Most businesses monitor their sales, marketing, and supply chain strategies. However, the companies with the best governance and risk management also regularly evaluate their capital and financial plans, understanding and thinking ahead about their needs for liquidity, their mix of different types of funding, and the eventual need to return money to their investors. The exigencies of public markets, as well as the law, require public companies to carefully monitor their capital and financial strategies in this systematic way—and to make timely adjustments when this ongoing evaluation points out the need to do so. This necessity has created a process that well-run private companies would be wise to emulate. Accordingly, this article will explore how private companies adopt the governance and risk management practices of public companies to enhance their performance. More precisely, it will explore how they overcome the challenge of having little visibility into capital market conditions for private companies, a problem that public companies do not have because they must abide by regulations that mandate the disclosure of critical financial and operational information.


The following thesis seeks to understand ancient Jewish ideas concerning the present ontological state of humankind—to which we refer in terms of ancient Jewish ontoanthropology—by exploring tales about humans thought to have had a mystical encounter with the divine and to have undergone ontological change as a result. For beliefs about human mutability and mystical change cannot be grasped without an appreciation for the principal ontoanthropology underlying them, and vice versa. It is our contention, therefore, that any text which advances a mystical change assumes the human to be an intrinsically mutable creature. And it is our aim to gain knowledge of ancient Jewish ideas on such matters.

The project consists of eight chapters. Chapter one introduces the subject, reviews pertinent literature and sets forth the approach and method to be utilised. Chapters two and three investigate Hekhalot Zutarti in the Hekhalot literature and Philo Judaeus' De opificio mundi, respectively. It is demonstrated here how each work shows a deep concern for the mystical-transformative experience of the individual. Chapters four and five analyse Serekh ha-Yahad in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Paul's letter to the Philippians. Here it is shown that the principal concern is the communal mystical-transformative experience. Chapters six and seven explore a motif in which humans are said to be able to ingest the presence of God and thereupon undergo ontological transformation. It is argued that this motif is critical to the message of Joseph and Aseneth and of utmost importance to tractate Sotah of the Babylonian Talmud. Our findings and chief contention will be revisited in chapter eight.

In the end, the various explorations comprising the chapters will lead towards an aggregate portrait of ancient Jewish ontoanthropology. By studying accounts of mystical change, we gain insight into ancient Jewish beliefs about the transformative experience of those who encounter the divine in this life. We also gain understanding of the deeper assumptions about the inherent mutability and ontological potentiality of the human creature which underlie those accounts of mystical change.


I explore in this article whether a more egalitarian society may be achieved by extending the protections and benefits of marriage to more groups or, alternatively, whether it would be better to abolish civil marriage in order to achieve such a goal. Currently, non-standard family arrangements are denied legal protections and benefits as well as social recognition because their failure to meet the paradigms of the matrimonial-family model. Furthermore, in our fixation with promoting a specific model of the family we have produced a very incoherent legal scheme. Consequently, answering this inquiry requires examining why we still adhere to an unequivocal definition of the family as a bureaucratized, monogamous, sexuated, married couple with children. It also requires examining how as society we could achieve what Professors Alice Ristroph and Melissa Murray have denominated as familial disestablishment: requiring the state to recognize the existence of diverse family arrangements and prohibiting the state from favoring one of those arrangements over the others. Attaining familial disestablishment is vital for addressing the three main problems we presently experience with our current legal regulation of the family. First, our legal system prevents a large group of people from exploring alternative ways to arrange intimate relationships by signaling and channeling people into a particular arrangement. Second, an inconsistent body of law that does not protect the real interests it claims to promote because it is premised on the marriage proxy, or simply put, on using the institution of marriage as a synonym for family when granting legal rights and benefits Finally, this inconsistent body of regulation has generated profound legal and social inequalities that oppose the basic tenants of our society. I survey the answers given thus far to these problems by contemporary liberal scholars – such as Martha Nussbaum, Tamara Metz and Jessica Knouse – using the discourse of rights, and conclude that such a theoretical framework is insufficient to encompass the multiple dimensions of familial establishment. These responses that are based on the discourse of rights ignore the use of the marriage proxy, its pernicious effects, and intend only to broaden who is covered under the current established definition of the family. Consequently, they ultimately bring us back to familial establishment and reinstate the same inequality problems we face today. Thus, I propose moving away from the narrative of rights to the narrative of power; and instead use a Neo-Marxist approach, which is more akin to the nature of the problems with familial establishment. Specifically, I employ Gramsci's ideas of hegemony and hegemonic contestation, and Luckas' idea of reification . This framework will help us understand how Family Law and various discourses related to the family have changed while the conception of the family has remained unaltered. It will also help us in comprehending why religious disestablishment has been possible in the United States while family disestablishment has not. By analyzing the established definition of the family from this perspective, this article draws three conclusions. First, I conclude that our subject of study should be the family-marriage dyad (a social and legal conflation of marriage and family as one unequivocal institution). We should not be talking about marriage and family separately, since our current legal process of granting rights to family arrangements is premised on using marriage as a proxy. Second, in order to really understand the legal and social ramifications of that dyad, we must acknowledge that there is a hegemonic discourse to which courts, scholars and people in general have been making reference without really naming it or establishing its contours. That hegemonic discourse is family-normativity. Family-normativity attempts to dictate how family relationships should be lived and arranged as well as to signal which affectionate relations are of social importance and which are not. It encompasses the bureaucratization of family relations, the promotion of two-person sexuated relationships, a monogamous ethic, and the establishment of child rearing as essential to the human families. Finally, the reason why we are not able to move from an unequivocal definition of the family and to familial disestablishment is because the hegemonic discourse of family-normativity has not been contested yet. The reified idea that family arrangements must be legally regulated and the removal of the family from the political realm have precluded that contestation from ensuing. If we truly seek familial disestablishment, the most viable way to achieve it is by unmasking the reified legal regulation of the family as the social construct that it is, so that family normativity could be actually contested. In order to do so, it is essential to engage in dialectical thinking. The only way to do so is by abolishing civil marriage and eradicating all the marriage proxies that exist in the law. This would bring the family back to the public domain and permit individuals to defy family-normativity. As soon as the state disengages from the practice of defining the family and directs its regulatory efforts to identify proxies that are truly related to the social goods it intends to promote, we would be on the path of recognizing and granting rights to the multiplicity of family arrangements that exist and the members thereof. This would eradicate social inequalities and create a more coherent body of law that truly protects the interests it contends to protect.


