Jozo Tomasevich. War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. xvii, 842 pp. Maps. Bibliography. Index. $75.00, cloth. Jozo Tomasevich's 800-page opus, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration, is the second volume in what was intended to be a three-volume study of wartime Yugoslavia. The first volume, subtitled The Chetniks and published in 1975, is still by far the best, most detailed, and most balanced treatment of that very controversial topic. This, the second volume, holds its own in comparison to the first and will almost certainly be considered the definitive work on the equally controversial topic of occupation and collaboration regimes in wartime Yugoslavia. This book, though substantially completed in 1994 when Dr. Tomasevich passed away, was put into the computer, edited, and prepared for publication by his daughter, Nina. Regrettably, of course, the posthumous publication of this volume means that we cannot look forward to the third one. The loss of that volume, which was to cover the activities of the Partisan Movement during the war, is a great blow to the scholarly community. We are, nonetheless, grateful now to have available to us two thirds of this masterful work. In this volume, Tomasevich covered in meticulous and awe-inspiring detail the activities and experiences of those parts of Yugoslavia occupied by or in active collaboration with the various axis regimes during the Second World War. The largest part of the book is, not surprisingly, devoted to the collaborationist NDH regime in Croatia, but it also covers the occupation regimes in Serbia, Macedonia, Slovenia, and Kosovo. Moreover, in every case Tomasevich made a clear distinction between each individual area of occupation, so that he dealt separately with those areas of Croatia, Bosnia, and Slovenia under Italian authority and those run by the Germans, as well as distinguishing those areas of Serbia under German occupation from those controlled by the Hungarians or Bulgarians. In this way, Tomasevich not only gave us a microscopic and accurate description of wartime activities in all occupied areas of the former Yugoslavia, but also provided many insights into the relationships between various occupying powers. He also drew out differences between and policy debates among different occupation officers and the consequences of those disagreements for the region in question. Beyond this chronological and geographical approach, Tomasevich addressed a number of other pressing and controversial questions in chapters on the role and fate of various religious groups and churches in occupied regions during the war, the extent of the Axis regimes' economic exploitation of Yugoslavia, as well as "Alleged and True Population Losses." Concerning the latter, he dealt in a thorough and entirely professional way with the numerous controversies and debates that have arisen both among scholars of, and politicians in, Yugoslavia concerning the demographic consequences of the Second World War. …


The evolution of the interferon (IFN) system, the major innate antiviral mechanism of vertebrates, remains poorly understood. According to the detection of type I IFN genes in cartilaginous fish genomes, the system appeared 500My ago. However, the IFN system integrates many other components, most of which are encoded by IFN-stimulated genes (ISGs). To shed light on its evolution, we have used deep RNA sequencing to generate a comprehensive list of ISGs of zebrafish, taking advantage of the high quality genome annotation in this species. We analyzed larvae after inoculation of recombinant zebrafish type I IFN, or infection with chikungunya virus, a potent IFN inducer. We identified more than 400 zebrafish ISGs, defined as being either directly induced by IFN or induced by the virus in an IFN receptor-dependent manner. Their human orthologues were highly enriched in ISGs, particularly for highly-inducible genes. We identified 72 orthology groups containing ISGs in both zebrafish and human, revealing a core ancestral ISG repertoire, which includes most of the known signaling components of the IFN system. Many downstream effectors were also already present 450 My ago in the common ancestor of tetrapods and bony fish, and diversified as multi-gene families independently in the two lineages. A large proportion of the ISG repertoire is lineage-specific; around 40% of protein-coding zebrafish ISGs had no human orthologue. We identified 14 fish-specific gene families containing multiple ISGs, including finTRIMs. This work illuminates the evolution of the IFN system and provides a rich resource to explore new antiviral mechanisms. Key points We established an exhaustive list of larval zebrafish ISGs. Orthologous ISGs in fish and human identify a large ancestral ISG repertoire.


Identifying terrigenous sources in deep-sea sediments may re- veal temporal trends in paleocirculation and the relative role of eolian, upwelled, and hemipelagic Fe sources to surface waters. Bulk elemental and isotopic geochemistry of deep-sea sediments recovered during Ocean Drilling Program Leg 177 in the south- eastern Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean reveal several im- portant aspects of paleocirculation and terrigenous provenance. The sites studied span 43!-53!S and represent different oceano- graphic settings relative to regional hydrography and sediment type. Bulk sediment geochemistry indicates that terrigenous prov- enance varied over the past 600 k.y. Site 1089, the northernmost site, exhibits clear glacial-interglacial variability in provenance, while provenance appears to vary regardless of climate state at the more southerly sites (Site 1093 and 1094). Nd and Sr isotopes and Sm/Nd ratios of the terrigenous fraction indicate that study sites have geochemically distinguishable provenance. Nd and Sr isotopes further suggest that Sites 1089 and 1094 both contain detrital com- ponents that originated in South America over the past 30 k.y.; however, Site 1089 is also influenced by southern African sources and the strength of the Agulhas Current. The" Nd data support a more hemipelagic source for the terrigenous material rather than an eolian source based on comparisons with Antarctic ice core data and known sea-ice extent.


The full connectivity offered by the nature of wireless communication poses a vast number of benefits and challenges to the designers of future generation wireless networks. One of the main challenges being faced is dealing with the unresolvable interference at the receivers. It is widely recognized that the heart of this challenge lies in the design of resource allocation schemes which provide the best trade-off between efficiency and complexity Exploration of this trade-off requires appropriate choices of performance metrics and mathematical models. In this regard, the thesis is concerned with certain technical and mathematical aspects of resource allocation in wireless networks. We specifically argue that an efficient resource allocation in wireless networks needs to take into account the following parameters: (i) rate of environment changes, (ii) traffic model, and (iii) amount of information available at transmitters. As mathematical tools for our investigation, we use optimization theory and game theory. We are especially interested in distributed resource allocation in networks with slow fading channels and with partial channel side information at the transmitters. Transmitters with partial channel side information have exact information of their own channel as well as statistical knowledge of other channels. In such a context, the system is inherently impaired by a nonzero outage probability. We propose low complexity distributed algorithms for joint rate and power allocation, aiming at maximizing the individual throughput, defined as the successfully-received-information rate, under a power constraint.


First detailed limnological study was performed from April 2003 to June 2008 in a 396.6 km long section of the Serbian Danube (divided in three parts; from 1260 r-km to 863.4 r-km) to examine community composition and spatial distribution of Mollusca with special attention to the expansion of Ponto-Caspian species, propagation of invasive and introduced species and occurrence of endemic species. Mollusca samples were collected at 15 sites in April, June, September and November. We investigated the spatial distributions and calculated the faunistic similarity of localities with respect to the community composition using the Sørensen Quotient of Similarity. Site variation in analyzed qualitative traits was examined using correspondence analysis. Additionally, the obtained Complete Linkage City-block (Manhattan) distances among sites/parts were subjected to UPGMA (unweighted pair-group method using arithmetic averages) cluster analysis. The class Gastropoda was represented by 18 species from two subclasses (Prosobranchia — six families and Pulmonata — three families).The class Bivalvia was represented by 15 species from four families of order Eulamellibranchiata. Mollusca were represented by 33 species belonging to 17 genera and 13 families. Out of five recorded Ponto-Caspian species in the studied Danube stretch, Lithoglyphus naticoides (Pfeiffer, 1828) and Dreissena polymorpha (Pallas, 1771) are assumed to be invasive species with the highest occurrence frequency (F = 1, each). Four new species in invertebrate fauna for the Danube, denoted as the introduced species — Neozoa, were identified: Theodoxus fluviatilis (L., 1758), Corbicula fluminalis (Müller, 1774), C. fluminea (Müller, 1774), and Sinanodonta woodiana (Lea, 1834). The only endemic species of Gastropoda found in the Danube was Viviparus acerosus Bourguignat, 1862.


Peat water is an abundant water resource in Asia, especially in rural areas. However, it is unsuitable to be used as a commercial water supply. Monitoring peat water characteristics at Beriah swamp, Perak, recorded colour (238 PtCo), turbidity (12.86 NTU), iron (0.89 mg/L), pH (4.8) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) (27 mg/L) over the national limitation standards. In this study, surfactant modified bentonite (SMB) shows high removal of colour (95%), turbidity (97%) and iron (100%) from peat water, but not COD (almost non-removal). From the results obtained, treatment of peat water using a combination of chitosan-natural bentonite was more efficient by the resulting optimal removal for all parameters such as colour (78%), turbidity (89%), iron (90%) and COD (67%). Meanwhile, a combination of chitosan-SMB gave similar results as SMB alone; however, reducing the amount of pollutants used in combination was advantageous in this combination. The response surface method was applied and the optimal reaction between coagulant and sample due to pH, dosage and contact time was determined.


We study whether cities with Jewish communities grew faster than cities without Jewish communities in Europe between 1400 and 1850. We match data on city populations from Bairoch (1988) with data on the presence of a Jewish community from Roth and Wigoder (2007). Our difference-in-differences results indicate that cities with Jewish communities grew about 30% faster than comparable cities without Jewish communities. To establish causality, we create time-varying instrumental variables which rely only on the spatially extended network of Jewish communities in order to predict Jewish presence in a given city. We provide evidence that the advantage of cities with Jewish communities stemmed in part from Jewish emancipation and their ability to exploit increases in market access after 1600.


