Nearly two-thirds of the Civil War's approximately 750,000 fatalities were caused by disease--a staggering fact for which the American medical profession was profoundly unprepared. In the years before the war, training for physicians in the United States was mostly unregulated, and medical schools' access to cadavers for teaching purposes was highly restricted. Shauna Devine argues that in spite of these limitations, Union army physicians rose to the challenges of the war, undertaking methods of study and experimentation that would have a lasting influence on the scientific practice of medicine. Though the war's human toll was tragic, conducting postmortems on the dead and caring for the wounded gave physicians ample opportunity to study and develop new methods of treatment and analysis, from dissection and microscopy to new research into infectious disease processes. Examining the work of doctors who served in the Union Medical Department, Devine sheds new light on how their innovations in the midst of crisis transformed northern medical education and gave rise to the healing power of modern health science.


Wildfire activity in the western United States has been increasing since the 1970s, with many fires occurring on land managed by government agencies. Over six million acres of public lands are surrounded by private land and lack road access, making them legally inaccessible to federal and state agencies and potentially constraining management and suppression of wildfires. In this paper, we assemble data on all fires that started on public lands in the western US over the period 1992–2015 and estimate the effect of legal accessibility on fire size. We find that ignitions are 14%–23% more likely to become large (greater than one acre) if they occur on inaccessible land. We provide evidence that this effect may be driven in part by agencies' inability to conduct fuels management and in part by slower suppression responses on legally inaccessible land. Our results suggest that wildfire prevention and suppression could be bolstered by improved access to public lands and underscore the need for ongoing research on the relationship between land ownership and wildfire.


In this chapter, we focus on the recent process on memcomputing (memristor + computing) in intrinsic SiOx-based resistive switching memory (ReRAM or called memristor). In the first section of the chapter, we investigate neuromorphic computing by mimicking the synaptic behaviors in integrating one-diode and one-resistive switching element (1D-1R) architecture. The power consumption can be minimized further in synaptic functions because sneak-path current has been suppressed and the capability for spike-induced synaptic behaviors has been demonstrated, representing critical milestones and achievements for the application of conventional SiOx-based materials in future advanced neuromorphic computing. In the next section of chapter, we will discuss an implementation technique of implication operations for logic-in-memory computation by using a SiOx-based memristor. The implication function and its truth table have been implemented with the unipolar or nonpolar operation scheme. Furthermore, a circuit with 1D-1R architecture with a 4 × 4 crossbar array has been demonstrated, which realizes the functionality of a one-bit full adder as same as CMOS logic circuits with lower design area requirement. This chapter suggests that a simple, robust approach to realize memcomputing chips is quite compatible with large-scale CMOS manufacturing technology by using an intrinsic SiOx-based memristor.


The objective of this work was to investigate dimensional parameters of 3D printed parts from glass ceramic photopolymer before and after debinding and sintering in a kiln. During experiments batches of green bodies were printed with different layer thickness and curing strategy. We used 3D printer with ultraviolet LED as a light power source. The peak of intensity of the UV LED was in the range from 385 to 405 nm. DLP projector from Texas Instruments was used for mask projection. After printing, each batch of green bodies was cleaned and post-cured in a UV chamber. Then their dimensions were measured, overgrowth of each sample was calculated. The next stage of the experiment was kiln firing according to special firing schedule. Dimensions of final parts were measured again, and their shrinkage was calculated. The experiment proved high influence of printing parameters on the overgrowth of models and almost no influence on shrinkage of parts after firing.


We propose a novel approach to realizing all-optical microwave filtering using an array of fiber Bragg gratings with identical reflectivities. The filter tapping coefficients are determined by the spectrum profile of a broadband light source and the central wavelengths of the gratings. Since the fiber Bragg gratings have identical reflectivities, the characteristics of the gratings with high uniformity are possible, which simplifies the fiber Bragg grating fabrication and reduces the implementation error. In addition, the spectrum profile of the broadband light source can be controlled using an optical filter, which could be used to control the filter coefficients to suppress the filter sidelobes. A microwave filter using four fiber Bragg gratings is experimentally implemented.


Background : The "Valentino" cross-sectional study is aimed at evaluating the prevalence and pattern of cigarette smoking according to occupational group in a representative sample of workers aged 18-35 years from Abruzzo, Italy. Methods : Randomly selected workers anonymously self-compiled a structured questionnaire containing validated items. Job type was coded according to the International Standard Classification of Occupations. Results : The sample consisted of 3989 workers. Current smoking prevalence was 45.9%, varying across occupational groups and ranged from 37.2% among clerical support workers, up to 57.1% among craft, agricultural and fishery sector workers. After controlling for several potential confounders using logistic regression, craft, agricultural, forestry and fishery workers (adjusted odds ratio 1.65; 95%confidence intervals 1.21-2.27), and call-center operators (1.91; 1.44-2.53) were significantly more likely to be current smokers than professionals and clerical or support workers. Interestingly, when alcohol and cannabis use were included in multivariate analysis, the association between smoking and gender was no longer significant. Conclusions : An independent association was found between specific occupational classes and tobacco smoking, suggesting occupation type should be considered in prioritizing subsets of populations towards which smoking cessation campaigns should be targeted first.


Macular edema occurs in several disease processes, but little is known about the mechanisms by which it occurs in any disease process. Previously, the authors showed that intravitreous injection of adenosine agonists, prostaglandin E1 (PGE1), or epinephrine in rabbits, causes breakdown of the blood-retinal barrier (BRB) measured by vitreous fluorophotometry. N-ethylcarboxamidoadenosine (NECA), a nonspecific adenosine agonist, and PGE1, cause much greater breakdown of the BRB than the other agents tested. In this study, rabbit eyes were examined ultrastructurally and electron immunocytochemically for extravascular albumin as an indicator of BRB failure after intravitreous injection of these agents or vehicle alone to investigate potential mechanisms involved in BRB compromise. Six hours after injection, there were significantly more open tight junctions between retinal vascular endothelial cells in NECA-, PGE1-, and adenosine-injected eyes than in vehicle-injected eyes. Immunocytochemical staining for serum albumin showed that many of the junctions that appeared open were functionally open. Forty-eight hours after injection of PGE1 (10(-4) mol/l), the percentage of open vascular endothelial cell tight junctions had returned to that of the control specimens, but the opening of tight junctions by NECA (10(-3) mol/l) did not appear to be reversed after 48 hr. Pinocytotic vesicular transport was prominent in all eyes, and no difference was found between vehicle- and drug-injected eyes. These data suggest that NECA and PGE1 cause breakdown of the BRB, at least in part, by opening tight junctions between retinal vascular endothelial cells.


This paper models loan rate-setting behavior, taking into account the product pricing and performance of the borrowing firm, and also calculates the bank's loan-risk sensitive equity values. The lending function creates the need to model bank equity as a capped call option, which captures the credit risk directly related to management of a firm's operations. When the product price set by the borrowing firm is relatively high and the loan rate set by the bank is relatively low, a rise in the product price increases the loan amount at a reduced margin. A capped call as such makes the bank less prudent and more prone to risk-taking, thereby adversely affecting the stability of the banking system. We also show that the market-based estimates of bank equity, which ignore the cap, lead to significant overestimation.


How can we close persistent gender gaps in political participation? We develop a theory highlighting the role of male household members as "gatekeepers" of women's participation in patriarchal settings and argue that the answer involves targeting these men. We conduct a field experiment in Pakistan and find that targeting women with a nonpartisan get-out-the-vote campaign has no effect on their turnout in a national election. However, women's turnout increases substantially when male household members are canvassed to support women's participation. Households where both men and women are canvassed see the largest increases in women's turnout and additional increases in political discussion and men's practical support to help women vote. Using a costly behavioral measure, we also demonstrate lasting effects on men's supportive behavior in these households two months after the election. Our results address the importance, and tangible benefits, of engaging men to ease constraints that hinder equal participation.


Background and Hypothesis:
Thoracic aortic aneurysm (TAA) is an aortopathy characterized by aortic enlargement and life-threatening complications such as aortic dissection and sudden cardiac death. Previous studies identified COQ8B as a candidate genetic modifier of TAA severity. COQ8B is important for mitochondrial biosynthesis of coenzyme Q, but its precise functions are not defined. We hypothesize that alteration of COQ8B influences TAA pathogenesis via energy and oxidant metabolism pathways.
Experimental Design:
Smooth muscle cells (SMCs) were cultured directly from leftover healthy aortic tissues acquired during cardiac transplant operations. At confluence of 50-70%, cells were transfected with siRNA targeting COQ8B or a non-targeting negative control siRNA. Gene expression was measured using real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR).  Production of the reactive oxygen species hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) was measured using the fluorescence-based Amplex Red Hydrogen Peroxide Assay (Invitrogen) in basal growth medium.
Results:
Expression of COQ8B decreased by approximately 75% to 85% at 48 hours following siRNA transfection compared with negative control.  This was associated with approximately 1.5 fold upregulation of the SMC contractile gene CNN1 (p<0.05).  Knockdown of COQ8B did not appear to alter H2O2 production measured at timepoints of 48 or 72 hours.
Conclusion and Impact:
Based on these preliminary data, decreased COQ8B expression appears to alter the contractile phenotype of SMCs but may not significantly influence extracellular levels of H2O2 under basal conditions.  Exogenous activation of pathways important for TAA pathogenesis may be required to elucidate the role of COQ8B. Ultimately, this work may lead to improved clinical approaches.