Traffic is regarded as the main reason for the air pollution problem and it seems obvious to try to reduce the particulate bioload affecting those travelling. Recently Volvo Cars introduced their Interior Air Quality System forcing the cabin air to be recirculated in case of a high level of noxious gases shutting out carbon monoxide, ground-level ozone and nitrogen dioxide. Ionization is another component of Mercedes AIR-BALANCE package. Considering the fact that it is the nano-size ultra-fine particles (UFP) that are known to cause the "oxidative" stress of the immune system one may ask if even the most well designed HEPA filter would sufficiently affect the in-cabin air particulates or is there a need for additional means by which the sub-micron class particles may be captured. An electrostatic field of sufficient strength may serve as an additional tool to clean the cabin air from sub-micron size particles.The initial data from the study indicate that electrostatic mechanisms substantially add to the in-cabin air cleaning properties of ultra-fine particulates compared to the standard filtering technology when recirculating the cabin air.


In the last decades, Brazil experienced a historical decline in its wage inequality level, particularly in the first decade of the 21st century. This paper reviews the literature that attempted to explain the observed pattern. It considers mechanisms related to the supply and demand for labor, as well as institutional factors. The paper argues that the favorable economic environment in the period, combined with increases in the minimum wage, higher formalization, and a larger supply of skilled workers led to a compression in wages. However, some aspects of the decline in wage inequality are still unanswered, such as the causes behind a reduction in the experience premium and interfirm payment heterogeneity, as well as the exact role of technological changes. The paper concludes by discussing future trends in wage inequality in Brazil.


This paper presents a proof-of-concept study and demonstrates the next generation of a "smart" catalyst material, applicable to high temperature catalysis and electro-catalysis such as gas processing and as a catalyst for solid oxide cells. A modified citrate-gel technique was developed for the synthesis of LaxSr1−1.5xTi1−yNiyO3−δ. This method allowed the synthesis of single phase materials with a high specific surface area, after the first calcination step at temperatures as low as 650 °C. Up to 5 at% of nickel could be incorporated into the perovskite structure at this low calcination temperature. X-ray powder diffraction and microscopy techniques have proven the exsolution of nickel nanoclusters under low oxygen partial pressure. The amount of exsoluted nickel nanoparticles was sensitive to surface finishing, whereby much more exsoluted nanoparticles were observed on pre-treated and polished surfaces as compared to original ones. Increasing A-site deficiency leads to a larger number of nickel particles on the surface, indicating a destabilizing influence of the A-site vacancies on the B-site metal cations. Repetitive redox cycles prove that the nickel exsolution and re-integration is a fully reversible process. These materials working in a cyclic and repetitive way may overcome the drawbacks of currently used conventional catalysts used for high temperature systems and overcome major degradation issues related to catalyst poisoning and coarsening-induced aging.