[Abstract]:
The vegetation patterns in the Central Coast region of New South Wales have been extensively studied with respect to single environmental variables, particularly soil nutrients. However, few data are available on the effects of multiple environmental variables. This study examines the relationships between vegetation and multiple environmental variables in natural vegetation on two underlying rock types, Hawkesbury sandstone and Narrabeen group shales and sandstones, in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park, Sydney. Floristic composition and 17 environmental factors were characterized using duplicate 500 m2 quadrats from fifty sites representing a wide range of vegetation types. The patterns in vegetation and environmental factors were examined through multivariate analyses: indicator species analysis was used to provide an objective classification of plant community types, and the relationships between vegetation and environmental factors within the two soil types were examined through indirect and direct gradient analyses. Eleven plant communities were identified, which showed strong agreement with previous studies. The measured environmental factors showed strong correlations with vegetation patterns: within both soil types, the measured environmental variables explained approximately 32 - 35% of the variation in vegetation. No single measured environmental variable adequately described the observed gradients in vegetation; rather, vegetation gradients showed strong correlations with complex environmental gradients. These complex environmental gradients included nutrient, moisture and soil physical and site variables. These results suggest a simple 'nutrient' hypothesis regarding vegetation patterns in the Central Coast region is inadequate to explain variation in vegetation within soil types.


This paper examines the evolution of returns to education in the West German labour market over the last two decades. During this period, graduates from the period of educational expansion entered the labour market and an upgrading of the skill structure took place. In order to tackle the issues of endogeneity of schooling and its heterogeneous returns, we apply two estimation methods: Wooldridge's (2004) approach that relies on conditional mean independence and Garen's (1984) control function approach that requires an exclusion restriction. For the population of wage workers from the SOEP, we find that both approaches produce estimates of average returns to education that decrease until the late 1990s and increase afterwards. The gender gap in returns to education seems to vanish. Furthermore, we find that the so-called "baby boomer" cohort has the lowest average return to education in early working life. However, this effect disappears when the "baby-boomer" cohort grows older.


This paper explores the potential of using the online digital world Second Life as a scientific visualisation tool, in particular, for remote collaborative exploration of scientific datasets. Second Life at its core provides a means whereby multiple remote participants can engage with 3D geometry within a virtual environment. It has been chosen for this evaluation for a number of reasons, these include the easy to learn user interface, its relatively widespread uptake, the availability of the player on the three main computer platforms, its non-aggressive social networking foundation, and the scripting capability. This paper will outline the desirable characteristics expected of any online collaborative tool in science research and will discuss, through examples, the extent to which Second Life meets those expectations.


At the end of 2016, Islamist organisations proved able to mobilise hundreds of thousands of people for political purposes in Indonesia. In order to explain their success, the role of social media should not be underestimated, as Islamic movements rely heavily on agitation in online media. This article sheds light on the example of the Front Pembela Islam, using one of the organisation's Facebook pages as a case study. Within the algorithmic enclave of a cyber tribe, narratives and symbols are applied in memes. The research examines how narratives and symbols evoke emotions in online memes and offline banners, what narratives are addressed, and how the memes make claims regarding commonly acknowledged signifiers such as the NKRI, Islam and Pluralism. The guiding thesis is that these memes express not simply anti-pluralist or anti-NKRI notions, as opponents of these groups frequently assert, but rather combinations of robust nationalism and their alternative version of pluralism with conservative Islamic approaches. Nonetheless, threats and enemies are inevitably present as a constitutive outside and suggest a highly exclusive version of Indonesianness. Thus similar narratives and symbols applied in online media also emerge within public spaces, blurring the distinction between the online and offline realms.


We address user system interaction issues in product search and recommender systems: how to help users select the most preferential item from a large collection of alternatives. As such systems must crucially rely on an accurate and complete model of user preferences, the acquisition of this model becomes the central subject of our paper. Many tools used today do not satisfactorily assist users to establish this model because they do not adequately focus on fundamental decision objectives, help them reveal hidden preferences, revise conflicting preferences, or explicitly reason about tradeoffs. As a result, users fail to find the outcomes that best satisfy their needs and preferences. In this article, we provide some analyses of common areas of design pitfalls and derive a set of design guidelines that assist the user in avoiding these problems in three important areas: user preference elicitation, preference revision, and explanation interfaces. For each area, we describe the state-of-the-art of the developed techniques and discuss concrete scenarios where they have been applied and tested.


Abstract The endolithic environment is a ubiquitous habitat for microorganisms and a critical interface between biology and geology. In this study, a culture-based method and the phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA and internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequences were used to investigate the diversity of endolithic bacteria and fungi in two main types of carbonate rocks (namely dolomite and limestone) from Nanjiang Canyon in Guizhou karst area, China. The results of bacterial diversity indicated that all bacteria isolated from dolomite and limestone rocks were divided into 4 bacterial groups, including Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes. For these two kinds of rocks, Proteobacteria was the first dominant group, and Gammaproteobacteria occupied the greatest proportion which might be closely related to Pseudomonas in phylogeny to be the most dominant genera after isolation. Actinobacteria and Bacillus bacteria were also widespread in these two kinds of rock environments. There were only 9 and 8 strains of fungi isolated from dolomite and limestone respectively, which all belonged to Ascomycota. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on diversity of endolithic culturable bacteria and fungi in carbonate rocks in Guizhou karst region. These microorganisms may play an important and unprecedented role in the carbonate rock weathering during the long history of geological evolution.


Many real-world systems, such as moving planets, can be considered as multi-agent dynamic systems, where objects interact with each other and co-evolve along with the time. Such dynamics is usually difficult to capture, and understanding and predicting the dynamics based on observed trajectories of objects become a critical research problem in many domains. Most existing algorithms, however, assume the observations are regularly sampled and all the objects can be fully observed at each sampling time, which is impractical for many applications. In this paper, we propose to learn system dynamics from irregularly-sampled partial observations with underlying graph structure for the first time. To tackle the above challenge, we present LG-ODE, a latent ordinary differential equation generative model for modeling multi-agent dynamic system with known graph structure. It can simultaneously learn the embedding of high dimensional trajectories and infer continuous latent system dynamics. Our model employs a novel encoder parameterized by a graph neural network that can infer initial states in an unsupervised way from irregularly-sampled partial observations of structural objects and utilizes neuralODE to infer arbitrarily complex continuous-time latent dynamics. Experiments on motion capture, spring system, and charged particle datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.


Distant metastases are formed by tumor cells that shed from the primary
tumor into the bloodstream. These circulating tumor cells (CTC) may be
enumerated in a patients? blood. The number of CTC provides a prognosis,
predicts a response to therapy and the expression of certain molecules
in the CTC allows for determination of the most appropriate therapy.
CellSearch, the standard assay for CTC enumeration from 7.5 mL of blood
has shown feasibility of both these concepts, but finds no CTC in up to
50% of metastatic carcinoma patients. In this thesis we investigate several
approaches to improve recovery of CTC. Archive data from several large
clinical CTC trials were used to test alternative CTC definitions resulting
in a higher number of CTC for similar or better prognostic value than
the CellSearch definition. Flow cytometry was compared to CellSearch
to evaluate whether a higher number of CTC is achievable by improved
enrichment. The distribution function of CTC in metastatic patients was
determined to estimate the effect of increased sample volume. The increase
of sample volume by filtration of apheresis samples was investigated. An
improvement to the CellSearch analyzer is presented to allow more accurate
measurement of treatment targets on CTC. Increasing the number of CTC
by a more inclusive CTC definition reduces the prognostic value of the
CTC count when evaluating effectiveness of therapy. A potential threefold
increase in EpCAM+CK+DNA+CD45- CTC by improved recovery will not
be sufficient to find CTC in all metastatic carcinoma patients. Extrapolation
of the EpCAM+CK+DNA+CD45- CTC distribution function in patients,
predicts that increasing the sample volume to 5 liters of blood will result
in recovery of CTC in 99% of metastatic patients. CTC enrichment by
filtration of apheresis samples may allow for the sampling of such a blood
volume, but we could not reach the required assay conditions due to sample
age. It is critical for CTC enumeration that any cell included in the count
is a CTC, even if this means that a large fraction of tumor cell (fragments)
are not counted. To recover CTC in all patients, the sample volume must
be increased dramatically. Sample age is critical, and CTC recovery in
an extracorporeal circuit using antibody or physical based enrichment can
circumvent this issue.


ABSTRACT This paper documents on the sepsid fauna (Diptera: Sepsidae) encountered during the Mitaraka 2015 expedition. These are the first published records of Sepsidae Walker, 1833 from French Guiana. During this survey, six genera with 11 species were recorded from French Guiana for the first time: Archisepsis armata (Schiner, 1868), Archisepsis diversiformis (Ozerov, 1993), Archisepsis peruana (Ozerov, 1994), Meropliosepsis sexsetosa Duda, 1926, Microsepsis armillata (Melander & Spuler, 1917), Microsepsis furcata (Melander & Spuler, 1917), Microsepsis mitis (Curran, 1927), Palaeosepsioides erythromyrmus (Silva, 1991), Palaeosepsioides mitarakensis Silva, n. sp., described herein, Palaeosepsis Duda, 1926 and Pseudopalaeosepsis Ozerov, 1992. The actual state of Sepsidae taxonomy, based mostly on the male fore femur morphology and genitalic characters, has led to a case where sometimes females cannot be properly assigned to a specific taxon – this was the case here for most of the Microsepsis Silva, 1993 females which corresponded to 25% of the collected specimens, one female assigned to Palaeosepsis dentata (Becker, 1919)/dentatiformis (Duda, 1926), and two females at present identified as Pseudopalaeosepsis sp. A checklist of Sepsidae of French Guiana is provided also including doubtful and unidentified female specimens.


