The Liberal-Conservative (LIBCON) scale is a seven-point semantic differential scale that has been widely used to measure identity within the Church of England. The history of the development of liberalism in the Church of England suggests that this scale should be associated with specific beliefs and attitudes related to doctrine, moral issues and church practices. This study tests this idea among a sample of 9339 lay and ordained readers of the Church Times (the main newspaper of the Church of England) using twelve summated rating scales measuring a range of beliefs and attitudes. Of these twelve variables, eleven were correlated with the LIBCON scale. Discriminant function analysis produced a linear function of these variables that correctly identified 35% of respondents on the scale, and 69% to within one scale score. The best predictors were scales related to either doctrine or moral issues, and these performed consistently across traditions (Anglo-catholic, Broad church or Evangelical) and between clergy and laity. Scales related to church practices suggested 'conserving tradition' was also involved in the liberal-conservative dimension, but this was less so for clergy and for Evangelicals. The scale is commended as an empirical measure of one dimension of Church of England identities, especially if used alongside a parallel scale measuring church tradition.


Questions: 1. Do different management types (i.e. hay meadow, silage meadow, meadow-pasture, pasture) have different impact on the size and composition of the seed bank of mesic grassland (Arrhenatheretalia)? 2. How strong is the effect of management on the seed bank in relation to above-ground vegetation, edaphic factors and land-use history? 3. Are there differences in C-S-R plant strategy types and seed longevity under different management regimes? Location: Lahn-Dill Highlands in central-western Germany. Methods: Above-ground vegetation and the soil seed bank of 63 plots (at 21 sites) in mesic grasslands were studied. Differences between management types in quantitative seed bank traits and functional characteristics were tested by ANOVA. The impact of management, above-ground vegetation, site conditions and land-use history on seed bank composition were analysed by partial CCA. Results: Management had no significant impact on species richness and density of the seed bank but significantly influenced their floristic composition and functional characteristics. CCA revealed that even after adjustment for soil chemical parameters and above-ground vegetation management still had significant impact on seed bank composition. ANOVA revealed that silage meadows contained higher proportions of R-strategy compared to hay meadows. In contrast, in hay meadows and meadow-pastures proportions of S-strategy were higher than in silage meadows. Conclusions: The type of grassland management has little impact on quantitative seed bank traits. Management types with a high degree of disturbance lead to an increase of species following a ruderal strategy in the seed bank. Irrespective of management type only a limited proportion of characteristic grassland species is likely to re-establish from the seed bank after disappearance from above-ground vegetation.


The present study deals with the speech production by bilinguals in both languages. The objective speech sounds are Japanese and English stop consonants. Japanese stop consonants are very similar to English ones, but is is well‐known that the voice onset time of stop consonants for both languages are different from one another. The aim of this study is to examine the voice onset time of Japanese and English stop consonants uttered by the returnees (Japanese–English bilinguals) under the different linguistic circumstances. It was found that there were three types for the returnees in the production of stop consonants. These results are compared with those of Japanese who learned English.


Background: Most clinical trials of direct-acting antiviral (DAA) therapy for hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection have excluded hepatitis B virus (HBV) coinfection, and little is known about the effects of DAA on chronic hepatitis C patients with HBV coinfection. Recent studies have reported that DAA therapy for HCV can also cause HBV reactivation in patients with HBV and HCV coinfection. The aim of this study was to assess the effects of DAA on sustained virologic response (SVR) and HBV reactivation in patients with chronic hepatitis C. Methods: Participants comprised 199 chronic hepatitis C patients who received DAA therapy (96 men, 103 women; mean age, 66.7 ± 12.0 years). Results: Twelve patients were coinfected with HCV and HBV. Sixty patients were HBV surface antigen negative but positive for hepatitis B core antibody and/or hepatitis B surface antibody, and one hundred and twenty-seven patients had not been exposed to HBV. Rates of SVR in HBV and HCV coinfected patients, HBV prior infection, and no exposure to HBV were 100, 95, and 97%, respectively. Significant differences were seen between each group. No case showed HBV reactivation. Conclusions: DAA treatments were effective in patients with HBV coinfection or HBV prior infection, as well as HCV monoinfection. As the number of cases was small, we still suggest caution regarding HBV reactivation in HCV and HBV coinfected patients undergoing treatment with DAA.


There is general consensus that the quality of in vitro-produced embryos is inferior to that of their in vivo counterparts and that along with other factors this may be responsible for the poorer cryosurvival and the lower pregnancy rates reported for these embryos. The feasibility to accurately select viable embryos would be valuable for improving pregnancy rates and avoiding futile transfer attempts. The aim of our study was to assess whether in vitro-produced ovine embryo quality could be determined by the timing blastocoelic cavity re-expansion after vitrification, thawing, and in vitro culture. Embryos were produced in vitro from ovine ovaries collected at the local slaughterhouse following a standard protocol developed for ovine oocytes, as previously described (Berlinguer et al. 2005 Reprod. Fertil. Dev. 17, 201). Blastocysts were then vitrified/warmed according to a simple method (Leoni et al. 2002 Cryobiology 45, 204-212) and cultured in vitro in TCM-199 supplemented with 10% FCS for 72 h in 5% CO2 in air at 39°C. Vitrified embryos were divided into two groups: (A) expanded within 8 h of in vitro culture after warming; (B) expanded during 8 to 16 h of in vitro culture after warming. Of the 338 vitrified/warmed embryos, 173 (51.1%) showed a re-expanded blastocoelic cavity after 8 h of in vitro culture, whereas 58 (17.1%) re-expanded during 8 to 16 h of in vitro culture. We also analyzed by semiquantitative RT-PCR a panel of genes expressed during pre-implantation embryo development (glucose transporter, HPS-10, e-caderin, poly(A)polimerase, and ubiquitine); our results showed that these genes, apart from ubiquitine which showed no difference in the two groups, were more expressed in Group A blastocysts compared to Group B. Group A blastocysts showed higher hatching rates (67.6%) than Group B blastocysts (43.1%; P < 0.01). The total cell number calculated for the hatched blastocysts after staining with Hoechst 33342 was significantly higher in Group A (140.7 ± 8.3, n = 42) than Group B (102.2 ± 8.4, n = 27; P < 0.01). Pregnancy rate (detected by ultrasonography 30 days after embryo transfer) after laparoscopic embryo transfer to 12 synchronized recipient Sarda sheep was 40% (6/15) in Group A and 13.4% (2/15) in Group B. The results indicated that timing of blastocoelic cavity re-expansion after vitrification/warming and in vitro culture can be considered as a reliable index of in vitro-produced ovine embryo quality, and in addition, a better prediction for improved survival rate after transfer to synchronized recipients. This work was supported by Cofin 2003.


It costs about $1.2 billion to bring a single new drug to market in the U.S. today. [1] With a combination of high late-stage failure rates and the high cost of drug trials, the number of new drugs being approved by the FDA has flat-lined at historically low levels, falling from 53 in 1996 to just 19 in 2009. [2] If the cost of drug trials doesn't come down, we will see far fewer new drugs on pharmacy shelves. [1] Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America Profile 2009 . Washington, DC: PhRMA. [2] Hughes B. 2009 Drug Approvals. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 9, 89-92 (February 2010)


Text augmentation is an effective technique in alleviating overfitting in NLP tasks. In existing methods, text augmentation and downstream tasks are mostly performed separately. As a result, the augmented texts may not be optimal to train the downstream model. To address this problem, we propose a three-level optimization framework to perform text augmentation and the downstream task end-to- end. The augmentation model is trained in a way tailored to the downstream task. Our framework consists of three learning stages. A text summarization model is trained to perform data augmentation at the first stage. Each summarization example is associated with a weight to account for its domain difference with the text classification data. At the second stage, we use the model trained at the first stage to perform text augmentation and train a text classification model on the augmented texts. At the third stage, we evaluate the text classification model trained at the second stage and update weights of summarization examples by minimizing the validation loss. These three stages are performed end-to-end. We evaluate our method on several text classification datasets where the results demonstrate the effectiveness of our method. Code is available at https://github.com/Sai-Ashish/End-to-End-Text-Augmentation.


Abstract : The role of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in military, commercial and recreational applications is continuously evolving as developments in technology increase capabilities. The research herein presents an inexpensive computer-vision-based solution for detection and classification of a stationary target with a mobile aerial sensor as a prototyping platform. The main goal of this system is to use commercial-off-the-shelf and open-source components to reduce design complexity to provide a legacy product for future development of specific capabilities. Color imagery collected during flight using a low-resolution camera is used to test the application of a simple algorithm against a commercially available and low cost sensor. Original image processing algorithms that leverage the existing body of works in the open-source community are developed and tested within the Systems Engineering construct. System architecture leverages a modular approach that can be easily modified and adapted to changing requirements and objectives. Conclusions are drawn and recommendations for further study and system development are presented.


In the 1950's endocrinologist Hans Selye described stress as "the consequence of the failure to adapt to change, specifically the inability to respond appropriately to emotional or physical threats to the organism, whether actual or imagined" (1). It is a logical inference, therefore, that coping with stress involves approaches that boost an individual's adaptability to change. Nature provides a number of phytonutrients that function as relaxants, "adaptogens" or "revitalizers", with a positive influence on the symptoms of stress including anxiety, insomnia, depression and irritability. The resultant "fight-or-flight" response by the autonomous nervous system culminates in cardiovascular, respiratory, gastrointestinal, renal, and endocrine effects. The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA), a major part of the neuroendocrine system is also activated by release of CRH and AVP. Adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) is released from the pituitary gland into the general bloodstream. This results in secretion of cortisol and other glucocorticoids that carry the stress response to various body tissues and organs, and ultimately contribute to the termination of the response via feedback inhibition. Stress significantly affects the body's immune response as well and compromises resistance to microbial infection and other environmental stressors.


