In the United States, over 40% of the country's total energy consumption is in buildings, most of which are either small-sized (<5,000 sqft) or medium-sized (5,000-50,000 sqft). These buildings offer excellent opportunities for energy saving and demand response (DR), but these opportunities are rarely utilized due to lack of effective building energy management systems and automated algorithms that can assist a building to participate in a DR program. Considering the low load factor in US and many other countries, DR can serve as an effective tool to reduce peak demand through demand-side load curtailment. A convenient option for the customer to benefit from a DR program is to use automated DR algorithms within a software that can learn user comfort preferences for the building loads and make automated load curtailment decisions without affecting customer comfort. The objective of this dissertation is to provide such a solution. First, this dissertation contributes to the development of key features of a building energy management open source software platform that enable ease-of-use through plug & play and interoperability of devices in a building, cost-effectiveness through deployment in a low-cost computer, and DR through communication infrastructure between building and utility and among multiple buildings, while ensuring security of the platform. Second, a set of reinforcement learning (RL) based algorithms is proposed for the three main types of loads in a building: heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) loads, lighting loads and plug loads. In absence of a DR program, these distributed agent-based learning algorithms are designed to learn the user comfort ranges through explorative interaction with the environment and accumulating user feedback, and then operate through policies that favor maximum user benefit in terms of saving energy while ensuring comfort. Third, two sets of DR algorithms are proposed for an incentive-based DR program in a building. A user-defined priority based DR algorithm with smart thermostat control and utilization of distributed energy resources (DER) is proposed for residential buildings. For commercial buildings, a learning-based algorithm is proposed that utilizes the learning from the RL algorithms to use a pre-cooling/pre-heating based load reduction method for HVAC loads and a mixed integer linear programming (MILP) based optimization method for other loads to dynamically maintain total building demand below a demand limit set by the utility during a DR event, while minimizing total user discomfort. A user defined priority based DR algorithm is also proposed for multiple buildings in a community so that they can participate in realizing combined DR objectives. The software solution proposed in this dissertation is expected to encourage increased participation of smaller and medium-sized buildings in demand response and energy saving activities. This will help in alleviating power system stress conditions by employing the untapped DR potential in such buildings. Development of a Software Platform with Distributed Learning Algorithms for Building Energy Efficiency and Demand Response Applications


The growth of the global technology industry drives the migration of skilled labor towards countries like the United States that can utilize it, but the U.S. limits the immigration of skilled workers that are employed domestically by U.S. firms. Proponents argue that skilled immigration allows firms to access technical skills that unavailable domestically and promote innovation, but there is little evidence of whether this firm-level effect exists. We evaluate the impact of skilled immigration on innovation in U.S. firms by exploiting a random lottery in the H-1B visa program, which allows us to estimate precise causal effects of marginal skilled immigration on firm-level innovation as measured by patenting productivity. Our set of empirical models compare firms that applied for the same number of lottery-subject immigrants but won different numbers of immigrants because of the lottery. Our results suggest that winning an H-1B immigrant does not significantly increase patent applications or grants at the firm level. Consistent with our main empirical findings, further analysis of the composition of participating immigrants and employers suggests that the current utilization of the H-1B program is not conducive to generating firm-level innovation; we find pervasive use of the program in industries, occupations, and firms where patenting is low.


Worthwhile applications for laser beam ablation in the macro range are found wherever hard materials, short process times and high precision are required. The laser beam ablation of thick-walled metals is gaining attention, especially in the field of industrial dismantling and the elimination of hazardous substances. This requires a high degree of flexibility, both in the machining process and in terms of mobility with regard to the place of use. Special attention is given to situations where sensitive, contaminated or explosive materials are behind the metal walls to be removed. It must be ensured that these substances are not influenced critically under any circumstances. In this context, a process of removing hazardous substances in closed cavities is developed. To prevent risks by initiating a reaction with these dangers, the thickness of the 10 mm plates is reduced without applying mechanical force and without exceeding a critical temperature. The volumetric rates of laser beam ablation have hitherto been severely limited by the requirement of high surface finishes. This article shows that the volumetric rates can be significantly increased by means of an adapted process strategy and an off-axis process gas control. Despite high volumetric ablation rates and the associated high laser energy, it is ensured that there is no danger to the hazardous substances. The critical temperature of 300°C which is several times lower than the melting temperature of the sheath, is not exceeded at the rear surface of the sheet metal. Results are presented which show how different process parameters affect the ablation depth and the workpiece temperature.


Justinian's Plague, the Black Death, the Great Plague, cholera, influenza, tuberculosis, and AIDS-these diseases and others have devastated human lives and society for generations, decimating populations, creating panic, and wrecking social and economic infrastructure. In Epidemics Laid Low epidemiologist and historian Patrice Bourdelais analyzes the history of disease epidemics in Europe from the Middle Ages to the present. This captivating account describes how populations respond to crises of disease and how authorities deal with the devastation afterward. Bourdelais discusses the successes of northern European countries in fighting and controlling infectious diseases and emphasizes, by comparison, the failures of the countries in the south. He links success to several factors: ideology of progress, economic development, popular demands to improve public health, and investment in medical research. Bourdelais studies the social consequences of these policies, the changes in the representation of epidemics, the behaviors of populations, and heightened tensions between advocates of individual freedom and those of collective interest. Epidemics continue to threaten us today. What do our responses to these threats say about our priorities? Will the security of public health remain a privilege of a few powerful countries or will poorer countries benefit from the efforts of the rich to prevent the spread of disease inside their own borders?


Abstract Knowledge representation (KR) is an important area in artificial intelligence (AI) and is often related to specific domains. The representation of knowledge in domain-specific contexts makes it desirable to capture semantics as domain experts would. This motivates the development of semantics-preserving standards for KR within the given domain. In addition to the storage and analysis of information using such standards, the effect of globalization today necessitates the publishing of information on the Web. Thus, it is advisable to use formats that make the information easily publishable and accessible while developing KR standards. In this article, we propose such a standard called Quenching Markup Language (QuenchML). This follows the syntax of the eXtensible Markup Language and captures the semantics of the quenching domain within the heat treating of materials. We describe the development of QuenchML, a multidisciplinary effort spanning the realms of AI, database management, and materials science, considering various aspects such as ontology, data modeling, and domain-specific constraints. We also explain the usefulness of QuenchML in semantics-preserving information retrieval and in text mining guided by domain knowledge. Furthermore, we outline the significance of this work in software tools within the field of AI.


Classic economic theory predicts that without copyright protection authors and publishers would not have sufficient incentive to invest the time or money needed to produce or distribute new works, and the public would suffer a shortage. Copyrights are an attempt to solve this problem. By granting a monopoly to the author of an expressive work the government gives him the sole right to copy it. If only the author has this right, authors will get a reasonable rate of return, and thus a sufficient incentive to create new works. However, empirical evidence on whether adequate expressive works would be created without copyright protection is hard to come by. This is a little disturbing. Copyrights, being monopolies, come with significant economic and social costs. Too-broad copyright protection often works, paradoxically, to stifle innovation. Where is the evidence going to come from? Almost everything that could be copyrightable subject matter has been made to be. However, there are some industries that do not receive strong intellectual property protection yet manage to be innovative, generating many new expressive works. Not very many industries operating in intellectual property law's open areas have been written about despite the seeming importance of identifying and cataloging them. This paper adds to that list by analyzing the mechanisms that allow typeface designs to proliferate despite being unprotected by copyright. These mechanisms include technological forces, industry norms, fashion-like cycles, and the practice of bundling computer fonts with software. Technology compels innovation when new designs are made to compensate for the limitations of newly introduced technology. At the same time, the digitization of type design has made typefaces easier and cheaper to produce while allowing features, not previously feasible, the market comes to demand. Norms within the type design industry are effective at mitigating plagiarism within it. Even when norms fail, typefaces, especially those that require the most time and investment to design, are resistant to plagiarism. Furthermore, while typefaces as computer fonts are subject to file-sharing, more damaging to prices is the practice of designing and bundling computer fonts with operating systems and other software to enhance their appeal. Typefaces are also subject to the vagaries of artistic movements and fashion-like cycles. As tastes change, which they do rather quickly, new typefaces have to be made to comport with the new aesthetic. Advertising and the advertising industry is an important cog in this process, helping to speed the fashion-cycle. Together, these mechanisms work to yield a large number of typeface designs. This challenges, at least in some instances, the orthodox justification for granting copyrights.


Leukocytes play a central role in protecting the body against infectious organisms and their research is essential for understanding the mechanisms of immunity. By studying leukocytes across a range of species, insights are provided into differing strategies employed to ensure resistance to disease. Surprisingly, the structure and function of marsupial leukocytes has received very limited study. Marsupials represent a major evolutionary pathway with distinct differences in reproduction and development from placental mammals. These differences in the life history of marsupials place unique challenges on the immune system, and differences in leukocyte structure and function could be reasonably expected. In this thesis, studies were undertaken to examine the cytochemical, ultrastructural and functional features of leukocytes from species of marsupials, belonging to the family Macropodidae (kangaroos and wallabies). The aim of these studies was to elucidate the characteristics of macropodid leukocytes and to compare and contrast these features with the known characteristics of other mammalian leukocytes.

