The certiorari petitions and briefs in these cases and the oral argument in Monroe also articulate this tension. Finally, the different political and social contexts in which Tenney and Monroe were decided illuminate the decisions themselves.


"Belgian-Moroccan Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and British-Bengali Akram Khan are two of today's most prolific choreographers. Given their respective backgrounds and the practices they pursue, their artistic universes are largely built around their identity in-between dance cultures. Guy Cools who accompanied both, situates their work within the larger critical debate on the (post)modern and (post-)migrant identity. Cools details some of their iconic choreographic pieces. In-Between Dance Cultures offers a complementary view on questions of cultural identity taking the contemporary dancer's somatic awareness and knowledge of the body as its starting point" -- Publisher's website.


The Sellmeier equation has been slightly modified to describe the drum position as a function of frequency for a Littrow type prism spectrometer. A widely available IBM Share program in Fortran II can be quickly and easily adapted to fit calibration data to this equation. The program provides a least-squares estimate of the constants in the equation when two of the constants, the curve asymptotes, are moderately well estimated. When this method was applied to a thermostated Perkin-Elmer model 99 double-pass monochromator, the resulting standard deviation sigma between data points and computed points was only slightly larger than reading repeatability. Prisms used were SiO(2), CaF(2), NaCl, KBr, and CsBr. The best fit was obtained for NaCl with sigma = 0.25 drum numbers between 1.4 micro and 13.7 micro. The maximum sigma obtained was 0.72 drum numbers for KBr in the 10-22 micro range, which corresponds to a standard deviation in wavelength of 0.01 micro. Using the calculated dispersion constan, a second program prints a table of drum numbers vs wavelength and wavenumber at intervals as small as the error in the fit will allow. This table is an accurate and convenient substitute for the wavelength calibration graph.


Economic adjustment to trade and policy shocks is hampered by the fact that some sectors tend to cluster, so are hard to initiate in new places. This can give rise to persistent spatial disparities between cities within a country. The paper sets out a two-sector model in which cities divide into those producing tradable goods or services subject to agglomeration economies, and those only producing non-tradables for the national market. If import competition destroys some established tradable sectors, then affected cities fail to attract new tradable activities and switch to just produce non-tradables. Full employment is maintained (we assume perfect markets and price flexibility) but disparities between the two types of cities are increased. All non-tradable cities experience real income loss, while remaining tradable cities boom. The main beneficiaries are land-owners in remaining tradable cities, but there may be aggregate loss as the country ends up with too many cities producing non-tradables, and too few with internationally competitive activities. Fiscal policy has opposite effects in the two types of cities, with fiscal contraction causing decline in cities producing non-tradables, increasing activity in cities producing tradable goods, widening spatial disparities, and in the process increasing the share of rent in the economy.


The guidance is for all those who have a role in promoting the quality of life (that is, the physical health, and social, educational and emotional wellbeing) of looked-after children and young people. This includes directors of childrenâ?Ts services, directors of public health, people who commission and provide health and social care services, social workers, carers (including foster carers), healthcare workers, staff in independent and voluntary agencies, schools, colleges and universities, and organisations that train professionals and inspect services. The guidance may also be of interest to looked-after children and young people, their families, prospective adopters and other members of the public. The focus of the guidance is on how organisations, professionals and carers can work together to help looked-after children and young people reach their full potential and enjoy the same opportunities in life as their peers. The recommendations cover local strategy and commissioning, multi-agency working, care planning and placements, and timely access to appropriate health and mental health services. In particular, they aim to: â?¢ promote stable placements and nurturing relationships â?¢ support the full range of placements, including with family and friends â?¢ encourage educational achievement â?¢ support the transition to independent living â?¢ meet the particular needs of looked-after children and young people, including those from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, unaccompanied asylum seekers, and those who have disabilities â?¢ places looked-after children and young people at the heart of decision making.


Broadband electromagnetic frequency or time domain sensor techniques present high potential for quantitative water content monitoring in porous media. Prior to in situ application, the impact of the relationship between the broadband electromagnetic properties of the porous material (clay-rock) and the water content on the frequency or time domain sensor response is required. For this purpose, dielectric properties of intact clay rock samples experimental determined in the frequency range from 1 MHz to 10 GHz were used as input data in 3-D numerical frequency domain finite element field calculations to model the one port broadband frequency or time domain transfer function for a three rods based sensor embedded in the clay-rock. The sensor response in terms of the reflection factor was analyzed in time domain with classical travel time analysis in combination with an empirical model according to Topp equation, as well as the theoretical Lichtenecker and Rother model (LRM) to estimate the volumetric water content. The mixture equation considering the appropriate porosity of the investigated material provide a practical and efficient approach for water content estimation based on classical travel time analysis with the onset-method. The inflection method is not recommended for water content estimation in electrical dispersive and absorptive material. Moreover, the results clearly indicate that effects due to coupling of the sensor to the material cannot be neglected. Coupling problems caused by an air gap lead to dramatic effects on water content estimation, even for submillimeter gaps. Thus, the quantitative determination of the in situ water content requires careful sensor installation in order to reach a perfect probe clay rock coupling.


The Paris Climate Agreement calls for decarbonization of the economy in the second half of this century. This requires a radical redirection and acceleration of technological change towards lowand particularly zero-carbon solutions. Global carbon pricing is seen as a key enabler for such decarbonization, with the European Union's Emission Trading System (EU ETS) serving as an important pillar. In this paper, I therefore review the evidence on the innovation impact of the EU ETS. The review shows a very limited effect of the scheme on technological innovation, but there are clear signs of it having stimulated organizational innovation, with the impact being more pronounced for the electricity sector than for industry. The initially high expectations of the EU ETS regarding technological innovation largely dissipated once the scheme's lack of stringency became apparent and prices collapsed accordingly. Also, for many of the rather incremental innovations that have taken place, the EU ETS was shown to be only one contributing factor among others, with the broader policy mix and long-term targets playing a particularly pivotal role in stimulating innovation. In contrast, there is clear evidence that the EU ETS has been a key driver of various organizational innovations, including making climate change a top management issue. However, so far, these organizational innovations have only had limited effects on shifting corporate strategies towards low-carbon solutions because of low carbon prices, the relatively high share of free allocations in industry, and more pressing business concerns. Despite this, the scheme's positive impact on organizational innovations should not be underestimated, as these constitute a necessary precondition for future technological innovations. The findings suggest that the Commission's proposal for the fourth trading period of the EU ETS points in the right direction, but further efforts will be needed to significantly increase the scarcity of EU allowances and the share of auctioning in order to fully unleash the scheme's transformative power. If the identified shortcomings are not addressed, the EU ETS cannot play its foreseen role in guiding the decarbonization of the European economy, for which innovations in low-carbon solutions are a fundamental requirement. JEL: O31, O38, Q54, Q55, Q58


Mobility support for users and devices, such as sensors, connecting to the Internet is a continuously growing trend. Different types of wireless networking technologies like WiFi, LTE, and ZigBee are available, creating a heterogeneous wireless networking environment. In general, the technology, ranging from network equipment to communications protocols, available today, tends to be designed with limited exibility when it comes to supporting heterogeneity. Proprietary technology and highly optimized mechanisms limit the potential use of networking infrastructure for multiple purposes. Supporting mobility for wireless devices between different networking technologies and administrative domains requires secure and scalable mobility management solutions. Current research in the field of mobility management and security in heterogeneous networking environment tends to handle mobility management performance, such as communications characteristics, and security related aspects as separate, and more or less mutuallyexclusive. The work presented in this thesis serves to challenge this trade-off and proposes solutions that seeks to brigde the gap between the two areas. This thesis proposes using an Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA) system based on the RADIUS AAA protocol that enables a common AAA infrastructure to operate in a heterogeneous networking environment, and that enables a hierarchical interconnection structure between service providers. The proposed AAA architecture offers a highly scalable AAA infrastructure with access technology independent support for user and device authentication as well as mobility on a global scale. Further, to support handoffs between networks, a set of methods for facilitating improved handoff decisions for intra- and inter-operator mobility in heterogeneous networks are presented. These methods rely on metrics that include indicators on network load conditions to improve service stability and decrease application down time during handoff. Results show that the proposed AAA infrastructure can be built to scale in order to support a very large number of entities, more than 1000 user or device authentications per second, using industry standard hardware. Further, an AAA architecture compatible sensor authentication protocol is proposed, implemented, and validated that supports sensor mobility and reduces power consumption, on wireless sensor nodes, with 33% compared to state-of-the-art protocols by reducing CPU and communications overhead. Using the proposed mechanism for facilitating handos in wireless sensor networks, a reduction of 44% in packet loss is achived during a mobility session compared to a traditional solution.