Tasmania is the last state or territory of Australia to make government policy regarding rights to power-sharing the management of protected areas, such as national parks and reserves. For this thesis, power-sharing will be an arrangement primarily between the Tasmanian Government and trouwunnan peoples, who comprise Tasmania's Indigenous population. I am trouwunnan, a trawlwulwuy woman from tebrakunna country, therefore I bring an emic perspective to this body of work. In Australia, these rights to share power with governments over protected areas are denoted as 'joint management' and encompass responsibilities to be devolved under remittance of local communities, ranging from employment of rangers to setting visions for plans of management. Joint management is both a form of redress towards colonising injustices and a means of broadening the sphere of devolved responsibilities. Such devolution, if well-designed, can increase governance transparency and encourage new economies through the conservation, and sustainable use, of natural and cultural resources.
The Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area (TWWHA), or TWWHA country, has been used as a real-time case study to investigate the development of, and advocacy for, trouwunnan frameworks for good governance under joint management. A central consideration has been to examine the extent to which trouwunnan worldviews have influenced the models and processes underpinning the new TWWHA country plan of management. To this end, I have analysed the structure of trouwunnan governance modes and highlighted the friction our peoples encounter in majority, non-Indigenous decision-making settings. I also reflect on the historical, global drivers that have influenced Tasmania's protected area management regimes and contrast these influences with our worldviews. My analysis reveals the difficulties and benefits in marrying governance and management styles to promote best practice outcomes and values of TWWHA country.
In negotiating the terms of joint management, trouwunnan have revealed a distinct characteristic of our demos within a protected area policy and legislative framework. This characteristic is legitimacy, which is derived from our worldviews that value reciprocity, equity and vitality in the governance relationships that define Tasmania's protected areas. Our legitimacy is a distinctive quality that can inform new policy agreements and, through the giving of kinship to non-Indigenous stakeholders, can provide a mechanism to enact reciprocal relationships for TWWHA country benefit. The outcome of articulating our legitimacy can, broadly, be translated into joint management as a process of ethical behaviours and a model of enduring relationships with government for successful agreements. To understand trouwunnan legitimacy is to grasp new meanings of how our governance structures operate, where family and Elders becomes the core unit for engaging in joint management devolution responsibilities. I posit that family and Elders are critical to the good governance of TWWHA country as they mediate the lived experiences of trouwunnan, both past and present, and inform how these experiences can render the benefits of power-sharing of TWWHA country.
I introduce novel Indigenous methodologies and approaches that have guided and influenced the crafting of the new plan of management for TWWHA country. These methodologies are both tangible, such as the construction of a bark canoe as a means of engaging trouwunnan in the drafting process of the new plan of management, and intangible, where a re-examination of historical documents relating to the first contact moments between French explorers and our women reveals unexpected theoretical applications. The approaches used to guide the experience of participation are based upon historical agreements between trouwunnan and the Tasmanian Government that lends integrity to the proceedings of drafting the new plan of management. These tools have assisted in creating a framework that shifts trouwunnan from marginal and exiled peoples to a core and legitimate partner in power-sharing over management of TWWHA country.
This dissertation comprises sections of previously published publications. However, it is an original body of work, as these publications have been a rehearsal to the main event of finding my thesis voice. Most of these publications have been written from a third person narrative, an alienating experience that implicitly gives power and status to non-Indigenous academies. Therefore, to reinforce the importance of trouwunnan worldviews, governance and legitimacy, I centrally locate our peoples, referring to 'us', 'ours' and 'trouwunnan' throughout the text, as powerful agents that can shape the nature of joint management. This methodology further reinforces the strength of trouwunnan contributions to become a banner force in reimagining Tasmania's protected areas.


Abstract ITER is trying to develop destructive and non-destructive methods of tritium measurement for discarded radwaste components. The ITER Type B(medium activity with long life) metallic radwastes that need tritium measurement are mainly Divertor Cassette Body, Blanket Modules, Test Blanket Module Port Plug, Torus Cryopump, etc. It has been known that 107 Bq/g of tritium is distributed within 1 mm depth from the surface of the metallic radwastes. The metallic radwastes generated from maintenance period of ITER facility will be transferred to the Hot Cell Facility (HCF) for treatment including cutting, tritium removal and pre-packaging, followed by being shipped to the disposal facility after interim storage at ITER site. In this study, the radiochemical analysis methods of tritium measurement for ITER type B metallic radwastes were reviewed. Especially, two experimental methods, chemical acid leaching method (CALM) and heating method (HM,) were compared with each others to suggest the most suitable method for tritium measurement. The recovery yield of tritium standards for CALM and HM showed excellent results of 98 and 90 %, respectively. Since HM requires post treatment of extracted tritium species due to impurities, as shown in the analysis of sample from Nuclear Power Plant, CALM was considered more efficient method than HM for tritium analysis of Type B metallic radwastes.


Background: Acute myocarditis is a rare complication of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccination. Little is known about the natural history of this complication. Contexte : La myocardite aiguë est une complication rare de l ' administration d ' un vaccin à ARNm contre la COVID-19. Toutefois, on en sait peu sur l ' histoire naturelle de cette complication. Methods: Baseline and convalescent ( (cid:1) 90 days) cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging assessments were performed in 20 consecutive patients meeting Updated Lake Louise Criteria for acute myocarditis within 10 days of mRNA-based vaccination. CMR-based changes in left ventricular volumes, mass, ejection fraction (LVEF), markers of tissue in fl ammation (native T1 and T2 mapping), and fi brosis (late gadolinium enhancement [LGE] and extracellular volume [ECV]) were assessed between baseline and convalescence. Cardiac symptoms and clinical outcomes were captured. Results: Median age was 23.1 years (range 18-39 years), and 17 (85%) were male. Convalescent evaluations were performed at a median (IQR) 3.7 (3.3-6.2) months. The LVEF showed a mean 3% absolute improvement, accompanied by a 7% reduction in LV end-diastolic volume and 5% reduction in LV mass (all P < 0.015). Global LGE burden was reduced by 66% ( P < 0.001). Absolute reductions in global T2, native T1, and ECV of 2.1 ms, 58 ms, and 2.9%, repectively, were documented (all P (cid:3) 0.001). Of 5 patients demonstrating LVEF (cid:3) 50% at baseline, all recovered to above this threshold in convalescence. A total of 18 (90%) patients showed persistence of abnormal LGE although mean fi brosis burden was < 5% of LV mass in 85% of cases. No patient experienced major clinical outcomes.


Robert Dahl s "Preface "helped launch democratic theory fifty years ago as a new area of study in political science, and it remains the standard introduction to the field. Exploring problems that had been left unsolved by traditional thought on democracy, Dahl here examines two influential models the Madisonian, which represents prevailing American doctrine, and its recurring challenger, populist theory arguing that they do not accurately portray how modern democracies operate. He then constructs a model more consistent with how contemporary democracies actually function, and, in doing so, develops some original views of popular sovereignty and the American constitutional system. For this fiftieth-anniversary edition, Dahl has written an extensive new afterword that reevaluates Madisonian theory in light of recent research. And in a new foreword, he reflects back on his influential volume and the ways his views have evolved since he wrote it. For any student or scholar of political science, this new material is an essential update on a gold standard in the evolving field of democratic theory. "A Preface to Democratic Theory" is well worth the devoted attention of anyone who cares about democracy. "Political Science Quarterly ""


The margay (Leopardus wiedii) is a small Neotropical arboreal wild cat. This species is thought to be forest-dependent, although few studies so far have directly evaluated the relationships between spatiotemporal aspects of its ecology and landscape characteristics. The aim of this study was to estimate margay population density and activity patterns in six areas with different habitat types and levels of anthropogenic disturbance in the southernmost Atlantic Forest of Brazil. Our working hypothesis was that density and activity patterns differed between areas in response to differences in forest cover and anthropogenic disturbance. Margay records were obtained using camera trapping, during spring and summer from 2017 to 2019. In all areas, the sampling scheme consisted of 20 un-baited stations, set 1km apart, each containing two paired cameras. We assessed the potential effects of environmental variables, including anthropogenic factors, on margay density, rate of detection and space use by comparing nine spatial capture-recapture (SCR) models. Activity patterns of the margay, its potential prey, and competitors were described and compared using the date and time of the records. We obtained 66 records of margay. Two of the six sampled areas were excluded from subsequent analyses due to the small number of records. The density estimated by the top-ranked model varied from 9.6±6.4 individuals/100km2 in the area with the highest human disturbance to 37.4±15.1 individuals/100km2 in a less disturbed area. Margay densities responded positively to vegetation cover, supporting the hypothesis of forest dependence by the species. Both the margay and their potential prey (small rodents and marsupials) were found to be mostly nocturnal. Margay activity also overlapped with that of the ocelot, Leopardus pardalis, and with mammals associated with human presence (wild boar, cattle, domestic dogs and cats). This is the first multi-area study on patterns of density and activity of the margay in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. We concluded that the margay is mostly nocturnal, and while its densities are positively influenced by forest cover and negatively influenced by human disturbance, the activity pattern of the species does not seem to change across landscapes with distinct levels of human modification. Margay populations seem to be able to persist under moderate levels of habitat modification, highlighting the importance of preserving even small native forest remnants in the highly fragmented Atlantic Forest.