 Leukocytes from two species of macropodid, the tammar wallaby (Macropus eugenii) and the western grey kangaroo (Macropus fuliginosis), formed the basis of this study with additional material provided from quokka (Setonix brachyurus), woylie (Bettongia pencillata) and red kangaroo (Macropus rufus). Staining characteristics of cells were examined following reaction with Sudan black B, peroxidase, chloroacetate esterase, naphthyl butyrate esterase, alkaline phosphatase and periodic acid-Schiff. Peroxidase and Sudan Black B reactions were similar to domestic animal species but chloroacetate esterase and naphthyl butyrate esterase were unreliable as markers for macropodid neutrophils and monocytes, respectively. Significant variation in staining for alkaline phosphatase was seen between species of macropodid. Tammar wallabies and quokka demonstrated strong neutrophil alkaline phosphatase activity whereas western grey kangaroos, red kangaroos and woylies contained no activity within their leukocytes.
 Peroxidase and alkaline phosphatase cytochemistry were also assessed at the ultrastructural level with transmission electron microscopy. This allowed the identification of distinct granule populations within macropodid neutrophils. Two subcellular compartments containing alkaline phosphatase activity were identified within tammar wallaby neutrophils. These were considered equivalent to secretory vesicles and a subpopulation of specific granules. Tubular vesicles containing alkaline phosphatase were also identified within the eosinophils of tammar wallabies. These structures were a novel finding having not been reported previously in the eosinophils of other animal species.

 In addition to cytochemistry, the general ultrastructure of leukocytes from tammar wallabies and western grey kangaroos were reported. Results were similar to previous reports for other marsupial species. The current body of knowledge was extended by the first detailed description of the ultrastructure of basophils in a marsupial.

 To assess functional aspects of macropdid neutrophils, flow cytometric assays were performed examining oxidative burst responses and phagocytosis. Reactive oxygen species were generated by neutrophils from tammar wallabies and western grey kangaroos in response to phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate but not N-formyl-Met-Leu-Phe or opsonised bacteria. Phagocytosis of opsonised bacteria was also measured in neutrophils from tammar wallabies, which was poor in contrast to ovine neutrophils. However, flow cytometric studies were limited by sample preparation. Further optimisation of isolation methods for tammar wallaby leukocytes should be undertaken before dogmatic conclusions are drawn.
Overall, the results of this thesis demonstrate that, in the areas examined, the general characteristics of leukocyte structure and function of mammals are present in macropodids. However differences were identified both within and outside of the macropodid group. These differences have important ramifications for the use of 'model' species in the study of leukocyte biology in marsupials. The results also provide potentially useful tools for the clinical diagnosis of haematological disease in macropodids and may be of interest to those studying comparative and evolutionary aspects of leukocyte structure and function.


The linkage of individuals with obesity and COVID‐19 is controversial and lacks systematic reviews. After a systematic search of the Chinese and English language literature on COVID‐19, 75 studies were used to conduct a series of meta‐analyses on the relationship of individuals with obesity–COVID‐19 over the full spectrum from risk to mortality. A systematic review of the mechanistic pathways for COVID‐19 and individuals with obesity is presented. Pooled analysis show individuals with obesity were more at risk for COVID‐19 positive, >46.0% higher (OR = 1.46; 95% CI, 1.30–1.65; p < 0.0001); for hospitalization, 113% higher (OR = 2.13; 95% CI, 1.74–2.60; p < 0.0001); for ICU admission, 74% higher (OR = 1.74; 95% CI, 1.46–2.08); and for mortality, 48% increase in deaths (OR = 1.48; 95% CI, 1.22–1.80; p < 0.001). Mechanistic pathways for individuals with obesity are presented in depth for factors linked with COVID‐19 risk, severity and their potential for diminished therapeutic and prophylactic treatments among these individuals. Individuals with obesity are linked with large significant increases in morbidity and mortality from COVID‐19. There are many mechanisms that jointly explain this impact. A major concern is that vaccines will be less effective for the individuals with obesity.


Observing the gradual transition from life to non-life tells us a lot about the features of living systems. Based on this idea, we started simplifying natural cells by inactivating their genes randomly through experimental evolution. Escherichia coli (E. coli) cells were cultured in a high-mutagenicity environment to accumulate replication errors on their genomes. As a result, we observed dozens of mutations, which were supposed to deactivate gene expression. In addition, the gene inactivation accumulates time proportionally without growth defects so far. These results suggest that naturally isolated cells are highly redundant in an experimental environmentimplying the possibility of further simplification deleting hundreds or thousands of genes.


Heart-breaking, uplifting and full of adventure, The Long Ride Home is the long-awaited sequel to the international bestseller The Horse Boy. Rowan came back from the shamans in Mongolia a changed boy. The three most debilitating effects of his autism - his incontinence, his endless tantruming, and his inability to make friends - were gone. But a year almost to the day since Rowan's improvement he started regressing: the accidents and tantrums reappeared, terrifying his father Rupert. Something had to be done. Father and son embarked on a new quest, journeying from the bushmen of Namibia to the coastal rainforests of Queensland, Australia and finally to the Navajo reservations of the American southwest, where Rowan was transformed - they had begun the Long Ride Home. "It is probably only once in a critical lifetime that one will be moved almost to tears ...a triumph of the human spirit". (Telegraph (on The Horse Boy)). "Magical, miraculous, uplifting". (Daily Mail (on The Horse Boy)). "Amazing, astonishing". (Sunday Times (on The Horse Boy)). Rupert Isaacson is British but lives with his family in Texas, USA. He is an ex-professional horse trainer and founder of The Horse Boy Foundation, which helps to make horses and nature available to other children, autistic or not, all over the world, including the UK. The Horse Boy was a Sunday Times top ten bestseller.


The only book of its kind, The New Inquisitions is an exhilirating investigation into the intellectual origins of totalitarianism. Arthur Versluis unveils the connections between heretic hunting in the early and medieval Christianity, and the emergence of totalitarianism in the twentieth century. He shows how 'secular' political thinkers in the nineteenth century inaugurated a tradition of defending the Inquisition, and how Inquisition-style heretic-hunting later manifested across the spectrum of twentieth-century totalitarianism. An exceptionally wide-ranging work, The New Inquisitions begins with early Christianity, and traces heretic-hunting as a phenomenon through the middle ages and right into the twentieth century, showing how the same inquisitional modes of thought recur both on the political Left and on the political Right.


Strategic projects form the core of corporate growth, change and wealth creation, which enable a firm to achieve and sustain long-term success. However, a traditional engineering perspective on project management still seems to dominate.

In general terms, manages are fully aware of some traditional techniques, such as NPV, but these can undervalue a strategic project. They occasionally apply techniques for controlling projects, and often lack a practical understanding of recently developed techniques. The purpose of these recently developed techniques is to create a project's value from the outset, and to drive a firm to superior performance and aspiration.

The current research project aims to explore the role of techniques in facilitating successful strategic project management, and the elements involved in it, as applied to the UK upstream oil and gas sector. At first, the existing literature on successful strategic project management is reviewed, with major emphasis given to the techniques applied to managing projects.

The proposed methodology follows a triangular approach. First, exploratory interviews essentially describe fifty multidisciplinary elements involved in strategic project management. Second, an exploratory deskwork explores the extent to which techniques address, in theory, these elements. Third, a main survey describes the elements managers pay considerable attention to, searches for the elements that are believed to explain a strategic project's success and identifies the techniques that often address each element in practice. Finally, follow-up interviews validate some questionnaire findings. As a result, sets of techniques for successful strategic project management are proposed, and validated through assessment sheets.

The present study represents an embryo for future investigation in the project management field. First, it explores the gap between elements that are believed to explain a project's success and those that managers pay most attention to in managing strategic projects. Finally, it suggests that the convergence of financial, environmental (green) and internal business issues might be a healthy route for the UK upstream oil and gas sector towards successful strategic project management.


Abstract We present initial results of a study that has more than doubled the time baseline for astrometric measurements of faint stars orbiting the supermassive black hole (SMBH) at the Galactic center. The advent of adaptive optics has enabled stars as faint as K = 19 mag to be tracked at 50 mas resolution for the last decade. While similar resolution images exist from the prior decade, they were obtained from speckle imaging data analyzed with the technique of shift-and-add, which limited detections to stars brighter than K = 16 mag. By improving the speckle data analysis technique with speckle holography and using prior orbital knowledge, we are now able to track stars as faint as ∼18 mag at 50 mas resolution through the early Keck speckle data sets (1995-2005). This methodology has already led to the detection of two short-period stars never previously seen in speckle images, such that our data now spans their full orbits. We can now better constrain the orbital parameters of all stars in the intriguing "S-star cluster," which will ultimately give us insight into the origin of these stars and be used to probe the curvature of space-time in the unexplored regime near a SMBH.


The sphere of gaming was always of considerable interest as subject to criminal encroachments as receiving high profit for rather short period and the control from the state is insufficient and not always effective. Gambling organization and conduction with violation of standards of the Russian legislation often predetermines communication of criminal structures with institutes of social control, becoming the determinant of crimes of corruption orientation. Being part of show business, gambling organization and conduction have received the strongest source of inspiration for development. In this regard the legislator has to improve the criminal law which establish the responsibility for the illegal gambling promotion for the purpose of restoration of social justice and prevention of crimes. The analysis of subjective and objective crime elements regarding illegal gambling promotion in the light of amendments to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation made by Federal law No. 227-FZ of July 29, 2018, which provide in this article, will allow the law enforcement official to qualify this crime.