The possibility of igniting D3He plasma in the fast-ignition, inertial confinement fusion scheme is discussed. Use of a small amount of DT fuel as an igniter is indispensable in order to mitigate the requirement on driver energy. Simulations have been made for a DT/D3He fuel compressed to 2000 ˜ 4000 times the liquid density. The DT igniter is placed at the edge of the compressed fuel. The work shows that it is possible to obtain sufficient pellet gains (≥100) with realistic driver energy below 10 MJ. The essential roles of DT fusion neutron and nuclear elastic scattering are clarified. The possibility to reduce the amount of DT fuel is discussed.


Most of the recent power line communication (PLC) systems and standards, both narrow-band and broadband, are based on orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM). This multiplexing scheme, however, suffers from the high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR), which can considerably impact the energy efficiency, size, and cost of PLC modems as well as cause electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) issues. This paper investigates the performance of vector OFDM (VOFDM), which has inherently better PAPR properties, over non-Gaussian broadband PLC channels equipped with two nonlinear preprocessors at the receiver. In addition, the low PAPR property of the VOFDM system is exploited to further enhance the efficiency of the nonlinear preprocessors. The achievable gains are studied in terms of the complementary cumulative distribution function of the PAPR, probability of noise detection error, and the signal-to-noise ratio at the output of the nonlinear preprocessors. For comparison's sake, the performance of conventional OFDM systems is also presented throughout this paper. Results reveal that the proposed system is able to provide up to 2-dB saving in the transmit power relative to the conventional OFDM under same system conditions, which eventually also translates into a system that is more resilient to EMC limits, reduced cost, and size of PLC modems. It is also shown that the achievable gains become more significant as the vector block size of the VOFDM system is increased.


Summary
Small-scale discontinuities, formed by accumulations of wood, are recognised as a key feature of functionally intact forested streams because they promote organic matter retention, increase habitat complexity and provide flow refugia. Re-establishing such features in physically degraded streams is therefore a common priority for restoration schemes. Ecosystem engineering by beavers in the form of dam building might offer a natural mechanism for restoring degraded streams. Despite an increase in beaver reintroductions globally, the ecosystem engineering concept has rarely been applied to restoring biodiversity and ecosystem function, especially within degraded freshwater systems.
By comparing multiple beaver-modified and unmodified sites on headwater streams draining 13 ha of pastureland in eastern Scotland, U.K., we investigated if hydromorphological changes caused by reintroduced beavers (Castor fiber) translate into desirable biological responses when there is a long history of physical degradation and contraction of the regional species pool due to agricultural land use.
Beaver modified in-stream habitat by constructing 10 dams, thus creating a series of interconnected dam pools. Organic matter retention and aquatic plant biomass increased (7 and 20 fold higher respectively) in beaver ponds relative to unmodified channels, consistent with the lower fluctuation in stream stage observed below a series of dams. Growing season concentrations of extractable P and NO3 were on average 49% and 43% lower respectively below a series of dams than above, although colour and suspended solids concentrations increased.
Macroinvertebrate samples from beaver-modified habitats were less taxon rich (alpha diversity on average 27% lower) than those from unmodified stream habitat. However, due to significant compositional differences between beaver versus unmodified habitats, a composite sample from all habitats indicated increased richness at the landscape scale; gamma diversity was 28% higher on average than in the absence of beaver-modified habitat. Feeding guild composition shifted from grazer/scraper and filter feeder dominance in unmodified habitats to shredder and collector-gatherer dominance in beaver-created habitats.
Dam building by beaver in degraded environments can improve physical and biological diversity when viewed at a scale encompassing both modified and unmodified habitats. By restoring ecosystem processes locally, it may also offer wider scale benefits, including greater nutrient retention and flood attenuation. These benefits should be evaluated against evidence of any negative effects on land use or fisheries.


At a time when Zimbabwe moves into a completely new political experience where change is an important element, it seems appropriate to deliberate upon recent developments overseas in so far as they influence changes in geographical education in Zimbabwe, The purpose of this paper is therefore, to provide a broad perspective of developments in geographical education, particularly of those in the United Kingdom, and relate these to developments in school geography in Zimbabwe. In this way it is hoped that United Kingdom experiences will be beneficial in dealing with problems facing geography teachers in this country .


The notion of Parisian charm is ubiquitous, and the magic of the city's interior design is the gold standard. The quintessential Parisian home typically characterized as a top floor apartment in a Haussmannian building is inimitably chic with the most tasteful of details. And yet Guillaume de Laubier takes us behind closed doors inside the homes of the most respected designers and artists in the city, to discover the rich diversity of Parisian style. These interiors are rife with inspiration: from the radically kitsch design philosophy of Pierre & Gilles, to the powder-hued romanticism chez Vanessa Bruno, from the retro haven of Jean-Bernard Hebey's design temple, to Pierre Yovanovitch's contemporary chic apartment, and from Jacques Garcia's subtly reworked Empire interior, to Jacques Granges harmonious blend of period pieces in Colette's former apartment overlooking the Palais-Royal gardens. This book draws back the curtain on the world of Parisian interiors, and Guillaume de Laubier's photographs capture sleek Scandinavian lines, traditionalist opulence, modernist curves, and exotic accents, documenting each unique interior aesthetic with flair.


Studies using data from the early 1990s suggested that while the progressive Social Security benefit formula succeeded in redistributing benefits from individuals with high earnings to individuals with low earnings, it was much less successful in redistributing benefits from households with high earnings to households with low earnings. Wives often earned much less than their husbands. As a result, much of the redistribution at the individual level was effectively from high earning husbands to their own lower earning wives. In addition, spouse and survivor benefits accrue disproportionately to women from high income households. Both factors mitigate redistribution at the household level. This paper compares outcomes for the earlier cohort with those of a cohort born twelve years later. With greater growth in women's earnings, the aim of the study is to see whether, after the recent growth in two earner households, and the growth in women's labor market activity and earnings, the Social Security system now fosters somewhat more redistribution from high to low earning households. We use data from the Health and Retirement Study to study a population consisting of members of households with at least one person age 51 to 56 in either 1992 or in 2004. We use four different measures of redistribution: the ratio of the present value of benefits to taxes for households arrayed by decile of covered earnings; the fraction of total Social Security benefits redistributed from households with high earnings to those with low earnings; the share of total benefits paid to members of each cohort redistributed from households falling in the highest deciles of earners to those with lower covered earnings; and the rate of return to Social Security taxes for members with different amounts of covered earnings. Considering differences in earnings between cohorts, women enjoyed a more rapid growth of labor force participation, hours of work and covered earnings than men. This increased the redistribution of Social Security benefits among households. Nevertheless, a considerable gap remains between the labor market activities and earnings of women versus men. As a result, the Social Security system remains much less successful in redistributing benefits from households with high covered earnings to those with lower covered earnings than in redistributing benefits from individuals with high covered earnings to those with lower covered earnings.


Fluorous biphasic systems use the temperature-sensitive miscibility of fluorinated materials in nonfluorous solutions as a means to control reaction systems and easily separate catalysts or other compounds from a mixture. We present perfluoroalkylated nanographene as a viable platform for photohomogenization and recycling of fluorous-tagged catalysts. The photothermal properties of graphene materials, particularly in the near-infrared range, enable comparatively fast activation time and simplify the recycling of catalysts thanks to the easy separation of the solid fluorinated graphene phase from most solvents by centrifugation. A fluorinated phosphine catalyst was used in a modified, catalyst-regenerative Appel reaction as a model system. The catalyst could be successfully recovered and reused for at least 10 cycles with minimal loss of yield.


Effective mentoring programs are very difficult to structure and execute, even with the best intentions and reasonable budget. In this report we conduct a multi-institution empirical analysis of mentoring in startup ecosystems to determine what helps entrepreneurial teams and mentors thrive in mentorship programs.
We survey the perspectives of mentees, mentors and university and accelerator program administrators. Our empirical findings reveal that personality and the malleability of entrepreneurial skills among the mentee and the mentor matter. Further we find that university programs lag behind non-university accelerator programs along several important dimensions, when it comes to matching mentees to mentors and providing support during the program and following up after the completion of the program. We provide several prescriptive recommendations for students, startup founders, mentors and program administrators, and outline a research agenda for studying mentoring in entrepreneurial ecosystems.


We determine the dimensions of subfield codes of Reed-Solomon codes and construct certain extensions and lengthenings of these codes. We start from the duals, using the language of orthogonal arrays. As a first result this allows us to obtain a fair number of improvements in the list of binary, ternary, and quaternary linear codes with largest known minimal distance.


We present the first version of a corpus annotated for psychiatric disorders and their etiological factors. The paper describes the choice of text, annotated entities and events/relations as well as the annotation scheme and procedure applied. The corpus is featuring a selection of focus psychiatric disorders including depressive disorder, anxiety disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, phobic disorders and panic disorder. Etiological factors for these focus disorders are widespread and include genetic, physiological, sociological and environmental factors among others. Etiological events, including annotated evidence text, represent the interactions between their focus disorders and their etiological factors. Additionally to these core events, symptomatic and treatment events have been annotated. The current version of the corpus includes 175 scientific abstracts. All entities and events/relations have been manually annotated by domain experts and scores of inter-annotator agreement are presented. The aim of the corpus is to provide a first gold standard to support the development of biomedical text mining applications for the specific area of mental disorders which belong to the main contributors to the contemporary burden of disease.