This report discusses how policymakers should deal with economic distortions on the cost-side of cost-benefit analysis in the area of environmental policies, and assesses the existing Nordic guideline recommendations. The two types of economic distortions are distortions to product markets, which are almost by definition tied to environmental policy interventions, and distortions to labour supply decisions. Drawing on best practices from the literature, we formulate a number of key principles useful for assessing the impact on labour supply decisions and welfare on product markets from policy interventions. Four analytical examples are included to illustrate the importance of these principles for the correct quantification of distortionary impacts, especially the importance of taking into account pre-existing policy induced distortions.


Superconducting magnets wound with second-generation high-temperature superconductors, i.e., REBa2Cu3O7–x (REBCO, RE = Rare Earth) tapes, are desired to apply high magnetic field nuclear magnetic resonance, MRI, and accelerators. However, a major problem for practical application is an undesirable irregular magnetic field caused by screening currents induced in REBCO tapes. To investigate the screening current-induced magnetic field, a few simulation methods have been proposed. One of the effective simulation methods employs a finite-element method with a thin approximation method. Although the thin approximation method was developed to simulate eddy currents in magnetic steel sheets, and it is not applicable to REBCO tapes carrying a transport current. Therefore, the thin approximation method is extended to simulate screening currents in REBCO tapes considering a carrying transport current. To show the validity of the proposed extended thin approximation method, the screening currents of an REBCO magnet are computed, and the results are compared with the measurement and simulation results of the conventional thin approximation method. The more accurate solution is available by using the proposed methods.


Although increasing globalizations spurred rapid industrialization in Malaysia, this article shows that the lack of significant technological upgrading and structural change has caused the premature plateauing of manufacturing, stemming from failures to coordinate policies, enforce standards, sustain high productivity growth and stimulate transition to higher value-added activities. Manufacturing as a whole has registered slow wage growth since the late 1990s, with labour markets characterized by heavy presence of low-skilled foreign workers, increased contract labour and outsourcing and declining worker organization. The focus on perspiration-based low-skilled foreign labour rather than on expanding professional and skilled labour has driven Malaysia down the low industrialization road. The Malaysian experience reflects a case of manufacturing's importance and direct contribution to the economy contracting before recording high levels of value added and sustained productivity growth, and with labour market practices constraining instead of facilitating positive change.


The low-power Internet of Things (IoT) introduces lossy radio links with ultra-constrained frame sizes and high transmission cost for each byte. Information Centric Networking (ICN) is considered a promising communication technology in this regime, as it increases reliability by ubiquitous caching and eases transmission efforts by hop-wise forwarding. Common ICN layers such as NDN, however, were designed for fixed network infrastructure and require an adaptation layer to the constrained wireless—as the common Internet Protocol does. In this paper, we design and evaluate such an ICN convergence layer for low power lossy links that (1) augments the NDN stateful forwarding plane with a highly efficient name eliding, (2) devises stateless compression schemes for standard NDN use cases with utile data encodings, (3) adapts NDN packets to the small MTU size of IEEE 802.15.4, and (4) generates compatibility with 6LoWPAN so that IPv6 and NDN can coexist on the same LoWPAN links. Our findings indicate that stateful compression can reduce the size of NDN data packets by more than 70 % in realistic examples, while packet fragmentation operates in a predictable way even for high fragment numbers. Our experiments show that for common use cases ICNLoWPAN saves 33 % of transmission resources over NDN, and about 20 % over 6LoWPAN.


Considering the high incidence of poverty and food insecurity among Malawi's rural population, agricultural input subsidies can be seen in part as a social protection instrument, improving accessibility and availability of food for vulnerable groups. However, questions about the sustainability of the Farm Input Subsidy Programme (FISP) have been raised since its introduction in 2005/06. Some have argued that with limited public resources and other competing needs of development, subsidisation of farm inputs for a food staple may not be the best use of scarce resources, justifying calls for an exit strategy. Others, however, describe the subsidy as a good thing insofar as it addresses chronic food insecurity in Malawi and contributes to inclusive economic growth and poverty reduction.


In the wake of Europe's evolving social landscape of family life, the European Court of Human Rights' (ECtHR) decision in Van der Heijden v. Netherlands sheds light on the scope of spousal privilege. The ECtHR found that the Netherlands' interference in Van der Heijden's nontraditional family life did not violate her Article 8 right guaranteed by the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms . In its decision, the ECtHR upheld the formal limits of Dutch spousal privilege even though it did not protect Van der Heijden in her de facto relationship with the accused. Despite the contentious split on the court, the ECtHR reached the correct result and properly embraced family form over function in this clash between criminal procedural law and informal Dutch family lifestyle. The ECtHR adopted a formalistic approach that departs from prior Article 8 case law, although, in this case it was justified because a criminal prosecution was at stake. This Comment asserts that the court's reasoning was appropriate in light of the margin of appreciation doctrine, the criminal context, and the letter and spirit of


This article was originally published in Encyclopedia of Analytical Science, published by Elsevier, and the attached copy is provided by Elsevier for the author's benefit and for the benefit of the author's institution, for non-commercial research and educational use including without limitation use in instruction at your institution, sending it to specific colleagues who you know, and providing a copy to your institution's administrator.


Assertions are helpful in program analysis, such as software testing and verification. The most challenging part of automatically recommending assertions is to design the assertion patterns and to insert assertions in proper locations. In this paper, we develop Weak-Assert, a weakness-oriented assertion recommendation toolkit for program analysis of C code. A weakness-oriented assertion is an assertion which can help to find potential program weaknesses. Weak-Assert uses well-designed patterns to match the abstract syntax trees of source code automatically. It collects significant messages from trees and inserts assertions into proper locations of programs. These assertions can be checked by using program analysis techniques. The experiments are set up on Juliet test suite and several actual projects in Github. Experimental results show that Weak-Assert helps to find 125 program weaknesses in 26 actual projects. These weaknesses are confirmed manually to be triggered by some test cases.


Chrome‐spinel grains from the fossil ungrouped achondrite Österplana 065 (Öst 065) recovered from Middle Ordovician limestone in Sweden were studied using Raman spectroscopy and TEM. All the studied chrome‐spinel grains have a high density of planar fractures and planar features, not seen in chromites from the other L chondritic Ordovician fossil meteorites. Raman spectra of the host chrome‐spinel grain and its planar features are similar and no signatures of high‐pressure phases of chromite were found. The planar features occur along planar fractures, are enriched in ZnO, and are most probably produced due to enhanced leaching during terrestrial weathering in the marine sediment. Dislocation densities within two FIB sections prepared from two chrome‐spinel grains from Öst 065 are similar to the dislocation densities found within chromite grains from the matrix of Tenham L6 chondrite. Using this observation and taking into account the presence of significant fracturing in all the grains, we conclude that the Öst 065 chrome‐spinel grains were subjected to moderate to very strong shock corresponding to shock stages of S4–S6. This makes Öst 065 fossil achondrite the highest shocked fossil meteorite studied so far. This is consistent with the hypothesis that Öst 065 is a piece of the impactor that led to the L chondrite parent body breakup.