The US government sought to extradite Ian Norris, the former chief executive officer of FTSE 250 company Morgan Crucible, on charges including conspiracy to fix prices of carbon products between 1989 and 2000. On 12 March 2008, the House of Lords allowed Mr Norris's appeal in part against the lower court's decision that Mr Norris should be extradited to the US to face charges of conspiracy to fix prices, obstructing the course of justice and interfering with witnesses. In a unanimous judgment, five Law Lords concluded that Mr Norris could not be extradited on the cartel allegation because price-fixing was not, at the relevant time, a criminal offence in the UK. The test of double criminality required for the extradition of a UK national to the US was not satisfied in respect of the price fixing charge. This article outlines and analyses this judgment.


The description of the conformational space generated by metal nanoparticles is a fundamental issue for the study of their physicochemical properties. In this investigation, an exhaustive exploration and a unified view of the conformational space of a gold nanocluster is provided using a Au 12 cluster as an example. Such system is characterized by coexisting planar/quasiplanar and tridimensional conformations separated by high-energy barriers. The conformational space of Au 12 has been explored by means of Born-Oppenheimer ab initio metadynamics, i.e., a molecular dynamics simulation coupled with a history dependent potential to accelerate events that might occur on a long time scale compared to the time step used in the simulations (rare events). The sampled conformations have complex, in general not intuitive topologies that we have classified as planar/quasiplanar or tridimensional, belonging to different regions of the free energy surface. Three conformational free energy basins were identified, one for the planar/quasiplanar and two for the tridimensional structures. At thermodynamic equilibrium, the planar/quasi-planar and tridimensional conformations were found to coexist, to be fluxional and to be separated by high-free-energy barriers. The comparison between the free energy and the potential energy revealed the relevance of the entropic contribution in the equilibrium distribution of the conformations of the cluster.


In off-road applications, where mobile robots operate on rough environments, the physical properties of the terrain play a key role on their performance. An extreme example is posed by planetary rover missions to Mars, for which communication constraints and the inability of vision-based approaches to detect non-geometric hazards, e.g. sand traps hidden below thin duricrusts, can lead to permanent immobilisation, as experienced by NASA's Spirit rover. To prevent such events, this paper proposes a method to classify dry granular soils according to their physical properties by using an on-board sensor system for on-line analysis of sinkage, slippage and vibrations of the hybrid wheel-legs mounted on a highly mobile robot. As reflected by the experimental results, obtained using a single wheel-leg test bed, the novel approach produces an efficient and robust differentiation of soils with dissimilar physical properties. This output can enable autonomous avoidance of non-geometric hazards without endangering the mobility of the mission. Different classifier algorithms are trained, validated and compared in terms of classification accuracy and computational efficiency, revealing the advantages and disadvantages of each approach.


The impact of the combined effects of heat stress, increased vapor pressure deficit (VPD) and water deficit on the physiology of major crops needs to be better understood to help identifying the expected negative consequences of climate change and heat waves on global agricultural productivity. To address this issue, rice, wheat, and maize plants were grown under control temperature (CT, 25°C, VPD 1.8 kPa), and a high temperature (HT, 38°C, VPD 3.5 kPa), both under well-watered (WW) and water deficit (WD) conditions. Gas-exchange measurements showed that, in general, WD conditions affected the leaf conductance to CO2, while growth at HT had a more marked effect on the biochemistry of photosynthesis. When combined, HT and WD had an additive effect in limiting photosynthesis. The negative impacts of the imposed treatments on the processes governing leaf gas-exchange were species-dependent. Wheat presented a higher sensitivity while rice and maize showed a higher acclimation potential to increased temperature. Rubisco and PEPC kinetic constants determined in vitro at 25°C and 38°C were used to estimate Vcmax, Jmax, and Vpmax in the modeling of C3 and C4 photosynthesis. The results here obtained reiterate the need to use species-specific and temperature-specific values for Rubisco and PEPC kinetic constants for a precise parameterization of the photosynthetic response to changing environmental conditions in different crop species.


Indigenous children have always figured prominently in settler colonial state expansion and consolidation. This article analyses the implication of the lives, bodies and homes of Palestinian children in Israel's settler colonial project. Drawing on Joseph Pugliese's State Violence and the Execution of Law (2013), I analyze the ways in which Israeli law is deployed to enable and normalize Palestinian children's suffering, and propel the state's continued project of eliminating the native (e.g. Wolfe 2006). I present two major arguments: First, that Palestinian children living in the settler colonial conditions of the Palestinian home/land are increasingly targeted in the Israeli state's eliminatory violence. Second, that denying children from their childhood and humanity relegates them to a death zone, a position that not only denies their suffering, but also constructs them as always already terrorist others who should be disciplined and violated. I center these arguments around three case studies: the normalized practices of child arrest, using children as human shields, and the attack on Palestinian children's homes. The article concludes by explaining that although living in the death zone constructed by the Zionist state attempts to evict them from childhood and humanity, Palestinian children continue resisting the everydayness of their oppression, and refusing to accept their demonization.


This study integrates and builds upon research on moral psychology, entertainment media selection, and political communication that has established a link between political ideology and moral sentiments. An automated content analysis of the lyrics of 37,309 songs across 10 genres assessed the extent of appeals to five different moral domains defined by moral foundations theory. The results of the content analysis are integrated with nationally representative survey data (N = 1,000) by linking lyrical content with self-reported preference for and exposure to musical genres. We then correlate the content of preferred genres with self-reported moral sentiments and political ideology. We find the moral content of music lyrics in the genres used by respondents is associated with their moral preferences and political ideology.


Stable discrete compactons in interconnected three-line waveguide arrays are found in linear and nonlinear limits in conservative and in parity-time (PT)-symmetric models. The compactons result from the interference of the fields in the two lines of waveguides ensuring that the third (middle) line caries no energy. PT-symmetric compactons require not only the presence of gain and losses in the two lines of the waveguides but also complex coupling, i.e., gain and losses in the coupling between the lines carrying the energy and the third line with zero field. The obtained compactons can be stable and their branches can cross the branches of the dissipative solitons. Unusual bifurcations of branches of solitons from linear compactons are described.


Purpose: To investigate the genotoxic effects of lutein (LBP) and β -carotene breakdown products (β -apo-8-carotenal, BA8C) and the preventive role of GSH in human retinal pigment epithelial cells (ARPE-19). Methods: LBP- and BA8C-induced DNA damage in human retinal pigment epithelial cells (ARPE-19) was determined by comet assay. The DNA damage was quantified by the image analysis system using Comet Score™ software. ARPE-19 cell viability was determined by CellTiter 96 AQueous one-solution cell proliferation assay kit. Intracellular GSH levels were measured by Ellman's reagent. Results: Incubation of serum-starved ARPE-19 cells with LBP and BA8C caused significant DNA damage in a dose- and time-dependent manner. The DNA damage and cell death incurred by LBP and BA8C were significantly prevented by N-acetylcysteine (NAC) but not by α -tocopherol + ascorbic acid (T + AA). Furthermore, BSO-induced GSH depletion in ARPE-19 cells caused a significant elevation in LBP- and BA8C-induced DNA damage, whereas increased GSH levels in ARPE-19 cells prevented it. Conclusions: Our results suggest that breakdown products of dietary carotenoids could be genotoxic in ARPE-19 cells. LBP-induced genotoxic effects could worsen oxidative stress. The intracellular GSH pool in ARPE-19 cells might play a critical role in carotenoid breakdown products-induced genotoxicity.


In near-field imaging with partially coherent x-rays, the phase shifting properties of the sample are encoded in the diffraction fringes that appear as an additional intensity modulation in the x-ray projection images. These Fresnel fringes are often regarded as purely an enhancement of the visibility at the interfaces. We show that retrieving the phase information contained in these patterns significantly advances the developments in fast micro-tomography. Improving temporal resolution without intensifying radiation damage implies a shortening of the exposure time rather than increasing the photon flux on the sample. Phase retrieval, to a large extent, compensates the consequent photon count moderation in the images, by fully exploiting the stronger refraction effect as compared with absorption. Two single-distance phase retrieval methods are evaluated for the case of an in situ 3 Hz micro-tomography of a rapidly evolving liquid foam, and an in vivo 6 Hz micro-tomography of a blowfly. A new dual-detector setup is introduced for simultaneous acquisition of two near-field diffraction patterns. Our goal is to couple high temporal, spatial and density resolution in a single imaging system in a dose-efficient manner, opening further options for dynamic four-dimensional studies.


Based on the work by Orlov (e-print arXiv:math.AG∕0503632), we give a precise recipe for mapping between B-type D-branes in a Landau-Ginzburg orbifold model (or Gepner model) and the corresponding large radius Calabi-Yau manifold. The D-branes in Landau-Ginzburg theories correspond to matrix factorizations and the D-branes on the Calabi-Yau manifolds are objects in the derived category. We give several examples including branes on quotient singularities associated with weighted projective spaces. We are able to confirm several conjectures and statements in the literature.


Free cyanide and totalmercury concentrationswere measured fromthe 196 water samples collected from the different water sources - rivers, dams, creeks, springswithin the vicinity of 40 small scalemining areas in Benguet, Philippines which is the largest mining area in the northern Philippines. Ninety-eight water samples each were subjected for free cyanide and total mercury analysis.While none of the water samples exceeded the maximum limit for free cyanide, there were 90 water samples (92%) had positive readings. The average reading of all the samples of cyanide analysis was 0.047ppm(s.d. 0.0098).While 83%of the water sampleswere positive with mercury, only twenty-nine percent exceeded the standard. Themean reading of all the positive results ofmercurywas 0.064ppb (s.d.0.061).The source of mercury and cyanide residues found can be due to historic and current mining operations in the tenmunicipalities and also to thewidespread smallmining operations in the province as a source of livelihood of the people.


