Aim:The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of performing an isometric conditioning contraction (CC) consisting of two sets of five seconds maximal voluntary contraction in physically active individuals prior to three sets of Loaded Squat Jumps (LSJ).Method:5 males and 4 females (mean ± SD: age 25 ± 2 years, height 175 ± 10 cm, body mass 70 ± 15 kg) were assessed on their power output, force production, jump height and velocity on three sets of LSJ on two separate sessions. Each participant attended two sessions in randomized order: a control session (CON) and an experimental session (EXP) separated by at least two hours. The EXP session consisted of a 10 min warm-up followed by 2 x 5 seconds isometric CC, this was proceeded by another two minutes of rest before three sets of LSJ were performed, each set separated by a two-minute rest. During the CON session a two-minute rest, followed by three sets of LSJ, replaced the isometric CC sequence.Results:No significant improvement was found on any of the physical parameters assessed, comparing the CON and EXP session (p > 0.05). The results showed a variance on individual response were some subjects performed better after the CC and others did not .Conclusion:In conclusion, this study evaluated the effect of performing an isometric CC prior three sets of LSJ. The results indicate that an isometric CC consisting of two sets of five seconds maximal voluntary contraction is insufficient to enhance the performance in an LSJ.


Neonatal diabetes is a rare monogenic form of diabetes that usually presents within the first six months of life. It is commonly caused by gain-of-function mutations in the genes encoding the Kir6.2 and SUR1 subunits of the plasmalemmal ATP-sensitive K+ (KATP) channel. To better understand this disease, we generated a mouse expressing a Kir6.2 mutation (V59M) that causes neonatal diabetes in humans and we used Cre-lox technology to express the mutation specifically in pancreatic beta cells. These beta-V59M mice developed severe diabetes soon after birth, and by 5 weeks of age, blood glucose levels were markedly increased and insulin was undetectable. Islets isolated from beta-V59M mice secreted substantially less insulin and showed a smaller increase in intracellular calcium in response to glucose. This was due to a reduced sensitivity of KATP channels in pancreatic beta cells to inhibition by ATP or glucose. In contrast, the sulfonylurea tolbutamide, a specific blocker of KATP channels, closed KATP channels, elevated intracellular calcium levels, and stimulated insulin release in beta-V59M beta cells, indicating that events downstream of KATP channel closure remained intact. Expression of the V59M Kir6.2 mutation in pancreatic beta cells alone is thus sufficient to recapitulate the neonatal diabetes observed in humans. beta-V59M islets also displayed a reduced percentage of beta cells, abnormal morphology, lower insulin content, and decreased expression of Kir6.2, SUR1, and insulin mRNA. All these changes are expected to contribute to the diabetes of beta-V59M mice. Their cause requires further investigation.


Development of a vibrant and competitive services sector is a key characteristic of modern economies. In the developed world, services frequently account for two-thirds or three-quarters of all economic activity. The transition from agriculture through manufacturing to a services economy has been the hallmark of economic development for many countries. In line with this trend, we see many emerging markets currently working hard to support and develop services industries, and to put in place the regulatory structures required for more integrated international services markets. Doing so is likely to form an important part of efforts to avoid the so-called "middle income trap", as improving services sector productivity is key to invigorating the economy and supporting the sustained innovation needed to move to high income status. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations ( Broadly speaking, measures aimed at reducing barriers to entry—which make markets less competitive—and lowering the costs of doing business for domestic and foreign service providers alike can have major impacts throughout the economy. A more productive services sector is not only good news for those directly connected with it through investment or employment, but also for other parts of the economy that use services inputs intensively. As just one example, growth in the services sector is one of the foundations on which international goods production networks are built, since it is impossible to move intermediate inputs across borders and undertake complex coordination of production processes without efficient markets for services such as transport, telecommunications, and business processes. ASEAN) countries, along with the People's Republic of China (PRC), and India ("the ACI countries"), are no strangers to this underlying trend. Although experience differs greatly from one country to another, the data reviewed in this report strongly suggest that an increasing services orientation is likely to be a key feature of the ACI economies over the medium-term. Services trade among the ACI countries has been growing at a very rapid rate over recent years, despite starting from a relatively low baseline. Although data are scarce and must be interpreted with caution, an analysis of applied services sector policies in the region suggests that there is much policymakers can do to intensify this process, and increase the pace at which the transformation to a services economy is taking place. Indeed, services policies in the ACI countries are generally quite restrictive by world standards, even though experiences differ greatly across countries. In addition to traditional services sectors such as finance and telecommunications—where the gains from reform remain potentially large—there are also a number of "sunrise" sectors of interest to the ACI countries. Healthcare is one example, with considerable potential for trade growth through outsourcing of allied health functions, as well as movement of patients, movement of medical personnel, and foreign investment in hospitals and other health care providers. Business process outsourcing has already become an important export earner in regional economies such as India and the Philippines. There is clear scope for policymakers to support expansion of this kind of trade in the future. Regional integration can provide a useful impetus for continued reform of services sector policies, thereby promoting competitiveness more broadly. Priorities for the ASEAN countries include ensuring on the ground implementation of the ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint as it relates to services markets. The same is true of the ASEAN-PRC Trade in Services Agreement, even though only a few countries have made substantially stronger commitments than under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). Conclusion of a services agreement with India could provide an additional spur to the already rapidly growing services trade between ASEAN and India. JEL Classification: O44, Q58, Q56, O10, O53, Q28, Q53 ADBI Working Paper 349 Shepherd and Pasadilla


eCommerce heralds a revolution in which businesses interact, collaborate and communicate electronically. Typically, this is based on the Internet; a global public network in which chaos seems to reign supreme. Companies at the forefront of the eCommerce revolution are developing business strategies that incorporate advanced technologies to redefine industries to their advantage. Many of the fastest growing companies operate solely as an eBusiness. Many global enterprises are now recognising that the development of a sound eCommerce strategy is not just a prerequisite to remaining competitive – it is paramount to survival. As a result, every company is faced with the question of how to rapidly grow and extend their eBusiness, at the same time ensuring that all interactions are authenticated and can be audited. Dealing with this transformation, or making use of the revolution to one's competitive advantage, requires transcending the technology landscape. SAFECommerce involves underpinning an eBusiness with a set of services that allow for a secure foundation to be built upon. It is essential that the development of an eBusiness incorporates services that track its complete lifecycle from developing an eBusiness concept through to implementing a solution and finally to transforming it as the marketplace demands.


An unintended consequence of loose US monetary policy is the increase in currency risk exposure abroad. Using firm-level data on corporate bond issuances in 17 emerging market economies (EME) between 2003 and 2015, we find that EME companies are more likely to issue bonds in foreign currency when US interest rates are low. This increase occurs across the board, including for firms more vulnerable to foreign exchange exposure, and is particularly strong for bonds issued in local markets. Interestingly, capital controls on bond inflows significantly decrease the likelihood of issuing in foreign currency and can even eliminate the adverse impact of low US interest rates. In contrast, macroprudential foreign exchange regulations tend to increase foreign currency issuances of non-financial corporates, although this effect can be significantly reduced using capital controls.


Rainwater harvesting (RWH) is a relatively inexpensive technology that has the potential to provide safe water in communities where conventional technologies are difficult to implement. In this study, the microbiological quality of rainwater harvested from rooftops and ground-surface runoff was evaluated based on the concentrations of Escherichia coli , total coliforms and enterococci. Samples were collected from 15 roof-harvested rainwater (RHRW) tanks, 4 ground-surface runoff rainwater harvesting (GRWH) tanks, 3 rivers and 1 spring water source in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa, and 14 RHRW tanks in Gauteng Province. In the Eastern Cape Province E. coli and enterococci were detected in 7 and 4 of the 15 RHRW tanks, respectively. Enterococci were detected only from one river whereas E. coli was detected in all three rivers; in spring water neither enterococci nor E. coli were detected. Samples from GRWH tanks were positive for E. coli and enterococci in 2 and 3 of the 4 tanks, respectively. In Gauteng Province, E. coli , coliforms and enterococci were detected from 6, 6 and 9 of the 14 rainwater tanks, respectively. On average, E. coli and enterococci were detected in 44.8% of the RHRW tanks, although enterococci concentrations were several times higher than those for E. coli . We further evaluated the significance of urban pigeons as the likely sources of contamination by isolating 156 enterococci from 30 pigeon faecal samples and 208 enterococci from RHRW samples collected from Gauteng Province. Matrix-assisted laser desorption ionisation identification of the various enterococci revealed 4 species – E. faecalis (20.5%), E. mundtii (20.51%), E. faecium (23.1%) and E. casseliflavus (17.3%) – to be dominant in faecal samples, whereas E. casseliflavus (34.6%) and E. mundtii (33.2%) were dominant in RHRW. Keywords : rainwater harvesting, contamination, indicator bacteria, health risks


A new generation of food activists has come to believe that "sustainable farming" and "eating local" are the way to solve a host of perceived problems with our modern food supply system. By combining healthy eating and a high standard of environmental stewardship, these locavores think, we can also deliver important economic benefits and increase food security within local economies. But after a thorough review of the evidence, economic geographer Pierre Desrochers and policy analyst Hiroko Shimizu have concluded these claims are mistaken. In The Locavore's Dilemma, they explain the history, science, and economics of food supply to reveal what locavores miss or misunderstand: the real environmental impacts of agricultural production; the drudgery of subsistence farming; and the essential role large-scale, industrial producers play in making food more available, varied, affordable, and nutritionally rich than ever before in history. At best, they show, locavorism is a well-meaning marketing fad among the world's most privileged consumers. At worst, it constitutes a dangerous distraction from solving serious global food issues. Deliberately provocative, but based on scrupulous research and incontrovertible scientific evidence, The Locavore's Dilemma proves that: * Our modern food-supply chain is a superior alternative that has evolved through constant competition and ever-more-rigorous efficiency. * A world food chain characterized by free trade and the absence of agricultural subsidies would deliver lower prices and more variety in a manner that is both economically and environmentally more sustainable. * There is no need to feel guilty for not joining the locavores on their crusade. Eating globally, not only locally, is the way to save the planet.