Abstract. The difference due to the content of a priori information between a constrained retrieval and the true atmospheric state is usually represented by a diagnostic quantity called smoothing error. In this paper it is shown that, regardless of the usefulness of the smoothing error as a diagnostic tool in its own right, the concept of the smoothing error as a component of the retrieval error budget is questionable because it is not compliant with Gaussian error propagation. The reason for this is that the smoothing error does not represent the expected deviation of the retrieval from the true state but the expected deviation of the retrieval from the atmospheric state sampled on an arbitrary grid, which is itself a smoothed representation of the true state; in other words, to characterize the full loss of information with respect to the true atmosphere, the effect of the representation of the atmospheric state on a finite grid also needs to be considered. The idea of a sufficiently fine sampling of this reference atmospheric state is problematic because atmospheric variability occurs on all scales, implying that there is no limit beyond which the sampling is fine enough. Even the idealization of infinitesimally fine sampling of the reference state does not help, because the smoothing error is applied to quantities which are only defined in a statistical sense, which implies that a finite volume of sufficient spatial extent is needed to meaningfully discuss temperature or concentration. Smoothing differences, however, which play a role when measurements are compared, are still a useful quantity if the covariance matrix involved has been evaluated on the comparison grid rather than resulting from interpolation and if the averaging kernel matrices have been evaluated on a grid fine enough to capture all atmospheric variations that the instruments are sensitive to. This is, under the assumptions stated, because the undefined component of the smoothing error, which is the effect of smoothing implied by the finite grid on which the measurements are compared, cancels out when the difference is calculated. If the effect of a retrieval constraint is to be diagnosed on a grid finer than the native grid of the retrieval by means of the smoothing error, the latter must be evaluated directly on the fine grid, using an ensemble covariance matrix which includes all variability on the fine grid. Ideally, the averaging kernels needed should be calculated directly on the finer grid, but if the grid of the original averaging kernels allows for representation of all the structures the instrument is sensitive to, then their interpolation can be an adequate approximation.


This thesis is concerned with managing and implementing an upgrade of the Murdoch University Pilot Plant and was a strictly defined project. It had specific outcome requirements and the choice of major components was selected prior to starting the project. All major components for the project were previously purchased by Murdoch University School of Engineering and Energy. The project covered integration, configuration, design, development, and installation of components as well as the development of documentation to support the final implementation of the system in the pilot plant.

This project is comprised of three aspects that together facilitate the upgrade of the pilot plant. These aspects involve different technical, and management challenges as well as different deliverable requirements. The first aspect consists of replacing the existing variable speed drives with units that support more advanced features, configuring the drive and developing documentation to support their ongoing maintenance including the development of schematic drawings. As part of the installation of the drives, they also had to be commissioned to achieve the desired operation.

The second aspect involves developing a ModBus communications network for use in the teaching laboratories and to prepare a similar network for use in the pilot plant. This aspect requires the development of several ModBus programs for the Industrial Computer Systems facility and also includes the configuration of the slave devices for the Pilot Plant. As part of this aspect, an interface module that will be used in the final implemented design of the pilot plant required configuration and testing. The third aspect covers the primary scope for the upgrade of the plant which is to facilitate the replacement of the existing control system. This aspect is significantly broader in scope than the previous two aspects with a significant increase in the level of complexity. This aspect involved the development of new user interface screens, development of IO lists, management of the development of the new control algorithms involving liaison with Honeywell India and the configuration of the Experion server.

Considering the segmented nature of the overall project, and the different challenges imposed, separate literature reviews will be discussed for each aspect of the project with a specific focus on using the literature to develop a solution. The control system aspect of the project is comprised of small components relating to specific aspects of the Experion system, to better relate the theoretical information to the technical implementation. Short literature reviews will be included in each section. Potential solutions were investigated and analysed with respect to the required deliverables on the project and the final implemented solution discussed. Considering the highly technical nature of the problem, the theoretical solutions did not always completely solve the problem and the discussion also investigates the process of fault finding and rectification. With time constraints and much of the works being required to be undertaken by third party contractors, the actual implementation of the upgrade was not complete before the completion of this thesis project. The installation of the C300 hardware could not be undertaken during the teaching semester as the plant was operational and the planned late arrival of the control program from India meant the system could not be commissioned in the time frame available. The control system upgrade of the project focused primarily on the preparation of the system for implementation. This included the development of extensive documentation including technical drawings on the final design and work scopes as deliverables for this aspect of the project.