Present research provides strong support for the use of creative activities such as composing in school music programmes based on evidence that learning music is more effective when students are exposed to authentic, experiential learning activities. Based on this premise the purpose of this study was to address the need to explore methods and skills necessary for incorporating music composition in Hong Kong schools given that this dimension of music teaching generally receives little attention from music teachers. A group of eight in-service music teachers were asked to design their own creative projects that were taught during a four-week Teaching Practice session. Field notes of observations and video recordings were analysed, which resulted in ten teaching strategies being identified according to four components of creativity: task motivation, domain-relevant skills, creativity-relevant processes, and metacognition. It is suggested that these components of creativity provide a framework that Hong Kong...


For more than 10 years now, arguments have been constructed regarding the need for new forms of educational assessment, and for a paradigm shift with a focus on supporting learning rather than on sorting and selecting students. The call for change in assessment follows an almost unanimous recognition of the limitations of current measurement theory and practice. The conceptions of learning represented by theories of learning and cognition appear strikingly different from those implied in current educational assessment and measurement practices. Indeed, most educational measurement specialists are still working from century-old understandings and behaviorist perspectives. Although the call for change is clear, the proposals and recommendations being put forward have limitations of their own and are unlikely to yield the kinds of fundamental changes envisioned by researchers. These limitations lie either in the focus of the work, in the lack of a clear articulation of the theories and concepts, in the nature of the assumptions made about learning (many of which remain implicit and unchanged), in the exclusion of certain conceptions of learning, or in some combination of these problems. This article explores the possibility of using inquiry as a way to understand, and hence to assess, learning. After an initial review of the assessment literature in which the need for change has been asserted and analysis of the theoretical and epistemological foundations that seem to undergird these writings, the focus shifts to the meaning of learning, knowing, and teaching implied in this literature and to the limitations of its recommendations. Later sections consider notions of learning that seem to be excluded from current assessment practices and begin to uncover similarities between learning, knowing, and inquiring that could make inquiry an appropriate metaphor for what we currently know as educational assessment. Finally, there is discussion of important issues that would need to be considered in an inquiry framework for assessment.


The relationship between democratization and war has recently sparked a lively debate. We find that transitions from autocracy that become stalled prior to the establishment of coherent democratic institutions are especially likely to precipitate the onset of war. This tendency is heightened in countries where political institutions are weak and national officials are vested with little authority. These results accord with our argument that elites often employ nationalist rhetoric to mobilize support in the populist rivalries of the poorly-institutionalized democratizing state but then get caught up in the belligerent politics that this process eventually unleashes. In contrast, we find that transitions that quickly culminate in a fully coherent democracy are much less perilous. Further, our results refute the view that transitional democracies are merely the targets of attack due to their temporary weakness: in fact, they tend to be the initiators of war. We also refute the view that any regime change is likely to precipitate the outbreak of war: transitions toward democracy are significantly more likely to generate hostilities than transitions toward autocracy.


Abstract : The inelastic deformation behavior of PMR-15 neat resin, a high-temperature thermoset polymer, was investigated at 288 degrees C. The experimental program was designed to explore the influence of strain rate on tensile loading, unloading, and strain recovery behaviors. In addition, the effect of the prior strain rate on the relaxation response of the material, as well as on the creep behavior following strain controlled loading were examined. The experimental data were modeled with the Viscoplasticity Based on Overstress (VBO) theory. A systematic procedure for determining model parameters was developed and the model was employed to predict the response of the material under various test histories. Additionally the effects of prior aging at 288 degrees C in argon on the time (rate)-dependent behavior of the PMR-15 polymer were evaluated in a series of strain and load controlled experiments. Based on experimental results, the VBO theory was extended to capture the environmentally induced changes in the material response. Several of the VBO material parameters were expanded as functions of prior aging time. The resulting model was used to predict the high-temperature behavior of the PMR-15 polymer subjected to prior aging of various durations.


Increasingly ICT-based virtual products are challenging physical products and markets. Obsolescence has become a real effect for an augmented number of established industries due to the facilitation of access, consumption, and permanent, immediate availability, which dematerialised products provide. Once again, Schumpeter's Wind of Creative Destruction intensifies organisations' permanent struggle for survival (1950). This paper presents long-term research in the optical disc industry, which has presented the optical disc format of Blu-ray as its latest innovation. It is an example of how an established industry launches a new product for finding new opportunities, but fights desperately against market resistance. The degree of innovation, the Blu-ray represents, may not be sufficient in the overarching battle of the physical place versus the virtual space (Kotler et al. 2002, Lam. 2004, Lamont et al. 1993, Scardigli et al. 1988).

As the US market research institute In-Stat highlights, the optical disc market has declined for the 10th year in sequence (Kaufhold. 2010, IFPI. 2010). Sufficient evidence is available that the replication industry of optical discs may be confronted with an endgame scenario. The market climate may already be too hostile to support this industry's desire for a renewal of consumers' acceptance of the physical product, here the Blu-ray disc, and to create new market opportunities in the struggle against the industry's potential obsolescence (Harrigan et al. 1983).

Despite strong efforts of promotion and powerful market approaches, the Blu-ray disc could not find inroads to markets yet making this format sustainably successful. Evidence is that after a short period of time, Blu-ray discs' available manufacturing capacities outperform consumers' demand by >30%, consumer and replication prices fall sharply and many of the Home Entertainment's content providers have little or no use for this format being a commodity and based on mass production (dvd-intelligence. 2010a, Kaufhold. 2010, Killer-Korff. 2010).

Therefore, as research among the replication industry indicates, it presently seems more as though the Blu-ray format may not fulfil this industry's needs and, with reference to Abernathy et al.'s research, may not lead to the renewal of industrial dynamics in a declining marketplace (1983, 1984). Further explanation for reasons can be found in the theories of innovation based on Utterback's, Christensen's and Christensen et al.'s studies of disruptive and discontinuous innovation (1996, 2003, 2003, 2004).

Following the paper presented at the Sixteenth Annual South Dakota International Business Conference, this paper presents research about the Blu-ray format's market problems. The introduction of the Transilience Organisation Innovation Map provided a conceptual approach for the initial explanation of the underlying reasons (Oestreicher. 2009). Research among European replication firms since concludes for Blu-ray that innovation in technology alone is not sufficient, when innovation's second stream of market linkages is involved (Abernathy et al. 1983, 1984). The paper presents explanations, why the Blu-ray disc may not be sufficiently strong to support the replication industry in overcoming the odds impacting their strategic opportunities in a declining and eventually disruptive environment (Lamont et al. 1993, Yoo. 1992).

The research methods applied are grounded theory and case study (Goulding. 2002, Charmaz. 2009, Eisenhardt. 1989, Davies. 2006).

The overall intention of this long-term research is to contribute to a theory, which may also be relevant for other industries, like the publishing industry, whose struggle against dematerialisation of content is presently starting (Picard. 2003).

Key Words: Radical vs. marginal innovation, Ideal Final Result, endgame strategies, theories of innovation, Blu-ray


Blood glucose concentrations are regulated by the reciprocal actions of insulin and glucagon, two hormones secreted by β and α cells of the pancreas, respectively. Xu et al. used both glucagon-secreting cultured α cell lines and isolated rat islets to show that insulin stimulated an increase in cell surface abundance of the ionotropic γ-aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptor, which hyperpolarized the α cells and decreased glucagon secretion. In the isolated rat islets, elevated concentrations of glucose stimulated insulin release without changing GABA release from the β cells and decreased glucagon secretion from the α cells. In cultured cells, GABAA insertion in the plasma membrane required the activity of the phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) pathway and phosphorylation of the β subunit of the GABAA receptor by Akt. In cells pretreated with glucose and insulin for 24 hours to desensitize the insulin receptor, subsequent application of insulin failed to increase GABAA receptors on the cell surface and failed to inhibit glucagon secretion. This was likely due to the slight elevation in basal Akt activity and increased abundance of GABAA receptors already present on the surface of these chronically stimulated cells. Defects in this pathway may contribute to type II diabetic hyperglycemia. E. Xu, M. Kumar, Y. Zhang, W. Ju, T. Obata, N. Zhang, S. Liu, A. Wendt, S. Deng, Y. Ebina, M. B. Wheeler, M. Braun, Q. Wang, Intra-islet insulin suppresses glucagon release via GABA-GABAA receptor system. Cell Metab. 3, 47-58 (2006). [PubMed]


Sara Riccetti firstname.lastname@example.com La Sapienza Università di Roma, Roma, Itália. My essay focuses on one of Tennessee Williams's least critically analyzed play and probably his less staged one, Camino Real (1953.) The play has often been interpreted as an expressionist and/or an existentialist play. Moreover, it was mostly rejected by critics and audiences alike when he was first performed in the 1950s, mostly due to its unrealistic quality. Remarkably, some of the attributes that the critics used to describe the play are the same used to describe absurdist dramas: "anti-drama", "anti-theatre." The reason for the failed success of Camino Real lies precisely, in my opinion, in the lack of recognition of the absurdist element in it: the "organized meaninglessness" (ADORNO) that allowed Williams to represent the irrational quality of the modern human condition. Using as critical tool Theodor Adorno's essay "Trying to Understand Endgame", my aim will be to show that the play is successful in taking on the themes and techniques of absurdist theatre in the manner of Samuel Beckett. In "Trying to Understand Endgame" Adorno mentions Camino Real and identifies the motif of rubbish as central in both Beckett's Endgame and Camino Real underlying in this way a sort of continuity between the two plays. In my contribution I am going to analyze Camino Real using some of the tools Adorno applies to his study of Endgame and I will try to show the characteristics that in my opinion make Camino Real an absurdist play.