Multiprocessor system-on-chip (MPSoC) has been widely used in many real-time embedded systems where both soft-error reliability (SER) and lifetime reliability (LTR) are key concerns. Many existing works have investigated them, but they focus either on handling one of the two reliability concerns or on improving one type of reliability under the constraint of the other. These techniques are thus not applicable to maximize SER and LTR simultaneously, which is highly desired in some real-world applications. In this paper, we study the joint optimization of SER and LTR for real-time MPSoCs. We propose a novel static task scheduling algorithm to simultaneously maximize SER and LTR for real-time homogeneous MPSoC systems under the constraints of deadline, energy budget, and task precedence. Specifically, we develop a new solution representation scheme and two evolutionary operators that are closely integrated with two popular multiobjective evolutionary optimization frameworks, namely NSGAII and SPEA2. Extensive experimental results on standard benchmarks and synthetic applications show the efficacy of our scheme. More specifically, our scheme can achieve significantly better solutions (i.e., LTR-SER tradeoff fronts) with remarkably higher hypervolume and can be dozens or even hundreds of times faster than the state-of-the-art algorithms. The results also demonstrate that our scheme can be applied to heterogeneous MPSoC systems and is effective in improving reliability for heterogeneous MPSoC systems.


The aim of this article is to present information search tasks as an alternative to standardized tests for the assessment of scholarly information literacy (IL). The article describes how a task taxonomy and scoring rubrics were developed as a basis for the construction of standardized search tasks. Based on this taxonomy, sample tasks were created and used in an evaluation study in which an IL instruction programme was scrutinised. In this study, the tasks were applied alongside with a standardized IL test to determine their convergent validity. The results show that IL can be assessed using information search tasks in a reliable and conceptually as well as ecologically valid way. To our knowledge, this is the first publication using information search tasks for the assessment of IL with this degree of standardisation. The task taxonomy, sample tasks, and scoring rubrics are included and can be used by practitioners to create information search tasks tailored to their needs.


Several nanometer‐scale technological applications rely on the promising scenario of highly anisotropic magnetic materials. Bearing this in mind, we have studied the structure, magnetic properties, and interfacial exchange anisotropy effects of unique wires of Ni/NiO synthesized using carbon nanotubes as substrates. Structural analyses of these nanocomposites in correlation with magnetic measurements show that the crystalline NiO outer shells cause an enhanced exchange bias, providing an extra source of anisotropy that leads to their magnetization stability. These Ni/NiO nanowires, with a spin‐glass‐like behavior and with their magnetic moments in a blocked state over a wide temperature range that includes room temperature, should therefore inspire further study concerning the applicability of anisotropic structures.


Abstract. Qurniati R, Darmawan A, Utama RB, Inoue M. 2019. Poverty distribution of different types of forest-related communities: Case study in Wan Abdul Rachman Forest Park and mangrove forest in Sidodadi Village, Lampung Province, Indonesia. Biodiversitas 20: 3153-3163. Forest has important role in community because it can influence social characteristics as well as the quality of life of the household. In the tropics, many people living around forest are in poor conditions. Sidodadi Village of Pesawaran District, Lampung Province bordered to Wan Abdul Rachman (WAR) Forest Park in the upland and mangrove forest in the coastal area represents a good case study of communities living adjacent to forests with different ecosystem type. The research objective was to identify and analyze the characteristics and the level of household poverty of community living around two forested areas (i.e. upland forest in WAR Forest Park versus mangrove forest) in Sidodadi Village. In this village, households were interviewed by randomly selecting 215 respondents. The poverty was analyzed using five indicators, i.e. the economic characteristics, material wealth, health, infrastructure and services, and knowledge. The study found that base on the aggregated five poverty indicators there were no households categorized as poor. However, analyses in each indicator had diverse results. Based on the indicators of knowledge and economic characteristics, we found that most respondents were classified as poor while based on three other indicators there were classified as rich. The poor knowledge level was dominantly in older people who have low formal and informal education, while poverty in terms of economic characteristics due to limited opportunity to have better livelihood. Results also indicate that the poor households were located near mangrove forests while those classified as rich were located near upland forest in WAR Forest Park. The rich households had better opportunities to earn income from limited uses of forest in the upland area, yet similar opportunities were not obtained from mangrove forests. Sustainable use of mangrove forests should be considered to support the livelihood option of the surrounding community to enhance their wealth.


This thesis aims to explore the potential impact of Computer Aided Architectural Design (CAAD) as a conceptual design tool on the design methodology of final year students. Many design studies have focused on sketching and its relationship with creative thinking to validate CAAD programs as a design tool. On the contrary, this study argues that the continued primacy of traditional tools as the predominant conceptual tools needs more evidence in the contemporary design practices. That is to say, the relative importance of CAAD alongside other media, such as sketching, model making and verbalisation must be recognised before the forthcoming leap in CAAD programs development. To illustrate these ideas, the Scott Sutherland School of Architecture and Built Environment was used as a case study to explore CAADs role in the educational context, the studio in general and the final year studio in particular. A mixed methods approach was employed to carry out two studies: a case study and a protocol study. A case study approach was utilised to understand the modern context whereby CAAD is used by the students despite CAAD not being an integrated part of the project model. The case study was also used to document the reasons behind students tendency of using CAAD at the conceptual phases of the design process. Mixed methods were used to collect data at three different intervals of the two semesters; before starting the studio project, while working on the project and after submitting the final project. The methods used include a questionnaire survey, structured reflection interviews, and a focus group. A protocol study was conducted to understand the impact of CAAD on selfcommunication using the think aloud method under the same experimental conditions using CAAD program(s) as the only external representation. The case study findings clarified the effects of the traditional context of the studio and the project model on CAADs utility within students design processes and identified the lack of CAAD professional skills, and the integration of CAAD as a knowledge base. The protocol study findings provided a greater understanding of the cognitive processes in designing and design performance while using CAAD, as well as acknowledging the possibility of a cyclic conceptual process. The potential impact of CAAD on the design process was further categorised. The empirical exploration provides CAAD research with new insights, instigating more useful ways of teaching and learning by an appropriate integration of CAAD programs and design methods in a situated manner where students can enhance their design processes creatively. It is proposed that a more measured and disinterested approach is now required to investigate CAAD and their implications for education.


When assessing a patient nutritional support the state of the gastrointestinal tract is the most important point to consider, whenever possible we should choose the enteral nutrition (EN) over parenteral nutrition (PN) and recog nized by its various advantages. The percutaneous gas trostomy (GRP) were introduced in clinical practice as an alternative to surgical gastrostomy (GQ). The speed, simplicity, low cost, low morbidity and low mortality of these techniques has allowed its rapid development.The feeding tubes types used were the balloon-retained de vices catheter, the pig tail and the ballon-retained with gastropexia (gastropexia). It is a retrospective study of all patients who were pla ced GPR in the Virgen del Rocio University Hospital, Sevilla, between September 1996 and September 2013, which aims to study is to describe the characteristics of patients and the complications presented for different types of enteral feeding tubes used. GPR 186 were performed in 176 patients (135 males (76.70%), with an ave rage duration of 303.6 days, the most frequent diseases were cancers of the head and neck 49.46%. The types of feeding tubes used were pigtail 118 (63.44%), balloon-retained devices 22 (11.83%), and gas tropexia 46 (24.73%). The most common early complications in the pigtail group were early purulent exudate and early bleeding (2.5 and 3.4% respectively), while in the balloon catheter group the initial output of the probe was most frequent early complication (13.7%), none of these complications were observed in the group of gas tropexy. The most common late complication was obstruction probe. The GPR is a safe technique with lower mortality of 1%; Low frequently of early and late complications. A better understanding of this technique can reduce the frequency of complications.


When the federal welfare system was reformed in 1996, Congress devolved much of the authority over welfare delivery to the states and gave them the option of contracting out administration of their programs to private entities. Moreover, after welfare reform, enacted as the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRA), welfare recipients are expected to work to receive benefits. This means that front-line workers must engage in intensive interpersonal counseling rather than simply confirm objective eligibility criteria and dispense checks. As a result, front-line workers have vastly increased discretion. When privatization is layered over this discretionary scheme, issues of accountability to program beneficiaries deepen. For over thirty years, it has been a tenet of public benefits law that due process protections attach to the government's delivery of benefits. Yet when private entities deliver the same benefits, constitutional protections may fall by the wayside. This article explores the implications of welfare privatization on welfare beneficiaries' procedural rights. It explains how the Supreme Court's current state action doctrine may well insulate private welfare providers and their state contracting partners from constitutional claims. Accordingly, the Article also explores other potential federal and state bases for enforcing accountability in welfare programs in privatized jurisdictions, ranging from statutory to contractual to equitable claims. The Article concludes that the procedural rights of welfare recipients under PRA are greatly diminished after welfare reform.