** * SUMMARY: The Inca bones are rarely seen among other inter sutural bones and are accepted as variants of the normal. The incidence of the Inca bones has been rese arched in different populations. The aim of this study was to investigate the rate and types of the Inca bones in West Anatolian population. One hundred fifty-one skulls of West Anatolian subjects of unknown ages and sex were e xamined. None of the specimens showed signs of prior cranial surgery, bony malformation or trauma. The skulls were classified as adults with teeth eruption. The Inca bones were macroscopically determined and analysed. The samples were photoghraphed with Canon 400B (55 mm objective). We follow previous criteria and nomenclatures of the Inca bones. The incidence of Inca bones of examined skulls was 1.98% (3/ 151). We observed 1 incomplete lateral asymmetric, 1 complete undivided and 1 complete asymmetric bipartita Inca bones. Inca os sicles are accessory bones found in human skulls due to ossification failure. Inca bones can be used in personal identification by com paring the ante- and post-mortem radiographs. There are some regional variations in frequencies within each restricted geographical area. In the present study, the incidence of the Inca bones is 1.98% in West Anatolian population. The frequency of the Inca bones in the sk ulls belonging to Hellenistic Roman periods of Cyprus and Constantinople in Natural History Museum of Turkey was 1.59%. The variatio n in Anatolia's population at different times and regions, because of the migrations, may cause the differences between frequencies in these studies. Evaluation of the presence of the Inca bones may be usefull in identification in forensic medicine and paleodermograph ical studies.


Lanthanum–cerium oxide (LCO) films were deposited on Ni-5%W substrates by chemical solution deposition (CSD) from water-based precursors. LCO films containing different ratios of lanthanum and cerium ions (from CeO2 to La2Ce2O7) were prepared. The composition of the layers was optimized towards the formation of LCO buffer layers, lattice-matched with the superconducting YBa2Cu3Oy layer, useful for the development of coated conductors. Single, crack-free LCO layers with a thickness of up to 140 nm could be obtained in a single deposition step. The crystallinity and microstructure of these lattice-matched LCO layers were studied by X-ray diffraction techniques, RHEED and SEM. We find that only layers with thickness below 100 nm show a crystalline top surface although both thick and thin layers show good biaxial texture in XRD. On the most promising layers, AFM and (S)TEM were performed to further evaluate their morphology. The overall surface roughness varies between 3.9 and 7.5 nm, while the layers appear much more dense than the frequently used La2Zr2O7 (LZO) systems, showing much smaller nanovoids (1–2 nm) than the latter system. Their effective buffer layer action was studied using XPS. The thin LCO layers supported the growth of superconducting YBCO deposited using PLD methods.


abstract: since the beginning of the 80ies austria also faces deteriorating labor market prospects, which affected substantially the youth labor market. this fact made it necessary to establish special youth labor market programs and to increase thevolume of the already existing vocational training measures of the labor market authorities. the following paper is analysing the realization conditions of these labor market improvement measures from a theoretical point of view, and tries to point out their function within the labor market dynamics. the main point of this work consists in the following of an analysis of the efficiency of the vocational training measures of the training year 1978/79. the main question on which we concentrate isto which degree it is possible with these measures to integrate teenagers and young workers into stable careers.;


The purpose of the current study was to investigate the experience of privacy, focusing on its functional role in personal well-being. A sample (N = 180) comprised subjects between 18 and 50 years of age were asked to spontaneously provide accounts of their experiences with privacy and answer close-ended questions to acquire a description of a daily experience of privacy. The results showed the importance attributed to the function of privacy related to the "defense from social threats", and the twofold function of privacy related to an "achieved state of privacy", in the terms of both "system maintenance" and "system development". The results also shed light on the role of the environment in shaping one's experience of privacy. Specifically, the participants recognized more easily the function of defense from threats related to seeking privacy while interacting in digital environments, whereas they seemed to benefit from positive functions related to an achieved state of privacy in physical environments. The findings sustain the notion of privacy as a supportive condition for some psychological processes involved in the positive human functioning and confirm previous studies conducted on the role of privacy in human well-being.


Abstract. Education on the subject of groundwater is crucial for sustainability. Nevertheless, international studies with students across different age groups have shown that the basic hydrogeological concept of groundwater defined as water within porous and permeable rocks is not an established everyday notion. Drawing from international research, a multimedia learning program Zwischen Regenwolke und Wasserhahn (between the rain cloud and the tap) was developed, which incorporates specific insights from the fields of conceptual change research, multimedia research, and the model of educational reconstruction. The effectiveness of the learning program was ascertained by means of two studies with Austrian seventh grade pupils as well as teacher-training students from the fields of biology and geography in order to ascertain the effectiveness of the learning program. Using a quasi-experimental research design, the participants' conceptions and knowledge of groundwater were determined in a pre- and post-test. The pupils and students greatly benefitted from working through the learning software independently. Their knowledge of groundwater increased significantly compared to the control group and there was a highly significant increase in the number of scientifically correct notions of groundwater. The acceptance of the program was also generally very high. The results indicate that theory-guided multimedia learning programs can play an important role in the transfer of research results to classroom settings, especially in science education.


In response to growing fears from the entertainment industry over online file-sharing of valuable content, the Federal Communications Commission ("FCC") enacted sweeping regulations over the production of electronic devices in the name of protecting digital television broadcasts. Although the FCC's "broadcast flag" regulation was struck down on jurisdictional grounds, Hollywood has not given up the push for strict control. If Hollywood successfully acquires broadcast flag protection there could be far-reaching implications for innovation and development of new digital technologies. While content providers have important reasons to protect copyrighted material, there is too much at stake to merely acquiesce to their demands in the name of piracy prevention.


Thermal degradation of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) of different molecular weights in inert and oxygen atmosphere is studied and discussed in detail. PDMS samples of different molecular weights were prepared by anionically initiated ring-opening polymerization of octamethylcyclotetrasiloxane in emulsion. The molecular weight of PDMS drastically affected the shape of TGA curve at higher temperatures when thermogravimetric (TGA) measurements were performed in the inert atmosphere. The thermal stability of PDMS decreased with increasing the average molecular weight of the sample, which could be explained by prevailing unzipping mechanism at lower molecular weights over intramolecular and intermolecular redistribution, which were more important at higher molecular weights. On the other hand, experiments in oxygen atmosphere showed zero effect of polydimethylsiloxane molecular weight on its thermal stability. In addition, a kinetic model describing the thermal degradation of PDMS in inert atmosphere as a function of PDMS molecular weight was proposed. The proposed kinetic model was composed of diffusion-limited kinetics step related to evaporation rates of the degradation products and of rate-determined step related to the formation of cyclic degradation products. As a result of mathematical modeling by fitting the calculated data to experimental data kinetic parameters were derived properly.


What does E=mc2 actually mean? Dr. Brian Cox and Professor Jeff Forshaw go on a journey to the frontier of twenty-first century science to unpack Einstein's famous equation. Explaining and simplifying notions of energy, mass, and light--while exploding commonly held misconceptions--they demonstrate how the structure of nature itself is contained within this equation. Along the way, we visit the site of one of the largest scientific experiments ever conducted: the now-famous Large Hadron Collider, a gigantic particle accelerator capable of re-creating conditions that existed fractions of a second after the Big Bang. A collaboration between one of the youngest professors in the United Kingdom and a distinguished popular physicist, Why Does E=mc2? is one of the most exciting and accessible explanations of the theory of relativity.


This thesis seeks to contribute to a cultural and historical geography of the mystical through a detailed case study of Cornwall since the mid-nineteenth century. In doing so, it also aims to contribute to a contemporary Cornish Studies literature that has begun to reclaim alternative and forgotten cultural and historical narratives of Cornwall. After a short introduction, chapter two positions this thesis in relation to debates around the region as a unit of geographical inquiry and the mystical as a cultural and historical category. It also positions this thesis in relation to the contemporary Cornish Studies literature; while chapter three engages with debates around the use of archives, interviews and oral histories as research methodologies. Chapter four argues that the late nineteenth and early twentieth century Celtic-Cornish Revival was connected to a new and somewhat exploratory version of the mystical that drew upon Anglo-Catholic history and theology in the new Diocese of Truro and in the Cornish landscape, but that was also characterised by a certain degree of slippage beyond the discursive boundaries of Celtic Christianity. The mid-twentieth century, chapter five argues, was characterised by a series of strategies to normalise this earlier version of the mystical by engaging with, and actively incorporating, other and potentially contradictory versions of the mystical, and by grounding this more inclusive version of the mystical in a new, decentralised and more populist institutional context. In turn, chapter six argues that the later twentieth century was characterised by the emergence of another new and more exploratory cultural formation of the mystical through a particular culture of landscape that was underpinned by the supposed rediscovery of the principles of megalithic science and an associated revival of Paganism among other new social and religious movements. Chapter seven, in conclusion, reflects upon the often understated connections between the mystical and a sense of socio-spatial order, the problematic nature of knowledge, and the consequences of bringing together the mystical, the geographical and the Cornish in the context of this thesis and of existing and future work on the geographies of religion and spirituality.