We present a method to acquire dynamic properties of facial skin appearance, including dynamic diffuse albedo encoding blood flow, dynamic specular intensity, and per-frame high resolution normal maps for a facial performance sequence. The method reconstructs these maps from a purely passive multi-camera setup, without the need for polarization or requiring temporally multiplexed illumination. Hence, it is very well suited for integration with existing passive systems for facial performance capture. To solve this seemingly underconstrained problem, we demonstrate that albedo dynamics during a facial performance can be modeled as a combination of: (1) a static, high-resolution base albedo map, modeling full skin pigmentation; and (2) a dynamic, one-dimensional component in the CIE L*a*b* color space, which explains changes in hemoglobin concentration due to blood flow. We leverage this albedo subspace and additional constraints on appearance and surface geometry to also estimate specular reflection parameters and resolve high-resolution normal maps with unprecedented detail in a passive capture system. These constraints are built into an inverse rendering framework that minimizes the difference of the rendered face to the captured images, incorporating constraints from multiple views for every texel on the face. The presented method is the first system capable of capturing high-quality dynamic appearance maps at full resolution and video framerates, providing a major step forward in the area of facial appearance acquisition.


Selecting the most appropriate advertising media is usually difficult for small businesses. The normal objective is to reach potential customers using the most cost-effective methods available. Jackson and Parasuraman (1988) note that small firms confronted with competition and cost pressures generally have limited financial and professional resources. Therefore, promotional decisions are commonly influenced by the firm's target audience, available advertising media, and financial resources (Vaccaro and Kassaye 1988). Typically, small retail firms place their advertising emphasis on newspaper and yellow page ads, with occasional use of radio and television advertising. The high costs of production and air time tend to make electronic media ads prohibitive for many small businesses. Trade shows have also been shown to allow small firms to effectively compete with large firms and have personal contact with their customers at a relatively low cost per contact (Brunning and Adams 1988). The general purpose of this article is to extend prior research regarding advertising media utilization. Little is known about the effectiveness of various advertising media (Vaccaro and Kassaye 1988), partly because it is generally difficult to measure (Belch and Belch 1990). Therefore, this article focuses on perceptions of effectiveness of various advertising media and uses multiple regression techniques to identify possible salient determinants of that perceived effectiveness. SAMPLE AND METHODOLOGY The initial sample of 375 firms was drawn from businesses listed in the 1987 Iowa Business Directory. Half of the sample was drawn from small towns (with populations of less than 10,000), and half was drawn from larger towns (with populations of more than 10,000). To ensure geographic diversity, the sample was further portioned by dividing Iowa into four quadrants and selecting one-fourth of the sample from each quadrant. A proportionate random sample from representative small and large towns also was drawn from each quadrant. The sample provided a representative cross-section of small Iowa businesses. A questionnaire was developed and pretested in June 1987. The first mailing was sent in early July, 1987; and a follow-up mailing was distributed in late July, 1987. A total of 132 usable questionnaires were returned, providing a response rate of 35.2 percent. The survey collected information on firm demographics, such as years in operation, size of market served (local, regional, national, international), type of ownership structure (sole proprietor, partnership, corporation), total capitalization, type of business (retail, service, and other), and size of local community. Respondents also were asked to rank, in terms of severity, problems they experienced during their first and most recent years of operation. These problems included establishing market identity, advertising, cash flow, personnel, bookkeeping, inventory, short-term debt, long-term debt, and supplier relationships. Finally, each respondent was asked to indicate and rank, in terms of effectiveness, the advertising media used during their firm's first and most recent year of operation (television, radio, newspaper, participation in community events, word-of-mouth/referrals, flyers, telephone directory). Given that most small businesses serve diverse markets and are confronted with a variety of problems, similar firms were expected to have some common problems, one of which was effective use of available advertising media. It was further expected that the types of advertising media used would change over time, in response to changing markets, resource availability, relationships with media salespeople, etc. The sample was initially subdivided into three groups (retail, service, and other). The percentage of firms using each type of advertising media was tabulated for each group. These percentages were calculated for each firm's first and most recent years of operation. …


Addiction is a state of compulsive drug use; despite treatment and other attempts to control drug taking, addiction tends to persist. Clinical and laboratory observations have converged on the hypothesis that addiction represents the pathological usurpation of neural processes that normally serve reward-related learning. The major substrates of persistent compulsive drug use are hypothesized to be molecular and cellular mechanisms that underlie long-term associative memories in several forebrain circuits (involving the ventral and dorsal striatum and prefrontal cortex) that receive input from midbrain dopamine neurons. Here we review progress in identifying candidate mechanisms of addiction.


ABSTRACT In 1856, the Treaty of Paris nominally welcomed the Ottoman Empire into the Concert of Europe, but this exposed a deep fault line in international relations. Although the gesture implied full sovereign rights, it seemed incompatible with the extraterritorial privileges held by Europeans in Ottoman lands under the age-old capitulations. New commercial treaties complicated the issue by extending similar privileges to British subjects as far afield as China, Siam and Japan. Consular jurisdiction soon became the focus of controversy in Westminster as extraterritoriality featured prominently in local disputes following British commercial expansion across Asia, among them the Arrow incident that led to the Second Opium War. In Japan and other states, it would also become a key grievance in popular campaigns against 'unequal treaties' and the injustices of informal empire. This analysis shows how, even before such narratives of resistance emerged, there was already a seam of ambivalence in Victorian political discourse on the question of extraterritoriality. In the Foreign Office, it came as no surprise to be told of defects in these treaties, but it was the context of the existing debate, notably fresh initiatives to set up mixed courts, that framed the British response.


The presence of relatively short time constants (<20 nS) in the impulse response of the thermal chirp of directly modulated DFB lasers is shown to significantly reduce the deleterious effects of interferometric noise in fiber-optic systems with multipaths. Compared with the chirp-free case of external modulation, thermal chirp can improve crosstalk tolerance by as much as 5 dB for eight interferers at 622 Mb/s and 13 dB at 80 Mb/s. This improvement was studied both theoretically and experimentally for several lasers. Simulations results match the experimental data, while two simplified semi-analytical models provide qualitative description.


In this paper, we propose a novel implicit semantic data augmentation (ISDA) approach to complement traditional augmentation techniques like flipping, translation or rotation. Our work is motivated by the intriguing property that deep networks are surprisingly good at linearizing features, such that certain directions in the deep feature space correspond to meaningful semantic transformations, e.g., adding sunglasses or changing backgrounds. As a consequence, translating training samples along many semantic directions in the feature space can effectively augment the dataset to improve generalization. To implement this idea effectively and efficiently, we first perform an online estimate of the covariance matrix of deep features for each class, which captures the intra-class semantic variations. Then random vectors are drawn from a zero-mean normal distribution with the estimated covariance to augment the training data in that class. Importantly, instead of augmenting the samples explicitly, we can directly minimize an upper bound of the expected cross-entropy (CE) loss on the augmented training set, leading to a highly efficient algorithm. In fact, we show that the proposed ISDA amounts to minimizing a novel robust CE loss, which adds negligible extra computational cost to a normal training procedure. Although being simple, ISDA consistently improves the generalization performance of popular deep models (ResNets and DenseNets) on a variety of datasets, e.g., CIFAR-10, CIFAR-100 and ImageNet. Code for reproducing our results are available at https://github.com/blackfeather-wang/ISDA-for-Deep-Networks.


We study the behavior of the Chern classes of graph hypersurfaces under the operation of deletion-contraction of an edge of the corresponding graph. We obtain an explicit formula when the edge satisfies two technical conditions, and prove that both these conditions hold when the edge is multiple in the graph. This leads to recursions for the Chern classes of graph hypersurfaces for graphs obtained by adding parallel edges to a given (regular) edge.
Analogous results for the case of Grothendieck classes of graph hypersurfaces were obtained in previous work. Both Grothendieck classes and Chern classes were used to define `algebro-geometric' Feynman rules. The results in this paper provide further evidence that the polynomial Feynman rule defined in terms of the Chern-Schwartz-MacPherson class of a graph hypersurface reflects closely the combinatorics of the corresponding graph.The key to the proof of the main result is a more general formula for the Chern-Schwartz-MacPherson class of a transversal intersection, which may be of independent interest. We also describe a more geometric approach, using the apparatus of `Verdier specialization'.