Perovskite–silicon tandem solar cells are potentially attractive, inexpensive solutions to surpass the power conversion efficiency limits of market-leading silicon solar cells. While such tandem solar cells have been demonstrated to reach high efficiencies, they require advanced light management to utilise the solar spectrum efficiently. Moreover, area upscaling with minimal optical losses is necessary to transfer the properties of lab scale devices to commercial scale products. Here, we demonstrate four-terminal perovskite–silicon tandem solar modules with efficient light management. With rigorous optical simulations of the complete tandem stack, we design light management concepts that minimise overall reflection and enhance complementary absorption of the subcells. The optical optimisation results in four-terminal tandem power conversion efficiencies of 25.3% on 0.13 cm2 and 23.9% on 4 cm2, both exceeding the stand-alone silicon solar cell power conversion efficiency of 23.0%.


In this paper, the designed of triple-band printed dipole antennas are incorporated with single-band artiflcial magnetic conductor (AMC). The single-band AMCs are designed to resonate at 0.92GHz, 2.45GHz and 5.8GHz using TLC-32 dielectric substrate. The four important parameters in AMC high impedance surface (HIS) design are also described in this paper. By simulating a unit cell of the AMC structure using a transient solver in Computer Simulation Technology (CST) software, the characteristic of the AMC can be characterized. The AMC condition is characterized by the frequency or frequencies where the magnitude of the re∞ection coe-cient is +1 and its phase is 0 - . It has high surface impedance (Zs) and it re∞ects the external electromagnetic waves without the phase reversal. This characteristic of AMC enables the printed dipole to work properly when the antenna with AMC ground plane (GP) is directly attached to the metal object. The performances of the antenna with and without AMC structure as a ground plane to the antenna such as return loss, realized gain, radiation e-ciency, radiation pattern and directivity are studied. Reported results show that the performances of the antenna are improved. Hence, the designed dipole tag antenna can be used for metal object identiflcations when the AMC structure is introduced as a ground to the antenna. The properties of the antenna are also remained well when the size of metal plate attached to them is increased.


Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) are increasingly breaking free of the lab and entering the classroom. These practice-based software systems promise significant learning gains over more traditional e-learning approaches. However, their widespread uptake is still hampered by the difficulty in building them. Over the past ten years we have developed ITS authoring tools that have evolved to the point that it is now feasible for teachers to build their own systems. We report on one such system, an ITS for medical imaging, built by the head of the Medical Imaging Department of a polytechnic institution using VIPER, an ITS authoring system we have developed. Despite requiring no specialist skills (other than domain knowledge) to build, an initial study provides evidence that the resulting ITS is effective at teaching the important concepts of this subject, and demonstrates that is it feasible for teachers to develop their own intelligent tutoring systems.


This updated third edition illustrates the mathematical concepts that a game developer needs to develop 3D computer graphics and game engines at the professional level. It starts at a fairly basic level in areas such as vector geometry and linear algebra, and then progresses to more advanced topics in 3D programming such as illumination and visibility determination. Particular attention is given to derivations of key results, ensuring that the reader is not forced to endure gaps in the theory. The book assumes a working knowledge of trigonometry and calculus, but also includes sections that review the important tools used from these disciplines, such as trigonometric identities, differential equations, and Taylor series.The third edition expands upon topics that include projections, shadows, physics, cloth simulation, and numerical methods. All of the illustrations have been updated, and the shader code has been updated to the latest high-level shading language specifications.


Douglas Adams's character from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, Marvin, is a depressed android. He is constantly bored and morose. His personality can illustrate the feelings that the proclaimed crisis of legal education triggers. Legal education is in crisis. We are facing unprecedented challenges and we urgently need to reform law schools to face these contemporary needs. Or at least, this is the prevalent discourse today. It was also the prevalent discourse a generation ago, and a generation prior too, and since the beginning of university legal education in Canada. This perception of crisis has been a constant, cyclically coming back and haunting legal educators. This is not to say that there aren't important challenges today, nor that there weren't important ones in the past as well; there certainly are and were. It is striking to observe that despite such frequent calls to thorough reforms, the key characteristics of legal education in Canada have not budged much over time. Moreover, when there have been substantial changes in the field of legal education, they seem to have been the results of powerful forces outside of legal education or accidents along the way rather than concerted efforts by legal educators to achieve a better outcome. In short, legal education, by in large, has been reacting to social changes rather than leading it. It is this repetitive phenomenon that triggers depressed and morose feelings when the topic of the crisis of legal education comes back around once again.


In May 2016, the World Health Assembly, the governing body of WHO, endorsed the first-ever global hepatitis strategy.1 This document, termed the Global Health Sector Strategy on Viral Hepatitis (GHSS-VH), proposes ambitious prevention and treatment targets with the ultimate goal of eliminating hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030. The GHSS-VH defines elimination as a 90% reduction in incidence of chronic HBV and HCV infections and a 65% reduction in hepatitis-related mortality. Achieving the goals of the global strategy will require scaling up prevention and treatment services, which in turn will require increases in financial resources and political commitment. In addition, national health planners will need to decide how best to allocate these resources so that they have maximal impact. A solid understanding of the epidemiology of hepatitis infection in the country, in particular identifying groups at highest risk of infection and those at highest risk of death should be the basis of a sound national treatment plan that can meet the incidence and mortality goals of GHSS-VH.

In this issue, Scott et al 2 developed a mathematical model to study which treatment strategies would most effectively and efficiently eliminate hepatitis C in Australia, based on the WHO strategy's goals. As in most high-income countries, HCV infection …


The field of civic and political participation has been studied mostly from individual, psychological approaches rather than collective, relational perspectives. Here we address this gap through a political ethnography in the youth wing of a major Portuguese political party, conducted during the fervent months right before and after the Portuguese parliamentary elections of October 2015. Investigating the meaningmaking of doing politics in real-life contexts, we assess the collective learning processes involved in political participation. This paper shows that youth wings can provide quality participation experiences. Indeed, collectively envisioning and constructing a more democratic society and working for the public good are guiding principles of the wing. Debatement politics and pedagogical politics thus play a fundamental role in the wing's activity, even if they are accompanied by the more mundane, festive party politics and the backstage politics. Through their activity, the wing's members acquire and display high levels of political efficacy, critical thinking and effort regulation regarding political involvement. Methodologically, this paper shows that ethnography is well equipped to study the experience of participation, foregrounding activities and perceptions of wing's members in order to make sense of their learning processes and outcomes.


Due to sustained partial neck flexion when operating a computer terminal for prolonged periods and by holding a stooped posture being proposed aetiologies for hypertonic posterior cervical muscles and subsequent mechanical neck pain, subjects for this research study were chosen according to their occupation and had to sit at a desk for more the three hours and less than eight hours a day. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation combined with heat therapy as opposed to proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation combined with cryotherapy in the treatment of mechanical neck pain caused by hypertonic posterior cervical muscles. This was a comparative, randomised, clinical trial consisting of two groups. Group A received proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF) combined with heat therapy as their treatment protocol. Group B received proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation combined with cryotherapy as their treatment protocol. Each group consisted of thirty people between the ages of 25 and 50 who were randomly allocated to their respective groups. It was hypothesized that the analgesic properties related to cryotherapy would result in the treatment group that received PNF stretching combined with cryotherapy yielding better results in terms of objective clinical findings. It was also hypothesized that the therapeutic effects of heat therapy would result in the treatment group receiving PNF stretching combined with heat therapy would yield better results in terms of subjective clinical findings and it is hypothesized that there is an association between the subjective and objective clinical findings between the cryotherapy and the heat therapy groups. The treatment regimen consisted of each participant receiving three treatments over a period of one week and then a one-week follow-up consultation. Subjective data monitored consisted of the Numerical Pain Rating Scale –101 (NRS-101) and the CMCC Neck Disability index. Objective data was collected using the Cervical Range of Motion goniometer (CROM) and the Algometer. At the end of all treatment protocols, statistical (quantitative) analysis was performed to determine whether one treatment protocol was more effective than the other. The analysis of the data collected showed that for all outcomes measured, either of the two treatments was effective overall. Trends suggested optimum treatments were dependent on the age of the patient. Age groups of 46-50 years old, 41-45 years old and the 31-35 years old responded best and improved the most with heat intervention, while age group of 36-40 years old responded best to the cryotherapy intervention. For the youngest age group of 25-30 years old, it did not make a difference whether they received heat therapy or cryotherapy as an intervention. It would seem that the older the patient the more effective the application of heat therapy as a result of the effect of heat therapy on the collagen and elastin fibers within the muscle and its fascia which allowed for increased and sustained improvement of the majority of the age groups represented in this study. Conversely it would seem that the cryotherapy group had only immediate and unsustained effects in the long term, which suggests that the cryotherapy had only a pain relieving function that allowed for the improvement of patients in the study, which when removed resulted in regression to the initial clinical syndrome severity. Most of the outcomes did not show a statistically significant interaction between time, age group and treatment group. The study was underpowered at the age group level, with only 12 subjects per age group. Further studies with a larger sample size in each of the age groups are needed in order to determine whether age is a definitive factor in one treatment being preferred over the other.