This study explores the effects of media type (including online, print, and TV), advertisement shape, and online animation level on advertising responses such as recall, recognition, attitude, and purchase intent. The study examined a set of 1636 surveys, each collecting consumer responses to an individual advertisement, conducted by the consumer research and consulting firm OTX Research. The findings showed that underlying the considered measures were two factors, brand identification and advertisement appreciation, and that media type and advertisement shape produced significant differences in these factors. While online advertisements had the highest brand identification, TV advertisements had the highest advertisement appreciation. Additionally, the three advertisement characteristics were able to effectively discriminate between high and low levels of these factors. The findings allow for intuitive explanations of how consumer engagement and sought experiences may be producing the comparative effects of online, print and TV advertisements.


Purpose - The Iranian currency (rial) depreciated on average 12.2 per cent per annum against the US dollar during the period 1960-1998 but, despite continued two-digit rates of inflation, the rial has witnessed only a meagre 1.7 per cent fall in its value in the post-1998 era. This paper seeks to examine this perplexing issue by identifying the major long-run determinants of the black market exchange rate. Design/methodology/approach - This paper uses the multivariate cointegration test, a threshold regression model and annual time series data (1960-2008) to determine exactly at what exchange rate the effect of relative prices on the exchange rate has been subject to an asymmetry adjustment process. Findings - It was found that the relative CPIs in Iran and the USA, total stock of foreign debt and the price of crude oil are the major long-run determinants of the black market exchange rate. However, the impact of relative prices (as measured by the magnitude of its elasticity) has significantly diminished from almost unity in the pre-1998 period to less than one-fourth since 1998. Based on the results, if oil prices continue to plunge, liquidity and inflation are out of control and at the same time Iran accumulates more external debt, the exchange rate will eventually exhibit an unprecedented and explosive depreciation in the coming years. Originality/value - No previous study has examined this issue using a threshold regression model without splitting the entire sample into two sections according to an endogenously determined threshold for the exchange rate.


EFSA's scientific Panel on Biological Hazards (BIOHAZ Panel) provides independent scientific advice on biological hazards in relation to food safety and food-borne diseases. This covers food-borne zoonoses, food microbiology, food hygiene, antimicrobial resistance (AMR), transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (BSE/TSEs) and associated waste management issues. Most of the activities of the BIOHAZ Panel focus on human health and the whole food chain and on science-based interventions to lower the risk to consumers. In the future, food-borne disease burden estimations are foreseen to become increasingly relevant. The risk assessments done by the BIOHAZ Panel are in line with the EU (European Union) strategy of one health, include a farm to fork approach and in many cases have a high multidisciplinary component. Whenever possible, the Panel applies this risk assessment framework developed by Codex Alimentarius as a basis for their work on food safety. The outcomes of some of the activities during the last three to four years are presented. From these examples of recent BIOHAZ opinions it can be seen that the work covers different approaches, ranging from quantitative risk assessments over structured qualitative risk assessment/risk ranking to opinions with short deadlines summarising existence knowledge from scientific literature. The approach taken depends on both the terms of reference (ToR) as received from the EC (European Commission), the available data and resources, and last but not least the time frame for the work following the risk managers' needs.


Author(s): Turner, William J.N; Walker, Iain S.; Roux, Jordan | Abstract: This study used an advanced airflow, energy and humidity modeling tool to evaluate residential air-side economizers and mechanical pre-cooling strategies using the air conditioner, in all US DOE Climate Zones for a typical new home with ASHRAE Standard 62.2 compliant ventilation. A residential air-side economizer is a large supply fan used for night ventilation. Mechanical pre-cooling used the building air conditioner operating at lower than usual set before the peak demand period. The simulations were performed for a full year using one-minute time steps to allow for scheduling of ventilation systems and to account for interactions between ventilation and HVAC systems. The short time steps also allow for more precise evaluation of HVAC system cycling operation. The results showed that a residential economizer can save large quantities (more than 2000 kWh/year) of cooling energy – in some cases the energy savings offset all of the mechanical ventilation related energy use. Using a high performance Brushless Permanent Magnet (BPM) air handler in the HVAC system saved an additional 12% of cooling energy compared to more typical Permanent Split Capacitor (PSC) air handlers. However, economizers may cause problems with excess humidity in climate zones 2A and 3A (Houston and Memphis) due to increases in indoor humidity. The economizer was most effective in the hot and dry Climate Zones 2B, 3B (Phoenix, El Paso) and the marine Climate Zone 3C (San Francisco). There were less significant, but still desirable, energy savings in mixed temperature Climate Zones 4A, B a C (Baltimore, Albuquerque and Salem). The effectiveness of pre-cooling is highly dependent on climate zone and the selected pre-cooling strategy. In this study the pre-cooling strategies included two levels of temperature depression: 22.2° and 23.3°C and pre-cooling times of 8, 5 and 3 hours. The results showed the expected tradeoff between peak savings and increased energy use. In looking to maximize peak energy savings and minimize the extra cooling energy used, our results showed that the high cooling climates (zones 1A-3B) gave the best results for the shortest time and least temperature depression. Climates with less cooling showed better results for pre-cooling with the least temperature depression. Climate Zones 3C and 8 showed no advantage with pre-cooling strategies due to near-zero air conditioning loads. One caveat with the pre-cooling recommendations is that they were for a lightweight wood frame construction and may change for heavier brick/block structures not included in this study.


The article shows that special legislation to regulate corporate forms for entrepreneurial activity (apart from forms for non-commercial activities) has been developed in Kazakhstan since the 1990s. The most important stages in such development are highlighted, with special emphasis on the influence of Russian legal developments. The article includes description of the current structure, content, and specifics of Kazakhstan's legislation on corporate forms for economic activity. The absence of a clear concept of company law and of a legal term 'corporation' in the law of Kazakhstan is noted in the paper, and also it is argued that a body of company law (or corporate law) of Kazakhstan has not been adequately institutionalised yet within the national legal system. The author identifies the main trends in the development of company/corporate law in Kazakhstan and key concerns related to it.


Condensation of tert-butyl (E)-3-(2'-aminophenyl)propenoate with a range of aromatic and heteroaromatic aldehydes gives the corresponding imines as single diastereoisomers (>98% de). Addition of lithium (R)-N-benzyl-N-(alpha-methylbenzyl)amide initiates a tandem conjugate addition/cyclization reaction to generate 2-aryl-4-aminotetrahydroquinoline-3-carboxylic acid derivatives in >98% de, >98% ee and high isolated yield. Hydrogenolysis of an N(1)-Boc protected derivative allows selective cleavage of the N-benzyl-N-alpha-methylbenzyl protecting groups without compromise of the diastereo- or enantiopurity.


Linguistics and archaeology have been, and continue to be, entwined in the discourse on the early human history of the Pacific. It is commonly assumed, explicitly or otherwise, that the bearers of the Lapita culture were speakers of Proto-Oceanic, the ancestor of the Austronesian languages of most of the Pacific. In this discursive piece, the chronological data for the location and timing of the emergence of Lapita pottery are compared with the linguistic data for the source region of Proto-Oceanic. Although both pottery and proto-language may possibly originate in the same location, this is not the most likely scenario if the evidence from the two disciplines is evaluated independently. There is no necessary historical association for the emergence of the Proto-Oceanic language and Lapita pottery. The Proto-Oceanic language and Lapita pottery should not be assumed to represent a single historical vector, as is commonly the case; rather, they should be considered discrete and separate historical phenomena.


An overview of parallel computing is provided, with reference to numerical analysis and, in particular, to computational electromagnetics. The history of parallelism is reviewed, and the general principles are provided. The two main types of parallelism encountered, pipelining and replication are discussed, and an example of each is described. A parallel algorithm for forming a matrix-vector product is presented and analyzed. This is then used as the core of a parallel conjugate gradient algorithm. The theoretically predicted efficiency and the measured efficiency are compared. A glossary and a brief discussion of the available literature on parallel processing are included.<<ETX>>


In this research, inspired by real life problems, very important scheduling areas, i.e. variability and due date related goals are considered. The focus of this study is on tardiness related objective functions in a scheduling system and the importance of the variability in tardiness and its effects on other tardiness related objectives. First the importance of minimizing variability of the positive difference between completion time of each job and its due date with the aid of some examples is explained. To measure the variability of tardiness in a flow shop scheduling system, the variance of tardiness as an objective function is considered. In this study the goal is finding a good compromise between minimizing variability in the system (variance of tardiness) and minimizing three other due date related objectives which are, total tardiness, maximum tardiness, and number of tardy jobs. One of the important advantages of the new objective function results from smoothing the difference of completion time of each job and its due date. In a situation that tardiness due to different uncertainties in the system cannot be avoided in the system, the new objective function helps to reduce the variability in the system and increase customer satisfaction in a situation that tardiness due to different uncertainties in the system cannot be avoided in the system. The enumeration analysis shows that variance of tardiness has no common behavior with other due date related objectives like total tardiness or number of tardy jobs. It means by minimizing variance of tardiness the other objective functions can be increased or decreased or it can also have no influence on the other objective functions. This shows that this new objective function should be considered next to other objective functions to minimize variability in tardiness next to other business targets. To solve this multi-objective function scheduling problem and reach a good compromise between all objective functions, two Algorithms are presented: Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGA II) and Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm (SPEA2) are presented. For the presented test problems, the numerical results show that SPEA2 has more efficient results in comparison with NSGAII; however, CPU time for NSGAII is significantly smaller than SPEA2.