The topic of this evening is the thesis that Euclid is to Europe what Panini is to India. It is a baffling topic because it causes havoc to a widespread prejudice: the myth of the two cultures of sciences and humanities. The sciences, it is said, are exact and rigorous; the humanities seem to lack those qualities and what they offer instead is not very clear. Since Euclid was a mathematician and therefore a scientist, he belonged to a species that is highly regarded and for good reasons. Panini. on the other hand, was a grammarian or linguist - according to some a more marginal occupation. So must we accept the myth and draw the conclusion, that Europe addressed basic and substantial issues but India dabbled in trivialities?.


This essay asserts that the structure of international aid to the Palestinian refugees, perpetuated since the origin of the refugee problem, should be reconceived and a new formulation created, and it argues that a new approach the refugee problem can have positive significance for the broader problem of peace in the Middle East. The essay identifies UNRWA (The United Nations Relief and Works Agency) as a contributor to the permanency of the refugee problem and its exacerbation, in that its presence has allowed host state governmental authorities to minimize their duty to address the needs of Palestinian refugees, while enabling these authorities to exercise full control over the life of the refugees and to erect the specific and debilitating constraints under which UNRWA struggles to operate. The essay proposes a restructuring (to be promoted by the United States and its allies, and administered under a new international trustee) that would convert refugee camps to self-sustaining communities. Political constraints imposed by official and unofficial opposition to any change suggesting integration or resettlement could be overcome by creating a community development program that would be attractive enough for refugees to adopt as their own (thus enlisting the individual refugee's motivation to improve his family's standard of living), and that would not require as a precondition that refugees abandon their political claims. By reducing the distress, frustration, and sense of injustice of the people at the heart of the conflict, the new program could reduce the level of tension, reduce insecurities, and improve the atmosphere and conditions for political resolution. It could also serve to resurrect the alternative of compensation - the relatively unexplored and only viable alternative presented by U.N. General Assembly Resolution 194.


Ultimate limits of an open pit, which define its size and shape at the end of the mine's life, is the pit with the highest profit value. A number of algorithms such as floating or moving cone method, floating cone method II and the corrected forms of this method, the Korobov algorithm and the corrected form of this method, dynamic programming and the Lerchs and Grossmann algorithm based on graph theory have been developed to find out the optimum final pit limits. Each of these methods has special advantages and disadvantages. Among these methods, the floating cone method is the simplest and fastest technique to determine optimum ultimate pit limits to which variable slope angle can be easily applied. In contrast, this method fails to find out optimum final pit limits for all the cases. Therefore, other techniques such as floating cone method II and the corrected forms of this method have been developed to overcome this shortcoming. Nevertheless, these methods are not always able to yield the true optimum pit. To overcome this problem, in this paper a new algorithm called floating cone method III has been introduced to determine optimum ultimate pit limits. The results show that this method is able to produce good outcome.


The concept of factor investing emerged at the end of the 2000s and has completely changed the landscape of equity investing. This approach has been extended to multiasset portfolios and, more recently, has gained popularity in the fixed-income universe. In this article, the authors focus on currency markets. The dynamics of foreign exchange rates are generally explained by several theoretical economic models that are commonly presented as competing approaches. In the opinion of the authors, they are more complementary and can be the backbone of a Fama–French–Carhart risk factor model for currencies. In particular, the authors show that these risk factors may explain a significant part of time-series and cross-section returns in foreign exchange markets. TOPICS: Factors/risk premia, quantitative methods, performance measurement, derivatives Key Findings • Risk factors explain 50% of the cross-section of currency returns on average. • The most important risk factors are carry and time-series momentum. • Only the value risk factor exhibits a positive risk premium priced by the market.


In the field of computer vision, developing automated systems to recognize people under unconstrained scenarios is a partially solved problem. In unconstrained scenarios a number of common variations and complexities such as occlusion, illumination, cluttered background and so on impose vast uncertainty to the recognition process. Among the various biometrics that have been emerging recently, this dissertation focus on two of them namely face and gait recognition. Firstly we address the problem of recognizing faces with major occlusions amidst other variations such as pose, scale, expression and illumination using a novel PRObabilistic Component based Interpretation Model (PROCIM) inspired by key psychophysical principles that are closely related to reasoning under uncertainty. The model basically employs Bayesian Networks to establish, learn, interpret and exploit intrinsic similarity mappings from the face domain. Then, by incorporating efficient inference strategies, robust decisions are made for successfully recognizing faces under uncertainty. PROCIM reports improved recognition rates over recent approaches. Secondly we address the newly upcoming gait recognition problem and show that PROCIM can be easily adapted to the gait domain as well. We scientifically define and formulate sub-gaits and propose a novel modular training scheme to efficiently learn subtle sub-gait characteristics from the gait domain. Our results show that the proposed model is robust to several uncertainties and yields significant recognition performance. Apart from PROCIM, finally we show how a simple component based gait reasoning can be coherently modeled using the recently prominent Markov Logic Networks (MLNs) by intuitively fusing imaging, logic and graphs. We have discovered that face and gait domains exhibit interesting similarity mappings between object entities and their components. We have proposed intuitive probabilistic methods to model these mappings to perform recognition under various uncertainty elements. Extensive experimental validations justifies the robustness of the proposed methods over the state-of-the-art techniques. i


A novel GF(p) crypto processor core architecture is presented in this paper. The core is used to implement a GF(p) elliptic curve cryptosystem (ECC). The architecture is such that a single core can be used to implement ECC or alternatively a two core solution can be adopted. As a result, the core architecture allows the exploitation of the parallelism that exists in elliptic curve point addition and doubling. The core architecture results in several advantages over conventional implementations with regard to speed and power consumption.


This paper investigates the relationship between wealth, ageing and saving behaviour of private households by using pooled cross sections of German consumption survey data. Diff erent components of wealth are distinguished, as their impact on the savings rate is not homogeneous. On average, the eff ect attributed to real estate dominates the other components of wealth. In addition, the savings rate strongly responds to demographic trends. Besides the direct impact of the age structure, an indirect eff ect arises through the accumulation of wealth. The savings rate does not decrease with age in a monotonic way, as the permanent income hypothesis suggests. Most prominently, older households tend to increase their savings in the second half of their retirement period, probably due to bequest motives and increasing immobility. Given the ongoing demographic trend, an increase of 1.4 percentage points in the aggregated savings rate should be expected over the next two decades. JEL Classifi cation: G10, G11


ABSTRACT Professional careers as manufacturer's representatives constitute a growing opportunity within sales for many businesses especially in global markets. These sales representatives act as independent agents possibly on behalf of several non-competing manufacturers. These representatives represent mostly in selling interrelated products and/or services within their assigned sales territories. Multifaceted sales organizations (agencies) generally employ multiple representatives. Recent college graduates may like to pursue an entry-level sales position with these sales agencies, yet the owners of these agencies may perceive the practice of hiring recent college graduates as an obstacle due to training time, costs and lost sales due to inexperience. The purpose of the paper is to investigate the impact of agency success, job expectations from manufacturers' representative and the degree of importance of marketing methods on the agency's willingness of hiring recent college graduates. INTRODUCTION Outsourcing has become a popular business strategy for trying to be more efficient in the marketplace as well as attempting to achieve better customer satisfaction with the realization of more business growth for those firms who are outsourcing. To better focus on a firm's core competencies, outsourcing may provide opportunities to save precious resources. Also, the mantra of cutting costs, downsizing, penetrating new markets, supply chain management efficiencies, consolidation of businesses, and globalization have been some major driving forces to more outsourcing.. Professional services, such as accounting, purchasing, human resources, law, and information technology, may appear to be a relatively new outsourcing phenomenon. In comparison, however, the professional services of manufacturers' representatives is a service that been outsourced for decades. These professionals have been providing sales support for manufacturers and middlemen for years. In fact, historians note that the development of the textile industry in the Northeast during the early 1800s was the beginnings of what was to become the modern day manufacturers' representatives in the United States (McQuiston, 2001). With globalization, manufacturer representatives have become quite essential in many foreign markets (Stephens, Carlson, & Weinrauch, 1996). Manufacturers' representatives, also known as contract sales agencies, are independent professionals who provide sales and marketing services to manufacturers, suppliers, and distributors (see for example, Anderson and Trinkle, 2005; Johnson, 1999; Kaufman, 1999; McQuiston, 2001; Weinrauch, Stephens, & Carlson, 1991; Weinrauch, Stephens, & Carlson, 1996; Weinrauch, Stephens, & Carlson, 1997; Weinrauch, Stephens, & Carlson, 2001 ; Weinrauch, Stephens, & Mann, 1998). Most of them are owned and operated by entrepreneurs who operate under a contractual agreement with their principals (manufacturers, suppliers, distributors, and other middlemen) for a defined territory. The representatives typically have multiple related but non-competing product lines in this exclusive sales territory. They are paid on straight commission based on sales. It is difficult to gauge the exact number of the contract sales force in North America. According to one well-known contract sales industry researcher, the best available statistics is that approximately 50 percent of all companies operating in North America use a manufacturer's representative in some capacity. They may use them for selling a piece of a product line, a certain geographic area or a particular application. In the electrical and food service industries, 80 percent of the firms rely partially or entirely on contract sales personnel. Representatives may also sell services, such as advertising (Anderson & Lodish, 2007). Most manufacturers' representative organizations (frequently known as agencies) are small firms who may have 5 to 10 individuals covering a well-defined product portfolio and specific narrow geography. …


Abstract We document the continued population expansion of red lionfish, Pterois volitans, the first documented successful introduction of an invasive marine fish species from the western Pacific to Atlantic coastal waters of the United States. Red lionfish are indigenous to the Indo-Pacific and have apparently established one or more breeding populations on reefs off the southeastern United States. Fifty-nine specimens, most presumably adult red lionfish, were documented or collected on live-bottom reefs off North Carolina, South Carolina, and Florida, and on a manmade structure off Georgia. Observation/collection depths and bottom water temperatures for these fish ranged from 40–99 m and 13.8–24.4°C, respectively. Eleven juvenile lionfish, believed to be expatriated from southeastern waters, were collected in estuaries along the coast of Long Island, NY, at depths of 0–5 m and water temperatures ranging from 13.8–16.5 °C. Twelve of the total 70 specimens collected or observed were positively identified as red lionfish. Based on histological assessment of gonad tissue, two reproductively-active males and one immature female were collected. The life history of red lionfish, especially their reproductive biology and food habits, should be investigated along the east coast of the US to determine the potential impacts of this species on ecosystems they have invaded.