By the mid-1980s, the civil justice system in many common law jurisdictions was reportedly 'in crisis', crippled by excessive delay, cost and complexity in proceedings and out of reach of ordinary people. During the next two decades, law reform commissions and other agencies were charged with identifying problems with the civil justice system and with making recommendations for its improvement. These bodies seemed to be in 'universal agreement as to the nature and severity of the problems afflicting the common law civil justice systems' and they appear to have produced proposals that have much in common. Many reforms were implemented as a result of their efforts the majority of the recommendations resulted in procedural reform achieved by legislation, rules of court and practice directions. Not unexpectedly, many reform agencies identified legal education as a factor contributing to the perceived crisis and made recommendations for change (and indeed, separate enquiries conducted into the state of legal education made similar recommendations). Reform agencies recognised that the system of civil litigation and the attitudes and skills of legal professionals (and law graduates) are inextricably linked. Legal education had to respond to and facilitate reform if reform was to be sustained. This article is available in Bond Law Review: http://epublications.bond.edu.au/blr/vol21/iss3/8 192 REFORM OF THE CIVIL JUSTICE SYSTEM TWO DECADES PAST – IMPLICATIONS FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION AND FOR LAW TEACHERS


The use of lignin as a renewable resource for the production of less-expensive carbon fibers has in recent years attracted great interest. In order to develop the strength properties, the stabilization and carbonization processes have to be optimized. For this reason, the process parameters during carbonization have here been studied on stabilized lignin fibers in the temperature interval from 300 to 1300 °C. The effects of temperature, heating rate, and straining of fibers during carbonization on the strength properties of carbon fibers were investigated. The heating rate, in the range from 1 to 40 °C/min, was shown to have no effect on the property development of the fibers. During carbonization with no load applied to the fibers, a shrinkage of 20% was noted. Counteracting the shrinkage by imposing a load on the fibers during the carbonization resulted in fibers with a greater stiffness. The tensile strength was not, however, affected by this loading. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016, 133, 43965.


This chapter deals with the position control of quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) when quadrotor's linear velocity is unavailable. We propose a hierarchical tracking controller for quadrotor UAV. The proposed controller does not require measurements of linear velocity of quadrotor. A nonlinear filter that avoids the need for measurements of linear velocity has proposed such that a global stability result is obtained for the position tracking error. However, backstepping based on barrier Lyapunov function has been used for the attitude controller. The control design is achieved by means of the hierarchical control, that is, design the position controller and attitude controller separately. This allows us to choose different nonlinear techniques for each controller.


Studies of gene function in non-model animals have been limited by the approaches available for eliminating gene function. The CRISPR/Cas9 (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats/CRISPR associated) system has recently become a powerful tool for targeted genome editing. Here, we report the use of the CRISPR/Cas9 system to disrupt selected genes, including nanos2, nanos3, dmrt1, and foxl2, with efficiencies as high as 95%. In addition, mutations in dmrt1 and foxl2 induced by CRISPR/Cas9 were efficiently transmitted through the germline to F1. Obvious phenotypes were observed in the G0 generation after mutation of germ cell or somatic cell-specific genes. For example, loss of Nanos2 and Nanos3 in XY and XX fish resulted in germ cell-deficient gonads as demonstrated by GFP labeling and Vasa staining, respectively, while masculinization of somatic cells in both XY and XX gonads was demonstrated by Dmrt1 and Cyp11b2 immunohistochemistry and by up-regulation of serum androgen levels. Our data demonstrate that targeted, heritable gene editing can be achieved in tilapia, providing a convenient and effective approach for generating loss-of-function mutants. Furthermore, our study shows the utility of the CRISPR/Cas9 system for genetic engineering in non-model species like tilapia and potentially in many other teleost species.


Roger Phillips and Martyn Rix are pioneers in the use of photography in plant illustration. The Botanical Garden I and II, are exciting and thoroughly modern renditions of illustrated botany books. Ten years in the making, this set combines the finest in photography with up-to-date, expert commentary to bridge the gap between gardener-friendly books and scientific texts. In the tradition of the great botanical illustrations, each featured plant has been carefully photographed -- as a whole and in its parts -- against a white background to reveal the plant's physical characteristics in exacting detail. Plants from more than 1,200 distinct groups are described -- from oaks to violets and water lilies to grasses -- and are presented in evolutionary order, from the most primitive to the most advanced. Each plant listing includes: Name: genus, species and common names, date of discovery, and range. Description: detailed and concise in the scientific style. Key Recognition Features. Ecology and Geography. Comment: cultivation needs plus notes about unusual hybrids or developments in the genus. As a pair, the two volumes are an all-inclusive source of information and photographs of more than 2,000 genera of temperate plants. Thorough introductory text encompasses numerous themes in botany, from the history of plant development to current DNA studies that are revolutionizing plant classification. Each volume includes a detailed index and bibliography. The Botanical Garden I and II are exciting additions to a gardening bookshelf. They are visually rich and highly accurate references that will remain interesting, useful and current for many years. Offering a discerning insight into the relationship between garden plants and their natural environments and accuracy that is unequalled outside scientific circles, this duo are truly the modern heirs to a long history of botanical references. There are simply no other works of this kind available today. About Volume I, Trees and Shrubs Featuring 510 genera of temperate woody garden plants with full details of how they are related, their origins and uses, Volume I covers trees, shrubs and climbers. From plants dating to prehistory -- tree ferns, gingkoes and some conifers - to those more recently evolved, this volume includes early- flowering plants (magnolia and its family), catkin-bearing trees, fruit and nut trees, maples, the cordyline, palm and bamboo species, and many more advanced trees and shrubs.


Involvement has been examined extensively within the consumer behavior literature. However, limited research exists concerning involvement and charitable contributions. Additionally, because of women's growing financial power, college athletic departments are increasingly interested in understanding how to attract greater numbers of female donors. Therefore, the primary purpose of this study was to examine gender differences in donor involvement using Zaichkowsky's (1994) Personal Involvement Inventory (PII). Several demographic characteristics of donors were also compared by gender. A sample of 1,664 donors from three NCAA Division I universities participated in this study. The PII was found to be an adequate measure of donor involvement based on the sample scores. Male and female donors differed in their level of affective involvement, annual contributions, donor longevity, and household income. These findings can be used to further our understanding of donor involvement, and to assist in the development of strategies to recruit and retain female contributors. ll '


The 10 states of Southeast Asia have combined to form the developing world's most successful and durable regional grouping, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, ASEAN. Economic integration among them is high and increasing. The ambitious ASEAN Economic Community is scheduled to take effect from December 2015, and should further accelerate this integration. But the socio-economic and institutional disparities among them are also very large. This paper therefore asks the question, does it make sense to contemplate a 'Southeast Asian development model'? Given this diversity, such a model obviously does not yet exist. But over time, these countries are converging with respect to their openness, their macroeconomic management and some aspects of their social policy. The poorer countries are generally growing faster than the richer ones, suggesting gradual convergence. There are also important spillover and demonstration effects evident from the region's leaders to its followers. Whether these developments will lead to the adoption of some sort of coherent regional development strategies remains to be seen.


13 Secrets for Speaking Fluent Japanese presents tested shortcuts for Japanese language acquisition. Identifying two groups of people who actively and effectively study Japanese to the point of fluency-successful non-native learners and Japanese children-Giles Murray has collected from both groups the most rewarding and universal techniques which can be put to immediate use by both beginner and advanced students of Japanese. This book is designed for people who have tried orthodox textbooks and failed, people who know a little Japanese but don't have the necessary time or motivation to make the transition to more serious textbooks, and people seeking to increase fluency using ability already acquired. It introduces new strategies for thinking, speaking and memorizing Japanese quickly, efficiently and independently. Used in tandem with a mainstream textbook, these strategies will enable any student to apply what they have learned in the classroom to real-life situations, and to speak without hesitation in natural and fluent Japanese. With lively and entertaining commentaries, striking illustrations, two Japanese manga-including a six-page extract from Osamu Tezuka's famous Blackjack series-brainteasing puzzles, and genuinely useful example sentences, 13 Secrets offers a unique and exciting alternative to all students of Japanese. Featuring- An original manga by Tezuka Osamu - All new custom-written 16-page manga- 3 mini-graphic novels- Over 100 illustrations- Dynamic quiz format- Full glossaries


Using the power flow equation, the state of mode coupling in 100-400 μm core step-index silica optical fibers is investigated in this article. Results show the coupling length L(c) at which the equilibrium mode distribution is achieved and the length z(s) of the fiber required for achieving the steady-state mode distribution. Functional dependences of these lengths on the core radius and wavelength are also given. Results agree well with those obtained using a long-established calculation method. Since large core silica optical fibers are used at short distances (usually at lengths of up to 10 m), the light they transmit is at the stage of coupling that is far from the equilibrium and steady-state mode distributions.


The notion of sediment‐transport capacity has been engrained in geomorphological and related literature for over 50 years, although its earliest roots date back explicitly to Gilbert in fluvial geomorphology in the 1870s and implicitly to eighteenth to nineteenth century developments in engineering. Despite cross fertilization between different process domains, there seem to have been independent inventions of the idea in aeolian geomorphology by Bagnold in the 1930s and in hillslope studies by Ellison in the 1940s. Here we review the invention and development of the idea of transport capacity in the fluvial, aeolian, coastal, hillslope, débris flow, and glacial process domains. As these various developments have occurred, different definitions have been used, which makes it both a difficult concept to test, and one that may lead to poor communications between those working in different domains of geomorphology. We argue that the original relation between the power of a flow and its ability to transport sediment can be challenged for three reasons. First, as sediment becomes entrained in a flow, the nature of the flow changes and so it is unreasonable to link the capacity of the water or wind only to the ability of the fluid to move sediment. Secondly, environmental sediment transport is complicated, and the range of processes involved in most movements means that simple relationships are unlikely to hold, not least because the movement of sediment often changes the substrate, which in turn affects the flow conditions. Thirdly, the inherently stochastic nature of sediment transport means that any capacity relationships do not scale either in time or in space. Consequently, new theories of sediment transport are needed to improve understanding and prediction and to guide measurement and management of all geomorphic systems.