Three laws of kinematics are identified. The first two were already known, and are presented with a slightly different perspective. However, the third law of kinematics is a new law of nature. And it states: for every elastic collisions, a free body with the higher kinetic energy can only gain energy from another body with lower kinetic energy, and the lower kinetic energy body will always gain energy from the higher kinetic energy body. Moreover, under general considerations from the theory of Special Relativity, a particle can decay into other particles only if there is a source of positive energy necessary to insure that the new particles have positive kinetic energy, which is why E=mc2 provides the source of this positive energy in the form of mass conversion into energy. Also this new kinematics leads to the reformulation of the 2nd law of thermodynamics which can now explain why heat only flows from a hot body to a cold body, and never the other way around, that a system left on its own will see its disorder increase in time, and that the entropy as defined according to Boltzmann tends to increase. The insight that we gain from this deeper concept which underlies the new law of kinematics and the reformulation of the second law of thermodynamics is that vacuum energy is a necessary condition for particles to pop out of the vacuum. However, this spells trouble for Hawking radiation as it has been formulated - it would lead to a violation of this new kinematics law. Surprisingly this new law of kinematics also sheds new insights into Planck's ad hoc hypothesis, E = ħω, and why energy must be quantized. As a general conclusion, every dynamical theory must reconcile with this new kinematics.


Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of visual impairment in the UK. In 2005, the first publication of a genome-wide associated study identified a single nucleotide polymorphism in complement factor H (CFH) as a genetic risk factor for AMD. CFH is a secreted regulator of the alternative complement pathway and therefore key to controlling the inflammatory response. Prior to 2005, little was known about the role of CFH in the retina. This study addresses this question in order to understand how this protein could contribute towards AMD pathology.
Initial experiments confirmed that retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells are capable of secreting detectable levels of CFH, and that RPE cells were able to enhance the secretion of CFH in response to inflammatory stimuli. The main focus of this study was to characterise the effect of loss of CFH on young and aged retina in Cfh-/- mice. Immunohistochemical studies revealed that signs of stress and re-distribution of complement proteins appear at one year of age. Genome-wide microarray analysis of the RPE and choroid or neuroretina, showed that loss of CFH has little effect on gene expression in young mice but that the impact of CFH loss increases with age. The largest group of genes to change were involved in antigen presentation and immunity suggesting that CFH has an important role in immune regulation in the eye.
Analysis of visual function using electoretinograms revealed that dysfunction seen at two years was not present at one year, indicating that age-related gene expression changes are likely to be involved in the pathogenic process in these mice. This study reveals the importance of CFH in maintaining retinal health and good visual function with age.


Pentecostal Christianity has gained many followers in the developing world, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. Despite a corpus of anthropological scholarship on the impact of following Pentecostalism on identities and social change, less has been written from the perspective of the believer, and little from within the field of development studies.
In this thesis, which is based on 14months of research in Kampala, Uganda, I explore how followers of this religion appropriate a discourse of prosperity and blessings, and how they utilise certain religious practices and relationships that are forged from the Pentecostal community in their efforts to mediate their futures and 'move on up' from a state of poverty. In particular, I discuss whether these practices and relationships can be seen as engendering transformative agency for these individuals. In doing so, I explore three themes that were prevalent in my data analysis: an everyday non-ecstatic speech act which is called 'positive confessions', ways of understanding poverty and dealing with situations of injustice, and patronage relationships between more wealthy and poorer members of the Pentecostal community.
I suggest that despite readily apparent displays of agency, in effect these religious practices and relationships do little to enable positive transformations in the lives of these believers, and instead, might actually uphold existing issues of disenfranchisement, through an emphasis on the individual as a force for change, a reorientation in ideas of time, and a prohibition of doubt and questioning. In addition, a more limited exploration of a group of non-Pentecostals sheds light on the potential for Pentecostal Christianity to be influential on the wider religious milieu than may have originally be thought, and hints at the need for a re-fashioning of our research methods when understanding the lives of those who are 'Pentecostal', in Uganda at least.