Commercial light curtains use a technique known as muting to differentiate between work pieces and other objects (e.g., human limbs) based on precise model knowledge of the process. At manually fed machinery (e.g., bench saws), such precise models cannot be derived due to the way the machinery is used. This paper presents a multispectral scanning sensor to classify an object's surface material as a new approach for the problem. The system is meant to detect the presence of limbs and therefore optimized for human skin detection. Evaluation on a test set of skin and (wet) wood samples showed a sufficiently high reliability with respect to safety standards.


The relative impacts of greenhouse gas (GHG) increase and stratospheric ozone depletion on stratospheric mean age of air in the 1960–2010 period are quantified using the Goddard Earth Observing System Chemistry‐Climate Model. The experiment compares controlled simulations using a coupled atmosphere‐ocean version of the Goddard Earth Observing System Chemistry‐Climate Model, in which either GHGs or ozone depleting substances, or both factors evolve over time. The model results show that GHGs and ozone depleting substances have about equal contributions to the simulated mean age decrease, but GHG increases account for about two thirds of the enhanced strength of the lower stratospheric residual circulation. It is also found that both the acceleration of the diabatic circulation and the decrease of the mean age difference between downwelling and upwelling regions are mainly caused by GHG forcing. The results show that ozone depletion causes an increase in the mean age of air in the Antarctic summer lower stratosphere through two processes: (1) a seasonal delay in the Antarctic polar vortex breakup that inhibits young midlatitude air from mixing with the older air inside the vortex, and (2) enhanced Antarctic downwelling that brings older air from middle and upper stratosphere into the lower stratosphere.


There remains no successful compilation of a universal bibliography for systematic biology. Commercial services like Mendeley or Zotero are achieving some traction. However, they are monolithic systems under the control of single entities, their biodiversity data scattered without easy data aggregation or interchange – why should competitors offer this functionality?

The ViBRANT (http://vbrant.eu/) project aims to compile a Bibliography of Life, building on the project's available infrastructure, gathering data from across biodiversity sciences. Evaluating existing platforms, both commercial and scientific, we found none met the needs for a sustainable, universal bibliography, for the following reasons: (1) Too narrowly focused to achieve critical mass in data volume or in user community. (2) Monolithic systems with single points of failure and low perceived sustainability. (3) Too focused on data analysis and research, at the expense of building a reliable base system, hence appearing to be prototypes rather than stable platforms, reducing perceived reliability and sustainability. (4) Integration of data curation with data input, which makes contributing references tedious, thereby alienating potential users.

Thus, we built RefBank, following a radically different approach, applying proven principles from other forms of data management. (1) RefBank is an open, coordinator-free network of independent nodes that replicate the data among themselves, eliminating any single point of failure, achieving reliability and sustainability through redundancy. (2) No single entity governs the data; everyone can set up a node to link into the network; the web application can be downloaded from most existing nodes. Replication is pull-based, so no node can actively push erroneous data into the network. (3) Contributing is easy: everyone can upload their bibliographies, be they in BibTeX, EndNote, plain text or many other common formats, without any curation, and without prior registration; ReCAPTCHA protects the upload forms. (4) RefBank uses graph theory to embrace near duplicate references exploiting their inherent redundancy to enable automated reconciliation and curation through data mining techniques. (5) RefBank's web interface supports manual curation, though manual curation is not required for the system to work; users can correct errors later as they find them when using the reference collection. (6) RefBank provides multiple data export formats, e.g. BibTeX and RIS, and can output references in a variety of common styles, e.g. Chicago or Harvard.


Pain is almost certainly the most common illness experience on the planet. Yet, it is frequently treated poorly and those who experience pain often endure scepticism, doubt and stigma for their condition. In most places around the world, pain closely tracks social power structures, which means that marginalised groups are both more likely to experience pain and are more likely to have it regarded dubiously and treated inadequately.

Moreover, while pain is a near-universal part of the human condition, it remains difficult to define and conceptualise. As Emily Dickinson famously noted, pain has an element of blank. And while pain and suffering are often experienced together, they remain distinct phenomena: some people in pain do not suffer and some people who suffer state that they are not in pain. Pain is an essential pathway to redemption for many and for others it exists only as a devastating, hollowing experience that defies meaning. In short, the paradoxes of pain are multiple, varied and slippery. While pain has not escaped scholarly attention in the medical and health humanities over the last decade, current and inequitable burdens of global pain alone justify the sustained focus and analysis contained in the current Theme Issue on Pain and Its Paradoxes. …


Simple prototypes for forced advection‐diffusion problems are known to produce passive tracer distributions that exhibit approximately exponential or stretched exponential tails. Having previously found an approximately exponential tail for the column integrated water vapor (CWV) distribution under high precipitation conditions, we conjectured that if such prototypes are relevant to more complex tropospheric tracer problems, we should find such tails for a wide set of tracers. Here it is shown that such tails are indeed ubiquitous in observed, model, and reanalysis data sets for a variety of tracers, either column integrated or averaged through a deep layer, including CO and CO2. The long tails in CWV are associated with vertical transport and can occur independent of a local precipitation sink. These non‐Gaussian distributions can have consequences for source attribution studies of anthropogenic tracers, and for mechanisms of precipitation extremes; the properties of the tails may help constrain model tracer simulations.


The reported work constituted the third phase of a programme of research into the performance of concrete pipes during installation by the pipe-jacked tunnelling technique. This third stage was a continuation of the on-site monitoring of full-scale pipe jacks during construction. Four schemes were monitored in different ground conditions: London clay, dense fine sand below the water table, stiff glacial till and soft alluvial clay. Pipe sizes ranged from 1000mm to 1800mm internal diameter and excavation methods included hand tools, slurry machines and an open face tunnel boring machine. The main objective was to collect information on jacking loads and stresses at the pipe-soil interface to provide a better basis for future designs. This was achieved by building twelve stress cells -capable of measuring total normal stresses, shear stresses and pore pressures - into the wall of a standard concrete jacking pipe that could be inserted anywhere in the pipe string. Jacking loads and forward movement of the pipe string were simultaneously recorded and the results were correlated against site activities, including lubrication operations, and tunnel alignment surveys. Another objective was to monitor the ground response by measuring displacements around the tunnel and ground pressures above the perpendicular to the intended line. Ground movements were measured using conventional surveying techniques for surface settlements, and inclinometer access tubes for sub-surface deformation. On one scheme, electro-levels were employed in a near-horizontal tube to measure centre line settlement as the tunnel bore advanced. Push-in spade cells and pneumatic piezometers were installed on two schemes to measure the change in horizontal pressures with the passage of the shield. Because of the myriad data collected, it has only been possible to present a summary of the results obtained. Jacking force records from all the monitored schemes - including the previous fieldwork stage - are presented. The pattern of jacking load build up and the magnitude of frictional resistance can differ significantly according to the type of ground and use of lubricants. Stress measurements at the pipe-soil interface show that the interaction between jacking loads, pipeline misalignment, stoppages, lubrication, excavation technique etc, is highly complex. Ground movement measurements compared to well established empirical predictive methods show that short-term displacements are related to ground losses caused by closure of the overbreak void between shield and pipe.


Author(s): Ng, KY; Dawson, WA; Wittman, D; James Jee, M; Hughes, JP; Menanteau, F; Sifon, C | Abstract: © 2015 The Authors. Merging galaxy clusters with radio relics provide rare insights to the merger dynamics as the relics are created by the violent merger process. We demonstrate one of the first uses of the properties of the radio relic to reduce the uncertainties of the dynamical variables and determine the three-dimensional (3D) configuration of a cluster merger, ACT-CL J0102-4915, nicknamed El Gordo. From the double radio relic observation and the X-ray observation of a comet-like gas morphology induced by motion of the cool core, it is widely believed that El Gordo is observed shortly after the first core passage of the subclusters. We employ a Monte Carlo simulation to investigate the 3D configuration and dynamics of El Gordo. Using the polarization fraction of the radio relic, we constrain the estimate of the angle between the plane of the sky and the merger axis to be α = 21°±911. We find the relative 3D merger speed of El Gordo to be 2400 ±400200 km s-1 at pericentre. The two possible estimates of the time since pericentre (TSP) are 0.46±0.090.16 and 0.91±0.220.39 Gyr for the outgoing and returning scenario, respectively. We put our estimates of the TSP into context by showing that if the time-averaged shock velocity is approximately equal to or smaller than the pericentre velocity of the corresponding subcluster in the centre-of-mass frame, the two subclusters are more likely to be moving towards, rather than away, from each other, post apocentre. We compare and contrast the merger scenario of El Gordo with that of the Bullet Cluster, and show that this late-stage merging scenario explains why the south-east (SE) dark matter lensing peak of El Gordo is closer to the merger centre than the SE cool core.