Ground based ionosonde measurements are the most essential source of information about long-term variations in the ionospheric E and F1 regions. Data of such observations have been derived at many different ionospheric stations all over the world some for more than 50 years. The standard parameters foE, h'E, and foF1 are used for trend analyses in this paper. Two main problems have to be considered in these analyses. Firstly, the data series have to be homogeneous, i.e. the observations should not be disturbed by artificial steps due to technical reasons or changes in the evaluation algorithm. Secondly, the strong solar and geomagnetic influences upon the ionospheric data have carefully to be removed by an appropriate regression analysis. Otherwise the small trends in the different ionospheric parameters cannot be detected. The trends derived at individual stations differ markedly, however their dependence on geographic or geomagnetic latitude is only small. Nevertheless, the mean global trends estimated from the trends at the different stations show some general behaviour (positive trends in foE andfoF1, negative trend in h'E) which can at least qualitatively be explained by an increasing atmospheric greenhouse effect (increase of CO2 content and other greenhouse gases) and decreasing ozone values. The positive foE trend is also in qualitative agreement with rocket mass spectrometer observations of ion densities in the E region. First indications could be found that the changing ozone trend at mid-latitudes (before about 1979, between 1979 until 1995, and after about 1995) modifies the estimated mean foE trend.


An adequate documentation in medical records is essential for patient safety and high quality care. The aim of this study was to evaluate documentation by dietitians in Swedish medical records. A retrospective audit of147 dietetic notes in electronic medical records was performed. The audit focused at documentation of essential parts of the dietetic care, as well as other quality aspects such as lingual clarity and structure of the documentation. The nutrition intervention showed to be the most documented part of dietetic care. However, the audit showed that several important parts of nutrition care were poorly documented, for instance nearly half of the audited records had no clear nutrition problem documented, and in most of the records, the goal of nutrition intervention was missing. The study shows that Swedish dietitians need to improve documentation in medical records, as a suggestion by implementing a more structured documentation model.


European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) forests have a long history of coppicing, but the majority of formerly managed coppices are currently under conversion to high forest. The long time required to achieve conversion requires a long-term perspective to fully understand the implication of the applied conversion practices. In this study, we showed results from a long-term (1992–2014) casestudy comparing two management options (natural evolution and periodic thinning) in a beech coppice in conversion to high forest. Leaf area index, litter production, radiation transmittance and growth efficiency taken as relevant stand descriptors, were estimated using both direct and indirect optical methods. Overall, results indicated that beech coppice showed positive and prompt responses to active conversion practices based on periodic medium-heavy thinning. A growth efficiency index showed that tree growth increased as the cutting intensity increased. Results from the case study supported the effectiveness of active conversion management from an economic (timber harvesting) and ecological (higher growth efficiency) point of view.


Studies were conducted on the effects of alcohol and opioids on the development of forensically important flies. In addition different methods of degree-day calculations and development thresholds were used to determine the effects on PMI estimates. The first study determined the effects of ethanol on the development of Phormia regina in vitro. Ground pork loin was treated with a 1, 5, or 10% ethanol solution to give an equivalent Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC) of 0.01, 0.04, and 0.8 % w/v. A significant difference in the time for second instars' to complete the stage was seen between the 1% treated and control. Significant differences were also found among pupal and adult weights between all treatments and the control. A significant difference was shown between growth curves of the 5% treated and control for third instar larvae using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test. The ethanol content of Phormia regina in migrating third instar larvae that fed on treated meat was examined using headspace-gas chromatography (HSGC). All larvae had a content of 0.01% w/v, including the control. The effects of ante-mortem injection of oxycodone in pigs were examined with respect to insect succession patterns and the development rates of Phormia regina. Pigs were given a subcutaneous injection of oxycodone hydrochloride (3 mg/kg by weight) and antemortem blood samples were collected prior to and following drug injection. Shortly after death the carcasses were placed at an open field site and allowed to decompose in a field cage. Insect samples were collected from carcasses for seven days post-mortem and the collected data were used to develop occurrence matrices. The Simple Matching Coefficient showed that successional patterns were similar between treated and untreated animals. Loin and liver from the carcasses were used as rearing media for in vitro development studies of Phormia regina. Kolmogorov-Smirnov test showed that third instar P. regina maggots from treated loin tissue were significantly longer in length than maggots feeding on untreated loin tissue. A significant difference in time was found among larvae on loin for the time from eclosion to completion of the second instar. Significant differences were seen in the weight of adults reared on liver and loin. A chi-square for homogeneity showed that adults were biased towards males (2:1) from untreated loin tissue. A final study compared weather data sources, Accumulated Degree-Day (ADD) methods, and postmortem interval (PMI) estimations based on threshold and developmental data source. Four pigs were used for statistical comparisons. Pigs were taken to a test site and allowed to decompose in an experimental cage. Probes recorded ambient temperatures and body temperatures. Maggot sampling was completed every day for each pig. A three way factorial linear fit model was used to test for statistical differences. Significant differences were seen in the calculated ADD based on probe location and the development threshold used. The ADD calculated from local weather station locations: Kentland Farm, Moore Farm, and Blacksburg Airport were also compared. A significant difference in ADD was found in the main effects among locations (Airport 44.1 ADD, Kentland 37.5 ADD, Moore 48.6 ADD), as well as among the thresholds used (10,12.2, and 14°C). Different PMI estimations also resulted when using development data from different development studies on Phormia regina.


Analyzing the performance of the economy in real time is a challenge for those who must forecast macroeconomic variables such as inflation or employment. A key aspect of this challenge is evaluating the incoming flow of information contained in economic announcements. In this article, the authors develop a simple-to-read index of these announcements that they then use to construct nowcasts. The index tracks whether key economic data have come in stronger, weaker, or as expected during the current quarter relative to a baseline consensus forecast. Specifically, the data releases are weighted relative to their importance in updating forecasts of real gross domestic product growth during the current quarter.


The gneiss complex of Wildhorse Creek (Wildhorse gneiss) forms the central component of the lowest structural plate in the Pioneer metamorphic core complex of south-central Idaho. The oldest rock in the complex is a felsic orthogneiss, with Neoarchean U-Pb magmatic zircon ages of 2.60–2.67 Ga. The orthogneiss overlaps in age and is interpreted to be part of the Grouse Creek block of the Albion Mountains to the south. This Archean metagranitoid is structurally interleaved with paragneiss containing quartzite and calc-silicate rock. Structurally below the orthogneiss, some quartzites have multiple concordant populations of detrital-zircon grains as young as ca. 1700 Ma, while others have no zircon grains younger than ca. 2500 Ma. Structurally above the Archean gneiss is a heterogeneous paragneiss that contains calc-silicate and quartzitic rocks with detrital zircons as young as ca. 1460 Ma. Amphibolite in this unit contains zircons dated at ca. 1850 Ma, indicating that this rock can be no older than that and implying considerable structural complexity. The upper part of the Wildhorse gneiss contains metaquartzites bearing zircons as young as ca. 1400 Ma. The protolith of this paragneiss is interpreted as the southernmost exposures of the Lemhi subbasin of the Mesoproterozoic Belt Supergroup. The upper Wildhorse gneiss includes ca. 695 Ma intrusive orthogneiss that is coeval with Neoproterozoic rift-related volcanic or intrusive rocks near Pocatello, House Mountain, and Edwardsburg, Idaho. This Cryogenian meta-intrusive rock is the likely source of the 650–710 Ma detrital-zircon population in the Big Lost River that drains the core complex. Initial eHf values from 675 Ma zircons are between 3.4 and –2.4, suggesting the granitoids had a mixed source in both continental crust and juvenile mantle.


In response to perceived threats to its position as a venue for adjudication of corporate litigation, in 2010 Delaware added a unique arbitration procedure to its menu of options for parties seeking to resolve their corporate disputes in Delaware. This new procedure relies on sitting judges to act as arbitrators in confidential proceedings. In this paper, I argue that not only is such a procedure in violation of the First Amendment policy to access to the courts, by virtue of the fact that sitting judges, rather than retired judges or professional arbitrators hear the cases, but that it is also bad policy from the perspective of the corporate law. If successful, the procedure threatens to put Delaware's corporate law franchise at risk over the long term.


We review microeconomic research on corruption from the last thirty years. We start by analyzing the seminal models of corruption built on three-tier, delegation models. Then, go into more details of the context of corrupt deals, and discuss the main economic factors that affect corruption. We discuss incentives and compensation in bureaucracies, and the interplay of market and bureaucratic structure. Competition and contract design will also be reviewed in relation to procurement under corruptible agents. After reviewing the theoretical contributions, we turn to the empirical evidence. We begin discussing measurement issues, and then move to the analysis of the empirical evidence relative to the theoretical models discussed in previous sections. Finally, we cover several anti-corruption mechanisms proposed in the literature and discuss their relative merits as devices to control or eliminate illegal activities.


This research aims to analyze the risk perception of tourists in Dolphin Discovery Center (DDC) Bunbury, West Australia and serves for the destination a management and marketing. Factor analysis, K-Means cluster analysis and variance analysis were combined to examine the extent of risk perception for DDC and demographic differences. The main conclusions were as following: three factors that tourism experience quality, physical safety, and amenity were extracted based on the exploring factor analysis; according to the extent of risk perception, wildlife tourists had been divided into three categories: weak risk awareness, medium risk perception, and strong risk perception. Wildlife tourists perceived experience quality risk as the strongest factor and physical safety as the weakest factor, and amenity risk was in an intermediate position. Independent-sample t test and variance analysis were used to examine the demographic difference in risk perception and the results showed that different age, income and family status all had significant difference in risk perception except gender; tourism experience, travelling companion, expenditure and staying time and other tourism behavior all had significant difference in risk perception as well as satisfaction and willingness to revisit, except for information source.