Songs by C. P. E. Bach performed by Norbert Meyn (tenor) and Terence Charlston (clavichord).

C. P. E. Bach's two collections of religious songs, published in 1758 and 1780-81, were among the most popular eighteenth-century Lieder publications. Here a selection of them is recorded for the first time with complete texts and accompanied with the clavichord, the composer's favourite instrument, underlining their intimate nature, intended more for private devotional use than for public performance. The recording includes the 'Hamlet Fantasy' that resulted when the poet Heinrich Wilhelm von Gerstenberg imposed his paraphrase of Hamlet's soliloquy on one of C. P. E. Bach's keyboard pieces.

For a discussion of this collaboration between Norbert Meyn and Terence Charlston see item #344 on this repository.


Crude palm oil (CPO) can be obtained from the milling process of raw materials, called fresh fruit bunch (FFB) into end products palm oil. The process usually through a series of steps producing and consuming intermediate products. The CPO milling industry considered in this paper does not have oil palm plantation, therefore the FFB are supplied by several public oil palm plantations. Due to the limited availability of FFB, then it is necessary to choose from which plantations would be appropriate. This paper proposes a mixed integer linear programming model for the supply chain integrated problem, considering waste. The mathematical programming model is solved using neighborhood search approach.


While the implications of payment mechanisms for provider behaviour and cost have been amply explored in industrialized countries, there is little empirical evidence from developing countries. This study exploits the opportunities created by a pilot study of micro health insurance with capitation in Rwanda to address this issue. Using cross-sectional data collected in 52 health centres, the paper employs an econometric cost function with payer-specific outputs to assess the cost impact of two provider payment mechanisms: (1) user fees for care paid by the uninsured, and (2) capitation payment paid by informal insurance schemes for the insured. The cost function allows payer-specific marginal and average costs and scale measures to be calculated. Findings point to significant differences in cost between the two payment forms. These may be due to the incentives embodied in the capitation provider payment or the less severe case-mix among insured patients arising from improved access to care for this group, or both. For both payment types there are important short-run economies of scale, which could be exploited through more intensive use of idle resources in health centres.


A high sensitivity fiber optic temperature sensor based on a side-polished fiber (SPF) coupled to a tapered multimode overlay waveguide (MMOW) is proposed and studied. Both tapered and non-tapered MMOW were considered to study the effect of tapering of MMOW on the characteristics of the device and to investigate the criticality of the uniformity of the multimode overlay waveguide over the SPF. Present study shows that tapering of the MMOW can be used to tune the desired wavelength range without any loss in the sensitivity. Sensitivity up to 9 nm/ $^{\circ}C$ within the temperature range of 25 to $100^{\circ}C$ can be achieved with the proposed sensor, almost 6 times higher compared even to state-of-the-art high-sensitivity grating-based fiber optic temperature sensors.


Place of taxation rules are the seminal cross-jurisdictional provisions of any consumption tax regime. They determine where among competing jurisdictions a particular service is taxed. They are not important for transactions that are restricted to a single jurisdiction and to businesses or individuals belonging to that jurisdiction. However, when two or more jurisdictions are involved, these are the essential tools for revenue allocation and avoidance of double taxation. It is therefore of considerable importance to Japanese businesses and consumers when the European Union (EU) undertakes a wholesale revision of the place of supply rules for services and intangibles. The European Commission has advanced two sets of proposals for reform of these rules. If adopted, these changes will be comprehensive, covering business-to-business (B2B) as well as business-to-consumer (B2C) transactions, effective July 1, 2006. The importance of these proposed changes is amplified by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD's) recent assessment of global place of taxation rules. Examining the taxation of services and intangibles in the world's consumption tax regimes the Committee of Fiscal Affairs (CFA) concluded that these rules exhibit a general "lack of international consistency and coherence." According to the OECD, this lack of consistency and coherence has erected global trade barriers (double taxation), and provided opportunities for global tax avoidance. This article first considers the proposed changes in the EU place of taxation rules for services and intangibles from the historical context of their development. It then takes up the companion rules under the Japanese Consumption Tax (CT). Less historical context is presented because these rules have a more limited history. A final section offers a comparative assessment that seeks to answer two questions. First, is there a lack of consistency and coherence between the Japanese and EU rules as currently constituted? Secondly, have the proposed changes in the EU place of taxation rules minimized or exacerbated differences? Although the EU Commission is contemplating major changes in the place of taxation rules for services and intangibles, at least with respect to transactions between the EU and Japan these changes will do nothing to eliminate the double taxation or double non-taxation in B2B transactions that currently exist. These reforms do however reinforce earlier efforts of the EU to impose the VAT on sales to EU final consumers from businesses not established in the EU. This area has been problematical for Japan. If Japan wishes to impose its CT on similar B2C transaction it should consider reforming its place of taxation rules for these transactions in a manner similar to that of the EU. However, the EU experience is that this change should not be just one of changing the place of taxation. In conjunction with this change Japan should consider adopting the electronic filing and reporting procedures adopted by the EU in its one-stop shop efforts under Article 26c and proposed Article 22b. Moving in this direction would also be in harmony with OECD recommendations.


As the universal solvent, water is unquestionably essential to most aspects of protein biophysics from protein folding to enzymatic activity. Much has been learned about the relationship between proteins and surrounding solvent waters; however, it is often difficult to experimentally examine these interactions in a sitespecific manner without perturbing molecular structure. Furthermore, the effect of nearby hydration dynamics on protein dynamics (and, in effect, protein conformational entropy) is poorly understood at atomic resolution. With the use of a combination of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and protein reverse micelle (RM) encapsulation, it is possible to examine both the dynamic behavior of waters in the protein hydration layer as well as protein dynamics for the same sample without physically altering the protein. The goal of this work is to use these complementary techniques in order to better understand the interplay between hydration and protein dynamics. First, we demonstrate the utility of NMR spectroscopy in monitoring and controlling the pH of the aqueous interior of reverse micelle ensembles. This leads to the ability to reliably confirm sample pH and structural fidelity upon RM encapsulation which is often difficult to accomplish using other techniques. Next we propose a novel approach to collecting and analyzing NMR hydration dynamics experiments with the use of non-uniform sampling (NUS) and nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) mixing time buildup experiments. We examine factors contributing to the reproducibility and reliability of hydration ratios. Using these NOE-based hydration experiments, we then examine the hydration dynamics of hen egg-white lysozyme (HEWL) with and without a bound inhibitor. We find minimal retardation of hydration dynamics within a partially hydrophilic binding cleft; we detect waters within an internal pocket which are relatively fast; and we inspect trapped interfacial waters upon ligand binding. Finally, we use RM encapsulation to examine the effect of changes in solvent dynamics on fast (ps-ns) protein dynamics. While retardation of hydration dynamics seems to affect dynamics of aromatic side chains, it has little to no effect on other fast protein dynamics effectively confirming that protein conformational entropy is not slaved to solvent. This work represents a large leap forward in our understanding of the relationship between proteins and their hydrating environment. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics First Advisor A J. Wand


Some recent considerations in three widely different aspects of high-temperature corrosion are summarized: 1) reactions at the metal/scale interface in support of scale growth; 2) mass transfer effects in the control of evaporation of volatile reaction products; and 3) the codeposition of multiple elements for diffusion coatings using halide-activated cementation packs. The climb of misfit edge dislocations from the metal/scale interface can achieve the annihilation of vacancies associated with scales grown by cation diffusion. For scale growth at the metal/scale interface by anion diffusion, the creation of anion vacancies occurs by the climb of misorientation dislocations. For cation-diffusing scales, a blocking of the vacancy annihilation reaction may be achieved by the specific adsorption of reactive elements at the metal/scale interface. The pinning of the interfacial misfit dislocations by segregated reactive elements can explain the changes in growth mechanism, in growth stresses, and in reaction kinetics associated with the reactive element effect for the growth of chromia scales on alloys. Although the vapor pressures of volatile species are readily calculated from available thermodynamic data, the use of these values to predict the kinetics of transport-limited evaporation has not been presented specifically for various substrate geometries and differing flow conditions. The empirical mass transfer relations are evaluated and plotted for the flat plat and tube geometries in the laminar and turbulent flow regimes. A criterion for the stability of a flat interface in selective evaporation from an alloy is still lacking. Despite the inherent difficulty to codeposit two or more elements with greatly differing thermodynamic stabilities for their halide species, cementation coating packs can be designed with selected combinations of powdered masteralloys and halide activator salts whereby elements are codeposited to yield a desirable surface composition. Selected examples for effective aluminizing/chromizing of Ni-base superalloys and for chromizing/siliconizing of steels are presented


Many of the original muddy marine sediments that have compacted to become gas shale could have been in a depositional environment suitable for the formation of natural gas hydrate (NGH), which concentrates gas by a factor of 164 (at STP). Dispersed biogenic NGH in fine-grained continental slope sediments today occurs in sections as thick as 250 m and contains enormous amounts of methane. Concentrated NGH can completely fill porosity in more permeable sediments. Formation of NGH in the early diagenetic history of shale gas sediments may have been the first step in the gas concentration process. NGH that formed in ancient gas shale sediments could have persisted and held the natural gas in place during lithification so long as hydrate remained stable. It is possible that the concentrated gas was held in place until the packing of the clay minerals effectively reduced permeability to a point that the gas released from naturally converting hydrate could not migrate easily. Because NGH creates open porosity upon conversion, a very large part of this gas could have been trapped in the shales before dissociation of the NGH to its component water and gas was completed. An implication for shale gas exploration is that high gas concentrations may not be confined to organic-rich shales but may also be found in any shales that once contained substantial gas hydrates. These include grey shales with lower organic content and more siliceous shales, which respond well to fracking.