Background: Drug abuse is common all over the world. Abused drugs are psychoactive and make abusers engage into activities which are unacceptable in the community. For injecting drugs, the apparatus used is often shared and is unsterile. Unsterile injecting apparatus predispose the users to blood borne infections. People who use drugs often indulge in unprotected sex which is a risk factor for acquiring sexually transmitted infections. Methods: A cross-sectional study of people who use drugs (PWUDs) aged 18 years and above, was done in Mwanza urban. People who use drugs who were either too sick or unable to answer questions and those who refused to give consent to the study were excluded. Data collection involved use of a questionnaire (Face to face approach) and collection of blood and urine samples. The blood samples were used to determine the serological status of the participants, while the urine samples were used to detect presence of illegal drugs. Complete data was obtained for seven hundred and seventy out of the 774 PWUDs who were initially recruited into the study. Results: The project has shown that cannabis and alcohol are highly abused 83.0% n= 581 and 74.2% n= 519 respectively followed by khat 38.3 % n= 268. Heroin use was recorded in 34.0% n= 238 and heroin injection was noted in 5.6% n= 43 of the illegal drug users. HIV infection was detected in 8.6% of the drug abusers, while hepatitis B was seen in 3.8%, hepatitis C was detected in 2.9% and syphilis was detected in 2.5% of the participants. Conclusion: HIV infection in people who use drugs was high (8.6%) compared to that seen in the general population (5.1%) and also high rates of positive results for hepatitis C and syphilis were recorded. Among the intravenous drug users 6.3% were HIV positive. Recommendations: Education should be given to the substance abusers on the consequences of taking illegal drugs. Safe sex should be advocated, a methadone clinic and sober houses should be established in Mwanza. The Ministry of Home Affairs should increase efforts to prohibit importation of illegal drugs.


Recent studies suggest the existence of a stochasticity in gene expression (SGE) in many organisms, and its non-negligible effect on their phenotype and fitness. To date, however, how SGE affects the key parameters of population genetics are not well understood. SGE can increase the phenotypic variation and act as a load for individuals, if they are at the adaptive optimum in a stable environment. On the other hand, part of the phenotypic variation caused by SGE might become advantageous if individuals at the adaptive optimum become genetically less-adaptive, for example due to an environmental change. Furthermore, SGE of unimportant genes might have little or no fitness consequences. Thus, SGE can be advantageous, disadvantageous, or selectively neutral depending on its context. In addition, there might be a genetic basis that regulates magnitude of SGE, which is often referred to as "modifier genes," but little is known about the conditions under which such an SGE-modifier gene evolves. In the present study, we conducted individual-based computer simulations to examine these conditions in a diploid model. In the simulations, we considered a single locus that determines organismal fitness for simplicity, and that SGE on the locus creates fitness variation in a stochastic manner. We also considered another locus that modifies the magnitude of SGE. Our results suggested that SGE was always deleterious in stable environments and increased the fixation probability of deleterious mutations in this model. Even under frequently changing environmental conditions, only very strong natural selection made SGE adaptive. These results suggest that the evolution of SGE-modifier genes requires strict balance among the strength of natural selection, magnitude of SGE, and frequency of environmental changes. However, the degree of dominance affected the condition under which SGE becomes advantageous, indicating a better opportunity for the evolution of SGE in different genetic models.


We used video-rate Confocal Laser Scanning Microscopy (CLSM) to observe the motion of blood cells in a micro-channel. Video-rate CLSM allowed us to acquire images at the rate of 30 frames per second. The acquired images were used to perform Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV), thus providing the velocity profile of the blood in a micro-channel. While previous confocal microscopy-assisted PIV required exogenous micro/nano particles as the tracing particles, we employed blood cells as tracing particles for the CLSM in the reflection mode, which uses light back-scattered from the sample. The blood flow at various depths of the micro-channel was observed by adjusting the image plane of the microscope. The velocity profile at different depths of the channel was measured. The confocal micro-PIV technique used in the study was able to measure blood velocity up to a few hundreds ${\mu}m/sec$ , equivalent to the blood velocity in the capillaries of a live animal. It is expected that the technique presented can be applied for in vivo blood flow measurement in the capillaries of live animals.


Abstract In his tale of the struggles and privations of the mining community in the industrial south of Wales in the early decades of the twentieth century, Lewis Jones, ex-miner and socialist activist, put aside the usual tools of political activism – of oratory and pamphlet propaganda – and instead turned to fiction as a means of educating and mobilising the political energy of the workforce. In doing so, Jones represented the extent to which the law was pivotal to the social organisation delivering injustice to working people. When one turns to history and to the legal record, the contestable accounts, elisions and absences from the record speak eloquently of the extent to which selective doctrine contributes to that injustice. The resultant message resonates with debates on the relationship between society, politics and the rule of law itself.


Few are unaware that the Tax Code and Regulations provide a detailed, complex (and lengthy) set of rules. It is hardly surprising (or new) that taxpayers attempt to avoid these rules to lower their taxes. Courts and lawmakers have long grappled to identify abusive transactions and strip taxpayers of the associated tax savings. The transactions have, however, changed dramatically over the last decade making the task much more challenging. The rapid proliferation of aggressive and diverse tax shelters has created what many refer to as a tax shelter war. In general, tax shelters refer to transactions carefully designed to fit within the letter of the law to derive benefits unintended by those sections. Courts, however, do not inquire directly into purpose when analyzing tax shelters but instead rely on traditional anti-abuse tests. These tests are outdated and insufficient to curb current tax shelters. Even those that defend these tests admit that they supply neither a necessary nor sufficient basis for denying tax benefits. Scholars defend the usage of these tests believing a viable alternative to be lacking. This Article attempts to fill this gap and develops an alternative test, which inquires directly into the purposes of the tax laws to address abuse directly. After developing this test along with an extensive set of guidelines for analyzing tax provisions, the test is applied to three recent tax shelters to illustrate its advantages. Such a test is an essential weapon to compete in current and future tax shelter wars.


Training a multilayer perceptron (MLP) with algorithms employing global search strategies has been an important research direction in the field of neural networks. Despite a number of signifcant results, an important matter concerning the bounds of the search region| typically defined as a box--where a global optimization method has to search for a potential global minimizer seems to be unresolved. The approach presented in this paper builds on interval analysis and attempts to define guaranteed bounds in the search space prior to applying a global search algorithm for training an MLP. These bounds depend on the machine precision and the term "guaranteed" denotes that the region defined surely encloses weight sets that are global minimizers of the neural network's error function. Although the solution set to the bounding problem for an MLP is in general non-convex, the paper presents the theoretical results that help deriving a box which is a convex set. This box is an outer approximation of the algebraic solutions to the interval equations resulting from the function implemented by the network nodes. An experimental study using well known benchmarks is presented in accordance with the theoretical results.


Mafic and granodioritic magmas mingled to produce a swarm of microdiorite enclaves in the granodiorite. The enclaves and rare hornfels inclusions were carried upward in an oval-shaped pipe, 30 m long and 15 m wide, probably as a gas-driven mass to a point where an H 2 O-rich, superheated felsic melt intruded the pipe and the enclave mass, and upon abrupt undercooling, deposited orbicular shells of tangentially oriented microcrystals of sodic plagioclase, quartz, K-feldspar, and biotite on 20% of the enclaves and inclusions now located only against the north margin of the pipe. The mass of orbicular and nonorbicular enclaves was then injected by a quartz monzodiorite magma that now comprises the matrix among the enclaves.


Stem cells, both embryonic and adult, promise to revolutionize the practice of medicine in the future. In order to realize this potential, a number of hurdles must be overcome. Most importantly, the signaling mechanisms necessary to control the differentiation of stem cells into tissues of interest remain to be elucidated, and much of the present research on stem cells is focused on this goal. Nevertheless, it will also be essential to achieve large-scale expansion and, in many cases, assemble cells in 3D as transplantable tissues. To this end, microgravity analog bioreactors can play a significant role. Microgravity bioreactors were originally conceived as a tool to study the cellular responses to microgravity. However, the technology can address some of the shortcomings of conventional cell culture systems; namely, the deficiency of mass transport in static culture and high mechanical shear forces in stirred systems. Unexpectedly, the conditions created in the vessel were ideal for 3D cell culture. Recently, investigators have demonstrated the capability of the microgravity bioreactors to expand hematopoietic stem cells compared to static culture, and facilitate the differentiation of umbilical cord stem cells into 3D liver aggregates. Stem cells are capable of differentiating into functional cells. However, there are no reliable methods to induce the stem cells to form specific cells or to gain enough cells for transplantation, which limits their application in clinical therapy. The aim of this study is to select the best experimental setup to reach high proliferation levels by culturing these cells in a microgravity-based bioreactor. In typical cell culture, the cells sediment to the bottom surface of their container and propagate as a one-cell-layer sheet. Prevention of such sedimentation affords the freedom for self-assembly and the propagation of 3D tissue arrays. Suspension of cells is easily achievable using stirred technologies. Unfortun ately, in conventional bioreactors, stirring invokes deleterious forces that disrupt cell aggregation and results in cell death. First-generation rotating bioreactors provided rotation on the horizontal axis, which resulted in the suspension of cells without stirring, thus providing a suitable environment to propagate cells without sedimentation to a surface. The rotatingwall bioreactors did not provide a way to remove air bubbles that were causing shear and disrupting 3D cultures. Johnson Space Center successfully engineered the hydrofocusing bioreactor (HFB) that resolved the problem of removing the air bubbles from the fluid medium of NASA's rotating-wall space bioreactors. The HFB uses the principle of hydrodynamic focusing that simultaneously produces a low-shear fluid culture environment and a variable hydrofocusing force that can control the movement, location, and removal of suspended cells, tissues, and air bubbles from the bioreactor. The HFB is a rotating, domeshaped cell culture vessel with a centrally located sampling port and an internal viscous spinner. The vessel and spinner can rotate at different speeds either in the same or opposite directions. Rotation of the vessel and viscous interaction at the spinner generate a hydrofocusing force. Adjusting the differential rotation rate between vessel and spinner controls the magnitude of the force. This work was done by Pier Paolo Claudio and Jagan Valluri of Goddard Space Flight Center. Further information is contained in a TSP (see page 1). GSC-15807-1


We propose a novel approach to automated delineation of linear structures that form complex and potentially loopy networks. This is in contrast to earlier approaches that usually assume a tree topology for the networks. At the heart of our method is an Integer Programming formulation that allows us to find the global optimum of an objective function designed to allow cycles but penalize spurious junctions and early terminations. We demonstrate that it outperforms state-of-the-art techniques on a wide range of datasets.