All the archaeal genomes sequenced to date contain a single Type 2 RNase H gene. We found that the genome of a halophilic archaeon, Halobacterium sp. NRC-1, contains an open reading frame with similarity to Type 1 RNase H. The protein encoded by the Vng0255c gene, possessed amino acid sequence identities of 33% with Escherichia coli RNase HI and 34% with a Bacillus subtilis RNase HI homologue. The B. subtilis RNase HI homologue, however, lacks amino acid sequences corresponding to a basic protrusion region of the E. coli RNase HI, and the Vng0255c has the similar deletion. As this deletion apparently conferred a complete loss of RNase H activity on the B. subtilis RNase HI homologue protein, the Vng0255c product was expected to exhibit no RNase H activity. However, the purified recombinant Vng0255c protein specifically cleaved an RNA strand of the RNA/DNA hybrid in vitro, and when the Vng0255c gene was expressed in an E. coli strain MIC2067 it could suppress the temperature-sensitive growth defect associated with the loss of RNase H enzymes of this strain. These results in vitro and in vivo strongly indicate that the Halobacterium Vng0255c is the first archaeal Type 1 RNase H. This enzyme, unlike other Type 1 RNases H, was able to cleave an Okazaki fragment-like substrate at the junction between the 3'-side of ribonucleotide and 5'-side of deoxyribonucleotide. It is likely that the archaeal Type 1 RNase H plays a role in the removal of the last ribonucleotide of the RNA primer from the Okazaki fragment during DNA replication.


The paper identified factors that influence the adoption and contribution of conservation agriculture (CA) on household food security using household-level data collected in 2010 from Nkhotakota District, Central Malawi where Total Land Care (TLC) a local Non-governmental Organization (NGO) has been promoting CA. To determine factors that influence adoption of CA, a Probit regression model was used. Then, the paper compared estimated production function between adopters and non- adopters of CA. The Probit results show that age and education level of the household head, number of extension visits, and land holding size are important factors that influence farmers' adoption of CA in the study area. Further results showed that CA adopters had more than 50% higher maize production than that of non-adopters from the Cobb-Douglas production estimates. From the findings, there should be improvement in the delivery of extension services in the promotion and dissemination of agricultural technology to foster wider adoption and improve food security status in the study areas. This can be achieved through increased number of extension workers, increase number of demonstrations when introducing CA technology and improved access to formal education. Our overall results show consistently that CA adopters are better off than non-adopters in various aspects such as maize production, per capita maize requirements and meal frequency. As such, the promoting and up-scaling of CA technologies to smallholder farmers should be intensified as an effective strategy for addressing household food insecurity than the promotion of chemical fertilizers use through programs such as the Farm Inputs Subsidy Program, which is not only unsustainable, but also inappropriate for poor resource farmers.


To succeed in today's globalized world, it is important to understand the places and cultures outside our own. Yet despite the acknowledged need for and importance of a greater understanding of the world, various surveys assessing geographic knowledge have demonstrated the geographic ignorance of people in the U.S. The purpose of this study is to assess the level of geographic literacy among undergraduate college students and to investigate factors that may influence geographic literacy. An on-line survey, adapted from the National Geographic –Roper 2002 Global Geographic Literacy Survey, was administered to a sample of undergraduate students at Virginia Tech. The survey included a geography "quiz" to assess knowledge of geography and world events and a background section to collect information about various factors that may influence the participants' geographic literacy. Over 400 students participated in the study. The data were statistically analyzed using the Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests for differences in means. Contrary to much of the previous research, the participants in this survey demonstrated a good level of geographic knowledge. The mean score of the geography "quiz" was 81 percent. Some of the factors found to have influence on the scores were gender, international travel, major, fulfillment of Virginia Tech's Area 7 requirement, frequency of news media access, and type of news accessed. Age, academic class, GPA, residency status, junior/high school geography classes, international friends, and knowledge of foreign languages were found to have little or no influence.


They say that the bread of exi1e is bitter, yet it nourishes us.(1) One of the most significant aspects of post-World War II migration to Australia has been the increasing diversification in the ethnic composition of immigrants. Currently, the Australian population is made up of people from over 110 countries. One in four Australians is from a non-English speaking background (NESB). Policy responses at the government level have reflected these changes by the shift from assimilation to integration to multiculturalism. Correspondingly, feminism in Australia is also faced with the challenge of responding to these changes. Feminism in Australia operates at three broad levels: academic, community, and government. Of these three, community and government are considered to be much more responsive to the issues pertaining to NESB women than the academic.(2) Historically, mainstream Australian feminist theory has been regarded as presenting culturally specific issues relevant mainly to middle-class Anglo-Celtic women as universal issues for all women in Australia.(3) Commitment to feminist ideals is often judged in terms of adherence to middle-class Anglo-Celtic norms in all spheres, including dress codes.(4) Attempts to correct this false homogeneity have often gone to the other extreme, by conceptualising NESB women as totally "the other." This otherness takes two forms. One is the "exotic other": this is the NESB woman of esoteric food, dance, music and clothing and, in the case of some communities, of various magical, mystical beliefs and practices.(5) The second is the "oppressed" other: both popular and academic representations of NESB women tending to enforce stereotypes of them as totally oppressed. For some mainstream feminists, the roots of this oppression lie solely in the cultures of the NESB women; hence multiculturalism is seen as likely to jeopardise the gains made for Australian women in recent decades: Feminism and multiculturalism have become essential articles of progressive faith. But these two tenets are often incompatible. The central premise of the multiculturalist credo, after all, is that all cultures are created equal. . . . Yet is it not possible that many people come to [Western countries] because they are attracted to the West's way of doing things? This may be particularly true of women, who often relish liberation from the patriarchal customs of home.(6) The two basic assumptions in this approach are: that NESB women generally migrate independently to Australia and that patriarchy is something peculiar to non-Western countries. The reality is that while some women did come alone,(7) most of the immigrant women arriving in Australia came and were treated as wives, fiancees, daughters and sometimes as mothers.(8) While a significant number of migrants have been admitted on humanitarian grounds, the major aim of Australia's immigration policy was simultaneously to recruit labour and to support the reproduction and growth of both labour power and the local consumer market. Migrant women's role in the fulfilment of these aims was a stereotypical one. Thus women came to Australia largely as dependents, except occasionally when concern for the unbalanced sex ratio was thought to place 'Australian' women at risk or encourage anti-social male migrant behaviour (stereotyping Italian men as fiery or violent, for example); or when some women were sought as domestics, again within traditional family and female roles.(9) More 'sympathetic' feminist accounts tend to locate NESB women's difficulties in the many structural barriers that they face. These include: - Economic barriers: limited opportunities to learn English, lack of marketable skills or non-recognition of overseas qualifications, dress and accents are some of the impediments to most NESB women being able to secure any or few well-paid jobs.(10) - Political barriers: since it is usually NESB men who are the principal applicants, Government and other agencies tend to delegate to them the task of representing their communities. …


This paper raises a number of critical questions regarding the contribution of education to peacebuilding. Despite recent calls for greater collaboration between the two fields, there is still a lack of clarity regarding the change theories through which education may contribute to peacebuilding processes. This paper outlines developments over the past decade in the field of education and conflict, before identifying five rationales for the ways in which education contributes to peacebuilding. The second half of the paper examines the translation of these rationales into practice. Sierra Leone is often regarded as a success story of UN peacebuilding and, 10 years post-agreement, offers the opportunity to examine a broad range of programming. Using data gathered during a two-week field study (17–28 January, 2011), the paper reflects on five education programmes that operated in Sierra Leone in the post-conflict period. Semi-structured interviews were held with project personnel and beneficiaries, educational officials, students and graduates, community leaders and UN personnel to assess views on the contribution of education to peacebuilding, the rationales informing projects and challenges to implementation. A number of critical questions are raised regarding the lessons learned by the international community, its tendency to pursue its own agendas and its commitment to conflict transformation through peacebuilding.


Contact lenses seem to be the ideal method of vision correction for ametropic people who participate in sporting activities. This thesis sets out to evaluate the viewpoint of the optometric professional and that of the patient on the use of contact lenses in sport and to establish if education is needed within this area. It also aims to provide some scientific evidence on the effect of exercise on the physiology of the cornea with and without contact lenses. Silicone hydrogel contact lenses have previously been suggested to impede heat dissipation from the cornea compared to mid water hydrogels. This was further demonstrated with exercise. The physiological integrity of the cornea is dependant on the amount of oxygen available to its surfaces. Contact lenses can disrupt the diffusion of oxygen to the cornea. Previous methods of measuring the oxygen consumption of the cornea have been limited by their invasive nature and assessment of only a small surface area of the cornea. They are not suitable to measure corneal oxygen consumption during exercise with and without contact lenses. A new method needed to be established. This was achieved by designing a novel method by the use of an oxygen sensor inside an airtight goggle using dynamic quenching of luminescence method. This established a non-contact way of measuring the effect oxygen uptake with and without contact lenses in vivo, allowing the contact lens to be undisturbed in their natural environment. The new method differentiated between the closed-eye and the open-eye condition with a good within-visit repeatability. It also illustrated that the cornea utilises oxygen at a faster rate during controlled aerobic exercise at moderate intensity. New contact lenses are available specifically for sport, these claim to reduce glare and increase contrast for daylight outdoor sports. However, visual benefits of these types of contact lenses cannot be measured easily in an indoor clinical environment, such as the optometric practice. To demonstrate any potential benefits of these lenses emulation of them should be conducted outdoors.


In this paper, we obtain some relationships between the curvatures of (r + 1)-dimensional generalized time-like ruled surfaces. We also calculate the drall of a generalized time-like ruled surfaces when the base curve is taken as an orthogonal trajectory of the generated spaces.