Abstract We evaluate how increasing wind generation affects wholesale electricity prices, balancing payments and the cost of subsidies using the Irish Single Electricity Market (SEM) as a test system, with hourly data from 1 January 2008 to 28 August 2012. We model the spot market using a system of seemingly unrelated regressions (SUR) where the regressions are the 24 hours of the day. Wind has a negative impact on the system marginal price, with every MWh increase in wind generation (equal to about 0.2% of the average wind generation in our sample) leading to a decrease of the system marginal price of €0.018 MWh, or about 0.3% of its average value. We use time series models to analyse the balancing market and show that wind generation increases balancing payments, as do the forecast errors of demand and wind. Every MWh of additional wind generation is associated with an increase in constraint payments of €3.2, or about 0.01%. Lack of storage increases the impact of wind on balancing payments whereas the lack of interconnection has no effect. Overall, wind decreases costs through its effect on the electricity price more than it increases constraint payments, even when storage is on outage. The effect of wind remains positive after including the cost of subsidies given to wind generation.


Teacher educators constantly search for the best models of instruction to help teacher education students become effective teachers. Remembering many failed reform efforts, teacher educators sense the here today, gone tomorrow sentiment that follows their demise. Wheeler (1996) notes, Systemic reform has a temporal character (p. 308). Reform has been on the national agenda in science education for more than a decade, and key leaders have offered their perspectives of progress to date (Rutherford, 1996; Strassenburg, 1996; Vos, 1996). Science educators have little disagreement about the need for reform, but they have little agreement about the specific modes to achieve this reform (Linn, 1992). Most science educators agree that even great materials, excellent summer programs for teachers, and incorporating the best educational methods do not suffice. A commonly agreed-upon theme for reform in science education is active involvement of learners in the teaching and learning process. As teacher educators embed the principles of science reform initiatives into their classrooms, they must involve teacher education students. Yager (1992) states that teachers are central to solutions and successes for current reform efforts (p. 907). Teacher education students must also be involved. Professional science associations, including the National Resource Council (NRC) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), have developed national science standards for grades K-12: the National Science Education Standards (National Resource Council, 1996) and Project 2061 Benchmarks for Science Literacy (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1993). Both documents elaborate ideas emerging from Project 2061 (Rutherford & Ahlgren, 1990) and other efforts focusing on the science knowledge and skills literate citizens should possess. Developed by two separate groups, the projects share common goals and recommendations; both aim to develop a nation of scientifically literate citizens. The national movement has trickled down to state and local boards of education through the development of state and local science curriculum standards. Schools, colleges, and departments of education (SCDEs) across the country are incorporating the curriculum standards into their science methods courses. The standards movement has specific implications for the preparation of teachers. They provide a map for teacher development of curricula with improved content, teaching methods, and assessment, and a guide for institutions of higher education to refine programs for learning science through inquiry (Close, Miller, Titterington, & Westwood, 1996). Educational reform in science education is about both what students should learn and how teachers should teach science (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1993; National Research Council, 1996). Science instruction should facilitate the development or understanding of science as a way of knowing (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1993; National Research Council, 1996; Rutherford & Ahlgren, 1990). Effective instruction helps students sort and distinguish among a multitude of ideas; the purpose of teaching is to encourage students to actively engage in the process of lifelong learning. The national standards support the development of environments; how teachers teach greatly influences students' learning (National Research Council, 1996; Rutherford & Ahlgren, 1990). An environment conducive to promoting students' construction of understanding by conveying attitudes and habits of mind enabling them to challenge ideas will empower them with knowledge, abilities, and attitudes conducive to understanding. Some researchers (Bates & Culpepper, 1991; Ganem, 1993; Keeports & Morier, 1994; Rutherford & Ahlgren, 1990) argue that prospective teachers must understand how science works. …


Abstract Anaesthesiologists are increasingly more involved in perioperative patient care wherein interpretation of special investigations is crucial to making therapeutic and prognostic decisions. Furthermore, anaesthetic journal publications increasingly rely on diagnostic tests, without paying sufficient attention to the methodology for evaluation of the predictive ability of these tests, particularly when conducting research. The purpose of this article is to provide an introduction to the principles underlying the objective appraisal of diagnostic tests and to provide basic tools for that purpose. Basic concepts about probability and conditional probability are introduced. An explanation is given how Bayes' theorem can be used to apply new information to improve uncertainty about a diagnosis. Various indices of diagnostic accuracy are clarified using simple probabilistic notation applied to a 2×2 table from which they can be calculated. Two clinical examples are employed to illustrate these concepts. The calculations are made easier using a spreadsheet that may be downloaded from the Internet and by using Fagan's nomogram. The use of receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves for choosing a suitable cut-off point between positive and negative tests is explained.


Differential x-ray phase contrast imaging using a grating interferometer was combined with a magnifying cone beam geometry using a conventional microfocus x-ray tube. This brings the advantages of a magnifying cone beam setup, namely, a high spatial resolution in the micron range and the possibility of using an efficient, low resolution detector, into differential phase contrast imaging. The authors present methodical investigations which show how the primary measurement signal depends on the magnification factor. As an illustration of the potential of this quantitative imaging technique, a high-resolution x-ray phase contrast tomography of an insect is presented.


This work investigates the optimisation of Quality of Service (QoS) levels through experimentation on streaming multimedia applications with WiMAX. This work initially tests two algorithms, the intelligent Adaptive Buffer Control (iABC) and the Bandwidth Fluctuation Location Based Dynamic Transmission Rate Control before bring these together in the Resource Harvest and Redistribution - Call Admission Control (RHR-CAC) algorithm.
The iABC algorithm augments ATM QoS categories within the wireless domain. iABC utilizes an intelligent adaptive buffering system for the existing users to redistribute the resources to facilitate further connections. iABC results demonstrates that additional connections can be accommodated while maintaining the QoS needs for the existing connections, improving the efficient use of resources. Whereas, the bandwidth fluctuation location-based dynamic transmission rate-limit control framework predicts when a user enters a weaker signal area and dynamically limits the bandwidth of other users to facilitate the QoS needs when the signal strength is reduced. The framework made its predictions based on location and mobile network coverage map queries before initiating the resource rate-limiting algorithm. This significantly improved QoS in video streaming and smoothing of bandwidth fluctuation. These two algorithms have initiated success with bandwidth management of harvesting bandwidth for one user without affecting the QoS of the others.
It is important to determine when simulating any QoS protocol, whether the perceived improvement will actually function under the planned usage, consequently it is vital to replicate the reality of the users behaviour. It is not just the technological issues that affect connectivity but also physical mobility. Therefore the geographical perspective of the user's physical location impacts on the relevance of experiments, to ensure they reflect reality as closely as possible. Therefore mobility were investigated to select the best fit for this work. The results illustrate that the random waypoint or random walk models both emulated the reality of a user in a mobile environment, for a simulation.
The work culminates, with the RHR – CAC algorithm which builds on the previous algorithms within the WiMAX domain. This encompasses all QoS, service flows by harvesting resources from those provisioned but not activated to provide the resources to accept additional connections. This improves the efficient redistribution of resources while improving the connectivity rate at the call admission control. The results evidenced that QoS has been maintained for all current connection while ensuring that all service flow are not starved of bandwidth.


IMPORTANCE
This systematic review summarizes existing studies on dry needling for spasticity and range of motion (ROM) and discusses its potential for use as an occupational therapy intervention.

OBJECTIVE
To examine existing studies on the effects of dry needling on spasticity and ROM.

DATA SOURCES
Article citations and abstracts from Scopus, Cochrane Library, PubMed, CINAHL, and a university library search.