China, Russia and the Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan formed the Shanghai Co-operation Organization (SCO) in 2001. China's backing for an SCO charter, permanent secretariat and anti-terrorism centre for the past three years reflects its desire to strengthen the SCO in countering United States influence in Central Asia. Diplomatically, China fears that the American presence means that regional states will be less accommodating to China's political demands. Economically, China worries that the United States' support for American petroleum companies will compromise Chinese efforts to wrest concessions from Central Asian governments. Security-wise, with bases close to China's western borders, Washington can assist Beijing in flushing out Xinjiang separatists operating in Central Asia, or put military pressure on China, should it be perceived as a threat. The American presence and resurgent Russian involvement in Central Asia seem to have put China's influence in the region on the defensive.


In 1979 Louis Witten demonstrated that stationary axially symmetric Einstein field equations and those for static axially symmetric self-dual SU(2) gauge fields can both be reduced to the same (Ernst) equation. In this paper we use this result as point of departure to prove the existence of the mass gap for quantum source-free Yang-Mills (Y-M) fields. The proof is facilitated by results of our recently published paper, JGP 59 (2009) 600-619. Since both pure gravity, the Einstein-Maxwell and pure Y-M fields are described for axially symmetric configurations by the Ernst equation classically, their quantum descriptions are likely to be interrelated. Correctness of this conjecture is successfully checked by reproducing (by different methods) results of Korotkin and Nicolai, Nucl.Phys.B475 (1996) 397-439, on dimensionally reduced quantum gravity. Consequently, numerous new results supporting the Faddeev-Skyrme (F-S) -type models are obtained. We found that the F-S-like model is best suited for description of electroweak interactions while strong interactions require extension of Witten's results to the SU(3) gauge group. Such an extension is nontrivial. It is linked with the symmetry group SU(3)×SU(2)×U(1) of the Standard Model. This result is quite rigid and should be taken into account in development of all grand unified theories. Also, the alternative (to the F-S-like) model emerges as by-product of such an extension. Both models are related to each other via known symmetry transformation. Both models possess gap in their excitation spectrum and are capable of producing knotted/linked configurations of gauge/gravity fields. In addition, the paper discusses relevance of the obtained results to heterotic strings and to scattering processes involving topology change. It ends with discussion about usefulness of this information for searches of Higgs boson.


ABSTRACT This article describes the development and empirical status of guided Internet-delivered self-help. The treatment approach combines the benefits of bibliotherapy with book-length text materials and the support given online via web pages and e-mail. Interactive features such as online registrations, tests, and online discussion forums are also included. Cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) guided the research and clinical implementations of this approach, as it lends itself more easily to the self-help format compared with other presently available psychotherapy approaches. We include an overview of the research, current issues and research in service delivery, lessons learned through a program of research, and directions for future investigations.


Prof. Islam El-Nakib Challenges of River Transport Logistics Development: The case of Egypt This research aims at presenting a comprehensive overview of the river transport sector in Egypt. The sector is facing several challenges and barriers to development. Logistics of inland waterways of Egypt has unique characteristics and abilities to be utilised properly and efficiently. However, there are numerous reasons for establishing a sound logistics system in Egypt which therefore hinders the development of the river transport sector. This paper is considered as a basic trail to conceptualise the factors affecting the river transport sector in Egypt. This study could be used as a key element for further development of mathematical model for the area of investigation.


The need for chemical free food is increasing and so is the demand for a larger supply to feed the growing global population. An autonomous weeding system should be capable of differentiating crop plants and weeds to avoid contaminating crops with herbicide or damaging them with mechanical tools. For the plant genetics industry, automated high-throughput phenotyping technology is critical to profiling seedlings at a large scale to facilitate genomic research. This research applied 2D and 3D imaging techniques to develop an innovative crop plant recognition system and a 3D holographic plant phenotyping system.
A 3D time-of-flight (ToF) camera was used to develop a crop plant recognition system for broccoli and soybean plants. The developed system overcame the previously unsolved problems caused by occluded canopy and illumination variation. Both 2D and 3D features were extracted and utilized for the plant recognition task. Broccoli and soybean recognition algorithms were developed based on the characteristics of the plants. At field experiments, detection rates of over 88.3% and 91.2% were achieved for broccoli and soybean plants, respectively. The detection algorithm also reached a speed over 30 frame per second (fps), making it applicable for robotic weeding operations.
Apart from applying 3D vision for plant recognition, a 3D reconstruction based phenotyping system was also developed for holographic 3D reconstruction and physical trait parameter estimation for corn plants. In this application, precise alignment of multiple 3D views is critical to the 3D reconstruction of a plant. Previously published research highlighted the need for high-throughput, high-accuracy, and low-cost 3D phenotyping systems capable of holographic plant reconstruction and plant morphology related trait characterization. This research contributed to the realization of such a system by integrating a low-cost 2D camera, a low-cost 3D ToF camera, and a chessboard-pattern beacon array to track the 3D camera's position and attitude, thus accomplishing precise 3D point cloud registration from multiple views. Specifically, algorithms of beacon target detection, camera pose tracking, and spatial relationship calibration between 2D and 3D cameras were developed. The phenotypic data obtained by this novel 3D reconstruction based phenotyping system were validated by the experimental data generated by the instrument and manual measurements, showing that the system has achieved measurement accuracy of more than 90% for most cases under an average of less than five seconds processing time per plant.


Two studies examined the effectiveness of using non-anatomical (non-AD) dolls as an interview tool, to aid children's communication about body positioning. In the first study, 49 6-8-year-old children took part in a game. Thirty minutes to an hour later, they were interviewed using the Specialist Child Witness Interview model. This was done verbally or with the opportunity to use non-AD dolls to clarify their own and others' body positioning. There was no difference in the amount of information reported nor the accuracy of children's reports when comparing both conditions. To complement the first study, the second study examined jurors' perceptions of children's abilities to use non-AD dolls. Non-AD dolls were generally thought to be helpful, but jurors identified some risks. However, jurors did not have strong beliefs about how non-AD dolls would influence the evidence that children provided. When jurors viewed a video of a child recounting a past event, their beliefs about non-AD dolls were more influential when evaluating a child's credibility than whether or not a non-AD doll was used during the interview. Overall, even when used in conjunction with evidence-based techniques, these findings do not support the use of non-AD dolls to help communicate body positioning in child forensic interviewing.


This book is the outcome of a South-South conference jointly organized by the Asian Political and International Studies Association (APISA), the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO) and the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) in Dakar, Senegal, May 2012. The conference was organised in response to the financial crisis of 2008 which started in the United States and Europe, with reverberating effects on a global scale. Economic problems emanating from such crises usually leave major social and structural impacts on important sectors of the society internationally. They affect living standards and constrain the well-being of people, especially in poor countries. Persistent problems include high unemployment, increased debt and low growth in developed countries, as well as greater difficulties in accessing finance for investment in the developing world. There is a need for countries in the South to examine the available options for appropriate national and regional responses to the different problems emanating from the economic crisis. This book attempts to provide ideas on some strategic responses to the disastrous impact of the crisis, while keeping in mind the global common interest of the South. It is hoped that the book will contribute significantly towards the agenda to rethink development and the quest for alternative paradigms for a just, stable and equitable global political, economic and social system. A system in which Africa, Asia, and Latin America are emancipated from the shackles of hegemonic and anachronistic neoliberal dictates that have nothing more to offer than crises, vulnerabilities and dependency.


The spatial and breeding dynamics of koalas in sub-tropical woodlands at Blair Athol in central Queensland were intensively monitored between 1993 and 1998. Genetic relationships among koalas at this locality were studied to determine the breeding dynamics of males, including whether 'resident' or 'transient' males dominate as sires. Males and females were radio-collared and tracked periodically throughout each year of the study. Genotypes from hypervariable microsatellite loci identified uniquely all individuals and were used to analyse parentage as well as to determine population genetic parameters when compared with other regional localities. Koalas at Blair Athol comprise a population in genetic equilibrium. Gene diversity estimates show the population to be similar to other populations found in similar habitat in the region, and estimates of genetic differentiation among four regional populations showed that gene flow conforms to a model of isolation by distance. Analysis of parentage found that both resident and transient males sired about equal numbers of offspring. Familial DNA analysis revealed multiple paternities of successive young in this population. The conclusion from this study is that 'resident' status among males does not confer any advantage for parentage.