This newbie's guide to Ubuntu lets readers learn by doing. Using immersion-learning techniques favored by language courses, step-by-step projects build upon earlier tutorial concepts, stimulating the brain and increasing the reader's understanding. It also covers all the topics likely to be of interest to an average desktop user, such as installing new software via Synpatic; Internet connectivity; working with removable storage devices, printers, and scanners; and handling DVDs, audio files, and even iPods. It also eases readers into the world of commands, thus allowing them to work with Java, Python or other script-based applications; converting RPMs to DEB files; and compiling software from source.


Initially published in French under the title Operation Nemesis, this revealing work is now available to the English-speaking public for the first time. It ranks as a major revision in the historic study of the Armenian resistance to the Ottoman genocide of Armenians. Operation Nemesis is a study of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (the Tashnak Party) and the individuals responsible for the execution of Turkish leaders. Until Derogy's book, it had been assumed that the assassins were acting out of personal and emotional motives. But through an amazing amount of detective work, it becomes clear that they were in fact part of a disciplined effort to seek retribution for historic crimes against the Armenian people. The work richly details Turkish plans for the liquidation of the Armenian people, the individuals selected to liquidate the genocidists, and above all, and most complex, to document for the first time the role of the organized Armenian political opposition to Turkish rule. In doing so, Derogy brings to light the relation between the legal party and its extra-legal arm; the mechanisms needed to implement the daring plan of assassination; and the special postwar circumstances in which the Armenian nation found itself - torn asunder by a Turkish-Soviet detente in which the independence of Armenia became the sacrificial pawn. Derogy worked closely with scholars around the world, and interviewed firsthand remaining survivors who had direct contact with the events described. His is a detective story of the first rank, no less than a piece of historical reconstruction with obvious portent for current Armenian efforts to recapture political legitimacy and personal pride.


A range of tools have been proposed to support decision making in contaminated land remediation (collectively referred to as Decision Support Tools or DSTs). From a European perspective it is clear, however, that there are considerable national differences in the decision support process, and more generally in the extent to which
this process supports the selection of less invasive, alternative and potentially more sustainable remediation options such as phytoremediation, in situ immobilisation etc.
(referred to here as "gentle" remediation technologies or options). This thesis critically reviews available DSTs in terms of their fitness for purpose for the application of "gentle" remediation technologies, using published literature and data from two stakeholder surveys: the first from a European perspective (completed in the European Union ERANET SNOWMAN project SUMATECS (Sustainable Management of Trace Element Contaminated Sites)) (sample size of 130) and the
second focused on contaminated land consultants and managers in the UK (sample size of 71). In general stakeholder feedback from both surveys indicates a lack of knowledge of currently available DSTs and the requirement for a simple DST using a tiered approach that can be integrated into an existing national framework.


The HIV/AIDS crisis in South Africa has reached pandemic levels, with over 1 000 deaths per day. The church in South Africa represents a largely untapped resource for addressing this problem. One of the largest Evangelical church groups in South Africa is the Assemblies of God (AOG/SA). This church group consists of three culturally distinct fraternals: The Group (white), The Association (coloured), and The Movement (black). Although they function under one executive committee, these fraternals have remained organizationally distinct even after the dismantling of apartheid laws in 1991. On the issue of HIV/AIDS, all three fraternals have remained largely quiet and uninvolved. They have made no attempt to strategize on a unified response to the pandemic, nor have they attempted to promote culturally relevant curricula capable of empowering their pastors and theological students to respond effectively to this crisis. The research consisted of two phases, following Rothman and Thomas's Intervention Research model (1994), with special emphasis on the design and development component. The first phase identified and assessed educational, cultural, and religious factors relevant to the development and delivery of a clergy-focused multicultural curriculum intervention addressing the HIV/AIDS pandemic in South Africa. Data-gathering strategy for the first phase consisted of semi-structured interviews with ethnographic notions. The target groups for the first phase of the research included 15 credentialed AOG/SA pastors and the three fraternal leaders. The leaders and fraternal members participated in semistructured interviews designed to establish cultural and religious points of divergence pertaining to topics surrounding the AIDS pandemic (e.g. sickness, death, sexuality and gender roles). The second phase of the research consisted of the development and delivery of a curriculum intervention. Integrating the cultural and religious factors identified in the first phase of the research, the nine-day curriculum intervention was presented to 34 tertiary-level theological students in two culturally distinct venues. The content of the curriculum primarily emphasized aspects of gender, tradition, and culture as they relate to HIV/AIDS and surrounding issues. The intervention utilized three curriculum theories that were deemed relevant to the educational context of South Africa: humanistic curriculum theory, social reconstructionist curriculum theory and dialogue curriculum theory. Data-gathering strategies for the second phase of the research utilized both quantitative and qualitative instruments with ethnographic notions. The quantitative instruments included the Scale of Basic HIV/AIDS Knowledge (SHAK), Personal Reflections of Men with HIV/AIDS (PRM) and Personal Reflections of Women with HIV/AIDS (PRW). Reflective journaling was used to acquire qualitative data from student participants. Scores significantly improved on the SHAK in both venues. Scores on the PRW improved in both venues, significantly so in one. Unexpectedly, scores on the PRM declined at both venues, although not significantly so. Males with HIV/AIDS were viewed more negatively by both genders at the end of the intervention in both venues. Reflective journal entries indicated that students at both venues clearly perceived a need for the church to be involved in the pandemic; many proposed that sex education should be taking place within the context of church youth ministry. Affective responses were markedly positive for those suffering with AIDS, particularly females. The data clearly indicated that the curriculum was effective in two culturally distinct venues.


U.S. business schools dominate the business school landscape, particularly for the MBA degree. This fact has caused schools in other countries to imitate the U.S. schools as a model for business education. But U.S. business schools face a number of problems, many of them a result of offering a value proposition that primarily emphasizes the career-enhancing, salary-increasing aspects of business education as contrasted with the idea of organizational management as a profession to be pursued out of a sense of intrinsic interest or even service. We document some of the problems confronting U.S. business schools and show how many of these arise from a combination of a market-like orientation to education coupled with an absence of a professional ethos. In this tale, there are some lessons for educational organizations both in the U.S. and elsewhere that are interested in learning from the U.S. experience.


Professional English in Use Medicine contains 60 units covering a wide variety of medical vocabulary. Topics include diseases and symptoms, investigations, treatment, examining and prevention. The book also introduces general medical vocabulary related to parts and functions of the body, medical and para-medical personnel, education and training, research, and presentations. Professional English in Use Medicine has been carefully researched using the Institute for Applied Language Studies medical corpus and is a must for teachers of medical English and for medical practitioners who need to use English at work, either in their own country or abroad.


In hospitalized medical patients, randomized trials have established that anticoagulant prophylaxis has an acceptable benefit-to-risk ratio: ie, it lowers the incidence of clinically silent and symptomatic venous thromboembolism (VTE), including fatal pulmonary embolism, more than it raises the risks of bleeding and other complications. However, no similar trials have been done in long-term care residents. More research is needed to ascertain which long-term care residents would benefit most from VTE prophylaxis. In the absence of evidence-based guidelines, we advocate a selective approach. More research is needed to ascertain which long-term care residents would benefit most from anticoagulant prophylaxis. In the absence of evidence-based guidelines, we advocate a selective approach.


Banks have a central role and importance in all commerce and hence in all societies.
This thesis investigates the ethical basis of banking practice with the aim of
developing an account of the virtues appropriate to bankers and banking. One central
issue concerns a conflict between the interests of banks and their customers, and how
this conflict plays out in relation to the lending policies and fee structure of banks.
Such lending policies can have a significant effect on banks, their customers and a
range of stakeholders. This research project investigated empirical evidence through
qualitative interviews with senior bankers in two locations, Australia and Hong Kong,
to elicit their thoughts on banking areas that involve customer interaction, namely,
deposit-taking, credit cards, home mortgage loans, corporate finance, and foreign
exchange. The institutions selected hold a substantial segment of banking business
in their respective countries and are thus representative of bankers' perspectives. The
dissertation also entailed a case study of the causes and consequences of the
American sub-prime crisis that was precipitated by the financial sector. The
interviews revealed an assertion of good ethical conduct based on adherence to peerdetermined
codes of conduct and compliance with regulations. There was also a
common predisposition to claims of corporate social responsibility and reputation
preservation but these have tended to mask the powerful underlying sales thrust. A
key finding of the study points to a lapse in ethical values in banks due to excessive
reliance on self-interest. Although self-interest is not in itself wrong, there has been a
lack of moderation vis-a-vis the interests of less powerful customers. A related
finding is a prevailing resistance to regulation that is necessary to curtail selfish and irresponsible behaviour by banks. The interview subjects prefer industry selfregulation
to government supervision. However, the banks in Australia and Hong
Kong, which have been subjected to tighter regulation, have survived the global
financial crisis better than their American counterparts despite complaints about the
severity of their regulatory climate. There is a strong case to ascribe ethical failure to
American practices that triggered the sub-prime calamities, which have devastated
homeowners and the global economy. American banks and regulators both operated
on the erroneous supposition that the quest after extreme profits would be restrained
by free market forces. The conclusions allude to virtues that are necessary for banks
to espouse moral conduct. These virtues can be embedded through leadership and
cultural change.