STUDY SELECTION AND DATA COLLECTION
Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines were used in abstracting data. Peer-reviewed journal articles published in English between January 2007 and June 2019 were searched. Of 270 identified studies, 10 met the inclusion criteria. Studies were divided into categories on the basis of outcome measures (Modified Modified Ashworth Scale and ROM). Pain outcome measures were excluded because a systematic review addressing this outcome has recently been completed.

FINDINGS
Strong evidence was found to support the use of dry needling to decrease spasticity and increase ROM.

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE
This systematic review suggests that dry needling is an effective physical agent modality to decrease spasticity and increase ROM, both of which are potentially beneficial to functional outcomes.

WHAT THIS ARTICLE ADDS
This article provides information that may be helpful in determining the appropriateness of dry needling as an occupational therapy intervention.


Several recent locality-focused studies suggest that the American Revolution was not particularly 'revolutionary'. These studies note continuity of pre and post-independence institutions and local leadership. But the American Revolution was experienced differently in different communities, and the American Revolution was likely more 'revolutionary' along the military frontiers—the subset of localities that experienced prolonged civil warfare—than in more peaceful locales. This study examines one wartorn locality, Monmouth County, New Jersey, to substantiate this hypothesis. The American Revolution split the pre-war leadership in Monmouth County into Whig and Loyalist blocs, and about half of the county's pre-war leaders dropped out of leadership as the war began. The gaps created by Loyalists dropping out of leadership plus the approximate doubling of local offices created a permeable and democratic, new leadership. Men of modest means came into leadership positions; men disaffected from the cause of independence continued being elected into local offices. Local leaders split into antagonistic factions that faced off at the polls, in the courts, and through a series of rival associations. Local political institutions, such as courts and elections, were scandal-plagued and dysfunctional for long stretches. The State legislature was compelled to censure county leaders for provocative and illegal conduct; twice, it voided the results of the county elections. The crucible of civil warfare created extraordinary stresses in Monmouth County, and by war's end, its leadership and governing institutions were substantially transformed. The pre-war elite were marginalized, new families achieved parity with established families in the leadership ranks, local institutions were re-made, and, despite the tribulations, competent local governance eventually emerged.


The understanding of weak measurements and interaction-free measurements has greatly expanded the conceptual and experimental toolbox to explore the quantum world. Here we demonstrate single-shot variable-strength weak measurements of the electron and nuclear spin states of a P31 single-atom donor in silicon. We first show how the partial collapse of the nuclear spin due to measurement can be used to coherently rotate the spin to a desired pure state. We explicitly demonstrate that phase coherence is preserved with high fidelity throughout multiple sequential single-shot weak measurements and that the partial state collapse can be reversed. Second, we use the relation between measurement strength and perturbation of the nuclear state as a physical meter to extract the tunnel rates between the P31 donor and a nearby electron reservoir from data conditioned on observing no tunneling events. Our experiments open avenues to measurement-based state preparation, steering and feedback protocols for spin systems in the solid state, and highlight the fundamental connection between information gain and state modification in quantum mechanics.


In this intriguing book, Morris Brownell offers a fresh account of the career and influence of Horace Walpole (1717-1797), the great English man of letters and art historian. Rejecting both the traditional view of Walpole as a trifling collector of curiosities and the more recent assessment of him as a sober social historian and connoisseur, Brownell argues that Walpole grew to become a serious patron, collector, and historian of the arts - "the Prime Minister of Taste". Drawing on vast Walpole archival materials and on his astonishing forty volumes of letters, Brownell describes the formation of young Walpole's taste and interest in the visual arts. Brownell argues that England's leading portrait engraver, George Vertue, converted Walpole from Grand Tour taste in painting to a life-long study of English portraits. The book discusses the significance of Walpole's collection of English historical portraits and French portraits of the ancien regime, and it analyses Walpole's fascination with portraiture, comparing the painted portraits Walpole collected and wrote about to the literary portraits he penned in his letters. Walpole's passion for the art of portraiture was not the trifling pastime he pretended, Brownell says, in fact it was the source of his greatest literary achievement - a gallery of literary portraits of the English aristocracy as fine as the painted portraits of Reynolds and Gainsborough.


Context awareness is viewed as one of the most important aspects in the emerging pervasive computing paradigm. We focus our work on situation awareness; a more holistic variant of context awareness where situations are regarded as logically aggregated contexts. One important problem that arises in such systems is the imperfect observations (e.g., sensor readings) that lead to the estimation of the current context of the user. Hence, the knowledge upon which the context / situation aware paradigm is built is rather vague. To deal with this shortcoming, we propose the use of Fuzzy Logic theory with the purpose of determining (inferring) and reasoning about the current situation of the involved user. We elaborate on the architectural model that enables the system to assume actions autonomously according to previous user reactions and current situation. The captured, imperfect contextual information is matched against pre-developed ontologies in order to approximately infer the current situation of the user. Finally, we present a series of experimental results that provide evidence of the flexible, efficient nature of the proposed situation awareness architecture.


An image caption should fluently present the essential information in a given image, including informative, fine-grained entity mentions and the manner in which these entities interact. However, current captioning models are usually trained to generate captions that only contain common object names, thus falling short on an important "informativeness" dimension. We present a mechanism for integrating image information together with fine-grained labels (assumed to be generated by some upstream models) into a caption that describes the image in a fluent and informative manner. We introduce a multimodal, multi-encoder model based on Transformer that ingests both image features and multiple sources of entity labels. We demonstrate that we can learn to control the appearance of these entity labels in the output, resulting in captions that are both fluent and informative.


This paper drew from discursive psychology and Foucauldian discourse analysis to analyse and critique constructions of welfare, its recipients and proposed policies as they were discussed in 200 New Zealand newspaper accounts published between 2005 and 2014. Analysis identified three dominant discursive formations related to welfare and work in the media accounts: the culture of dependence, carrot-stick discourse and work as a panacea. Media accounts were examined for stereotypical constructions of welfare recipients to reveal the promotion of particular social positions, attributions of blame and practices. Media accounts of proposed welfare policies that drew from these discursive formations were similarly examined to demonstrate the potential for media constructions to inform policy changes. Media accounts that resisted the dominant discursive formations were examined for alternative accounts of welfare recipients, work and policy. The dominant discursive formations were demonstrated to rest on a neoliberal social framework that promoted the interests of dominant social groups and shifted blame off an unequal society and economic structure onto welfare recipients. These findings demonstrate a need to increase the representation of welfare recipients' interests through research exploring their lived experiences of dependence and the continued critique of existing social and power structures.


A transcription factor dependent on electrical activity regulates genes involved in long-term memory formation. Area CA3 of the hippocampus is required for the fast encoding of contextual memory. However, which CA3-specific molecular pathways regulate contextual memory formation is unclear. Using both loss-of-function and gain-of-function genetic manipulations in mice, Ramamoorthi et al. discovered that activation of the transcription factor Npas4 in CA3 is central to contextual memory formation. Npas4 directly regulates an activity-dependent transcription program. Its transcriptional targets include several well-characterized immediate early genes (IEGs). Npas4 initiates the expression of these IEGs by recruiting RNA polymerase II to their promoter and enhancer regions. K. Ramamoorthi, R. Fropf, G. M. Belfort, H. L. Fitzmaurice, R. M. McKinney, R. L. Neve, T. Otto, Y. Lin, Npas4 regulates a transcriptional program in CA3 required for contextual memory formation. Science 334, 1669–1675 (2011). [Abstract] [Full Text]


Oncology Nurses' Suggestions for Improving Obstacles in End-of-Life Care Rosanne J. Oliver College of Nursing, BYU Master of Science The purpose of this paper was to determine the most important changes needed to improve the quality of end-of-life (EOL) care to terminal cancer patients as perceived by experienced oncology nurses. The study was designed as a cross-sectional survey, sampling 1,000 Oncology Nursing Society members from the United States with experience caring for inpatient cancer patients, who could read English, and had experience in EOL care. Eligible nurses responded to an open-ended item sent to them as part of a mailed questionnaire. Nurses were asked to respond to the following question: "If you had the ability to change just one aspect of the end-of-life care given to dying oncology patients, what would it be?" Open-ended text answers were categorized and coded by a team of four nurse researchers. Respondents identified five major and six minor themes they determined as requiring interventions to improve the dying experience for their patients. Major areas identified included better staffing, improvement to the environment, increased education, improvement in issues surrounding physician behaviors, and earlier EOL interventions. Minor areas reflected needs to facilitate a more peaceful death, initiate earlier palliative and hospice interventions, end care deemed futile, and provide for spiritual needs. The suggested improvements shared by shared by oncology nurses provide opportunities to identify and alleviate obstacles in EOL care which may prevent optimal patient quality of life when dying. Improving care in the identified areas may address the many needs of dying oncology patients as nurses become better able to facilitate a quality experience at the end of life.