Abstract. We document, for the first time, how detailed vertical profiles of cloud
fraction (CF) change diurnally between 51∘ S and 51∘ N, by
taking advantage of 15 months of measurements from the Cloud-Aerosol
Transport System (CATS) lidar on the non-sun-synchronous International Space
Station (ISS). Over the tropical ocean in summer, we find few high clouds during daytime. At
night they become frequent over a large altitude range (11–16 km between
22:00 and 04:00 LT). Over the summer tropical continents,
but not over ocean, CATS observations reveal mid-level clouds (4–8 km above
sea level or a.s.l.) persisting all day long, with a weak diurnal cycle
(minimum at noon). Over the Southern Ocean, diurnal cycles appear for the
omnipresent low-level clouds (minimum between noon and 15:00) and
high-altitude clouds (minimum between 08:00 and 14:00). Both cycles are time
shifted, with high-altitude clouds following the changes in low-altitude
clouds by several hours. Over all continents at all latitudes during summer,
the low-level clouds develop upwards and reach a maximum occurrence at about
2.5 km a.s.l. in the early afternoon (around 14:00). Our work also shows that (1) the diurnal cycles of vertical profiles derived
from CATS are consistent with those from ground-based active sensors on a
local scale, (2) the cloud profiles derived from CATS measurements at local
times of 01:30 and 13:30 are consistent with those observed from CALIPSO at
similar times, and (3) the diurnal cycles of low and high cloud amounts (CAs)
derived from CATS are in general in phase with those derived from
geostationary imagery but less pronounced. Finally, the diurnal variability
of cloud profiles revealed by CATS strongly suggests that CALIPSO
measurements at 01:30 and 13:30 document the daily extremes of the cloud
fraction profiles over ocean and are more representative of daily averages
over land, except at altitudes above 10 km where they capture part of the
diurnal variability. These findings are applicable to other instruments with
local overpass times similar to CALIPSO's, such as all the other A-Train
instruments and the future EarthCARE mission.


By using the method of finite elements and starting with the possibilities given by the program system ANSYS in the field of application, research has been performed regarding the analysis of static behavior of a centrifugal pump shaft. The computational analysis of static behavior of shaft using the method of finite elements on the examined model during the phase of projecting, was aiming for a timely sighting of critical spots, in order to avoid possible further malfunction. In this way it is possible to examine validity of the basic solution with no need for making the prototypes. By static behavior analysis, in other words, using the method of finite elements it was shown to which extent can certain conditions of exploitation, created tensions, that is shifted knots, cause difficulties in the whole model performance. Analysis of the static behavior of shaft was performed for two cases with different load: the effect of radial force and the torsion moment. A special attention was given to modelling of rolling-element bearings and following of their condition in relation to outside influences. ARTICLE HISTORY Received: 09 February 2016 Accepted: 28 February 2016 Available online 30 June 2016


Single and binary solute adsorption of phenol and o-cresol at 23°C on three activated carbons with different pore size were conducted in this study. One granular activated carbon (GAC) F400 and two activated carbon fibers (ACFs) were considered. Anoxic (absence of molecular oxygen) and oxic (presence of molecular oxygen) conditions were evaluated. For the single solute system, the three adsorbents studied have shown higher adsorptive capacities under oxic conditions as compared to anoxic conditions. The degree of adsorption enhancement was related to the pore size of the adsorbent. For binary adsorption on ACC-10, which has the least average pore size (1.76 nm), the oxic and anoxic adsorption isotherms overiapped, indicating no impact of the presence of molecular oxygen on the adsorptive capacity. Significant differences on adsorptive capacities were noticed for the binary solute adsorption on ACC-15 (2.10 nm) and F400 (2.48 nm). The Ideal Adsorbed Solution Theory (IAST) predicted well all binary systems for ACC-10 and anoxic isotherms on ACC-15 and F400. Poor model predictions for GAC and ACC-15 under oxic conditions were attributed to the oligomerization of the adsorbates on the surface of activated carbon. The unique pore size of ACFs has been shown to be a limiting factor in hampering the oligomerization under oxic conditions.


Word embeddings, which represent words as dense feature vectors, are widely used in natural language processing. In their seminal paper on word2vec, Mikolov and colleagues showed that a feature space created by training a word prediction network on a large text corpus will encode semantic information that supports analogy by vector arithmetic, e.g., "king" minus "man" plus "woman" equals "queen". To help novices appreciate this idea, people have sought effective graphical representations of word embeddings.

We describe a new interactive tool for visually exploring word embeddings. Our tool allows users to define semantic dimensions by specifying opposed word pairs, e.g., gender is defined by pairs such as boy/girl and father/mother, and age by pairs such as father/son and mother/daughter. Words are plotted as points in a zoomable and rotatable 3D space, where the third "residual" dimension encodes distance from the hyperplane defined by all the opposed word vectors with age and gender subtracted out. Our tool allows users to visualize vector analogies, drawing the vector from "king" to "man" and a parallel vector from "woman" to "king-man+woman", which is closest to "queen". Visually browsing the embedding space and experimenting with this tool can make word embeddings more intuitive. We include a series of experiments teachers can use to help K-12 students appreciate the strengths and limitations of this representation.


This guide is designed to help students, faculty, and researchers locate information through the Texas A&M University Libraries in the areas of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.


Mushrooms have been used as a common folk medicine due to their effective bioactive compounds including polysaccharides. It is known that the glucans are the main bioactive mushroom polysaccharides. This review study explains the method of isolation, structural characterization, and antitumor activities of mushroom polysaccharides. In many laboratories, these trials are still underway, and the function of polysaccharides as an antitumor agent is particularly under intense discus-sion. This review aims to summarize the accessible data and reflect this study area's current status with a perspective to future direction.


Policymakers and educational leaders continue to use school district decentralization as a reform effort that attempts to shift power and authority from central office administration to school-level leadership. In 2015, the Nevada Legislature passed legislation to restructure the Clark County School District (CCSD), the state's largest school district, with the intent of breaking it up into smaller districts but instead evolving to decentralization. In this article, we use case study methods to explore the events leading up to the reorganization of CCSD. We take a critical perspective on Kingdon's multiple streams framework to analyze the reorganization efforts, focusing specifically on how Nevada's political context provided a window of opportunity for the reorganization to occur. We also examine the extent to which equitable educational opportunity was a factor in these efforts. Our analysis of the reorganization of CCSD contributes to a wider understanding of state-level policy development and politics within contemporary educational contexts. In this case, we find that state-level policymakers successfully leveraged the opportunity to enact the power and authority necessary to significantly and rapidly impact the structure of one of the largest school districts in the United States.


Background Novel angiotensinogen (AGT) inhibitors are in early clinical development for treatment of hypertension. Evidence that this therapeutic approach will safely reduce risk of cardiovascular outcomes in humans is limited. We leveraged genetic data from more than one million individuals to characterise the effects of AGT inhibition. Methods We identified a genetic instrument for AGT inhibition from systolic blood pressure (SBP) genome-wide association study data, and investigated its relationship with AGT gene expression and circulating AGT protein concentration. We examined the instrument's association with cardiovascular and renal outcomes, and compared the effect of the instrument with that of genetic instruments for other renin-angiotensin system (RAS) components and the causal effect of SBP overall. We performed phenome-wide association analyses to identify unanticipated effects of AGT inhibition. Results The AGT instrument (rs2478539; 0.49 mmHg lower SBP per G-allele) was strongly associated with hypertension, and showed evidence of colocalisation with AGT mRNA expression across various tissues. Scaled to a 10 mmHg lower SBP, the AGT instrument was associated with a 41% lower risk of major cardiovascular events, a composite of myocardial infarction, coronary revascularisation and stroke (111,549 cases; odds ratio 0.59, 95% confidence interval, 0.47 - 0.74; P = 3.1 x 10-6). There was little evidence of heterogeneity between the AGT vascular estimates when compared to equivalent estimates from other RAS targets and the effect of SBP lowering more broadly, and no strong evidence of potential target-mediated adverse effects. Conclusion Our findings suggest that inhibition of AGT safely reduces risk of major vascular events. These results support ongoing clinical development programmes for AGT inhibitors.


A new entrant has shouldered its way into the crowded field of medical organisations. The College of Medicine has its origins in the Prince of Wales's Foundation for Integrated Health, which closed in April this year, but its launch on Thursday 28 October was Hamlet without the prince.

The remit of the new college, which promises to put the "care" back into "healthcare," is much broader than that of the prince's foundation. Its president is Graeme Catto, former president of the General Medical Council, and its officers and advisory council include Ian Kennedy (an expert in health law and former chairman of the Healthcare Commission), Nigel Crisp (former chief executive of the NHS), Muir Gray (chief knowledge officer to the NHS), Cyril Chantler (former dean of Guy's, King's and St Thomas' Medical and Dental Schools), and Ilora Finlay (past president of the Royal Society of Medicine).

Members of its governing council include Sam Everington, an east London general practitioner well known in BMA circles, and Mustafa Djamgoz, professor of cancer biology at Imperial College London, who also chairs the new college's science council. Anybody tempted to dismiss the College of Medicine as no more …


How might society ensure the allocation of credit to those who lack meaningful collateral? Two very different options that have each been pursued by a variety of societies through time and space are (i) relatively harsh penalties for default and, more recently, (ii) loan guarantee programs that allow borrowers to default subject to moderate consequences and use public funds to compensate lenders. The goal of this paper is to provide a quantitative statement about the relative desirability of these responses. Our findings are twofold. First, we show that under a wide array of circumstances, punishments harsh enough to ensure all debt is repaid improve welfare. With respect to loan guarantees, our findings suggest that such efforts are largely useless at best, and substantially harmful at worst. Generous loan guarantees virtually ensure substantially higher taxes — with transfers away from the non-defaulting poor to the defaulting middle-class — and greater deadweight loss from high equilibrium default rates. Taken as a whole, our findings suggest that current policy toward default is likely to be counterproductive, and that guarantees for consumption loans are not the answer.