Present days, herbal medicines are widely practiced to treat cardio vascular diseases (CVD) and heart care management in most of the Asian countries. The present study was to evaluate the hypercholesterolemic and antioxidative effect of Boerhaavia diffusa root extract (BD) on oxidized cholesterol induced hypercholesterolemia in rats. The root extract was prepared in 70% ethanolic medium by soxhlet extraction procedure.  Experiment was designed to carry out with 18 male albino rats which are equally divided into 3 groups for four week experiment. All experimental animals provided rat chow and water ad libitum. Group II and III received oxidized cholesterol through gastric intubation at the dose of 1mg/rat/day, where as in group III followed by BD at the dose of 1ml/rat/day for 4 weeks. Parameters like lipid peroxidation, total cholesterol and antioxidant status in plasma along with catalase (CAT), glutathione reductase (Gred) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) in liver tissue were analyzed on oxidized cholesterol supplemented rats with and/or without treatment of BD. The total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG) and LDL levels in plasma of group II remained high compared to the counterparts. But in group III showed significant decrease in TC, TG and LDL levels by 34.39%, 42.13% and 48.30%, respectively. The based on findings, it seems very levelheaded to believe that this greener way of formulation of herbal medicines is not just a utilization of naturally occurring medicinal herbs but also to make it available for the betterment of the society at low cost. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3126/ijasbt.v2i1.9483 Int J Appl Sci Biotechnol, Vol. 2(1): 69-74


This paper examines the role of cash-plus programming (including graduation) for livelihoods, income, protection, and health outcomes in contexts of different conflict intensity. We assess the origins of cash-plus programming (including graduation) for livelihoods outcomes as it has developed in settings that are more peaceful and where social protection systems are stronger. The paper then considers fragile and conflict-affected settings (FCAS), where social protection systems are often weak, and the threat of conflict-related violence undermines livelihoods as well as programming operations. We introduce a simple framework to understand programming contexts in FCAS, using both the strength of the social protection system as well as the intensity of conflict to identify four broad categories or landscapes for cash-plus programming. We use this framework to present the findings of a comprehensive review and analysis of 42 cash-plus programmes in 17 fragile and conflict-affected countries. This review maps key features in design and implementation of social and humanitarian cash assistance augmented by livelihood support across FCAS. There is significant variation, and few dominant patterns, in the objectives, coverage, duration, type of support, implementers, and impacts of programmes. This reflects the very different landscapes of conflict and systems of social assistance provisioning that exist across the countries covered in the review. Finally, we draw out lessons, questions, and challenges for programme design and implementation across different contexts and provide suggestions for future deeper research on these themes in the Better Assistance in Crises (BASIC) Research programme.


Water is a primary concern for producers in the Great Plains; as such, research is warranted to quantify how much cover crops affect the amount of soil water available to subsequent cash crops. Cover crop mixes have been marketed as a means to conserve water in no-till cropping systems following winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) harvest. The objectives of this study are to quantify changes in soil profile water content in the presence of different cover crops and mixtures of increasing species complexity, to quantify their biomass productivity and quality, and to quantify the impact of cover crops on subsequent corn (Zea mays L.) yields. We hypothesized the change in soil water brought on by the cover crop treatments would be correlated to the quantity of biomass produced and the species composition, rather than mixture complexity. Soil moisture was measured using a neutron probe to a depth of 9 ft. Results from 2013–14 showed no difference in water use between cover crop mixtures and single species. Cover crops depleted the soil profile by a maximum of 3.5 in. during growth, but fallow was able to gain 0.75 in. of water during the same period. At the time of corn planting, soil moisture under all cover crops had replenished to levels at cover crop emergence, except for the brassicas, which had extracted water from deeper in the profile. Corn yields were reduced following the grass cover crops and the six-species mix. Corn yields were more closely related to the carbon:nitrogen (C:N) ratio of the cover crop residue than to profile soil moisture at corn emergence. The fact that yields were similar for corn after fallow and for corn after brassica cover crops implied that water was not the cause of yield reductions after the other cover crops.


Author(s): Regnier, Cynthia; Mathew, Paul; Schwartz, Peter; Shackelford, Jordan; Robinson, Alastair; Walter, Travis | Abstract: Most building retrofit projects are still component-based in that they typically address only one piece or type of equipment at a time. Systems-based retrofits that seek to address multiple components in an integrated manner have the potential to provide significantly greater energy savings. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) partnered with several utilities to develop and evaluate three different integrated retrofit packages involving lighting systems: automated shading with daylight dimming controls, workstation-specific lighting with daylight controls, and task/ambient lighting with plug load occupancy controls. Specifically, our analysis sought to quantify the marginal benefits of these systems (energy savings as well as lighting performance and visual comfort) relative to component based approaches. The analysis was based on a combination of measured performance data from LBNL's FLEXLAB® test facility and energy simulations. All three systems were compared to a simple fluorescent-to-LED retrofit, which represents the component-based approach. While the simple LED upgrade provides significant lighting energy savings of 63%, the systems yielded energy savings of 81-93%, which equates to additional savings of 49-82% over the simple LED upgrade (Table A-1).1 All systems tested provided satisfactory visual comfort as well, indicating good potential for market acceptance.


In this chapter, we will present criteria for user selection and relay selection to enhance the physical layer security in multiuser multi-relay networks. Specifically, for multiuser networks with multiple amplify-and-forward (AF) relays, we present three criteria to select the best relay and user pair. Criteria I and II study the received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the receivers and perform the selection by maximising the SNR ratio ofthe user to the eavesdroppers. To this end, criterion I relies on both the main and eavesdropper links, while criterion II relies on the main links only. Criterion III is the standard max-min selection criterion, which maximises the minimum of the dual-hop channel gains of main links. For the three selection criteria, we examine the system secrecy performance by deriving the analytical expressions for the secrecy outage probability. We also derive the asymptotic analysis for the secrecy outage probability with high main-to-eavesdropper ratio.


The manner in which information is presented can profoundly affect the interpretation of that information and, consequently, any action taken. As an illustrative example, let us assume that swimming pools across the country have to report the time it takes to rescue a child who is drowning. As a parent, would you be satisfied if the median time to rescue a drowning child was 30 seconds? Knowing that a lifeguard could reach your child in only half a minute may be comforting. However, this comfort likely would not last if you were then informed that the 90th percentile is 6 minutes, a time which is likely life-threatening. We argue here that acute ischemic stroke treatment faces a similar reporting issue and that we should be doing more to acknowledge and improve the 90th percentile for stroke patients.

We recommend that investigators report interval times with the 90th percentile, in addition to median and interquartile range, in their primary results on paper and at presentation. In the long run, this change would allow us to focus on ensuring that the majority of patients are treated within an acceptable time frame, rather than only 50% of patients. Additionally, efforts tailored to improving the 90th percentile would result in improved systems of care and stroke outcomes.

Based on data from recent endovascular trials, it is absolutely clear that when it comes to stroke treatment, time is brain.1–5 The longer the time from onset to reperfusion, the lower the likelihood of good outcome.6 The effect of time delay is even more pronounced when one considers onset to randomization times in endovascular trials.1–5 This is not because of physiological factors; rather, it is the result of these trials overtly selecting patients based on favorable imaging. In all of …


Aegirine is synthesized at temperatures as low as 200°C in the system Si, Fe, Na, H 2 O. Aegirine is mixed with a poorly crystallized 2:1 ferric phyllosilicate. At lower temperature, only 2:1 phyllosilicates are synthesized. A thermodynamic approach shows that the synthesized aegirine is in equilibrium with ferripyrophyllite, and that the stability field of aegirine at lower temperature is strongly reduced by a 2:1 phyllosilicate with a tetrahedral charge due to tetrahedral substitutions of Si for Fe 3+ .


The development of efficient full-spectrum-activated photocatalysts has become a research topic of intense interest in environmental remediation or solar energy conversion applications. Herein, newly Z-scheme UV-vis-NIR-activated photocatalysts consisting of β-NaYF4:18% Yb3+, 2% Er3+@TiO2–Ag6Si2O7 (denoted as NaYF4@T–ASO) were designed and used as full-spectrum response photocatalysts. For tailoring NaYF4@T–ASO, the size of in situ deposited ASO nanoparticles on the surface of NaYF4@T microplates was determined by the pumping rate of the AgNO3 precursor, which played indirect roles in the photocatalytic activity with different carrier migration distances. Especially, NaYF4@T–ASO (S10) with the smallest and well distributed ASO nanoparticles showed superior photocatalytic activity than the commercial P25 TiO2 by 15 fold under the stimulated solar light irradiation. The enhanced photocatalytic performance of NaYF4@T–ASO could be ascribed to the synergic effect of the upconversion material and the direct Z-scheme heterojunction formed between TiO2/ASO, where the Z-scheme heterojunction induced efficient separation of photogenerated carriers and highly oxidative species (h+ and ˙O2−). Alternative mechanisms of carriers and energy transfer under various light sources have been proposed and discussed in detail.


We develop a framework linking organizational and industry architectures to value creation and value capture, and apply it to the case of Industry 4.0 (the coordinated use of digitally-enabled technologies like robots, sensors, and artificial intelligence) in the automotive industry. We argue that if factory owners develop automation methods that capitalize on their greater access to the context in which production data is generated, they will be better able to prevent value from migrating to "digital entrants" that offer automation consulting and data analytics. Manufacturers can do this by adopting an organizational architecture that empowers shop-floor workers to combine their local knowledge with digital tools. Conversely, to the extent that digital entrants develop a more abstract version of these tools that they spread across industries, they will capture more value.