Most damping controller designs are based on, and aimed at, damping the first dominant resonant mode of the targeted system. The higher-order dynamics of these systems are left unmodeled and an adequate feed-through term is generally added to compensate for model truncation effects. The Integral Resonant Control (IRC) exploited this feed-through term to manipulate the dynamics of resonant colocated systems such that a simple integrator delivered adequate damping to the resonant mode. As an added advantage, IRC also imparted damping to other higher-order modes and was guaranteed stable. Nevertheless, this was still a single-mode based design. In this paper, we formalize the effect of the feed-through term on a typical multimode system and present the design and analysis of a true multi-mode IRC.


Meteorites originating from asteroids are the oldest-known rocks in the Solar System, and many predate formation of the planets. Refractory inclusions in primitive chondrites are the oldest-known materials, and chondrules are generally a few million years younger. Igneous achondrites and iron meteorites also formed in the first five million years of the protoplanetary disk and escaped accretion into planets. Isotopic dates from these meteorites serve as time markers for the Solar System's earliest history. Because of the unique environments in the protoplanetary disk, dating the earliest meteorites has its own opportunities and challenges, different from those of terrestrial geochronology.


By inhibiting the production of farnesyl pyrophosphate, statins may promote epithelial wound healing. Skin and other epithelial surfaces have a remarkable capacity to heal in response to wounding. In the skin, wound healing involves the migration of keratinocytes into the wounded area, their activation, and finally epithelialization and wound closure. Vukelic et al. use a pharmacological approach to show that farnesyl pyrophosphate (FPP) inhibits keratinocyte activation and wound epithelialization. Glucocorticoid receptors (GR) are known to inhibit wound healing, partially through repression of the expression of genes encoding keratins in keratinocytes. Primary human keratinocytes treated with mevastatin, which inhibits HMG-CoA reductase preventing FPP synthesis, showed limited GR activation, monitored by the nuclear accumulation of phosphorylated GRs. In contrast, treatment of the cells with dexamethasone (a GR agonist), zaragozic acid (ZGA, a squalene synthetase inhibitor that increases the abundance of FPP), or FPP activated GR, which was determined from the nuclear accumulation in nontransfected keratinocytes and the activities of two GR reporter genes (one activated and one repressed) in transfected keratinocytes. Chromatin immunoprecipitation experiments confirmed that GR was bound to the keratin 6 (K6) reporter gene promoter, which is repressed by GR, in cells treated with FPP. In a scratch assay with primary human keratinocytes, treatment of the cells with ZGA, FPP, or B581 (a compound that blocks protein farnesylation and increases FPP) inhibited keratinocyte migration, whereas coapplication of a GR antagonist reversed the inhibition. Treatment with mevastatin increased migration, which was blocked by coapplication of FPP. The authors also tested the effect of FPP and mevastatin in wound closure in a human skin organ culture punch biopsy and found that topical application of FPP or ZGA inhibited epithelialization and K6 production at the wounded area, whereas application of mevastatin promoted epithelialization and K6 production, an effect blocked by coapplication of FPP. These results suggest that statins may be useful in promoting epithelial wound healing and that inhibition of GR activity by blocking production of FPP may contribute to this activity. S. Vukelic, O. Stojadinovic, I. Pastar, C. Vouthounis, A. Krzyzanowska, S. Das, H. H. Samuels, M. Tomic-Canic, Farnesyl pyrophosphate inhibits epithelialization and wound healing through the glucocorticoid receptor. J. Biol. Chem. 285, 1980–1988 (2010). [Abstract] [Full Text]


Adult patients with severe chronic small intestinal dysmotility are not uncommon and can be difficult to manage. This guideline gives an outline of how to make the diagnosis. It discusses factors which contribute to or cause a picture of severe chronic intestinal dysmotility (eg, obstruction, functional gastrointestinal disorders, drugs, psychosocial issues and malnutrition). It gives management guidelines for patients with an enteric myopathy or neuropathy including the use of enteral and parenteral nutrition.


Newspapers are in trouble. Steep declines in circulation and advertising revenue have forced outright closures, reductions in force, cessation of print in favor of web only editions and frantic searches for additional sources of revenue and audience. In this paper, we report results from an interview study focused on everyday news consumption practices. Our study indicates there are many design opportunities for local news creation and distribution at interface/interaction, infrastructure and strategy levels.


Spatial memory, or the ability to remember and recall specific locations and objects, is central to autonomous agents' ability to carry out tasks in real environments. However, most existing artificial memory modules are not very adept at storing spatial information. We propose a parameter-free module, Egospheric Spatial Memory (ESM), which encodes the memory in an ego-sphere around the agent, enabling expressive 3D representations. ESM can be trained end-to-end via either imitation or reinforcement learning, and improves both training efficiency and final performance against other memory baselines on both drone and manipulator visuomotor control tasks. The explicit egocentric geometry also enables us to seamlessly combine the learned controller with other non-learned modalities, such as local obstacle avoidance. We further show applications to semantic segmentation on the ScanNet dataset, where ESM naturally combines image-level and map-level inference modalities. Through our broad set of experiments, we show that ESM provides a general computation graph for embodied spatial reasoning, and the module forms a bridge between real-time mapping systems and differentiable memory architectures. Implementation at: https://github.com/ivy-dl/memory.


Abstract Thh essay discusses the role of aesthetics in Bernard Stiegler's work in its relation to individuation and technology. It argues that Stiegler understands aesthetics as the sensuous experience of space and time, which he sees as the ground for the individuation of individuaL· and groups. The article shows how Stiegler's particular understanding of aesthetics is based in his reading of Immanuel Kant's 'transcendental aesthetics' in the Critique of Pure Reason. However, by making thL· aesthetics dependent on technology Stiegler undermines the transcendental nature of Kant's aesthetics. As a result, technology now intervenes directly into the organisation of our sensuous experience of space and time. This in turn has dire consequences for the process ofindividuation. This article discusses these consequences (aesthetic malaise, hyper-synchronization and a loss ofindividuation) and concludes by questioning Stiegler's take on aesthetics.Keywords aesthetics, technology, individuation, community, capitalism, industrialisation, immaterial labourTHE TURN TOWARD AESTHETICSWhile Stiegler's early work focuses mainly on the technical conditioning of time as memory, his recent work makes the shift toward a more rudimentary (but also more flexible) focus on time as rhythm. Technics and Time, 1. The Fault of Epimetheus, makes virtually no mentioning of rhythm.1 Yet in Technics and Time, 2. Disorientation, the concept acquires a central place. Accordingly, aesthetics is only introduced in Technics and Time, 2. Disorientation, but it immediately begins to fulfil a significant role in Stiegler's work. It is the turn toward aesthetics diat motivates Stiegler's shift from memory to rhythm. The 'notion of aesthetics', he observes, 'requires a typological description of programs and rhythms even more than as memories'.2 Stiegler's claim that aesthetics requires a concept and description of rhythms indicates that he takes aesthetics to be more than a theory of the beautiful. He divides aesthetics into different parts, the interplay of which will constitute an aesthetic program that defines an entire society. There is a sensuous or physiological part, a technical or technological part, and a symbolic or figurative part. The interplay between these three should be seen as an interlacing of different rhythms: biological or physiological rhythms, the manipulation of those rhythms with technology, and finally cultural rhythms that are based both on the biological and technological conditions. If we can understand how these rhythms rework one anouier, we can begin to understand how communities and individuals are constituted, how they acquire their own singular characteristics, and how cultural changes within these communities are invoked by technological or biological transmutations. Aesthetics, then, would be the ground (or better yet rhythm) on which all of this is based.In his recent work Stiegler has presented a rather grim image of contemporary society. Our society, he contends, finds itself in an 'aesthetically sinister zone'.3 We are caught in an aesthetic situation in which individuation of both individual and community is no longer possible. To understand why this is so, Stiegler contends, we need to understand what happened to the interplay of biological, technical, and cultural rhythms during the last 1 50 years or so, starting with the emergence of technical media and the impact of the industrial revolution. A process of media-technological industrialisation has led to a technological and economic appropriation of the aesthetic rhythms that is now jeopardising the individuation of bodi communities and individuals. This appropriation of aesthetics by a technological and economic constellation is what Stiegler calls hyperindustrial society.In this article I will focus on how Stiegler sees the interplay between technology and aesthetics. This interplay, as we will see, only comes into full view when we understand the pivotal role individuation plays in the constitution of individuals (and individual consciousness) and societies (and their cultural specificity). …