Abstract The field of rehabilitation has increasingly adopted commercially available games using perceptual interfaces as a means for physically training patients. The adaptability of such systems to match each person's need and rehabilitation goal remains problematic. This paper presents a rapid prototyping approach for customising gaming technology using various affordable commercial devices and open source software. We first demonstrate how a freely available game is adapted for training disabled people through different sensors and control modes. We then show how an open online virtual world such as Second Life® offers sufficient conditions for quickly building custom content for testing with interactive devices. When presented with these prototyping possibilities, people from the target groups (healthcare professionals, patients, people with disabilities, older people, families) related such systems to their needs and further elaborated on the use of such systems. Our research indicates how availability of simple prototyping platforms expands upon the possibilities for developers and practitioners.


Every twelve seconds, someone dies in the United States. Most of these deaths results from a collaborative, consensus decision to withdraw or to withhold life-sustaining medical treatment. Unfortunately, existing policies for making such life-determining decisions is increasingly at variance with Americans' health care needs. In the absence of instructions to the contrary, the standard approach to end-of-life treatment is to provide aggressive medical treatment – even when such treatment has virtually no chance of achieving a cure or even partially reversing the disease process. Such overtreatment may paradoxically shorten life as it inflicts tremendous suffering on all concerned. This is not the way that most of us want to die. To avoid such a fate, we must affirmatively 'opt out' of the technological imperative. Opting out is not difficult if we still have the mental capacity to make our own health care decisions. But few of us will have such capacity as we near the end of our lives. Dr. Terman has developed a unique Advance Care Planning (ACP) tool that offers substantial advantages over all alternatives. This book provides clear, practical directions to prepare your Natural Dying Advance Directive/Natural Dying Physician's Orders (NDAD/NDPO).


By 2050, it is expected that antimicrobial resistance (AMR) will overtake cancer to become the world's biggest killer. As the pharmaceutical industry spends less on antibiotic research and development, universities have an increasing role to play. As part of this degree, my two research projects approach AMR from different angles. The first takes a traditional approach to AMR, and uses transposon mutagenesis to identify novel novobiocin resistance mechanisms in Klebsiella pneumoniae. The second takes a genotypic approach and explores the application of anti-virulence drugs, which inhibit IscR in Yersinia pseudotuberculosis to disarm rather than kill the bacteria. Diversification is essential for the development of novel antimicrobial strategies.


Autophagy is an essential degradative pathway that maintains neuronal homeostasis and prevents axon degeneration. Initial observations suggest that autophagy is spatially regulated in neurons, but how autophagy is regulated in distinct neuronal compartments is unclear. Using live-cell imaging in mouse hippocampal neurons, we establish the compartment-specific mechanisms of constitutive autophagy under basal conditions, as well as in response to stress induced by nutrient deprivation. We find that at steady state, the cell soma contains populations of autophagosomes derived from distinct neuronal compartments and defined by differences in maturation state and dynamics. Axonal autophagosomes enter the soma and remain confined within the somatodendritic domain. This compartmentalization likely facilitates cargo degradation by enabling fusion with proteolytically active lysosomes enriched in the soma. In contrast, autophagosomes generated within the soma are less mobile and tend to cluster. Surprisingly, starvation did not induce autophagy in either the axonal or somatodendritic compartment. While starvation robustly decreased mTORC1 signaling in neurons, this decrease was not sufficient to activate autophagy. Furthermore, pharmacological inhibition of mammalian target of rapamycin with Torin1 also was not sufficient to markedly upregulate neuronal autophagy. These observations suggest that the primary physiological function of autophagy in neurons may not be to mobilize amino acids and other biosynthetic building blocks in response to starvation, in contrast to findings in other cell types. Rather, constitutive autophagy in neurons may function to maintain cellular homeostasis by balancing synthesis and degradation, especially within distal axonal processes far removed from the soma. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Autophagy is an essential homeostatic process in neurons, but neuron-specific mechanisms are poorly understood. Here, we compare autophagosome dynamics within neuronal compartments. Axonal autophagy is a vectorial process that delivers cargo from the distal axon to the soma. The soma, however, contains autophagosomes at different maturation states, including input received from the axon combined with locally generated autophagosomes. Once in the soma, autophagosomes are confined to the somatodendritic domain, facilitating cargo degradation and recycling of biosynthetic building blocks to primary sites of protein synthesis. Neuronal autophagy is not robustly upregulated in response to starvation or mammalian target of rapamycin inhibition, suggesting that constitutive autophagy in neurons maintains homeostasis by playing an integral role in regulating the quality of the neuronal proteome.


Optimization of Algorithms Using Extensions of Dynamic Programming Hassan AbouEisha We study and answer questions related to the complexity of various important problems such as: multi-frontal solvers of hp-adaptive finite element method, sorting and majority. We advocate the use of dynamic programming as a viable tool to study optimal algorithms for these problems. The main approach used to attack these problems is modeling classes of algorithms that may solve this problem using a discrete model of computation then defining cost functions on this discrete structure that reflect different complexity measures of the represented algorithms. As a last step, dynamic programming algorithms are designed and used to optimize those models (algorithms) and to obtain exact results on the complexity of the studied problems. The first part of the thesis presents a novel model of computation (element partition tree) that represents a class of algorithms for multi-frontal solvers along with cost functions reflecting various complexity measures such as: time and space. It then introduces dynamic programming algorithms for multi-stage and bi-criteria optimization of element partition trees. In addition, it presents results based on optimal element partition trees for famous benchmark meshes such as: meshes with point and edge singularities. New improved heuristics for those benchmark meshes were obtained based on insights of the optimal results found by our algorithms. The second part of the thesis starts by introducing a general problem where different problems can be reduced to and show how to use a decision table to model such problem. We describe how decision trees and decision tests for this table correspond 5 to adaptive and non-adaptive algorithms for the original problem. We present exact bounds on the average time complexity of adaptive algorithms for the eight elements sorting problem. Then bounds on adaptive and non-adaptive algorithms for a variant of the majority problem are introduced. Adaptive algorithms are modeled as decision trees whose depth reflects the worst-case time complexity and average depth indicates the average-case time complexity. Non-adaptive algorithms are represented as decision tests whose size expresses the worst-case time complexity. Finally, we present a dynamic programming algorithm that finds a minimum decision test (minimum reduct) for a given decision table.


Abstract The seismogeodetic method computes accurate displacement and velocity waveforms by optimally extracting high‐frequency information from strong‐motion accelerometers and low‐frequency information from collocated Global Positioning System (GPS) instruments. These broadband observations retain the permanent (static) displacement, are immune to clipping and magnitude saturation for large earthquakes, and are sensitive enough to record P ‐wave arrivals. These characteristics make seismogeodesy suitable for real‐time applications such as earthquake early warning. The Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) has developed an inexpensive microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) accelerometer package to upgrade established GPS stations. We compare the performance of our MEMS accelerometer with an observatory‐grade accelerometer using an experiment at the University of California San Diego Large High‐Performance Outdoor Shake Table. We show that the two types of accelerometers agree in frequency ranges of seismological and engineering interest and produce equivalent seismogeodetic estimates of displacement and velocity. To date, 27 SIO MEMS packages have been installed at GPS monitoring stations in southern California and the San Francisco Bay area and have recorded four earthquakes ( M  4.2, M  4.1, and two of M  4.0). The P ‐wave arrivals are distinguishable in the seismogeodetic observations at distances of up to ∼25  km away but not in the GPS‐only displacements. There is no significant permanent deformation for these small events. This study demonstrates the lower limit of detectability and that seismogeodetic waveforms can also be a reliable early confirmation that an event is not large or hazardous. It also raises the possibility of rapid magnitude estimation through scaling relationships.


This investigation constitutes part of a larger study designed to obtain insights into fire properties of refusederived fuel (RDF). Several fires of densified RDF occurred in silos storing this material, giving us an impetus for this study, with the present investigation focusing on measuring temperature profiles and mass loss of RDF samples. A specialised sample holder was constructed to accommodate four fine thermocouples (76 µm in diameter), which facilitated the measurement of the temperature profiles within RDF samples undergoing oxidation and pyrolysis. An additional thermocouple was positioned at the base of the sample to verify the assumption of heat transfer in semi-infinite slab, prior to ignition. This assumption was applied previously within the context of the integral analysis to obtain the value of the effective thermal conductivity. The temperature profiles prior to ignition were combined with the measurements of the surface temperature collected by a pyrometer. Mass-loss measurements were also performed, but only after the onset of the flaming combustion, as a consequence of fluctuations induced by the changing flow field above the samples. A separate data-acquisition system was used to allow a faster sampling rate than 1 Hz permitted by the default setting of the cone calorimeter. The experiments determined the critical mass flux at extinction and identified three combustion regimes occurring in fires of RDF-type materials: flaming combustion; a transition regime involving simultaneous flaming combustion and char pyrolysis; and char pyrolysis. These measurements were consistent with results of the earlier fire experiments performed in the cone calorimeter.