Nickel-Titanium (NiTi) shape memory alloys are often used in medical component devices, for instance as guide wires for neurological surgery applications. Manufacturing of such devices becomes more and more challenging, especially considering the need to join them with other metals, like Stainless Steel (SS). Laser welding is a promising technique to realize and to guaranty the mechanical stability of dissimilar metal welds. However, inherent differences in chemical compositions may lead to fracture of the weld due to the formation of brittle intermediate phases, such as TiFe or TiFe2. So it is important to characterise microstructure in a very efficient way. Both, pulsed Nd:YAG and continuous fibre laser were experimented to produce sound welds with sufficient tensile strength. Transmission (TEM) and Scanning Electron Mi- croscopy (SEM) were used to observe microstructure. Diffraction and Energy Dispersive Spectrometry (EDS) were used to determine phase structure and composition.


The dawning of the 21st century generally brought new hope to African leaders and countless thousands of ordinary citizens of many countries on the continent. The first signs of a new turn of events shone through by the end of the last decade of the previous century. This was manifested by economic growth rates that started to pick up in a number of African states, by pro-democracy movements which in country after country succeeded in replacing authoritarian regimes, and by the winding down and termination of some of Africa's most devastating wars. The results of this analysis confirm the above-mentioned positive political, economic and conflict trends in Africa. It is clearly a significant turn of events given the well-known political and economic predicament with which Africa is struggling. When this negative legacy and Cold War background of Africa is considered, the importance of present developments is clear to see. The identified heightened sense of purpose among the leaders and peoples of Africa and the changed mood and need among Africans to take charge of their own future that found expression in the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) are indeed significant and bode well for the future of the continent. A word of warning here is, however, necessary. Our conduct with Africa must be very cautious and we must guard against over-optimism and the exaggerated belief that Africa is now on a trajectory of sustained development and peace. We cannot generalise about Africa – for that the continent is just too big and diverse from a geographical, cultural, economic and political point of view.


Legumes like faba bean (Vicia faba L.) and soybean (Glycine max L.) is able to fix 20–60 kg N ha 1 under tropical environments, but these amounts are significant for the succeeding cereal to meet the N requirement for economically attractive mean yields. Density of rhizobium population, intrinsic antibiotic resistance and nodulation and seed yield of faba bean and soybean from soil before and after planting in western Ethiopia was studied. The highest population of rhizobia was found from fields planted with faba bean without rhizobium inoculation in two farm fields and with rhizobium inoculation in one farm fields indicating the variations of effective local rhizobium strains in the soil due to faba bean plantation in the field. Faba bean planted with application of nitrogen fertilizer was produced lower rhizobium population density. Inoculation of different strains of rhizobia was produced considerable variation in population density of rhizobia in soybean. Knowing farm history before planting and selection of available rhizobium for faba bean and soybean was very crucial to use rhizobium strains. The rhizobium population from direct planting was varied among farms indicating planting faba bean and soybean are in the filed past. Mean plant height, seed yield and dry biomass at harvest of faba bean and soybean were significantly varied among farms, with and without rhizobium inoculation. The mean biological nitrogen fixation of faba bean was varied from farm to farm and with and without rhizobium inoculation showing variations of field with farm history with faba bean. Significantly higher nitrogen fixation of soybean was obtained from soybean seed planted without rhizobium strain inoculation. Application of nitrogen fertilizer was gave lower biological nitrogen fixation of faba bean as compared with and without rhizobium strain inoculation. Biological N -fixation faba bean could be suppressed 2 by application of nitrogen. The available rhizobium strains of faba bean and soybean (FB-1018, FB-1035 and MAR-1435) were found to be resistant to antibiotics (resistant to Amoxicillin, Ampicillin and Cloxacilline) than the SB-12 strains which are found resistant to Ampicillin and Cloxacilline only. The nutrient concentrations of the soil were varied among farms indicating soil fertility status and management practices variation of the farm field.


Human activity recognition is widely used in many fields, such as the monitoring of smart homes, fire detecting and rescuing, hospital patient management, etc. Acoustic waves are an effective method for human activity recognition. In traditional ways, one or a few ultrasonic sensors are used to receive signals, which require many feature quantities of extraction from the received data to improve recognition accuracy. In this study, we propose an approach for human activity recognition based on a two-dimensional acoustic array and convolutional neural networks. A single feature quantity is utilized to characterize the sound of human activities and identify those activities. The results show that the total accuracy of the activities is 97.5% for time-domain data and 100% for frequency-domain data. The influence of the array size on recognition accuracy is discussed, and the accuracy of the proposed approach is compared with traditional recognition approaches such as k-nearest neighbor and support vector machines where it outperformed them.Human activity recognition is widely used in many fields, such as the monitoring of smart homes, fire detecting and rescuing, hospital patient management, etc. Acoustic waves are an effective method for human activity recognition. In traditional ways, one or a few ultrasonic sensors are used to receive signals, which require many feature quantities of extraction from the received data to improve recognition accuracy. In this study, we propose an approach for human activity recognition based on a two-dimensional acoustic array and convolutional neural networks. A single feature quantity is utilized to characterize the sound of human activities and identify those activities. The results show that the total accuracy of the activities is 97.5% for time-domain data and 100% for frequency-domain data. The influence of the array size on recognition accuracy is discussed, and the accuracy of the proposed approach is compared with traditional recognition approaches such as k-nearest neighbor and support vector mac...


We describe the design and experiences gained with the databaseand web-based document server DOL, which we developed at the University of Leipzig (http://dol.uni-leipzig.de). The server provides a central repository for a variety of fulltext documents. In Leipzig, it has been used since 1998 as a university-wide digital library for documents by local authors, in particular Ph.D. theses, master theses, research papers, lecture notes etc., offering a central access point to the university's research results and educational material. Decentralized administration and different workflows are supported to meet organizational and legal requirements of specific document types (e.g., Ph.D. theses). All documents are converted into several formats, and can be downloaded or viewed online in a pagewise fashion. The documents are searchable in a flexible way using fulltext and bibliographic queries. Moreover, a multi-level navigation interface is provided, supporting browsing along several dimensions. DOL is interoperable with global digital libraries such as NCSTRL and can be ported to the needs of different organizations. It is also in use at Stanford University.


Abstract Polycystin-2 or transient receptor potential polycystic 2 (TRPP2) is a membrane glycoprotein that is encoded for by the gene pkd-2, which accounts for ˜15% of autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease. TRPP2 is an independent non selective cation channel localized to either the plasma membrane or the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) that is involved in diverse cellular functions including control of cell cycle, cell wall synthesis, left-right symmetry, cardiac & renal development and mating behavior. In addition, it interacts with polycystin-1 that regulates different cell signaling pathways including JAK/STAT. As a trans-membrane protein, polycystin-2 is expressed, folded and matured in the endoplasmic reticulum. To date no data is available about the nature of endoplasmic reticulum which is responsible for the proper folding of polycystin-2. This led us to the hypothesis that calreticulin, an endoplasmic reticular calcium binding chaperone protein, is involved in stabilizing and transporting polycystin-2 to the plasma membrane. To test this hypothesis we examined changes in polycystin expression and localization in wild type and calreticulin deficient cells using western blot analysis, and immunocytochemistry. Furthermore, western blot and immunohistochemical analyses were used to examine changes in polycystin expression and localization upon calreticulin over expression in vascular smooth muscle and endothelial cells of transgenic mice. Our data showed that over expression of calreticulin in either vascular smooth muscle cells or endothelial cells of transgenic mice results in the development of multiple clear cysts in the kidney cortex of these mice. Histopathological analysis of these kidneys resembles those of human polycystic kidney disease. Furthermore, loss of calreticulin function resulted in altered polycystin-2 expression in the mouse embryonic fibroblast cell lines. However, there were no significant changes in the localization of polycystin-2 protein in calreticulin deficient cells when compared to the wild type cells. Our data supports a possible role for calreticulin in the expression of polycystin-2. Further research is warranted to elucidate the role of calreticulin as a chaperone or regulator of calcium homeostasis in the expression of polycystin-2.


by François Velde, senior economist Are U.S. households carrying too much debt? Debt levels have grown recently to unprecedented levels. But that is nothing new, as debt has long been following an upward trend. Rising debt can be a good thing, signaling improved access to credit. For aggregates, what matters is net worth. That has risen in the late 1990s and fallen recently, but consumption had not kept up with the rise, and may not follow the fall.


PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES
To describe the needs of testicular cancer survivors, develop a nurse-led workshop, and explore the experience of participation.

RESEARCH APPROACH
A systematic intervention development process was used to design a self-management workshop for cancer survivors, which then was evaluated qualitatively.

SETTING
Outpatient clinic in England.

PARTICIPANTS
26 healthcare professionals, charity workers, family members, and testicular cancer survivors participated in the intervention development process. Six testicular cancer survivors attended the workshop and participated in the postintervention focus group discussion.

METHODOLOGIC APPROACH
Ten participants, including four survivors, completed the initial needs assessment interviews. Twenty-six participants then rated the identified needs on two dimensions: importance to self-management and changeability via a self-management intervention. Literature review and expert consultation were used to identify potential workshop components. To explore the experience of attending the intervention, six testicular cancer survivors who participated in the nurse-led workshop were interviewed six weeks later.

FINDINGS
The workshop was well received by participants, who appreciated the goal-setting and information provision activities. The men also felt that they had benefited from the experience of being in the group.

CONCLUSIONS
Testicular cancer survivors had unmet post-treatment needs. The systematic intervention development method led to an evidence-based workshop to address those needs. Men reported benefits from attending the workshop, which may help maintain and improve health.

INTERPRETATION
Nurse-led workshops can address the current unmet needs of testicular cancer survivors.

KNOWLEDGE TRANSLATION
Testicular cancer survivors may require support with health information, maintaining psychological health, and monitoring cancer symptoms. Survivors also need help planning and maintaining an active lifestyle. In addition, a brief workshop approach to intervention delivery is acceptable to testicular cancer survivors.


Abstract The complicated geological conditions and geological hazards are challenging problems during tunnel construction, which will cause great losses of life and property. Therefore, reliable prediction of geological defective features, such as faults, karst caves and groundwater, has important practical significances and theoretical values. In this paper, we presented the criteria for detecting typical geological anomalies using the tunnel seismic prediction (TSP) method. The ground penetrating radar (GPR) signal response to water-bearing structures was used for theoretical derivations. And the 3D tomography of the transient electromagnetic method (TEM) was used to develop an equivalent conductance method. Based on the improvement of a single prediction technique, we developed a technical system for reliable prediction of geological defective features by analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of all prediction methods. The procedure of the application of this system was introduced in detail. For prediction, the selection of prediction methods is an important and challenging work. The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was developed for prediction optimization. We applied the newly developed prediction system to several important projects in China, including Hurongxi highway, Jinping II hydropower station, and Kiaochow Bay subsea tunnel. The case studies show that the geological defective features can be successfully detected with good precision and efficiency, and the prediction system is proved to be an effective means to minimize the risks of geological hazards during tunnel construction.


Introduction and purpose: Sustainable careers can be defined as "sequences of career experiences reflected through a variety of patterns of continuity over time, thereby crossing several social spaces, characterized by individual agency, herewith providing meaning to the individual" (Van der Heijden & De Vos, 2015, p.7). This requires ongoing self-regulation; by pursuing needs and avoiding frustrations in a proactive and selective way with the aim to protect and promote one's development, well-being and productivity. According to the self-determination theory (SDT), individuals are intrinsically proactive, self-regulating and inherently inclined to development and integrated functioning. For optimal functioning, need satisfaction of the three basic psychological needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness, is required. Failure to satisfy any of these needs will be manifested in diminished growth, integrity and well-being. Even worse, need thwarting is associated with greater ill-being and more impoverished functioning. SDT further states that psychological needs satisfactions and frustrations vary within persons, over time, context and social interactions. Factors or events, alone or in interaction, that generate variations in need satisfaction or frustration, will also produce variations in activity, self-regulation, and well-being. In line with SDT, it is useful in the context of sustainable careers, to study how personal and contextual events and changes, as well as their interconnectedness, over the life span, influence need satisfaction or frustration, and what consequences this has for activity, integration, and well-being towards sustainable careers. Therefore, this qualitative study explores how (non-)sustainable careers have developed over time, and which factors and their mutual relationships have influenced them. Design, Methodology and Results Data will be collected by means of semi-structured interviews with employees of a Dutch care organization. The results are expected in the winter of 2018. Qualitative content analyses will be applied. Discussion The results of this study can help to further understand the development of (non-)sustainable careers. The presented study is retrospective, which has as disadvantage that the reliability of memories is debatable. This study is to our knowledge the first to generate insights in personal and contextual factors over time, in relation to sustainable careers, grounded in self-determination theory, and may as such, offer relevant directions for further research on sustainable careers and SDT. Reference Van der Heijden, B.I.J.M., & De Vos, A. (2015). Sustainable careers: Introductory chapter. In A. De Vos, & B.I.J.M. Van Der Heijden (Eds.). Handbook of research on sustainable careers (pp. 1–19). Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing.


This Retraction follows an Expression of Concern relating to this article previously published by Portland Press. This article is being retracted from Bioscience Reports at the request of the Editor-in-Chief and the Editorial Board following receipt of a notification from a reader, alerting the Editorial Board to Figures 2C, 3C, 5E, 6J and 7A which contain overlaps in data and duplication of images with several other publications. The authors have been contacted in regards to the retraction, and have not responded to the Journal's queries and the concerns raised. Given the extent of the issues raised, the Editorial Board stand by the decision to retract the article.


Abstract. The modeling study presented here aims to estimate how uncertainties in
global hydroxyl radical (OH) distributions, variability, and trends may
contribute to resolving discrepancies between simulated and observed methane
(CH4) changes since 2000. A multi-model ensemble of 14 OH fields was
analyzed and aggregated into 64 scenarios to force the offline
atmospheric chemistry transport model LMDz (Laboratoire de Meteorologie Dynamique) with a standard CH4 emission
scenario over the period 2000–2016. The multi-model simulated global
volume-weighted tropospheric mean OH concentration ([OH]) averaged over
2000–2010 ranges between 8.7×105 and 12.8×105 molec cm−3. The inter-model differences in tropospheric OH burden and
vertical distributions are mainly determined by the differences in the
nitrogen oxide (NO) distributions, while the spatial discrepancies between
OH fields are mostly due to differences in natural emissions and volatile organic compound (VOC)
chemistry. From 2000 to 2010, most simulated OH fields show an increase of
0.1–0.3×105 molec cm−3 in the tropospheric mean [OH],
with year-to-year variations much smaller than during the historical period
1960–2000. Once ingested into the LMDz model, these OH changes translated
into a 5 to 15 ppbv reduction in the CH4 mixing ratio in 2010, which
represents 7 %–20 % of the model-simulated CH4 increase due to
surface emissions. Between 2010 and 2016, the ensemble of simulations showed
that OH changes could lead to a CH4 mixing ratio uncertainty of
>±30 ppbv. Over the full 2000–2016 time period, using a
common state-of-the-art but nonoptimized emission scenario, the impact of
[OH] changes tested here can explain up to 54 % of the gap between model
simulations and observations. This result emphasizes the importance of
better representing OH abundance and variations in CH4 forward
simulations and emission optimizations performed by atmospheric inversions.


The description of Pynchon's Oedipa Maas above might once have served to describe Pynchon critics and, indeed, Critics of postmodernism generally. Emphasis on the epistemological and ontological uncertainties of self-reflexive and open-ended texts has for too long distracted attention from their social and political import. Even Marxist critics like Fredric Jameson and Terry Eagleton, who might be expected to be more receptive to the social meaning encoded in complex texts, have characterized postmodern fiction as apolitical pastiche or depthlessness–generalizations as premature as they have been influential. Almost as if in response to these critics, Pynchon has recently published a text ( Vineland [1990]) so ostentatiously political that it might well prompt a more socially conscious rereading of his entire oeuvre. This essay is a mere prolegomenon to such a rereading, spurred by Vineland and by the recent work of critics like Linda Hutcheon and Robert Siegle who have begun to see the formal innovations of postmodern fiction, not merely as intellectual puzzles, but also as responses to social context and as cultural interventions designed to effect change within that context.


Since Nesterov's seminal 1983 work, many accelerated first-order optimization methods have been proposed, but their analyses lacks a common unifying structure. In this work, we identify a geometric structure satisfied by a wide range of first-order accelerated methods. Using this geometric insight, we present several novel generalizations of accelerated methods. Most interesting among them is a method that reduces the squared gradient norm with $\mathcal{O}(1/K^4)$ rate in the prox-grad setup, faster than the $\mathcal{O}(1/K^3)$ rates of Nesterov's FGM or Kim and Fessler's FPGM-m.


Unlabeled sensing is a recent problem encompassing many data science and engineering applications and typically formulated as solving linear equations whose right-hand side vector has undergone an unknown permutation. It was generalized to the homomorphic sensing problem by replacing the unknown permutation with an unknown linear map from a given finite set of linear maps. In this paper we present tighter and simpler conditions for the homomorphic sensing problem to admit a unique solution. We show that this solution is locally stable under noise, while under a sparsity assumption it remains unique under less demanding conditions. Sparsity in the context of unlabeled sensing leads to the problem of unlabeled compressed sensing, and a consequence of our general theory is the existence under mild conditions of a unique sparsest solution. On the algorithmic level, we solve unlabeled compressed sensing by an iterative algorithm validated by synthetic data experiments. Finally, under the unifying homomorphic sensing framework we connect unlabeled sensing to other important practical problems.