Financial globalisation and the expansion in global capital flows bring a number of benefits — more efficient allocation of resources, improved risk sharing and more rapid technology transfer. But they can also increase the risk of financial crisis. In recent years, to reduce these risks to stability, countries have reformed financial regulation, enhanced frameworks for central bank liquidity provision and developed new elements, and increased the resources, of the global financial safety net (GFSN). A comprehensive and effective GFSN can help prevent liquidity crises from escalating into solvency crises and local balance of payments crises from turning into systemic sudden stop crises. The traditional GFSN consisted of countries' own foreign exchange reserves with the IMF acting as a backstop. But since the global financial crisis there have been a number of new arrangements added to the GFSN, in particular the expansion of swap lines between central banks and regional financing arrangements. The new look GFSN is more fragmented than in the past, with multiple types of liquidity insurance and individual countries and regions having access to different size and types of financial safety nets. These new facilities provide many benefits, such as increasing the resources available to some countries and providing additional sources of economic surveillance. However, many facilities have yet to be drawn upon and variable coverage risks leaving some countries with inadequate access. This paper consider the features, costs and benefits of each of the components of the GFSN and whether the overall size and distribution across countries and regions is likely to be sufficient for a plausible set of shocks. We find that the components of the GFSN are not fully substitutable: different elements exhibit different levels of versatility, have been shown to be more or less effective depending upon the circumstances, have different cost profiles and have different implications for the functioning of the international monetary and financial system as a whole. We argue that while swap lines and RFAs can play an important role in the global financial safety net they are not a substitute for having a strong, well resourced, IMF at the centre of it. By running a series of stress scenarios we find that for all but the most severe crisis scenarios, the current resources of the GFSN are likely to be sufficient. However, this finding relies upon the IMF's overall level of resources (including both permanent and temporary) being maintained at their current level. Our analysis also highlights that the aggregation of global resources can mask vulnerabilities at the country, and even regional, level. In other words, while the current safety net might be big enough in aggregate, there is a risk that, for large enough shocks, gaps in coverage could be revealed. Steps should be taken to ensure the different components of the safety net function effectively together to reduce the risk of gaps appearing. Policymakers should consider measures which (i) reduce vulnerabilities in external balance sheets which leave countries exposed to volatility in cross-border capital flows and increase potential demands on the safety net; (ii) secure the availability of appropriate GFSN resources, including the IMF's resource base; and (iii) make more efficient use of the current GFSN resources by ensuring the elements of the GFSN more effectively complement one another.


The rate of decay of genetic variability was investigated for two-dimensional continuous populations of finite size. The exact value of the rate involves a rather complicated expression (formula (4-1)). However, numerical examples indicate that in a population habitat size LxL and density D, the rate is approximately equal to (see PDF) where sigma(2) is the variance of dispersion distance assuming isotropical migration. The value given in (2) is equal to that of a panmictic population of size DL(2). It is remarkable that whether the rate assumes the value given by (1) or by (2) depends only on Dsigma(2) (a local property), which is independent of the habitat size. Since, in a one-dimensional population, this depends on both Dsigma(2) and the habitat size, there is an essential difference between the two types of population structure.-The function giving the probability of two homologous genes separated by a given distance being different alleles was also obtained, (formula (5-1)).


This project assessed the significance of Pigeon Creek, San Salvador, Bahamas as a nursery habitat for coral reef fishes. Pigeon Creek's perimeter is lined with mangrove and limestone bedrock. The bottom is sand or sea grass and ranges in depth from exposed at low tide to a 3-m deep, tide-scoured channel. In June 2006 and January 2007, fish were counted and their maturity was recorded while sampling 112 of 309 possible 50-m transects along the perimeter of the Pigeon Creek. Excluding silversides (Atherinidae, 52% of fish counted), six families each comprised more than 1% of the total abundance (Scaridae/parrotfishes, 35.3%; Lutjanidae/snappers, 23.9%; Haemulidae/grunts, 21.0%; Gerreidae/mojarras, 8.5%; Pomacentridae/damselfishes, 6.1%; Labridae/wrasses, 2.4%). There were few differences in effort-adjusted counts among habitats (mangrove, bedrock, mixed), sections (north, middle, southwest) and seasons (summer 2006 and winter 2007). Red mangrove (Rhizophora mangle), covering 68% of the perimeter was where 62% of the fish were counted. Snappers, grunts and parrot fishes are important food fishes and significant families in terms of reef ecology around San Salvador. Mangrove was the most important habitat for snappers and grunts; bedrock was most important for parrot fishes. The southwest section was important for snappers, grunts and parrot fishes, the north section for grunts and parrot fishes, and the middle section for snappers. Among the non-silverside fish counted, 91.2% were juveniles. These results suggest that Pigeon Creek is an important nursery for the coral reefs surrounding San Salvador and should be protected from potential disturbances.


Learning to predict complex time-series data is a fundamental challenge in a range of disciplines including Machine Learning, Robotics, and Natural Language Processing. Predictive State Recurrent Neural Networks (PSRNNs) (Downey et al., 2017) are a state-of-the-art approach for modeling time-series data which combine the benefits of probabilistic filters and Recurrent Neural Networks into a single model. PSRNNs leverage the concept of Hilbert Space Embeddings of distributions (Smola et al., 2007) to embed predictive states into a Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Space, then estimate, predict, and update these embedded states using Kernel Bayes Rule. Practical implementations of PSRNNs are made possible by the machinery of Random Features, where input features are mapped into a new space where dot products approximate the kernel well. Unfortunately PSRNNs often require a large number of RFs to obtain good results, resulting in large models which are slow to execute and slow to train. Orthogonal Random Features (ORFs)(Yu et al., 2016) is an improvement on RFs which has been shown to decrease the number of RFs required for pointwise kernel approximation. Unfortunately, it is not clear that ORFs can be applied to PSRNNs, as PSRNNs rely on Kernel Ridge Regression as a core component of their learning algorithm, and the theoretical guarantees of ORF do not apply in this setting. In this paper, we extend the theory of ORFs to Kernel Ridge Regression and show that ORFs can be used to obtain Orthogonal PSRNNs (OPSRNNs), which are smaller and faster than PSRNNs. In particular, we show that OPSRNN models clearly outperform LSTMs and furthermore, can achieve accuracy similar to PSRNNs with an order of magnitude smaller number of features needed.


Author(s): Strum, Khara M.; Dybala, Kristen E.; Iglecia, Monica N.; Shuford, W. David | Abstract: The Central Valley of California provides important breeding habitat to numerous species of wetland-dependent birds, despite the loss of over 90% of naturally occurring wetlands. A majority of shorebirds breeding in this region rely on shallow-flooded habitat adjacent to sparsely vegetated uplands as provided by rice (Oryza sativa), managed wetlands, and other habitats. We estimated the current extent of potential breeding shorebird habitat provided by rice and managed permanent and semi-permanent wetlands in each of four major planning regions of the Central Valley, and estimated the average breeding densities and current population sizes of two species of shorebirds: the Black-Necked Stilt (Himantopus mexicanus) and American Avocet (Recurvirostra americana). Using a population status framework based on principles of conservation biology, we estimated that stilt populations are small (l10,000 individuals) or very small (l1,000 individuals) in three of the four planning regions, and avocet populations are small or very small in all four planning regions. We then used the framework to define long-term (100-year) population objectives for stilts, avocets, and a third species, Killdeer (Charadrius vociferous), designed to meet our long-term conservation goal of supporting self-sustaining, genetically robust, and resilient populations of breeding shorebirds in the Central Valley. We also estimated the long-term species' density and wetland habitat objectives necessary to achieve the population objectives for all three species. The corresponding short-term (10-year) conservation objectives are to restore semi-permanent wetlands to provide an additional 11,537 ha (28,508 ac) of habitat for breeding shorebirds (by planning region: 2,842 ha in Sacramento, 2,897 ha in Yolo–Delta, 2,943 ha in San Joaquin, and 2,855 ha in Tulare), and to enhance existing habitat to support density objectives. Our approach provides a transparent, repeatable process for defining science-based conservation objectives for breeding shorebirds and their habitats in the Central Valley, which can help unite stakeholders around common goals and motivate conservation actions.


Rotating relativistic stars have been studied extensively in recent years, both theoretically and observationally, because of the information they might yield about the equation of state of matter at extremely high densities and because they are considered to be promising sources of gravitational waves. The latest theoretical understanding of rotating stars in relativity is reviewed in this updated article. The sections on the equilibrium properties and on the nonaxisymmetric instabilities in f-modes and r-modes have been updated and several new sections have been added on analytic solutions for the exterior spacetime, rotating stars in LMXBs, rotating strange stars, and on rotating stars in numerical relativity.


The laws of conservation of mass, momentum, and energy are applied to the compressible flow through a two-dimensional cascade of airfoils. A fundamental relation between the ultimate upstream and downstream flow angles, the inlet Mach number, and the pressure ratio across the cascade is derived. Comparison with the corresponding relation for incompressible flow shows large differences. The fundamental relation reveals two ranges of flow angles and inlet Mach numbers, for which no ideal pressure ratio exists. One of these nonideal operating ranges is analogous to a similar type in incompressible flow. The other is characteristic only of compressible flow. The effect of variable axial-flow area is treated. Some implications of the basic conservation laws in the case of nonideal flow through cascades are discussed.


As architects, entrepreneurs, hoteliers, healthcare professionals and others embrace the Internet of Things (IoT) and the Smart Environment paradigms, developers will bear the brunt of constructing the IT relationships within these, making sense of the big data produced as a result, and managing the relationships between people and technologies. We explore how PolySocial Reality (PoSR), a framework for representing how people, devices and communication technologies interrelate, can be applied to developing use cases within integrated IoT and Smart Environment paradigms, giving special consideration to the nature of location-aware messaging from sensors, and the resultant data collection. Based on this discussion, we suggest ways to enable more robust messaging, and eliminate redundant messages by enlisting a social awareness of software agents applied in carefully considered contexts.