Introduction Information technology, as a technology with the fastest rate of development and application in all branches of business, requires adequate protection to provide high security. The aim of the safety analysis applied on an information system is to identify and evaluate threats, vulnerabilities and safety characteristics. IT assets are exposed to risk of damage or losses. IT security involves protecting information stored electronically. That protection implies data integrity, availability and confidentiality. Nowadays, there are many types of computer crimes: money theft 44%, damage of software 16%, theft of information 16%, alteration of data 12%, theft of services 10%, trespass 2% (Boran, 2003). In order to minimize losses, it is necessary to involve risk management and risk assessment in the areas of information technology and operational risks. Risk management and risk assessment are the most important parts of Information Security Management (ISM). There are various definitions of Risk Management and Risk Assessment [ISO 13335-2], [NIST], [ENISA Regulation], but most experts accept that Risk Management involves analys is, planning, implementation, control and monitoring of implemented measurements, and Risk Assessment, as part of Risk Management. It consists of several processes: * Risk identification, * Relevant risk analysis, * Risk evaluation Risk Management recognizes risk, accesses risk, and takes measures to reduce risk, as well as measures for risk maintenance on an acceptable level. The main aim of Risk Assessment is to make a decision whether a system is acceptable, and which measures would provide its acceptability. For every organization using IT in its business process it is significant to conduct the risk assessment. Numerous threats and vulnerabilities are presented and their identification, analysis, and evaluation enable evaluation of risk impact, and proposing of suitable measures and controls for its mitigation on the acceptable level. The security policy has changed in the last years. From checklists for identifying specific events, the information security has risen onto a higher level, i.e. the security policy and strategy consider threats and weaknesses of the business environment, and IT infrastructure (Dhillon, 2001). Risk Management In the process of risk identification, its sources are distinguished by a certain event or incident. In that process, the knowledge about the organization, both internal and external, has an important role. Besides, past experiences from this or a similar organization about risk issues, are very useful. We can use many techniques for identifying risk: checklists, experienced judgments, flow charts, brainstorming, Hazard and Operability studies, scenario analysis, etc. In order to assess the level of risk, likelihood and the impact of incidental occurrences should be estimated. This estimation can be based on experience, standards, experiments, expert advice, etc. Since every event has various and probably multiple consequences, the level of risk is calculated as a combination of likelihood and impact. Risk analysis or assessment can be quantitative, semi-quantitative, and qualitative (Macdonald, 2004). Quantitative approach to risk assessment assigns numerical values to both impact and likelihood. The quantitative measure of risk calculated by statistical model is used to judge whether or not it is acceptable. Figure 1 represents relations between consequences, likelihood and limits of acceptance. Event A has both low values, and risk is acceptable as far as it is under the limits. Event C is above the limits with high frequency and huge consequence. It is unacceptable, and it needs some measurements to reduce consequence and/or probability. For event B, which is in grey zone between the limits, it is hard to make decision. [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] Semi-quantitative assessment classifies threats according to the consequences and probabilities of occurrence. …


River systems provide diverse ecosystem services (ES), such as flood regulation (regulating), fresh water (provisioning), nutrient cycling (supporting), and recreation (cultural), among others. The construction of infrastructure (e.g., for hydropower, irrigation) enhances the delivery of tangible ES for example food or energy (generally provisioning) to meet human needs. However, the resulting change to river flows threatens both the ecological health of a river and its ability to provide intangible but vital ES, for example those which support the delivery of other services. Understanding these supporting ES processes in river systems is essential to fully recognise the impact of water resources development on ES delivery. Whilst approaches for assessing instream supporting ES are under development, to date few provide quantitative methods for assessing delivery. Thus, this paper sets out a framework for the assessment of instream supporting ES using hydroecological modelling. It links supporting ES delivery to fluvial hydrological indicators through the use of ecologically relevant hydrological indices and macroinvertebrate flow preferences. The proposed framework is demonstrated on the Beas River basin (Western Himalayas, India), and is flexible enough to be transferred to a basin-wide model, thereby allowing ES relationships to be accounted for in basin-wide water resources planning.


Entrepreneurship has been considered as a factor of risk and reward. However, there are instances of entrepreneurship for social cause, where social well being takes a priority over profit motive. In the present study, the researcher analyses the findings from study of 9 pioneering social organization using semi-structured interviews and discussions. The findings from these studies are presented as propositions and as a model for social entrepreneurship. A model has been proposed which shows the growth and direction of social organizations. The ultimate stage in the growth has been identified as the stage of centre of excellence, where the organization works for promoting other organization, as a role model. It tries to focus on HRD and institution building activities for other organizations and institutions. Factors relating to social entrepreneur have also been studied.


Brain-electric correlates of reading have traditionally been studied with word-by-word presentation, a condition that eliminates important aspects of the normal reading process and precludes direct comparisons between neural activity and oculomotor behavior. In the present study, we investigated effects of word predictability on eye movements (EM) and fixation-related brain potentials (FRPs) during natural sentence reading. Electroencephalogram (EEG) and EM (via video-based eye tracking) were recorded simultaneously while subjects read heterogeneous German sentences, moving their eyes freely over the text. FRPs were time-locked to first-pass reading fixations and analyzed according to the cloze probability of the currently fixated word. We replicated robust effects of word predictability on EMs and the N400 component in FRPs. The data were then used to model the relation among fixation duration, gaze duration, and N400 amplitude, and to trace the time course of EEG effects relative to effects in EM behavior. In an extended Methodological Discussion section, we review 4 technical and data-analytical problems that need to be addressed when FRPs are recorded in free-viewing situations (such as reading, visual search, or scene perception) and propose solutions. Results suggest that EEG recordings during normal vision are feasible and useful to consolidate findings from EEG and eye-tracking studies.


Through global circuits of wage labor and capital, the Murid way has become an economic force in the Senegalese postcolony amid conditions of protracted global volatility. In this article, I analyze women's actions within these global circuits. Women create value by giving gifts during the celebration of births and marriages, gifts that are the product of and the motivating force behind Murid global trade. Female ritual activities, on which male honor rests, draw women into conflict with the Murid clergy, which views women's actions as customary and not part of its modern, austere, and global vision of Islam in Senegal.


Growth-oriented entrepreneurial start-ups generate more economic growth than other self-employed businesses, yet they only constitute a small fraction of start-ups. We examine whether financial constraints impede these types of start-ups by exploiting lottery wins as exogenous wealth shocks. We find that lottery-win magnitude increases winners? subsequent incorporation, implying that entrepreneurs face financial constraints, but not business registration, implying that financial constraints do not bind as much for the self-employed. Our results, that financial constraints bind for incorporations among men, for serial entrepreneurs, during economic booms, and in neighborhoods without local lenders, are important for understanding the financial impediments to entrepreneurial start-ups.


The present work deals with some aspects of the fluidmechanics of paper-making,more specifically partial dewateringduring roll forming. The study is mainly experimental. Pressureand wire position measurements have been carried out in anexperimental facility, the KTH-Former,which models the rollforming zone of a paper machine.Measurements are carried out with pure water for threedifferent wires (fabrics): A non-permeable,a semi-permeable anda conventional wire. Although not used in paper making,thenon-permeable wire is useful when trying to understand thefundamental mechanics of roll forming.The semi-permeable wirewith finite but low permeability is used to model the effectsof the fibre web on the drainage.Tests have mainly been carried out for different wiretensions and different jet speeds. It is shown that the localcurvature of the wire is strongly correlated to the dewateringpressure.The conventiona wire shows a single pressure peak causingcomplete de- watering in the first part of the dewateringzone.The pressure distributions for the non-and semi-permeablewires are found to show two consecutive pressure peaks followedby a suction peak where the wire is taken of the roll.Thisoscillating behaviour is due to capillary waves where the wiretension plays the role of surface tension on a free surface.Thewavy behaviour of the wire is recovered from an analyticalmodel and the effect is governed by a dimensionless Webernumber. The measured wave lengths correspond well to thosegiven by the theory.When the wire tension is high,i.e.a high dewateringpressure,the flow in the impingement region collapses when thedynamic pressure of the headbox jet is about half of thedewatering pressure. It is shown experimentally that the localdrainage shows a correlation to the dewatering pressure andhence to the wire curvature.


A plot study was conducted at the Gatton Research Dairy, Queensland, Australia, to quantify the effects of 5 regrowth periods (9, 11, 14, 16 and 18 days) and 4 vertical strata on the composition and nutritive value of kikuyu (Cenchrus clandestinus) pastures using a block factorial design with 4 replicates. Pasture samples were analyzed for crude protein (CP), ethanol-soluble carbohydrates (ESC), acid detergent fiber (ADF), neutral detergent fiber (aNDFom), in vitro indigestible neutral detergent fibre (iNDF240) and minerals. Metabolizable energy (ME) was then calculated from the concentrations of other nutrients. Regardless of the stage of regrowth, stems were located mainly in the bottom 1 or 2 strata, while leaves were present mainly in the top 2 or 3 strata. CP, ESC and ME declined, but aNDFom, ADF and iNDF240 increased with stage of regrowth and from top to bottom of the swards (P<0.05). While herbage quality variables were affected by both factors, vertical stratum had a much larger impact on quality than stage of regrowth. These results indicate that grazing management of kikuyu pastures should be based not only on stage of regrowth but also on level of defoliation, as both have strong impacts on the nutritive value of the consumed forage.


Vibration signals can be used in monitoring the structural integrity of steel beams. If the beams are cracked or slotted, the resonant frequencies will decrease and the mode shapes will change depending on the size and the location of the defects. The current study involves applying a perturbation method in prediction of resonant frequencies and mode shapes of a slotted beam. Modal analysis techniques are used in estimation of modal parameters including resonant frequencies, damping, and mode shapes. The effect of using the modal analysis method on the frequency resolution will be discussed. A large discrepancy was observed between experimental frequency shifts and those predicted by the perturbation method for relatively large slots. As required by the method itself, perturbation to the system (in this case is slot) should be small, which will lead to small changes in modal parameters. These results are compared with those obtained previously [Man et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 95, 2029–2037 (1994)] by solv...