OBJECTIVE: Opioid-induced adrenal insufficiency (OIAI) may develop in patients treated with chronic opioids due suppression of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis. Our objective was to describe clinical manifestations, biochemical presentation and clinical course of OIAI. METHODS: A retrospective study of adults diagnosed with OIAI between 2006 and 2018 at an academic center. Opioid daily dose was converted into morphine mg equivalent (MME). RESULTS: Forty patients (n=29, 73% women) taking chronic opioids at a daily median MME dose of 105 (60-200) mg and median duration of 60 (3-360) months were diagnosed with OIAI. Patients reported fatigue (n=29, 73%), musculoskeletal pain (n=21, 53%), and weight loss (n=17, 53%) for a median of 12 (1-132) months prior to diagnosis and only 7.5% (n=3) patients were identified with OIAI through case detection. Biochemical diagnosis of OIAI was based on 1) low morning cortisol, baseline ACTH and/or DHEAS in 59% (n=26) patients or 2) abnormal cosyntropin stimulation test (CST) in 41% (n=14) patients. With glucocorticoid replacement, 16/23 (70%) patients with available follow up experienced improvement in symptoms. Opioids were tapered or discontinued in 15 patients, of whom 10 were followed for adrenal function of which 7 (70%) recovered from OIAI. CONCLUSION: Minimum daily MME in patients diagnosed with OIAI was 60 mg/day. OIAI causes significant morbidity and recognition requires a high level of clinical suspicion. Appropriate glucocorticoid treatment led to improvement of symptoms in 70%. Resolution of OIAI occurred following opioid cessation or reduction.


Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) modulate voltage-gated K(+) channel inactivation by an unknown site and mechanism. The effects of ω-6 and ω-3 PUFAs were investigated on the heterologously expressed Kv1.4 channel. PUFAs inhibited wild-type Kv1.4 during repetitive pulsing as a result of slowing of recovery from inactivation. In a mutant Kv1.4 channel lacking N-type inactivation, PUFAs reversibly enhanced C-type inactivation (Kd, 15-43 μM). C-type inactivation was affected by extracellular H(+) and K(+) as well as PUFAs and there was an interaction among the three: the effect of PUFAs was reversed during acidosis and abolished on raising K(+) Replacement of two positively charged residues in the extracellular pore (H508 and K532) abolished the effects of the PUFAs (and extracellular H(+) and K(+)) on C-type inactivation but had no effect on the lipoelectric modulation of voltage sensor activation, suggesting two separable interaction sites/mechanisms of action of PUFAs. Charge calculations suggest that the acidic head group of the PUFAs raises the pKa of H508 and this reduces the K(+) occupancy of the selectivity filter, stabilizing the C-type inactivated state.


This paper examines multiple interpretations organizational members have of Internet-based information systems (IS) by carrying out an interpretive investigation into the evolution of such systems in a large organization. The findings indicate that exploring interpretive schemes relating to the nature and application of Internet-based IS offers a better understanding of the choices made regarding the design and use of Internet-based IS. This paper illustrates that differences in the interpretive schemes of social groups may lead to differences in actions around Internet-based technologies and were also seen as a source of innovation. The implications of the findings for theory and practice are discussed.


Planning, design and management of microirrigation systems require extensive numerical calculations. The introduction of computers in these processes removes much of the complications in calculation and results in more accurate analysis. Not many of the available software can be used to deal with an overall irrigation system implementation. Usually, separate software are used for irrigation planning and irrigation systems design. Consequently, this increases the investment cost for using the software in irrigation schemes. Hence, an integrated approach for both planning and
system design is required. In this study, an integrated computer aided design for microirrigation systems was developed. The program was written in Visual Basic (version 6.0) and it runs in Windows environment. A user-friendly interface is provided to give more flexibility to the user. This program uses menu bar and toolbar which takes the user to all data entry and results dialogs. Additionally, it is designed in such a way that extensive use of tables tables and graphics will be provided. This program also provides a help file that can be used as a guide for selecting the appropriate data during data entry processes. The developed program has the ability to estimate crop water requirements and design of microirrigation system pipelines. The computation of reference crop evapotranspiration from the available climatic data can be done for daily and monthly
time steps, using F AO Penman-Monteith method. Crop water requirement during the whole crop growing season can be calculated. Using these data, the program estimates
irrigation requirement taking into consideration the available rainfall. All the inputted data and the obtained results can be displayed in tabular or graphical forms. The program is also capable of performing analysis of either lateral or submain unit. All the emitter flows along a lateral or in a submain unit can be determined. Additionally, maximum and minimum emitter flows and their locations can also be determined. Finally, emitter flow variation and pressure variation along a lateral or in a
submain unit are computed. In this stage, tables and graphics are also provided. The overall laterals' layout and emitter flows profile can be displayed in the screen.
The developed program can be considered as a tool for preliminary design of micro irrigation systems. It is recommended to extend it to more powerful software by
including the design of all irrigation system.


The current study explores potential disaggregated, simultaneous, and interactive effects of a composite scale measure of self-control on self-reported adolescent violent delinquency and minor delinquency. Using data from 616 Dutch adolescents participating in the Study of Peers, Activities, and Neighborhoods (SPAN), this exploratory study seeks to investigate the full utility of the self-control measure and its effect on adolescent delinquency. Specifically, this thesis explores if a composite measure of self-control— along with corresponding disaggregated measures—significantly predicts violent and minor delinquency independently from and simultaneously with one another. Interaction effects are also investigated with exploratory analysis. Using negative binomial regression, results indicated that self-control significantly predicted both adolescent violent delinquency and minor delinquency when examined as a composite measure and disaggregated into dimensional measures. Results further indicated that in simultaneous models, all dimensional measures of self-control significantly predicted violent delinquency; however, risk-taking was the only significant predictor of minor delinquency. This would suggest that dimensional measures of self-control influence varying types of delinquency differently which is inconsistent with the theory of selfcontrol. Contributing preliminary findings to the self-control literature, impulsivity was found to moderate the relationship between risk-taking and minor delinquency in a longitudinal analysis. This suggests that the effect of risk-taking on minor delinquency does vary across levels of impulsivity and future research should investigate this finding further in other samples. This thesis argues that composite scale measures of self-control should be disaggregated to better understand how individual dimensions of self-control influence different forms of delinquency.


Differences in judgmental models between highly differentiated individuals and poorly differentiated individuals were investigated. Level of cognitive differentiation was determined by participants' responses to a Repertory Grid technique. Based upon previous research, it was predicted that highly differentiated individuals would engage in judgmental processes that reflected a nonadditive model, while poorly differentiated individuals would engage in more additive judgmental processes. While it was shown that highly differentiated individuals did engage in nonadditive judgmental processes and poorly differentiated individuals did engage in additive judgmental processes, the difference between the two groups was not statistically significant. The findings are discussed in context of previous research on cognitive differentiation.


Forests are a significant part of the global carbon cycle. Forests sequester carbon by conducting photosynthesis, which is the process of converting light energy to chemical energy and storing it in the chemical bonds of sugar. Carbon sequestration through forestry has the potential to play a significant role in ameliorating global environmental problems such as atmospheric accumulation of GHG's and climate change.  The present investigation was carried out to determine carbon sequestration potential of hybrid Eucalyptus. This study was conducted primarily to develop a prediction model of carbon storage capacity for plantation forest of hybrid Eucalyptus in Aek Nauli, Simalungun District, North Sumatera. Models were tested and assessed for statistical validity and accuracy in predicting biomass and carbon, based on determination coefficient (R) and correlation coefficient (r), aggregative deviation percentage (AgD), and the average deviation percentage (AvD). The best general model to estimate the biomass of hybrid Eucalyptus was Y = 1351,09x^0,876. e^(0,094).  Results showed that hybrid Eucalyptus had an average above-ground biomass in year 0 (the land without the eucalyptus trees) up to year 3 as large as 1.36, 11.56, 43.18, and 63.84 t ha. The carbon content of hybrid Eucalyptus were 0.61, 5.2, 19.43 t^(-1), and 28,73  t^(-1) C ha while the carbon sequestration potential were 2.23, 19.08, 71.31, and 105.43 t^(-1) CO  ha^(-1) respectively.


Network coarsening refers to a new class of graph 'zoom-out' operations by grouping similar nodes and edges together so that a smaller equivalent representation of the graph can be obtained for big network analysis. Existing network coarsening methods consider that network structures are static and thus cannot handle dynamic networks. On the other hand, data-driven approaches can infer dynamic network structures by using network information spreading data. However, existing data-driven approaches neglect static network structures that are potentially useful for inferring big networks. In this paper, we present a new semi-data-driven network coarsening model to learn coarsened networks by embedding both static network structure data and dynamic network information spreading data. We prove that the learning model is convex and the Accelerated Proximal Gradient algorithm is adapted to achieve the global optima. Experiments on both synthetic and real-world data sets demonstrate the quality and effectiveness of the proposed method.