In Turkey there is currently a lack of trust and an increasing feeling of ambiguity and insecurity about the future of Turkey-EU relations. However, this article argues, EU-full membership should be the main axis of Turkish foreign policy. With Turkey-EU relations as the main axis, Turkey can play the roles expected of it most realistically and successfully – such as offering an alternative to the clash of civilization thesis. And most importantly the EU anchor will enable Turkey to consolidate its democracy and democratize its modernity, which, in fact, constitute a determining benchmark to make proactive foreign policy sustainable.


The aim of this paper is to address left invertibility for dynamical systems with inputs and outputs in discrete sets. We study systems that evolve in discrete time within a continuous state-space. Quantized outputs are generated by the system according to a given partition of the state-space, while inputs are arbitrary sequences of symbols in a finite alphabet, which are associated to specific actions on the system. We restrict to the case of contractive dynamics for fixed inputs. The problem of left invertibility, i.e. recovering an unknown input sequence from the knowledge of the corresponding output string, is addressed using the theory of Iterated Function Systems (IFS), a tool developed for the study of fractals. We show how the IFS naturally associated to a system and the geometric properties of its attractor are linked to the left invertibility property of the system. Our main results are a necessary and sufficient condition for a given system to be left invertible with probability one on the space of inputs (i.e. for almost all input sequences), and necessary and sufficient conditions for left invertibility and uniform left invertibility under some weak additional hypotheses. A few examples are presented to illustrate the application of the proposed method.


The National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) and Weighed Arithmetic Index (WAI) methods for water quality index (WQI) have been studied to evaluate their reliability in water quality assessment in rivers. Water samples were collected in various GPS predetermined points in Temi, Nduruma, Tengeru and Maji ya Chai rivers-Tanzania during wet and dry seasons and were analyzed for several water quality parameters using standard methods as per APHA. Medium to excellent water qualities were observed for pristine environment in three rivers except Maji ya Chai under NSF and WIA methods, respectively. Excellent water quality was observed in the pristine environment of Temi and Tengeru rivers during wet season. Maji ya Chai water was identified unsuitable for drinking throughout the year. Fecal Coliforms (FC), Nutrients content, BOD and Fluorides (F - ) were the major contributors to the poor water quality in Maji ya Chai whereas FC and Nutrients were a serious problem in flood-plain for other rivers.  The two methods showed different overall Water Quality Indices using the same data thus, making them unreliable tools for water quality assessment when used simultaneously for the same purpose. Therefore selection of the method for water quality assessment and decision making may depend on the water use. Key words :  Water quality Index; Mount Meru Rivers


We measured whole‐stream uptake of ammonium (NH4+), nitrate (NO3−), and phosphate (as soluble reactive phosphorus [SRP]) in two reaches of three forested headwater streams eight times from May 2003 to April 2004 (n = 46 measurements per nutrient type). We also measured factors that could affect uptake, including ambient nutrient concentrations, whole‐stream metabolism, and organic matter standing stocks. In all three streams, we measured the highest rates of NH4+ and NO3− uptake velocity (Vf) during the spring. Low ambient NH4+ concentrations limited NH4+ uptake (U) in two streams. In one stream, when ambient NO3− concentrations increased during summer, NO3− Vf decreased. Temporal patterns of SRP Vf varied among streams, but were unrelated to variability in ambient SRP concentration. However, in all three streams, seasonal variation in SRP Vf was strongly influenced by heterotrophic metabolism (as measured by community respiration; State Creek r = 0.81, p = 0.03; Shane Creek r = 0.89, p < 0.01; Walton Creek r = 0.91, p < 0.01). Although heterotrophic processes typically dominate in forested headwater streams, we found that variability in nutrient uptake among streams was also explained by variables related to autotrophic activity (i.e., proportion coverage of large inorganic substrata and gross primary production). We suggest that the unexpected influence of autotrophy in this study was a result of stream sampling frequency, which included winter and spring—seasons not typically sampled. Our study demonstrates that examining nutrient uptake across streams and during different seasons can provide insight into factors controlling nutrient uptake parameters.


We believe that by the time of the workshop Deep Blue will have lost another match to Garry Kasparov, showing little improvement over the previous one. But even if it is indeed a "new kind of intelligence", it can be argued that this intelligence is very basic. There is a long way to go until Deep Blue could be considered a fully autonomous agent, the type we are eagerly trying to build in AI and that we believe we will eventually be successful at.

We should not consider Deep Blue (or any software agent) fully autonomous until it can manage its own computational resources (memory and time), minimize risk and cost of various decisions, assess its errors and develop new representations of (chess) knowledge, and be able to cooperate and communicate with other computer and human chess players.

We feel indeed that Deep Blue falls somewhere non-trivial on the scale of intelligence. But to move further along that scale greater autonomy will be required: Is Deep Blue now selecting its own openings, deciding when and whether to play for a draw, etc? Does it generalize from its past experiences, annotate its own games etc.? Does it know that is has played the agent "GKasparov" before? That the match will last 6 games (like last time) etc. Can it apply the information or decision theoretic model on which it is choosing its moves to other operations management and control situations? Does Deep Blue know that one mistake against the World Champion could be fatal? Does it know that bishops can only reach one color square? Does it contain a declarative representation of the rules of chess?.


Domain Specific Models with graphical syntax play a big role in Model-Driven Software Development, as do model composition tools. Those tools however, often ignore or destroy layout information which is vital for graphical models. We believe that one reason for the insufficient support for layout information in model composition tools is the lack of generic solutions that are easy to adapt for new graphical modelling languages. Therefore, this paper proposes a language-independent framework for layout preservation and composition as an extension to existing model composition frameworks. We describe the single components of the framework and evaluate it in combination with the Reuseware Composition Framework for layout compositions in two different industrial used languages. We discuss the results of this evaluation and the next steps to be taken.


This article examines US fair housing policy from a critical perspective. We describe the impact of the expansion of neoliberal ideology on the fair housing assistance program (FHAP), the fair housing initiatives program (FHIP), and the scope of US Department of Justice activities. Prior findings from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and IRS Form 990 are summarized. We argue that neoliberalism has contributed to the underdevelopment, underfunding, and poor implementation of US fair housing policy. We offer three recommendations for fair housing reform. The first focuses on the need to remove fair housing activities from HUD and place them in an independent fair housing agency. The second focuses on the need for the federal government to mandate fair housing enforcement across all governmental programs and agencies. The third focuses on the need for increased lobbying, litigation, and activism by community-based advocacy organizations for reform.


Abstract Social media has become a new revolution in communications and most governments around the world use these platforms as two-way communication between them and the citizens. The Jordanian government started using these platforms early, so this paper came to examine the Jordanian's practice on these platforms. The paper use two way of analysis, the first one was a systematic literature review in the largest two databases (Scopus and Web of Science). After the literature has been analysed and the paper found the best practices for governments around the world, three main determinants were identified for any government to start the use of social media (presence, up to date information and interaction). The most popular Jordanian's social platforms (Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube) have been selected to start the analyses and 52 Jordanian governmental institutions (all the 25 ministries and 27 institutions belong to the prime ministry) have been analysed. After the institutions' websites and their pages or accounts on social media platforms scanned and analysed, most of the institutions have fulfilled the first two criteria (presence) and 77% shows that they have appearances on social media and (up to date information) 67% of the institutions regularly updated their information. But for the last criteria (interaction) we have found that the institutions still need to improve their interactions with the citizens since the results showed only 38% of these institutions have interaction on their pages or accounts on social media.


Nanoplasmonic sensing, based on the plasmonic resonance absorption of thin, irregularly-shaped Au nanostructures film, with a starting thickness of about 15 nm (±3 nm) sputtered on a quartz substrate, is used to monitor the CeO 2 NPs (with an average diameter of 50 nm) film refractive index variations using different film thicknesses (90 nm, 146 nm, 172 nm, and 196 nm). Increasing the film thickness of solution-processed CeO 2 NPs film, with layer-by-layer deposition on top of Au nanostructures, shows a significant redshift in the plasmonic resonance absorption of the plasmonic metal, from 580 nm to 611 nm. Such an increase is related to the change in the building microstructure of the semiconductor's film which is reflected in changing its refractive index. Plasmonic surface refractive index sensitivity of 437.5 nm/RIU with FOM of 4.2 has been recorded. Such a sensing technique offers a large potential for developing cost-effective plasmonic nanosensing devices for clinical applications. This sensor structure is versatile and can be utilized to sense and monitor a large variety of materials and chemicals. 2 ± Surface is using free AFM 2


In flexible and open models of education students and lecturers experience a virtual sense of separation that is caused by more than physical distance between students and lecturers. Transactional distance is "a psychological and communications gap, a space of potential misunderstanding between the inputs of lecturer and those of the student" created in part by the physical distance inherent to online learning (Moore 1991, transactional distance,). a large transactional distance such as that between geographically dispersed students and lecturers in an asynchronous, text-based, online learning environment may contribute to students' feelings of isolation and disconnectedness, which can lead to reduced levels of motivation and engagement and consequently attrition.