The goal of this research was to model the relationship between stress and natural disasters, with a view to explaining levels of stress among women. Following flooding in Iowa, in 1993, two in-depth questionnaire surveys were administered, one to residents in high flood exposure areas, and another to the general population as a control. Results indicated that gender plays a significant role in interpreting stress responses to natural hazards, with women consistently exhibiting greater stress than men. However, it was evident that a complex web of factors influenced stress levels including marital status, structure of the family unit, age, socio-economic status, health, levels of social involvement, and degree of hazard experience. These findings suggest that more research should focus on determining structural constraints that exacerbate stress levels for women.


"On the 31st of August, 1846, I left Concord in Massachusetts for Bangor and the backwoods of Maine"--thus begins The Maine Woods, the evocative story of Thoreau's journeys through a familiar yet untouched land. As he explores Mt. Katahdin (an Indian word meaning "highest land"), Lake Chesuncook, the Allagash River, and the East Branch of the Penobscot, Thoreau muses on his own vulnerability and the humility engendered by his solitude in the wilderness. Throughout Thoreau invokes the forest of Maine--the mountains, waterways, fauna, flora, and the people--in his singular style. Echoing Walden, Thoreau's passionate outcry against the degradation of the environment in The Maine Woods will resonate strongly today. This fully annotated gift edition of The Maine Woods makes a wonderful companion volume to Walden: A Fully Annotated Edition and I to Myself: An Annotated Selection from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.


Radiotherapy is a local approach that involves the use of ionising radiation by exploiting its cell-killing effect to cure cancer. This effect, however, is not specific to damage only cancerous cells and spare healthy cells. Therefore, developments in radiotherapy aimed at reducing treatment uncertainties such that therapeutic radiation dose may be delivered to a malignant tumour while decreasing the dose received by healthy tissues. The recent advances in imaging techniques impacted and radiotherapy strategies enormously by facilitating the personalisation of the treatments and the dose to healthy tissues. To date, computed tomography (CT) is considered the primary modality in radiotherapy, providing a personalised patient model to forecast the radiation attenuation in human beings. Also, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is increasingly used in radiotherapy planning, especially for tumour delineation, owing to its superior soft-tissue contrast compared with CT. In Western countries, prostate cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancer in men and radiotherapy is one of the curative treatments for prostate cancer patients. Since the prostate is a gland constituted of soft tissue, the advantage of using MRI for radiotherapy is recognised: it facilitates precision of target delineation. The current pathway for prostate cancer radiotherapy consists of patient simulation both on CT and MRI. Unfortunately, image registration is then required potentially introducing systematic spatial uncertainties and errors during treatment planning given the fact that CT and MR are acquired at a different moment and potentially affected by set-up differences. To remove potential inter-scan differences "MR-only radiotherapy" has been proposed. Also, MR-only radiotherapy offers practical and logistical advantages as simplifying the pathway by reducing the overall treatment cost and workload and lowering patient exposure to ionising radiation. In MR-only radiotherapy, sole MR images are used for delineation, dose planning and as reference images for patient positioning during irradiation. However, MRI does not provide information to forecast the attenuation of radiation in the body, and it may suffer geometrical distortion impacting the accuracy of patient positioning. To overcome such challenges, this thesis investigated strategies to perform MRI-based prostate radiotherapy facilitating future clinical implementation. First, the thesis focused on the evaluation of the dosimetric accuracy obtainable during MR-based planning studies. Embracing the clinical perspective, the accuracy of MR-based dose calculation has been investigated using a commercially available solution for sCT generation called MRCAT (Philips Healthcare). MR-based dose calculation for photon and proton radiotherapy was studied demonstrating its accuracy. Second, it was assessed whether image-guided radiotherapy (IGRT) is feasible when patient setup correction relies solely on MRI as a reference imaging modality. Considering that IGRT for prostate patients is based on gold fiducial marker implanted in the prostate. It has been evaluated the inter-observer localisation of the marker. Also, an automatic method has been proposed leading to a detection rate comparable to a manual observer. Ultimately, the work presented in this thesis contributed to shaping the clinical implementation of the MR-only pathway in Utrecht aiming at ensuring a safe introduction of MR-only radiotherapy for prostate cancer patients.


Fossil tetrapod swim tracks have been reported from deposits throughout the world, ranging in age from the Carboniferous (Mississippian) to the Neogene (Pleistocene). A normalized analysis of these occurrences demonstrates that lower Triassic strata contain an anomalously high number of occurrences. Lower Triassic swim tracks also tend to be better preserved, showing exceptionally detailed features such as scale striae and crescent-shaped claw margins. Preservation of these features required a firm and semicohesive substrate in order to maintain track detail before and after burial. Swim-track localities from the lower Triassic Moenkopi Formation in Utah (USA) are characterized by sedimentary and trace fossil features that demonstrate the widespread development and persistence of firmground substrates in a large delta plain complex. Within this delta, complex low-diversity invertebrate trace fossil assemblages consist of locally high densities of diminutive, millimeter-scale traces characteristic of stressed brackish-water faunas. We suggest that the depauperate infauna characteristic of such environments was repressed due to delayed biotic recovery following the end-Permian mass extinction, resulting in extremely low intensities of bioturbation. Lack of biogenic mixing promoted semiconsolidation of dewatered mud substrates and the widespread production and persistence of firmgrounds capable of recording and maintaining swim tracks. Thus a combination of factors, unique to the Early Triassic, increased the preservation potential of detailed swim tracks: (1) depositional environments that promoted the production of firmground substrates, (2) delayed ecologic recovery resulting in the lack of well-bioturbated sediment, and (3) the swimming behavior of various Early Triassic tetrapods.


This thesis examines literary and historical accounts of the Creole slave ship revolt (1841) by Frederick Douglass, William Wells Brown, Lydia Maria Child and Pauline E. Hopkins. The introduction debates the generic status of government testimony and press reportage and identifies the fundamental theoretical issues of the dissertation which include those of intentionality, intertextuality and "signifyin(g)." Chapter I traces the traditions of black and white abolitionism which influenced Douglass's adaptations of the mutiny and researches his representations of the heroic slave figure, Madison Washington, in speeches which he gave in Britain and America during the 1840s. Chapter II analyses the major critical questions surrounding Douglass's. The Heroic Slave (1853) while exploring its previously neglected theatrical conventions. This chapter also compares this work with Douglass's recently discovered second version, The Heroic Slave: A Thrilling Narrative of the Adventures of Madison Washington in Pursuit of Liberty (1853/63? ). Chapter III contextualises Brown's (re)modelling of the black historical figure by examining the varying types of forum - including both periodical and historical volumes - within which he published "Madison Washington" (1861,1863) and "Slave Revolt at Sea" (1867). This chapter discusses Brown's experimentation with an antislavery panorama and interweaving of literary, biographical and historical techniques to revise existing formal conventions. The final chapter interprets Child's biography of "Madison Washington" published in The Freedmen's Book (1866), and Hopkins's short story, "A Dash for Liberty" (1901), in terms of their interventions into gendered representations of slave heroism. Child's text is considered alongside her earlier journalism on the Creole revolt and her short story on insurrection, "The Black Saxons" (1846), and contextualised by an analysis of its publication in an educational tract. This chapter also discusses Hopkins's "Famous Men and Women of the Negro Race" (1901-2), and her textual borrowings from Brown's "Slave Revolt at Sea" (1866) to demonstrate the political imperatives guiding her dramatisations of black history. Finally, the conclusion explores the mid-twentieth century version of this revolt, Madison (1956), a musical composed by the black playwright, Theodore Ward, to indicate the importance of this approach for re-evaluating intertextual relationships across black and white abolitionist authors, throughout the nineteenth century and after.


Background: In 2013, 36 million adults (73%) in the UK accessed the Internet daily with over 245 million (78.1%) daily users in the USA. Increased use of the internet is reflected in the growing trend of Internet Mediated Research (IMR) for survey and intervention studies. This trend presents an opportunity for FSD to develop as a methodology. Aim: to construct and present a FSD study within an IMR laboratory.Method: The study employed a virtual research environment managed by Project Implicit®. FSD methods were utilised to identify predictor variables and construct the vignette stem. Assignment of the predictor variables and generation of the vignettes was achieved offline using customised algorithms. Validated patient photographs were integrated with vignettes enhancing realism. The online presentation of the vignettes was programmed using JavaScript. Multiple gatekeepers in 2 health trusts and 2 universities emailed invitations to participants containing the study hyperlink through which participants self-administered the survey. This deployment method guaranteed anonymity a necessity with a sensitive topic.Results: The technology constructed and presented realistic clinical vignettes adhering to FSD criteria. Orthogonality was achieved as Spearman rank correlations among predictor variables were all < 0.1. N=427 participants completed 3,416 vignettes, no technical difficulties were experienced.Conclusion: This study created an environment conducive for exploring sensitive issues with decision-making, enhanced recruitment via its originality and contributed to the development of FSD as a methodology.


A new subcategory of employee status - the recently coined 'employee shareholder' - is presently in force in Britain effective from 1st September 2013. This paper discusses and analyses the main rules applicable to the employee shareholder. From amongst this select body of regulations, emphasis is placed on the procedures and technicalities of the contract, specifically in relation to the contentious mechanism whereby the previous contract of employment is converted into the new contract of employee shareholder. Additionally, possible contradictions arising from the recently enacted legislation are identified and the tenor of the legal framework, in light of these discrepancies, reflected on at length. Against the backdrop of this doctrinal analysis, the purpose of this contribution ultimately cogitates upon how, ontologically, the new category of employee complies with the 'state of the art' EU legislation which requires Member States to implement forms of participation of the workers in the management and capital of a company. In this respect, the only rational conclusion to be drawn is that Britain appears to be, both politically and legislatively, much closer to America than to the shores of the Old Continent.