As our everyday social and cultural experiences are increasingly mediated by electronic products--from "intelligent" toasters to iPods--it is the design of these products that shapes our experience of the "electrosphere" in which we live. Designers of electronic products, writes Anthony Dunne in Hertzian Tales, must begin to think more broadly about the aesthetic role of electronic products in everyday life. Industrial design has the potential to enrich our daily lives--to improve the quality of our relationship to the artificial environment of technology, and even, argues Dunne, to be subverted for socially beneficial ends.The cultural speculations and conceptual design proposals in Hertzian Tales are not utopian visions or blueprints; instead, they embody a critique of present-day practices, "mixing criticism with optimism." Six essays explore design approaches for developing the aesthetic potential of electronic products outside a commercial context--considering such topics as the post-optimal object and the aesthetics of user-unfriendliness--and five proposals offer commentary in the form of objects, videos, and images. These include "Electroclimates," animations on an LCD screen that register changes in radio frequency; "When Objects Dream...," consumer products that "dream" in electromagnetic waves; "Thief of Affection," which steals radio signals from cardiac pacemakers; "Tuneable Cities," which uses the car as it drives through overlapping radio environments as an interface of hertzian and physical space; and the "Faraday Chair: Negative Radio," enclosed in a transparent but radio-opaque shield.Very little has changed in the world of design since Hertzian Tales was first published by the Royal College of Art in 1999, writes Dunne in his preface to this MIT Press edition: "Design is not engaging with the social, cultural, and ethical implications of the technologies it makes so sexy and consumable." His project and proposals challenge it to do so.


Background: IgA nephropathy (IgAN) has variable course; few patients have a benign presentation and other patients present with late stage disease. Endocapillary hypercellularity has a prognostic significance in IgAN. It is important to identify E1 lesions accurately. The use of CD68 immunohistochemistry marker to identify glomerular macrophages will standardize the reporting and help the clinicians prognosticate the patients. Subjects and Methods: The material is from a referral laboratory for renal biopsies in a tertiary care hospital. Renal biopsies are processed as per protocol including light microscopy, immunofluorescence and electron microscopy where ever required. CD68 was used in this study to identify macrophages in E1 lesions. A total of 1220 primary glomerular diseases were diagnosed from January 2019 till date. Out of these, IgA constituted 11.9% of primary glomerular diseases. Renal biopsies received were from the department of nephrology and various other nephrology centers. Biopsies were received in 10% buffered formalin. Immunofluorescence is done on all biopsies, and electron microscopy was done in few cases to differentiate from other lesions with dominant IgA deposits. CD68 was done in 50 cases of IgAN. Apart from hematoxylin and eosin stains, periodic acid-Schiff, Masson trichrome, Jones silver stain were also done. Results: IgAN constituted 11.9% of cases. Twenty-five cases of E0 and twenty-five cases of E1 lesions were correlated with clinical and morphological features. There was correlation with proteinuria and hypertension in E1 lesions. There was no significant correlation with the morphological variants like crescents, focal segmental glomerulosclerosis. Conclusions: Inter observer correlation of E lesions is poor in classifying IgAN. Use of CD68 is a useful adjunct to identify macrophages. E1 lesions have more proteinuria requiring treatment for delaying the progression to end stage disease. Despite significant association of E1 lesions with progression, there may be many unmeasured factors which would influence the outcome.


In this episode, Founder and CEO David Pembroke sits down with Dr Caroline Fisher, Lecturer in journalism at the University of Canberra. They discuss the new role journalism plays in the public sector and how that is changing with new content marketing initiatives. David and Caroline explain how public sector workers should convince media advisors to employ content marketing tactics when pushing out new programs. They also talk about the new Bachelor of Journalism, Content Marketing degree at UC and where it is headed.


Cell cycle activity is required for plant growth and development, but its involvement in the early events that initiate seedling development remains to be clarified. We performed experiments aimed at understanding when cell cycle progression is activated during seed germination, and what its contribution is for proper seedling establishment. To this end, the spatial and temporal expression profiles of a large set of cell cycle control genes in germinating seeds of Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) and white cabbage (Brassica oleracea) were analyzed. The in vivo behavior of the microtubular cytoskeleton was monitored during Arabidopsis seed germination. Flow cytometry of Arabidopsis germinating seeds indicated that DNA replication was mainly initiated at the onset of root protrusion, when germination reached its end. Expression analysis of cell cycle genes with mRNA in situ localization, β-glucuronidase assays, and semiquantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction showed that transcription of most cell cycle genes was detected only after completion of germination. In vivo green fluorescent protein analysis of the microtubule cytoskeleton demonstrated that mitosis-specific microtubule arrays occurred only when the radicle had started to protrude, although the assembly of the microtubular cytoskeleton was promptly activated once germination was initiated. Thus, seed germination involves the synthesis and/or activation of a reduced number of core cell cycle proteins, which only trigger DNA replication, but is not sufficient to drive cells into mitosis. Mitotic divisions are observed only after the radicle has protruded and presumably rely on the de novo production of other cell cycle regulators.


Title of Document: THE EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENTAL STRESSES ON THE RELIABILITY OF FLEXIBLE AND STANDARD TERMINATION MULTILAYER CERAMIC CAPACITORS Garry Brock Jr., Master of Science, 2009 Directed By: Chair Professor, Michael G. Pecht, Department of Mechanical Engineering Flexible termination capacitors were designed to reduce stresses transmitted to the ceramic dielectric of a capacitor and thereby prevent flex cracking. Two studies were conducted to examine the reliability of flexible termination multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) subjected to environmental stresses. The first study used temperature-humiditybias to compare the effects of termination type (standard vs. flexible), presence of a conformal coating (acrylic coating vs. no coating), and voltage bias level. In situ monitoring demonstrated similar failure statistics between the flexible and standard termination capacitors, presence of conformal coating, and voltage bias level. Upon removal from THB conditions recovery occurred only in the standard termination MLCCs. Flexible termination capacitors at the rated voltage bias were found to have more permanent failures after exposure to THB testing as compared to standard termination capacitors. Failure analysis indicated that silver and palladium migration between electrodes was the failure mechanism in the biased flexible termination capacitors. In the second study flexible and standard termination MLCCs experienced a storage test in which they were exposed to elevated temperature and humidity conditions. It was found that the standard termination MLCCs had a lower reliability with the majority of the MLCCs failing compared to the flexible termination MLCCs where only one MLCC failed. Nearly all failures were for insulation resistance with few capacitors failing for other parameters. Subsequent bake-out of the MLCCs showed some recovery, however more failures were still occurring in the standard termination MLCCs compared to the flexible termination MLCCs. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and cross-sectioning were used to examine the failure mechanisms of the capacitors. A bulk migration of silver into the dielectric was determined to be one of the failure mechanisms in the capacitors. THE EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENTAL STRESSES ON THE RELIABILITY OF FLEXIBLE AND STANDARD TERMINATION MULTILAYER CERAMIC CAPACITORS By Garry Robert Brock Jr. Thesis submitted to the faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science, Mechanical Engineering May 2009 Advisory Committee: Dr. Michael Pecht, Chair Professor of Mechanical Engineering Dr. Donald Barker, Professor of Mechanical Engineering Dr. Patrick McCluskey, Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering © Copyright by Garry Robert Brock Jr. 2009