ASSESSMENT OF MICROBIAL CARBON PROCESSING AND ITS IMPLICATIONS TO THE CARBON BUDGET OF LAKE SUPERIOR By Lindsey Michelle Koren, PhD A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University. Virginia Commonwealth University, 2019 Major Director: Dr. S. Leigh McCallister Associate Professor, Department of Biology Over the past few decades, there has been increased research focus on carbon cycling within aquatic systems, especially with the changing global climate. Inland waters play a major role in the global carbon cycle, but the fundamental features remain poorly understood, particularly the large lakes of the world. Our experimental approach assessing the carbon budget of Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake by area, provides spatial and temporal variability that has been previously overlooked but may be critical to our understanding on the biogeochemical processes controlling the lake. Multiple stations were chosen across the lake, both nearshore and offshore, to evaluate the variability in physical mixing regimes and biogeochemical processing. Short and long-term carbon consumption measurements were coupled to assess the heterotrophic activity relative to the lability of dissolved organic carbon. Partial pressure of carbon dioxide (pCO2) was directly measured to determine the metabolic nature of the lake and the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) that fluxes across the air-water interface. The pCO2 results were further coupled with an isotopic approach measuring oxygen-18 (δO) to evaluate how the metabolism of Lake Superior has changed over a decadal scale. A range of environmental factors, including temperature, photodegradation and source/quality of organic carbon, influenced short and long-term carbon consumption. In-situ pCO2 observations supported a temporal switch in metabolism from the lake being a source of CO2 in the spring to being a sink in the summer driven by biological components of the system. When the pCO2 results were coupled with the isotopic measurements over the past decade (19992011), Lake Superior was dominated by respiration during isothermal conditions and production during stratification. In the past decade, Lake Superior has experienced increased surface water temperatures, shifting the metabolic state to a shorter net heterotrophic period in the spring and a longer net autotrophic period in the summer. This research highlights fundamental aspects of Lake Superior's metabolism that have been previously understudied, as well as providing key information about processes controlling its carbon budget, and giving a better understanding of how climate change will continue to impact Lake Superior.


Background: Among Hispanic breast cancer survivors, we examined the long-term effects of a short-term culturally based dietary intervention on increasing fruits/vegetables (F/V), decreasing fat, and changing biomarkers associated with breast cancer recurrence risk. Methods: Spanish-speaking women (n = 70) with a history of stage 0–III breast cancer who completed treatment were randomized to ¡Cocinar Para Su Salud! (n = 34), a culturally based 9-session program (24 hours over 12 weeks, including nutrition education, cooking classes, and food-shopping field trips), or a control group (n = 36, written dietary recommendations for breast cancer survivors). Diet recalls, fasting blood, and anthropometric measures were collected at baseline, 6, and 12 months. We report changes between groups at 12 months in dietary intake and biomarkers using 2-sample Wilcoxon t tests and generalized estimating equation (GEE) models. Results: At 12 months, the intervention group compared with the control group reported higher increases in mean daily F/V servings (total: +2.0 vs. −0.4; P < 0.01), and nonsignificant decreases in the percentage of calories from fat (−2.2% vs. −1.1%; P = 0.69) and weight (−2.6 kg vs. −1.5 kg; P = 0.56). Compared with controls, participants in the intervention group had higher increases in plasma lutein (+20.4% vs. −11.5%; P < 0.01), and borderline significant increases in global DNA methylation (+0.8% vs. −0.5%; P = 0.06). Conclusions: The short-term ¡Cocinar Para Su Salud! program was effective at increasing long-term F/V intake in Hispanic breast cancer survivors and changed biomarkers associated with breast cancer recurrence risk. Impact: It is possible for short-term behavioral interventions to have long-term effects on behaviors and biomarkers in minority cancer patient populations. Results can inform future study designs. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev; 25(11); 1491–502. ©2016 AACR.


Tectonics, climate and sea level are dominant controls on the nature and distribution of sedimentary environments. By inverse logic, recognition of influences on sedimentation from the stratigraphic record as a result of perturbations in these variables leads to clarification of past environmental and structural change. The succession of sedimentary environments in time and place is determined by a wider combination of variables; namely, sediment flux, biological evolution, atmosphere and water body productivity and chemistry. The feedbacks and interrelationships between all variables cause the complexity seen in sedimentation processes over geological time. The processes of global tectonics that cause widespread mountain belt and continental plateau uplift have produced numerous 'severe' events during Earth history: these often random workings-out of the plate tectonic cycle define the state of 'Cybertectonic Earth' (from cyber, after the Greek kubernan: to steer or govern). This has worked within a usually zonally arranged series of climatic belts and within the framework provided by biological evolution. At certain times in the geological past, a combination of factors arose as a response to continental uplift and have acted to cause certain Earth surface conditions and variables (notably mean global surface temperature, atmospheric pCO2, pO2) to have varied by very large amounts (×2–×10) compared with present values. These large fluctuations, such as those responsible for the Neoproterozoic, Late Palaeozoic and late Tertiary glaciations, lead one to doubt the reality of homeostatic control of surface conditions as proposed in Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis. The Gaian kuberne0te0s (steersman) had a weak hand on the helm, frequently unable to prevent vast areas of the globe experiencing rapid fluctuations in environmental conditions and inimical conditions to life for very long periods during Neoproterozoic and Phanerozoic times. At the same time, biogenic and abiogenic processes have proved capable of returning Earth to states of mean stability, although biogeochemical cycling models seem alarmingly ad hoc and largely untestable as scientific hypotheses in any true geological sense.


Over the last two decades, Mexico has experienced macroeconomic stability, an open trade regime, and substantial progress in education. Yet average workers' earnings have stagnated, and earnings of those with higher schooling have fallen, compressing the earnings distribution and lowering the returns to education. This paper argues that distortions that misallocate resources toward less-productive firms explain these phenomena, because these firms are less intensive in well-educated workers compared with more-productive ones. It shows that while the relative supply of workers with more years of schooling has increased, misallocation of resources toward less productive firms has persisted. These two trends have generated a widening mismatch between the supply of, and the demand for, educated workers. The paper breaks down worker earnings into observable and unobservable firm and individual worker characteristics, and computes a counterfactual earnings distribution in the absence of misallocation. The main finding is that in the absence of misallocation average earnings would be higher, and that earnings differentials across schooling levels would widen, raising the returns to education. A no-misallocation path is constructed for the wage premium. Depending on parameter values, this path is found to be rising or constant, in contrast to the observed downward path. The paper concludes arguing that the persistence of misallocation impedes Mexico from taking full advantage of its investments in the education of its workforce.


In a footnote to his introduction to the 1979 Arden edition of A Midsummer Nights Dream, Harold Brooks notes of the Bottom/Titania subplot that: ... though the humour resides partly in contrast between his animal form and her 'airy spirit', even a controlled suggestion of carnal bestiality is surely impossible: jealous Oberon would not have cast his spell to cuckold himself. Her dotage is imaginative and emotional. (1) Brooks' dismissal is understandable; the idea that "jealous Oberon" might "cast his spell to cuckold himself" as a means of punishing his wife is jarring, and potentially troubling in the extreme. Indeed, the mere suggestion has the potential to undercut the play's comic effect, at least for a modern audience. Of course, whether it would have done so for an early modern audience is by no means certain. In this essay, I propose that Oberon has indeed "cast his spell to cuckold himself," using erotic desire as a weapon to humiliate his rebellious wife and enforce her submission. He does this in order to reassert his position at the head of his family and, by extension, the state as embodied in the fairy kingdom, while at the same time restoring order to the natural world by remedying the domestic and political chaos which has infected it with "contagious fogs" and "progeny of evils." In his chastising of Titania, and Titania's acceptance of it, we see a clear example of the erotic dominance and submission which underpin the domestic, social, and political economies of A Midsummer Night's Dream. A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play famously concerned with the nature of erotic desire, and perhaps for this reason it is one of Shakespeare's most perennially popular comedies, performed in various (sometimes truncated) forms since the late sixteenth century. (2) The play's engagement with that desire has been central to critical inquiry for nearly as long. Even Samuel Pepys, one of the play's earliest (and harshest) critics, remarked in his diaries that it showcased "some handsome women." (3) More recent criticism, while no less engaged with the play's treatment of erotic desire, has also tended to comment upon the play's gender dynamics, reading the play in the context of gender relations of the late Elizabethan period in which it was written. Shirley Nelson Garner notes that despite the "renewal" which is promised in the conclusion, the play "recognizes the tenuousness of heterosexuality." (4) Critics such as David Marshall have noted the ways in which the comedy's female characters are marginalized, (5) while Louis Montrose reads the play as a kind of cultural artifact whose treatments of gender and social relations must be understood in relation to the Elizabethan court. (6) Jonathan Crewe built upon this reading, arguing that A Midsummer Night's Dream's "sexual politics" were both complex and "historically specific."(7) In Things of Darkness, Kim Hall reads the comedy as a gyno/xenophobic study in which "threatening female sexuality and power" are displaced into the literal and rhetorical darkness of the forest. (8) More recently, Bruce Boehrer has undertaken a study of the play's "economies of desire," noting the parallels between the play's "bestiality motif" and its "various references to same-sex communities. (9) While all of these studies are informative and illustrative in various ways, Boehrer's study is particularly to my purpose. I propose here a new reading of the play's "economies of desire," or "erotic economies," as I term them. (10) As critics have long noted, the play is focused on the power dynamics of gender relations, and all of the play's representations of erotic desire emanate from this focus. Arguably the most conspicuous feature of erotic desire as it is depicted in A Midsummer Night's Dream is its close linking with control. Indeed, in the Oberon/Titania/Bottom plot, erotic desire is inextricable from control; it is, in fact, a form of control. …


The paper probes the notions of an "optimum currency area" (OCA) and "business cycle synchronization" in the context of convergence within the European Monetary Union (EMU). Analyzing the latest literature in this area, the author concludes that most of the measures currently used and promoted ignore the key advantages and disadvantages of an optimum currency area. At the same time, the paper attempts to apply a common tool of gravity equation to test the possible impact of the EMU on trade patterns among EU member states. By implementing a traditional notion of gravity equation, the author demonstrates that, as far as international trade is concerned, it is possible to move trade flows from non-EMU countries to those using the single European currency.