The purpose of this paper is to review options for measuring innovation in the informal sector and proposes an agenda for future work.,It starts with a review of surveys of innovation in the formal business sector, and related definitions, as sources of questions and definitions which could be applied to the informal sector. Then, labor force surveys, and those that are combined with establishment surveys to measure informal sector activities, are examined with a view to adding questions, or modules, on the measurement of innovation in the informal sector. In addition, the advantages of using semi-structured interviews and ad hoc questionnaires in specific sub-sectors of the informal sector are explored.,The discussion leads to a possible agenda for future work on the development of policy relevant indicators of innovation in the informal economy. Two viable scenarios emerge: first, adding innovation questions to existing large-scale surveys of the informal economy; and/or second, conducting ad hoc questionnaire- and interview-based sectoral studies in selected countries.,The proposed course of actions suffers from a few shortcomings: first, amending existing surveys as proposed here is always a challenging undertaking. A new survey questions have to be tested (cognitive and other testing); their deployment also depends on the willingness of countries to include new questions. Second, surveying the informal economy and applying proper sampling will remain an issue, no matter how good the survey design, and not matter how sincere the effort. Third, and finally, conducting these new survey techniques will require substantial resources over time.,In the coming years, new efforts are planned to gather data and better measure innovation in developing countries, such as the third edition of the African Innovation Outlook. This will widen the scope of reporting and analysis to include coverage of innovations in the informal sector (AU-NEPAD 2014). The suggestions in this chapter are intended to lay important groundwork for future empirical work, to help develop appropriate indicators and support new approaches to innovation policy in developing countries. Pragmatic suggestions are formulated, pointing to potential opportunities and challenges.,The informal economy is a hugely important contributor to economic growth and social well-being in Africa and other developing countries. Better measurement and contributing to a better understanding of innovation in the informal economy will be important progress.,The contribution of the paper lies in the novel combination of tested approaches in informal sector surveys, on the one hand, and innovation surveys in the formal sector, on the other hand. The approaches provide ways forward to gain better understanding of the innovation in the informal economy, and to support innovation policy in African countries and beyond.


Game design is a sibling discipline to software and Web design, but they're siblings that grew up in different houses. They have much more in common than their perceived distinction typically suggests, and user experience practitioners can realize enormous benefit by exploiting the solutions that games have found to the real problems of design. This book will show you how.


This dissertation investigates the relationships between various aspects of self-concept (i.e., generalized self-efficacy, public self-consciousness, state hope, and self-esteem), clothing selection (i.e., clothing that expresses individuality, clothing that improves the emotional state, clothing that camouflages the body), and life satisfaction among disabled consumers. This study aims to examine the impact that such aspects of disabled consumers' self-concept have on the type of clothing they choose to wear and their life satisfaction. A two-step research design was employed. Step one consisted of a qualitative preliminary study. In step two, a survey questionnaire was developed based on a review of existing literature and the findings of the preliminary study. A total of five hypotheses were developed based on constructs defined in the literature on self-concept, life satisfaction and clothing selection. Existing measurements were selected from the literature to assess each construct and to test the hypotheses. The survey was disseminated at universities and community disability organizations. A total of 318 usable questionnaires were collected from 113 females and 199 males whose ages ranged from 18 to 81 years, with an average age of 38 years. Most of the respondents were Caucasian/White. The majority of the participants had a mobility impairment or a visual impairment, and have had their disabilities for over 10 years. Structural equation modeling was employed via Lisrel 8.8 to test the hypotheses. Results for the main effects of the conceptual model revealed a X2 of 2873.37 (df = 1023; p < .000), GFI of .72, CFI of .94, RMSEA of .076, NFI of .90, and X2/df = 2.80. Based on the inclusion of the two additional paths suggested by the modification indices, the adjusted model had a X2 of 2285.51 (df = 932; p < .000), GFI of .76, CFI of .95, RMSEA of .068, NFI of .91, and X2/df = 2.45. The model was deemed to be an acceptable fit for the data. Results indicate that for disabled consumers, self-esteem is related to two aspects of their multifaceted self-concept, public self-consciousness and state hope, and that self-esteem positively influences life satisfaction. Findings suggest that disabled individuals who are satisfied with their lives are more likely to choose clothing to express their distinctive identities. Positive relationships between state hope and life satisfaction and between public self-consciousness and the assurance dimension of clothing choice were identified. Additionally, significant relationships were found between generalized self-efficacy and self-esteem, and between self-esteem and the assurance dimension of clothing choice. This study provides a theoretical framework that describes the relationships between disabled consumers' self-concept, life satisfaction, and clothing choice. Results shed light on the social-psychological factors influencing clothing choices of disabled consumers and thereby address a gap in the literature by considering the use of clothing by this often overlooked consumer segment. More research is needed to provide further empirical support for the relationships between self-concept, clothing choice, and life satisfaction found in this study.


U.S. banking registered lower profitability in 1986, as the industry withstood another year of heavy loan losses. Problem loans, meanwhile, halted their recent relative decline. This somewhat disappointing news comes despite a fifth consecutive year of U.S. economic expansion and it fuels the arguments of those who suggest a long-term decline in U.S. banking. A closer look at the variety of performance across the industry, however, reveals a more complex picture.


Given the increased national attention to the use of the Clean Air Act to address climate change, an analysis of the origins of the Clean Air Act is instructive for understanding the law in its current form. Contrary to the traditional view, the formation of the Clean Air Act was not the result of the events of the Year of the Environment, but rather, the gradual evolution of a federal regulatory approach to the medium of air between 1955 and 1970. Far from being weak and ineffectual, the federal air pollution laws of 1955, 1963, 1965, and 1967 laid the legal and conceptual framework for the modern Clean Air Act.


A new method based on DNA melting has been developed for the rapid analysis of STRs in the human genome. The system is based on homogeneous PCR followed by fluorescence melting analysis and utilises a HyBeacon probe combined with a PCR primer-blocker oligonucleotide. The use of blockers of different length permits identification of the full range of common D16S539 repeats enabling detection of 99.8% of known alleles. The interrogation of STRs can be carried out on standard genetic analysis platforms and could be applied to other loci to form the basis of a bespoke high-throughput system for use in forensic analysis, particularly as fluorescent genetic analysis platforms are now available for high-resolution melting. This methodology may be suitable for rapid forensic DNA analysis at the point-of-arrest or in a custody suite where it is important to identify an individual from a small group of suspects/detainees.


The histogram location approach has been proposed by Kahn (1997) to estimate the fraction of wage cuts prevented by downward nominal wage rigidity. In this paper, we analyze the validity of the approach by means of a simulation study which yielded evidence of unbiasedness but also of potential underestimation of rigidity parameter uncertainty and therefore of potential anticonservative inference. We apply the histogram location approach to estimate the extent of downward nominal wage rigidity across the EU for 1995-2001. Our data base is the User Data Base (UDB) of the European Community Household Panel (ECHP). The results show wide variation in the fraction of wage cuts prevented by nominal wage rigidity across the EU. The lowest rigidity parameters are found for the UK, Spain and Ireland, the largest for Portugal and Italy. Analyzing the change of rigidity between sub periods 1995-1997 and 1999-2001 even shows an widening of the differences in nominal wage rigidity. Due to the finding of large differences across the EU, the results imply that the costs of low inflation policies across the EU differ substantially.


Melanesian Pidgin is a cover term for closely related varieties of the English-lexifier Pacific Pidgin that is spoken in Vanuatu (where it is known as Bislama), Papua New Guinea (where it is known as Tok Pisin), and Solomon Islands (where it is known as Pijin). Structurally and lexically, Bislama is closer to Solomon Islands Pijin than either is to Tok Pisin. The precise nature of many of the structural differences between these three varieties of Melanesian Pidgin has not been widely described, partly because Bislama, and particularly Solomon Islands Pijin, are relatively little described in the literature. This paper aims to describe one grammatical feature which differentiates these three varieties. The grammatical feature that is the subject of this paper is the form se. It carries a particularly high functional load in Bislama. The same form is also present in Solomons Pijin, though in this variety of Melanesian Pidgin, it has a sharply reduced functional load as compared with Bislama. On the other hand, in most current varieties of Tok Pisin, it is almost completely absent. In those varieties of Tok Pisin in which it is present, its status as a genuinely independent grammatical or lexical item is questionable. This paper will also go somewhat beyond a straightforward structural description of se in Melanesian Pidgin, as it will also reconstruct its history in the three varieties of the language. The paper will concentrate on Bislama, as it is in this variety of the language that the form se is most widely used.


In this paper, we propose a kind of phase conjugate fiber optic gyroscope (FOG). The natural time reversal property of the phase conjugation process can eliminate much of the nonreciprocal effects in optical gyroscope, so this can improve the FOG performance for better applications. We use the degenerate four-wave mixing (DFWM) process to generate counter-propagating phase conjugated waves with the advantage that this process is free from phase matching constrains. DFWM is also a parametric amplification process, so this can remedy the power attenuation in the interacting process and improve the signal to noise ratio. This method can improve sensitivity of the FOG as well. We also take advantage of the evanescent field outside the optical waveguide to interact with the imposed pump field. In this way, we can maximize the nonlinear interaction through choosing proper waveguide dimensions and the cladding materials.