When designing e-learning experiences lecturers must consider two variables that affect transactional distance: structure and dialogue. Structure refers to the flexibility or rigidity of the pedagogical methods and strategies used in an e-learning experience. Dialogue refers to the interaction between the lecturer and student during an e-learning experience. Moore does not suggest that either structure or dialogue are inherently good things. Each may be appropriate in different circumstances and a typical educational event such as a conventional lecture will, at a micro-level, move constantly between the two. Another dimension of the theory suggests that more autonomous students, being self-directed, are better able to cope with more structure while less autonomous students benefit more from greater dialogue.

This paper explores a proposed model of flexible learning which attempts to inform practitioners of the fluid, interdependent relationships between students, resources, contexts and lecturers. This helps explain and justify a reconceptualization of the role of the lecturer and suggests how social activity is also pivotal in successful learning outcomes for students.


Recent evidence indicates that variation in intensity of aggressiveness and competitive ability among nestlings ofa clutch may be attributed, at least partly, to differences in maternally deposited yolk testosterone that affects embryonic development (Schwabl 1993). We developed a radioimmunoassay (RIA) for measuring yolk testosterone levels in house wren (Troglodytes aedon) eggs. This procedure was used in initial studies to determine whether yolk testosterone varies within a clutch of house wren eggs. The analysis revealed the presence of higher levels oftestosterone in yolks of eggs laid later in the clutch sequence. Because later laid eggs tend to hatch later (Winkler 1993), variation in the amount of testosterone deposited by the female may ensure a greater chance of survival for younger, less developed offspring.


Background: Mother's Characteristics and Knowledge About Early Stimulation Related To The Development of Pre-school Age Children. Children development is influenced by the importance of early stimulation, especially at the pre-school age. Stimulation depends on the people around the child that is parents and family environment. Stimulation is influenced by mother knowledge, age, education, occupation, number of children, and socioeconomic of the family. The purpose of this research was to know the relationship of mother's characteristics and knowledge about early stimulation with the development of pre-school age children. Methods: The research method was quantitative, design cross-sectional study, used questionnaires. Sample was taken in total-sample, use statistical test of Chi-square and Kendall's tau-c. Results: Show there is a relationship between the mother's knowledge with development of children, and relationship between the mother's occupation with the development of children. Conclusion: Mother's knowledge is important in providing early stimulation, as well as other factors such as mother's occupation. It is advisable to conduct counseling about early stimulation to improve mother's knowledge.


Aims: Plantago major is used in traditional medicine for the treatment of gastrointestinal disorders. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of hydro – alcoholic extract of Plantago major on indomethacin-induced gastric ulcer in rats. Materials & Methods: 72 male Wistar rats were used in this experimental study. In treatment groups, animals received indomethacin (35 mg/kg) as single dose for induces stomach ulcer, then rats were gavaged by ranitidine (50 mg/kg) and different doses of the extract (200 mg/kg, 400 mg/kg and 800 mg/kg) for 3 days. In preventive groups, animals were treated by ranitidine and different doses of extract for 3 days, and then indomethacin was gavaged on 4th day for stomach ulcer induction. Gastric mucosal damage and acid secretion were evaluated 6 hours later. Statistical analysis was performed using one-way ANOVA. Findings: Acid secretion significantly decreased in therapeutic group that received 200 mg/kg dose of the extract and in preventive groups that received different doses of the extract (p<0.05). Also macroscopic results showed all doses of extract in preventive groups and 200 mg/kg and 800 mg/kg doses of extract in therapeutic groups significantly decreased ulcer index (p<0.05, p<0.01). Conclusion: Hydro – alcoholic extract of Plantago major can protect the gastric mucosa against indomethacin-induced gastric ulcer, via decreasing of gastric acid secretion.


A deferred annuity typically includes an option-like right for the policyholder. At the end of the deferment period, he may either choose to receive annuity payouts, calculated based on a mortality table agreed to at contract inception, or receive the accumulated capital as a lump sum. Considering stochastic mortality improvements, such an option could be of substantial value. Whenever mortality improves less than originally expected, the policyholder will choose the lump sum and buy an annuity on the market granting him a better price. If, however, mortality improves more than expected, the policyholder will choose to retain the deferred annuity. We use a realistically calibrated life-cycle consumption/saving/asset allocation model and calculate the welfare gains of deferred annuities under stochastic Lee- Carter mortality. Our results are relevant both for individual retirement planning and for policymakers, especially if legislation makes annuitization, at least in part, mandatory. Our results also indicate the maximal willingness to pay for the mortality option inherent in deferred annuities, which is of relevance to insurance pricing.


There has been an explosion of interest in statistical models for analyzing network data, and considerable interest in the class of exponential random graph (ERG) models, especially in connection with diculties in computing maximum likelihood estimates. The issues associated with these diculties relate to the broader structure of discrete exponential families. This paper re-examines the issues in two parts. First we consider the clo- sure of k-dimensional exponential families of distribution with discrete base measure and polyhedral convex support P. We show that the normal fan of P is a geometric object that plays a fundamental role in deriving the statis- tical and geometric properties of the corresponding extended exponential families. We discuss its relevance to maximum likelihood estimation, both from a theoretical and computational standpoint. Second, we apply our results to the analysis of ERG models. By means of a detailed example, we provide some characterization of the properties of ERG models, and, in particular, of certain behaviors of ERG models known as degeneracy.


The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate and gain a deeper understanding of the survival and success of SMEs specifically on the Kadazandusun businesses by looking into the challenges that they face and the determinants in which they believed contribute towards business survival and success. As this dissertation is in a form of exploratory study, the case study method was selected whereby data was collected by reviewing existing literature and conducting semi-structured interviews. The interviews were conducted with Kadazandusun SMEs' owners within any industry in Sabah. Using qualitative and quantitative analysis approaches, findings show that these SMEs face problems in terms of human resource, finance, and competition. Consequently, personal characteristics, proper handling of management, and building good relationships emerge as ways to survive and succeed in the marketplace. The findings are only based on a very small sample and are not particular to any industry. Nevertheless, findings may produce interesting suggestions of conducting research involving outside parties for a more significant generalisation and of other indigenous groups for meaningful comparison.


In The Garden of Delights, Fiona J. Griffiths offers the first major study of the Hortus deliciarum, a magnificently illuminated manuscript of theology, biblical history, and canon law written both by and explicitly for women at the end of the twelfth century. In so doing she provides a brilliantly persuasive new reading of female monastic culture. Through careful analysis of the contents, structure, and organization of the Hortus, Griffiths argues for women's profound engagement with the spiritual and intellectual vitality of the period on a level previously thought unimaginable, overturning the assumption that women were largely excluded from the "renaissance" and "reform" of this period. As a work of scholarship that drew from a wide range of sources, both monastic and scholastic, the Hortus provides a witness to the richness of women's reading practices within the cloister, demonstrating that it was possible, even late into the twelfth century, for communities of religious women to pursue an educational program that rivaled that available to men. At the same time, the manuscript's reformist agenda reveals how women engaged the pressing spiritual questions of the day, even going so far as to criticize priests and other churchmen who fell short of their reformist ideals. Through her wide-ranging examination of the texts and images of the Hortus, their sources, composition, and function, Griffiths offers an integrated understanding of the whole manuscript, one which highlights women's Latin learning and orthodox spirituality. The Garden of Delights contributes to some of the most urgent questions concerning medieval religious women, the interplay of gender, spirituality, and intellectual engagement, to discussions concerning women scribes and writers, women readers, female authorship and authority, and the visual culture of female communities. It will be of interest to art historians, scholars of women's and gender studies, historians of medieval religion, education, and theology, and literary scholars studying questions of female authorship and models of women's reading.


The mass equivalent of radiation is implicit in Poincare's formula for the momentum of radiation, published in 1900, and was used by Poincare in illustrating the application of his analysis. The equality of the mass equivalent of radiation to the mass lost by a radiating body is derivable from Poincare's momentum of radiation (1900) and his principle of relativity (1904). The reasoning in Einstein's 1905 derivation. questioned by Planck, is defective. He did not derive the mass-energy relation.


Rather than use the product liability screwdriver as a chisel, why not consider a package of more effective tools. Corporations and individuals that market software despite knowledge of software security flaws should face criminal prosecution as well as civil lawsuits with punitive damages. Perhaps bounties should be available for the first to discover and establish the existence of a security flaw. Publishers should be required to post to the Web and otherwise publicize promptly patch availability. The software equivalent of an Underwriters Laboratories should establish and constantly improve security-related standards and testing protocols. It should be made readily apparent whether a program has passed and at what level. Prospective customers should be educated and encouraged to insist on software that has passed. Stronger software security is important. Software developers and publishers must do better. But product liability is not the right legal tool for the job.


In 2013, GoWell East commenced a cohort study of physical activity among secondary school pupils in Glasgow. The study will run from 2013 to 2017, following a group of pupils throughout their school career from S1 to S5.

The research design compares physical activity of pupils in six secondary schools in Glasgow, organised into three pairings: two East End secondary schools; two secondary schools located in other deprived parts of Glasgow; and two secondary schools in more affluent part of the city.

By comparing results across the three groups of schools we can see whether physical activity is different between deprived and affluent schools, and whether there is any additional effect from being located near the main Games site in the East End of the city.

This report presents some of the key findings from the baseline 2013 survey of S1 pupils and presents a comparison of results for boys and girls across four activity areas.