Sex differences in many spatial and verbal tasks appear to reflect an inherent low-level processing bias for movement in males and objects in females. We explored this potential movement/object bias in men and women using a computer task that measured targeting performance and/or color recognition. The targeting task showed a ball moving vertically towards a horizontal line. Before reaching the line, the ball disappeared behind a masking screen, requiring the participant to imagine the movement vector and identify the intersection point. For the color recognition task, the ball briefly changed color before disappearing beneath the mask and participants were required only to identify the color shade. Results showed that targeting accuracy for slow and fast moving balls was significantly better in males compared to females. No sex difference was observed for color shade recognition. We also studied a third, dual attention task comprised of the first two, where the moving ball briefly changed color randomly just before passing beneath the masking screen. When the ball changed color, participants were required only to identify the color shade. If the ball didn't change color, participants estimated the intersection point. Participants in this dual attention condition were first tested with the targeting and color tasks alone and showed results that were similar to the previous groups tested on a single task. However, under the dual attention condition, male accuracy in targeting, as well as color shade recognition, declined significantly compared to their performance when the tasks were tested alone. No significant changes were found in female performance. Finally, reaction times for targeting and color choices in both sexes correlated highly with ball speed, but not accuracy. Overall, these results provide evidence of a sex-related bias in processing objects versus movement, which may reflect sex differences in bottom up versus top-down analytical strategies.


Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is a technique associated with assisted reproduction
(AR) which is the analysis of genetic material from pre-embryo in order to determine if it is free
of genetic alterations and to transfer it to the uterus of the mother enabling the seed of a healthy
baby.
To do this project it has done a thorough search, searching many keywords in databases,
bibliographic and webgraphy sources and consulting specialists in medical field. To complement
the theoretical knowledge acquired stays were performed with Girofiv and Reprogenetics
groups.
PGD is a technique basically indicated in couples who have sex-linked diseases, monogenic
diseases, the search of histocompatible siblings, in numerical and structural chromosomal
abnormalities, in women who have had recurrent abortions or in patients over 35 years where
the doctor can suspect the presence of genetic alterations in oocytes. To analyse these situations
is usually provided genetic counselling by specialists where all possibilities available to patients
are determined. In the PGD it is necessary to obtain oocytes, which are extracted from ovarian
puncture with prior hormonal stimulation. Mature oocytes (either from the same patient or
donor, which can be cryopreserved) are fertilized in vitro or by intracytoplasmic injection to get
the pre-embryos, which are selected to extract one or more cells from a biopsy polar body,
blastomere or trophectoderm. The extracted DNA from the cells is analysed by three techniques:
PCR, FISH and CGH array.
The legislation of this technique is highly influenced by ethical and religious issues. Spain is one
of the countries of the European Union and the world that most uses the PGD techniques of RA,
having a fairly permissive legislation, always validated by specialized committee. Other
European countries have more or less restrictive legislation regarding this technique. Outside
Europe, the developed countries which use the DGP usually do not have separate legislation for
this technique, and they often regulate it by commissions or from what determines their
religion


The growth rate of 4H-SiC epi layers has been increased by a factor 3 (up to 18μm/h) with respect to the standard process with the introduction of HCl in the deposition chamber. The epitaxial layers grown with the addition of HCl have been characterized by electrical, optical and structural characterization methods. An optimized process without the addition of HCl is reported for comparison. The Schottky diodes, manufactured on the epitaxial layer grown with the addition of HCl at 1600 °C, have electrical characteristics comparable with the standard epitaxial process with the advantage of an epitaxial growth rate three times higher.


Ensuring privacy of Big Data managed on the cloud is critical to ensure consumer confidence. Cloud providers publish privacy policy documents outlining the steps they take to ensure data and consumer privacy. These documents are available as large text documents that require manual effort and time to track and manage. We have developed a semantically rich ontology to describe the privacy policy documents and built a database of several policy documents as instances of this ontology. We next extracted rules from these policy documents based on deontic logic which can be used to automate management of data privacy. In this paper we describe our ontology in detail along with the results of our analysis of privacy policies of prominent cloud services.


Back ground: Dental caries and periodontal disease were the most common andwidely spread diseases affecting children. The nutrition may be one of the factorsaffecting the severity of the oral diseases. The Aims of this study was theassessment of the following oral diseases (dental caries, gingivitis) in addition toassessment of oral hygiene among 4-5 years old children in Karbala city –Iraq.Furthermore, nutritional status was assessed in relation to oral diseases.Materials and methods: A sample of 658 children (350 males, 308 females) agedfour and five years old was selected randomly from the fourteenth kindergartensin Karbala city. Diagnosis and recording of dental caries was followed the criteriaof WHO 1987. Dental plaque was assessed using plaque index of Silness and Loe,1964. Gingival health condition was assessed using gingival index of Loe andSilness, 1963. The assessment of nutritional status was performed usinganthropometric measurement (height and weight) according to Body mass indexindicator with -2SD cutoff point.Results: Caries prevalence was found to be (83%) of the total sample the mean rankvalue of dmfs was higher among boys in comparison to girls with statistically nosignificant difference (P>0.05). The value of dmfs increased with age withstatistically highly significant difference (p<0.01).The mean rank values of dentalplaque and gingival indices for total boys were found to be higher than total girlswith statistically highly significant differences (P<0.01). Recording of this studydemonstrated that 100% of children had dental plaque and gingival inflammation.Positive highly significant correlations were recorded between dental caries withdental plaque and gingival indices. The prevalence of malnutrition described byBody mass index indicator was (3.2%). According to nutritional status indicatorBody mass index-for-age, it was found that the wasted children had higher valueof dmfs than well nourished children with statistically no significant differences(P>0.05). The plaque and gingival indices were higher among well nourishedchildren than among wasted children with statistically highly significantdifferences (P<0.01).The correlation coefficient between body mass index withdental caries, plaque index and gingival index were very weak and statistically notsignificant (p>0.05).Conclusions: High prevalence of dental caries and gingivitis was recorded indicatingthe need of public and preventive programs among kindergarten children.


Seafloor spreading anomalies in the world's ocean basins yieldcrucial information about the paleogeographic configuration of thecontinents and the development of ocean basins. Standard methodsfor measuring these variations are to apply ship towedmagnetometer systems or aircrafts. For the polar regions,magnetometer systems fixed to a vessel are more appropriate. Aprocessing sequence for the evaluation of magnetometer dataacquired onboard RV \emph{Polarstern} with a sensor system fixedto the ship is described in the first part of this thesis. In thesecond part, seafloor spreading anomaly data, measured by ship,aircraft and helicopter, in the South Atlantic region, are used toconstrain a geodynamic model for the Mesozoic break-up of Gondwanaand the development of the Weddell Sea Basin.Magnetometer data acquired onboard the German ice breaker andresearch vessel Polarstern have to be corrected for theship's interfering field caused by the hull and other steel partsof the ship. This correction is done by the calculation ofappropriate compensation coefficients. With the processing schemepresented in this thesis the ship's magnetometer data arecompensated and filtered to an accuracy of about 20nT at ahorizontal resolution of about 154m in quiet sea conditions.This makes the data suitable for a consistent interpretation ofsingle track data or further processing of a network of profiles.The compilation of a magnetic anomaly map and comparison withother high resolution magnetic anomaly data demonstrate thesuitability of the processed data to be used for detailedinterpretations of magnetic anomalies in geodynamic problems likethose encountered in the South Atlantic region and dealt with inthe second part of this thesis.A refined model for the break-up of Gondwana and the opening ofthe Weddell Sea is presented in the second part of this thesis.From an interpretation of a newly acquired extensive magneticanomaly data set in the eastern Weddell Sea, well constrained agesand orientations of seafloor spreading anomalies are used tocalculate a new set of model parameters for the opening of theWeddell Sea. These are combined with constraints on the SouthAmerica - Africa and Africa - Antarctica spreading systems, basedon a compilation of magnetic anomaly and fracture zone data, todetermine a new model for Gondwana break-up between 167Ma and83Ma. At the same time when north-south oriented separationbetween Africa and Antarctica is initiated by rifting in theSomali and Mozambique basins, stretching and extension takes placein the Filchner-Ronne Shelf and the Falkland Plateau between167Ma and 147Ma. In contrast to models proposing only rigidEast-West Gondwana separation, this model features three separatebasins developing simultaneously during early Gondwana break-up.These basins are the Somali, Mozambique, and Weddell Sea basins.In the new model, separation between South America and Antarcticastarts in the southern Weddell Sea at around 147Ma, about 15 to20 million years later than previously estimated. Subsequentspreading occurs at slow (~12-14mm/yr halfrate), and aftermagnetic chron M2 (122.3Ma) ultra-slow (~8mm/yr)spreading rates, with little change in the NNW spreadingdirection. Further consequences of this model are a revision ofthe age of formation of seaward dipping reflector sequences alongthe continental margin off western Dronning Maud Land and newconstraints on possible movements of the Mozambique Ridge betweenAfrica and Antarctica during the break-up of Gondwana and thedevelopment of a deep water connection between the Indian and theSouth Atlantic Ocean.