ABSTRACT Previously undescribed examples of Holocene cementation of carbonate sediment have been discovered at two localities in the Florida Keys. Slabs of weakly cemented carbonate sand were discovered on a continuously submerged portion of White Bank, 3.1 km SE of the Mosquito Bank tower. The cement comprises furry coatings of acicular crystals interpreted as aragonite on basis of morphology, results of staining tests, and high-strontium, low-magnesium content. This is a normal form of submarine cement. Near the southeasternmost corner of Bahia Honda Key carbonate rock ledges crop out discontinuously along a 46 m foreshore stretch of sandy beach. Rock texture is like that of adjacent unconsolidated beach sands. Grains range from fine sand to free gravel, commonly in alternating layers within a single exposure, and most of the rock is laminated. The rock dips seaward, at approximately the same angle as the beach surface, but is apparently a form of cay rock. The rock is weakly cemented by rhombic crystals that by electron probe microanalysis were determined to have low strontium and relatively low magnesium content. This suggests that the cement is low-magnesium calcite. Similarly cemented carbonate sand occurs as much as one meter below the backshore surface, and at depths of 16 to 25 cm in a freshwater marsh lying inland from the beach. The relatively low magnesium content of the calcite and the salinity of water in contact with the rock suggest that cementation occurred in the zone of fresh water-sea water mixing.


Aims. The lack of an upstream solar wind plasma monitor when a spacecraft is inside the highly dynamic magnetosphere of Mercury limits interpretations of observed magnetospheric phenomena and their correlations with upstream solar wind variations.
Methods. We used AMITIS, a three-dimensional GPU-based hybrid model of plasma (particle ions and fluid electrons) to infer the solar wind dynamic pressure and Alfvén Mach number upstream of Mercury by comparing our simulation results with MESSENGER magnetic field observations inside the magnetosphere of Mercury. We selected a few orbits of MESSENGER that have been analysed and compared with hybrid simulations before. Then we ran a number of simulations for each orbit (~30–50 runs) and examined the effects of the upstream solar wind plasma variations on the magnetic fields observed along the trajectory of MESSENGER to find the best agreement between our simulations and observations.
Results. We show that, on average, the solar wind dynamic pressure for the selected orbits is slightly lower than the typical estimated dynamic pressure near the orbit of Mercury. However, we show that there is a good agreement between our hybrid simulation results and MESSENGER observations for our estimated solar wind parameters. We also compare the solar wind dynamic pressure inferred from our model with those predicted previously by the WSA-ENLIL model upstream of Mercury, and discuss the agreements and disagreements between the two model predictions. We show that the magnetosphere of Mercury is highly dynamic and controlled by the solar wind plasma and interplanetary magnetic field. In addition, in agreement with previous observations, our simulations show that there are quasi-trapped particles and a partial ring current-like structure in the nightside magnetosphere of Mercury, more evident during a northward interplanetary magnetic field (IMF). We also use our simulations to examine the correlation between the solar wind dynamic pressure and stand-off distance of the magnetopause and compare it with MESSENGER observations. We show that our model results are in good agreement with the response of the magnetopause to the solar wind dynamic pressure, even during extreme solar events. We also show that our model can be used as a virtual solar wind monitor near the orbit of Mercury and this has important implications for interpretation of observations by MESSENGER and the future ESA/JAXA mission to Mercury, BepiColombo.


The vehicle localization is an essential component for stable autonomous car operation. There are many algorithms for the vehicle localization. However, it still needs much improvement in terms of its accuracy and cost. In this paper, sensor fusion based localization algorithm is used for solving this problem. Our sensor system is composed of in-vehicle sensors, GPS and vision sensors. The localization algorithm is based on extended Kalman filter and it has time update step and measurement update step. In the time update step, in-vehicle sensors are used such as yaw-rate and speed sensor. And GPS and vision sensor information are used to update the vehicle position in the measurement update step. We use visual odometry library to process vision sensor data and generate the moving distance and direction of the car. Especially, when performing visual odometry we use georeferenced image database to reduce the error accumulation. Through the experiments, the proposed localization algorithm is verified and evaluated. The RMS errors of the estimated result from the proposed algorithm are about 4.3 m. This result shows about 40% improvement in accuracy even in comparison with the result from the GPS only method. It shows the possibility to use proposed localization algorithm. However, it is still necessary to improve the accuracy for applying this algorithm to the autonomous car. Therefore, we plan to use multiple cameras (rear cameras or AVM cameras) and more information such as high-definition map or V2X communication. And the filter and error modelling also need to be changed for the better results.


The existence of multiple heat shock factor (HSF) genes in higher eukaryotes has promoted questions regarding the functions of these HSF family members, especially with respect to the stress response. To address these questions, we have used polyclonal antisera raised against mouse HSF1 and HSF2 to examine the biochemical, physical, and functional properties of these two factors in unstressed and heat-shocked mouse and human cells. We have identified HSF1 as the mediator of stress-induced heat shock gene transcription. HSF1 displays stress-induced DNA-binding activity, oligomerization, and nuclear localization, while HSF2 does not. Also, HSF1 undergoes phosphorylation in cells exposed to heat or cadmium sulfate but not in cells treated with the amino acid analog L-azetidine-2-carboxylic acid, indicating that phosphorylation of HSF1 is not essential for its activation. Interestingly, HSF1 and HSF2 overexpressed in transfected 3T3 cells both display constitutive DNA-binding activity, oligomerization, and transcriptional activity. These results demonstrate that HSF1 can be activated in the absence of physiological stress and also provide support for a model of regulation of HSF1 and HSF2 activity by a titratable negative regulatory factor.


This chapter deals with a case in which work that aimed at rekindling a critical memory of a conflictual past ends up producing a certain form of oblivion instead. The work in question is the archaeological research we conducted at two battlefields of the Spanish Civil War. During our work, we found the traumatic history of the war neutralized through memory practices sponsored, in one case, by government institutions and in another by grassroots associations. In both cases, the involuntary memories materialized in things insisted in disrupting the comfortable narrative that people tried to impose on them. I will argue that archaeologists should work to channel this material memory so as to construct critical accounts of the past that are helpful to foster a more reflexive citizenry.


1. Barn owls ( Tyto alba ) can locate prey in total darkness using only the sense of hearing, with an error of less than I° in both the vertical and horizontal planes. 2. Differences between the behaviour of barn owls flying at prey in complete darkness (analysed from films taken under infra-red illumination) and their behaviour in the light are correlated with the problems they must face in acoustic orientation. 3. Experiments with owls trained to strike a concealed loudspeaker show that they depend on frequencies of sound above 5 kHz. 4. Measurements of sound pressure in the region of the owl9s eardrum, made with a probe-tube microphone while moving a loudspeaker around the owl9s head, reveal that for frequencies above 8-5 kHz the ear is highly directional. At such frequencies, regions of high sensitivity (tightly isolated by peripheral regions of low sensitivity) are directed along different paths for the two ears. 5. These regions of good sensitivity are correlated with the asymmetry of the barn owl9s external ears. Movements of a flap of skin in front of the ear opening changes the overall directional sensitivity patterns by redirecting the regions of maximum sensitivity. 6. A theory is presented to explain how a barn owl might locate the position of a sound source by moving its head until the intensity of all frequencies comprising a complex sound is brought to a maximum in both ears (aided perhaps by differences in inter-aural time delay that are enhanced by intensity disparities).


Thirty five samples were collected from seven types of milk powder in Mosul city markets, and surveyed for the presence of aflatoxin M1 (AFM1), by using Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) technique. Analytical results showed that 82.8% of the samples were contaminated with AFM1. The incidence of AFM1 in Al-mudhish, Angolac, Dielac, Lona, Nido, Melgro and Multi samples were 40, 50, 80, 100, 100, 100 and 100%, respectively. The occurrence of AFM1 in milk powder, 79.3% (23 out of 29) of positive samples were higher than the permissible limits, according to the European Commission (50 ng/kg), whereas 6.8% (2 out of 29) of positive samples were above the prescribed limit of US regulation (500 ng/kg). The level of AFM1 concentration in Melgro and Multi types was higher than Al-mudhish type and it had a low level of contamination, compared with other types of milk powder.


Using a longitudinal dataset comprising of detailed financial and exporting data from Belgian small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) between 1998 and 2013, this article examines the manner in which firms manage to finance their export activities and the resulting impact on corporate capital structure. We find that exporters have to finance relatively more working capital as compared to their non-exporting peers and that they resolve this financing need by carrying more short-term debt. In addition, we evidence that the relationship between pledgeable short-term assets, such as working capital, and short-term debt financing is more pronounced for exporters. In particular, we show that the ties between pledgeable short-term assets and short-term debt financing are stronger for export-intensive firms and firms that serve distant and risky export destinations. Overall, what our empirical findings seem to suggest is that developing tools that facilitate the pledging of assets is likely to boost SME export activities by widening access to bank financing and reducing financial constraints.


In their influential paper, Wichmann and Hill (2001) have shown that the threshold and slope estimates of a psychometric function may be severely biased when it is assumed that the lapse rate equals zero but lapses do, in fact, occur. Based on a large number of simulated experiments, Wichmann and Hill claim that threshold and slope estimates are essentially unbiased when one allows the lapse rate to vary within a rectangular prior during the fitting procedure. Here, I replicate Wichmann and Hill's finding that significant bias in parameter estimates results when one assumes that the lapse rate equals zero but lapses do occur, but fail to replicate their finding that freeing the lapse rate eliminates this bias. Instead, I show that significant and systematic bias remains in both threshold and slope estimates even when one frees the lapse rate according to Wichmann and Hill's suggestion. I explain the mechanisms behind the bias and propose an alternative strategy to incorporate the lapse rate into psychometric function models, which does result in essentially unbiased parameter estimates.