The global refugee regime represents one of the few generous commitments governments offer to outsiders. Indeed, few persons fleeing armed conflict actually claim international protection upon first arriving in Europe, even though the benefits of legal protection are significant. Displaced persons' decisions to remain informal is particularly puzzling in light of the risks it entails; these include lack of access to food and housing and possible abuse by smugglers. Existing theories highlight bureaucratic obstacles and push-pull factors, such as attractive onward destinations, to explain the significant gap between formal protections and actual rights access. However, in environments of high uncertainty, decisions to apply for asylum and exercise rights depend critically on information, misinformation, and rumors. We argue that asylum seekers underutilize legal pathways because limited and biased information leads them to distrust government authorities and aid organizations, and increasingly trust smugglers. To assess these claims, we use mixed methods, and combine ethnographic and interview-based research with data drawn from anonymous online rumor trackers.1


Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that women treated for ovarian cancer are at increased risk of a rapid and potentially fatal recurrence if their tumor cells have high levels of a binding proteinthat triggers abnormal growth and slows down cell death, both hallmarks of malignancy. "Now there's the possibility that testing for NAC-1 protein in cancer tissue removed during surgery might identify women most at risk for recurrence and guide doctors and patients to greater vigilance and extended therapy," said Ie-Ming Shih, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of pathology at Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center. The research also suggests that drugs capable of blocking NAC-1 activity may be a useful strategy in preventing and treating recurrences as well. A report on the research, the first to link NAC-1 to cancer, appears in the December 5, 2006 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "Because recurrent cancers are often what really kill patients, and most ovarian cancer is diagnosed when it's already advanced, our findings offer women a better chance of catching or preventingrecurrent disease early and increasing survival," says Shih. An estimated at least 60 percent of advanced-stage ovarian cancer patients who appear to be disease-free after initial treatment develop recurrent disease, according to the researchers. When the investigators compared levels of NAC-1 among primary and recurrent tumor samples taken from 338 ovarian cancer patients from two hospitals, they found that levels of NAC-1 were significantly higher in recurrent tumors compared with primary tumors taken from the same patient. Women whose primary cancers had high levels of NAC-1 were more likely to suffer a recurrence within one year. Studying the functions of NAC-1, the researchers genetically modified cells so they made both NAC-1 and a component of the protein found at the ends of natural NAC-1 that is a binding site. In the modified cells, N130 capped off NAC-1 proteins disrupting their ability to bind with each other. This action can prevent tumor formation and kill cancer cells in experimental mice. Shih says that in thefuture, drugs that mimic N130 can be used to treat cancer. This research was supported by the Department of Defense and the National Institutes of Health. Co-authors of the published research include Kentaro Nakayama, Naomi Nakayama, Jim J.-C. Sheu, Antonio Santillan, Ritu Salani, Natini Jinawath, Robert E. Bristow, Robert J. Kurman, and Tian-Li Wang from Johns Hopkins; Ben Davidson from the Norwegian Radium Hospital, Oslo, Norway; and Patrice J. Morin from the National Institute on Aging, NIH. For more information, contact: Vanessa Wasta; Tel.: 410.955.1287


Summary

1
Seasonal rivers in semi-arid African savannas support riparian woodland and hydromorphic grassland, key habitats for wildlife or livestock. We investigated the effect of numerous, small, agricultural dams built on low-order streams within the Kolope–Setonki subcatchment of the Limpopo river. We examined how reducing or changing the pattern of water flow in the main rivers will affect the riparian or hydromorphic vegetation.

2
Existing hydrological models demonstrate a mean annual water flow of 7·6 × 106 m3, ranging from zero to 215 × 106 m3. The catchment area affected by agricultural dams increased from 2% to 50% between 1955 and 1987. Dams are believed to have curtailed the flow during years of low flow.

3
The water requirement of four key species was assessed from their elevation above and distance from the river such that Faidherbia albida > Schotia brachypetala ~ Xanthocercis zambesiaca > Combretum imberbe. This order did not accord with the relative degree of mortality and canopy dieback. Twenty-nine per cent of F. albida trees were dead and the remainder had lost an average of 31% of canopy volume; S. brachypetala and X. zambesiaca exhibited negligible dieback and no mortality; whereas 10% of C. imberbe were dead and the remainder had lost an average of 8% of canopy volume.

4
Tree size and water availability influenced mortality and canopy dieback of F. albida and C. imberbe. Mortality of F. albida affected trees of all except the smallest size, although dead trees were on average larger than living trees. Dead trees of C. imberbe were at a greater elevation above or distance from the river. The likelihood of F. albida experiencing dieback was greater at higher elevations above the river and for larger trees, whereas that of C. imberbe was greater at greater distances from and higher elevations above the river if a tree was large.

5
Woody cover on hydromorphic grasslands, mainly of Acacia tortilis, increased from 8% to 37% between 1955 and 1987. Most of the increase occurred between 1965 and 1977, coincident with the extended 1960s drought and the above-average rainfall of the 1970s in a system that had been exposed to sustained, severe grazing by livestock.

6
The cumulative impact of many small farm dams on downstream rivers is apparently to reduce flow during critical dry years to levels causing dieback of F. albida and C. imberbe and desiccation of hydromorphic grassland. The water requirements of this vegetation need to be determined for policy makers to address the conflicting water needs of agriculture and indigenous vegetation.


Knee orthotics play an important role in aiding in the recovery of those with knee injuries, especially athletes. However, structural knee orthotics is often very expensive, ranging between $300 and $800. The primary reason for this project was to answer the question: can 3D printed orthotics represent a viable and costeffective alternative to present structural knee orthotics? The primary objective for this research project was to design a knee orthotic for athletes with knee injuries for a low-cost under $100 and evaluate its effectiveness. The initial design for the orthotic was done in SolidWorks, a computer-aided design (CAD) software available at Loyola Marymount University. After this design was completed, finite element analysis (FEA) was utilized to understand how normal stresses placed upon the knee affected the orthotic. The knee orthotic was then adjusted and redesigned to meet a specified factor-of-safety of 3.25 based on the data gathered during FEA and literature sources. Once the FEA was completed and the orthotic was redesigned based from the data gathered, the next step was to move on to 3D-printing the first design of the knee brace. Subsequently, physical therapy movement trials were used to evaluate physical performance. Using the data from these movement trials, the CAD design of the brace was refined to accommodate the design requirements. The final goal of this research means to explore the possibility of replacing highcost, outsourced knee orthotics with a readily available low-cost alternative. Keywords—Knee Orthotics, 3D printing, finite element analysis.


In this thesis, we consider two classes of stochastic models which both capture some of the essential properties of teletraffic. Teletraffic has two time regimes where profoundly different behavior and characteristics are seen. When traffic traces are observed at coarse resolutions, properties like self-similarity and longrange dependence are visible. In small time-scales, traffic exhibits complex scaling laws with much more spiky bursts than in coarser resolutions. The main part of the thesis is devoted to a large time-scale analysis by considering Gaussian processes and queueing systems with Gaussian input. In order to understand the small time-scale dynamics, first steps are taken towards general multifractal models offering a suitable basis for short time-scale teletraffic modeling. The family of Gaussian processes with stationary increments serves as the traffic model for large time-scales. First, we introduce a fast and accurate simulation algorithm, which can be used to generate long approximate Gaussian traces. Moreover, the algorithm is also modified to run on-the-fly. Then approximate queue length distributions for ordinary, priority and generalized processor sharing queues are derived using a most probable path approach. Simulation studies show that the performance formulae appear to be quite accurate over the full range of buffer levels. Finally, we construct a semi-stationary predictor, which uses a constant variance function and mean rate estimation based on a moving average method. Moreover, we show that measuring the past of a process by geometrically increasing intervals is a good engineering solution and a much better way than equally spaced measurements. We introduce a family of multifractal processes which belongs to the framework of T-martingales and multiplicative chaos introduced by Kahane. The family has many desirable properties like stationarity of increments, concave multifractal spectra and simple construction. We derive, for example, conditions for nondegeneracy, establish a power law for the moments and obtain a formula for the multifractal spectrum.