A new database of trace gases and aerosols with global coverage, derived from high vertical resolution profile measurements, has been assembled as a collection of binary data files; hereafter referred to as the "Binary DataBase of Profiles" (BDBP). Version 1.0 of the BDBP, described here, includes measurements from different satellite- (HALOE, POAM II and III, SAGE I and II) and ground-based measurement systems (ozonesondes). In addition to the primary product of ozone, secondary measurements of other trace gases, aerosol extinction, and temperature are included. All data are subjected to very strict quality control and for every measurement a percentage error on the measurement is included. To facilitate analyses, each measurement is added to 3 different instances (3 different grids) of the database where measurements are indexed by: (1) geographic latitude, longitude, altitude (in 1 km steps) and time, (2) geographic latitude, longitude, pressure (at levels ~1 km apart) and time, (3) equivalent latitude, potential temperature (8 levels from 300 K to 650 K) and time. In contrast to existing zonal mean databases, by including a wider range of measurement sources (both satellite and ozonesondes), the BDBP is sufficiently dense to permit calculation of changes in ozone by latitude, longitude and altitude. In addition, by including other trace gases such as water vapour, this database can be used for comprehensive radiative transfer calculations. By providing the original measurements rather than derived monthly means, the BDBP is applicable to a wider range of applications than databases containing only monthly mean data. Monthly mean zonal mean ozone concentrations calculated from the BDBP are compared with the database of Randel and Wu, which has been used in many earlier analyses. As opposed to that database which is generated from regression model fits, the BDBP uses the original (quality controlled) measurements with no smoothing applied in any way and as a result displays higher natural variability.


We study the problem of decision-making in the setting of a scarcity of shared resources when the preferences of agents are unknown a priori and must be learned from data. Taking the two-sided matching market as a running example, we focus on the decentralized setting, where agents do not share their learned preferences with a central authority. Our approach is based on the representation of preferences in a reproducing kernel Hilbert space, and a learning algorithm for preferences that accounts for uncertainty due to the competition among the agents in the market. Under regularity conditions, we show that our estimator of preferences converges at a minimax optimal rate. Given this result, we derive optimal strategies that maximize agents' expected payoffs and we calibrate the uncertain state by taking opportunity costs into account. We also derive an incentive-compatibility property and show that the outcome from the learned strategies has a stability property. Finally, we prove a fairness property that asserts that there exists no justified envy according to the learned strategies. This is a joint work with Michael I. Jordan.


PURPOSE
The implementation of an accurate beam model is an integral part of the commissioning of any planning system. This process is especially challenging in the case of IMRT beam models owing to the complexity of small field sizes and MLC leaf-end and tongue-and-groove effects. The question of how to judge the quality of an IMRT beam model in comparison with other versions of the same model is central to this work.

METHODS
We make an important distinction between evaluation of the beam model and evaluation of the optimization routine that is a part of any IMRT planning system. The H-shaped target used in this work has several important features: it can only be covered by segments with small field size, for which all leaf design effects are important, and it has the overall dimensions of a common IMRT target. The procedure for inter-comparison of two IMRT beam models (old and new) involves the generation of two plans optimized with each beam model using identical IMRT prescriptions. Both plans are subsequently delivered on a solid water phantom with film located in two parallel planes with a small-volume ionization chamber inserted in the center.

RESULTS
Four dose calculations are performed, such that each plan is calculated with either of the two beam models. The four dose distributions are subsequently compared with the two film measurements using gamma analysis. In addition, the absolute dose measured in the center of the dose distribution is compared with the calculated value. A score is assigned to each beam model based on the results.

CONCLUSIONS
Using the procedure outlined in this presentation, different versions of an IMRT beam model can be compared and scored for quality. Adoption of a unified strategy for beam model inter-comparison can greatly facilitate the evaluation and commissioning of IMRT beam models.


Mie scattering theory is used to calculate the efficiency factors for absorption by microscopic dielectric spheres. Resonances in the efficiency factors for absorption and resonances in the amplitudes of the electric and magnetic multipoles which occur in an expansion of the fields inside the dielectric sphere are discussed. Several trends in the strengths and width of the various resonances as functions of the absorption coefficient of the sphere, size parameter, multipole order, and multipole resonance number are given. A formal solution for elastic (Mie) and inelastic (Raman) scattering by microscopic particles is derived from the extinction theorem. With this background, some implications of the resonances in the interpretation of absorption, fluorescence, and Raman scattering by microscopic particles are discussed.


International trade relies on trade finance (credit or insurance) by financial institutions. Data limitations, however, have made it difficult to quantify the impact of changes in the supply of trade finance on trade. This paper is the first to establish a causal link between the supply of private credit insurance and exports. I overcome endogeneity issues by using a unique bilateral data set which covers the activities from 1992 to 2006 of one of the world's leading private credit insurers. This database enables me to use the insurer's claim ratio - a primary determinant of the supply of credit insurance - as an instrument for insured exports. Subsequently, applying the method of instrumental variables and a variety of trade models, I consistently find a positive and statistically significant effect of private credit insurance on exports. The estimates are economically relevant and suggest that, depending on the decline in the supply of private credit insurance during the 2008-09 international trade collapse, the reduction in private insurance exposure explains about 5 to 9 percent of the drop in world exports and 10 to 20 percent of the drop in European exports.


Ten Barnett Shale lithofacies have been recognized in a 223-ft (68-m)-long core from Johnson County, Texas. Eight of these lithofacies match those previously identified in the main producing area of the Newark East (Barnett Shale) field in the northern part of the Fort Worth Basin, but two new lithofacies have been identified in this core, resedimented spiculitic mudstone lithofacies and lag deposits, both of which are indicative of a relatively higher energy environment and downslope resedimentation of shallower water deposits. The recognition of cyclical stacking patterns of the lithofacies, condensed sections (CSs), and transgressive surfaces of erosion were the keys to establishing the sequence-stratigraphic framework in these fine-grained rocks, which consists of seven stratigraphic intervals in the lower Barnett Shale and nine stratigraphic intervals in the upper Barnett Shale. Spectral gamma-ray uranium and thorium logs aided in this objective and are recommended for future sequence-stratigraphic studies of these and other shales. The sequence-stratigraphic framework reveals that the lower Barnett Shale in this area was deposited mainly in a low-energy, relatively deep-water environment, somewhat far from a terrigenous source area, which probably lies to the northwest. By contrast, the upper Barnett Shale was deposited in an oxygenated shallower water environment, which had a source area from the west and southwest sides of the basin. The higher frequency of sea level fluctuation during development of the upper Barnett Shale most probably indicates periodic tectonic activity, perhaps associated with a structural high that was susceptible to sea level fluctuations. Alternatively, it could have resulted from the onset of glaciations in Gondwanaland during this time. This higher frequency may indicate that the upper Barnett is Chesterian in age, because cyclicity was higher than during the Osagean and Meramecian stages. If so, there may be more high-frequency cycles than recognized in this core. Siliceous sponge spicules are more common in this core than in more northerly cores, so more brittle facies might prevail in the southern part of the Fort Worth Basin. High gamma-ray log responses, which are caused by a high total organic carbon, and/or in-situ phosphate minerals are commonly found in CSs and can be used for regional correlations. However, high gamma-ray phosphatic deposits that have been resedimented to downslope positions by sediment gravity flows are an exception to the previous statement. Correlation of the Barnett stratigraphic intervals now provides a north-to-southeast stratigraphic framework along the Fort Worth Basin. Relative hydrocarbon potential (RHP) is an organic geochemical parameter applied to this core and found to provide an indicator of marine transgressions and regressions. We recommend continued testing and use of the RHP parameter for high-frequency sequence-stratigraphic analysis of unconventional gas shales.


This collection gathers the best work of flourishing but often-neglected avant-garde southern poets, deepening understanding of modern poetry and poetics. Another South is an anthology of poetry from contemporary southern writers who are working in forms that are radical, innovative, and visionary. Highly experimental and challenging in nature, the poetry in this volume, with its syntactical disjunctions, formal revolutions, and typographic playfulness, represents the direction of a new breed of southern writing that is at once universal in its appeal and regional in its flavor. Focusing on poets currently residing in the South, the anthology includes both emerging and established voices in the national and international literary world From the invocations of Andy Young's "Vodou Headwashing Ceremony" to the blues-informed poems of Lorenzo Thomas and Honoree Jeffers, from the different voicings of John Lowther and Kalamu ya Salaam to the visual, multi-genre art of Jake Berry, David Thomas Roberts, and Bob Grumman, the poetry in Another South is rich in variety and enthusiastic in its explorations of new ways to embody place and time. These writers have made the South lush with a poetic avant-garde all its own, not only redefining southern identity and voice but also offering new models of what is possible universally through the medium of poetry. Hank Lazer's introductory essay about "Kudzu textuality" contextualizes the work by these contemporary innovators. Like the uncontrollable runaway vine that entwines the southern landscape, their poems are hyperfertile, stretching their roots and shoots relentlessly, at once destructive and regenerative. In making a radical departure from nostalgic southern literary voices, these poems of polyvocal abundance are closer in spirit to "speaking in tongues" or apocalyptic southern folk art - primitive, astonishing, and mystic.