Problem. One of the major concerns in education today is the improvement of behavior. Over the years various strategies have been proposed to modify human conduct. A careful review of these theories shows many similarities and divergences. Albert Bandura and Ellen G. White, two proponents from different eras and with widely disparate cultural and intellectual heritage, have strongly recommended modeling or example as the major factor in shaping human behavior. The present study sought to determine what, if any, similarities or differences exist in their modeling concepts. Procedure. This investigation is a descriptive analytical study concerned with concepts and philosophies. The general procedure of the study is conceptually oriented, moving from a broad overview of behavior modification toward basic conceptual aspects of modeling. After an introduction and a review of literature, two chapters provide the reader with necessary background material. Bandura's conceptual framework and experimental studies are discussed in the next two chapters. Then follows a synthesis of White's philosophy of example. Chapter VIII concentrates on the comparison, with ten concepts in Bandura's writings and experiments as the frame of reference. Chapter IX reports the writer's interview with Bandura. The summary, conclusions, and implications of the study are presented in the last chapter. Summary and Conclusions. The modeling positions of Bandura and White are based on entirely different frames of reference. They bring to their writings divergent approaches, purposes, and values, and non-corresponding philosophical orientations of human nature and reality. Significantly, in spite of these differences, Bandura's modeling concepts were found to corroborate the much earlier views of White. Commonalities exist in the following concepts: 1. Behavior is learned by observing the behavior of other human beings. 2. Real-life models are the basic sources of modeling influences. 3. Modeling is a potent means of behavior transmission and modification. 4. Modeling involves different complex variables originating in the observer and the model. 5. Words and deeds do not possess equal power for changing behavior. 6. Children's behavior results from an interaction of parental modeling and other models in the immediate environment. 7. Parents establish conditions for learning and value acquisition of children during the children's early years. 8. Children are receptive and vulnerable to shaping influences in their environment. 9. Children's learning is facilitated and increased in a warm and supportive atmosphere. 10. Symbolic models are nearly equal to real-life models in effecting behavioral patterns. 11. Aggressive responses result from dangerous thoughts generated by exposure to aggressive symbolic models and generalize to new settings. 12. Some human models are more imitated than others because of their position, competencies, and responsibilities. 13. People choose as models associates with similar values and conduct patterns to themselves. 14. Reference-group models are sources of attitudes and values which are imparted by example. 15. Reinforcement is facilitative, motivating, response strengthening, and informative.


ABSTRACT The ongoing devolution of climate policy-making to sub-national levels has prompted growing interest in policy entrepreneurship by individuals who are politically and technically creative and institutionally resourceful. This paper investigates the case of the materials-management programme in the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality which has emerged as a national and international leader by focusing on the role of household consumption in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Two noteworthy innovations involve the development of a consumption-based GHG emissions inventory and introduction of policies aimed at facilitating construction of small homes (so-called Accessory Dwelling Units, ADU). The case traces over several decades the higher order learning processes within the group and their entrepreneurship toward affecting broader changes in emission accounting and climate policies in Oregon. The paper identifies the enabling factors for these innovations, and considers: how to create the conditions for learning, experimentation, and policy entrepreneurship; how to reproduce these conditions in different locales; and how to recognize and foster innovations that arise outside the established mainstream 'climate community'. It also stresses the benefits of breaking down the barriers between science-based analysis and policy. The two questions frequently raised in the climate policy debate – how to bring researchers and practitioners together to develop efficacious policies; and how to replicate successful programmes and policies across different communities, jurisdictions, and locations – should be re-examined. It may be more appropriate to ask instead: How to create conditions for learning, experimentation, and policy entrepreneurship; and how to reproduce these conditions in different locales. Key policy insights Using a consumption-based greenhouse gas emission inventory instead of a sector-based inventory radically changes climate policy priorities, shifting the emphasis from technological fixes to curbing household consumption. Policy innovations thrive in teams that combine technical and scientific competencies with: a commitment to addressing societal problems; interest in inquiry, experimentation, and learning; entrepreneurship; and strategic and political savvy. These qualities require breaking down artificial barriers between science and policy. Transformative policy ideas can originate within institutional nodes that operate outside of an established community of expertise and authority; and these should be identified and fostered.


The rational design and construction of carbon nanostructures, particularly those assembled from carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and graphene because of their superior synergistic advantages, are of significance for the development of metal-free electrocatalysts with low cost and high activity in energy conversion and storage fields. Herein, we report a highly efficient oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) catalyst based on a three dimensional nitrogen-doped CNTs–holey graphene framework (N-CNTs–HGF) formed by the in situ, precisely positioned growth of nitrogen-doped CNTs on the holey-edges of porous graphene sheets. Benefiting from the unique hierarchical structure of CNTs and graphene with the merits of fast charge and mass transport along the interfaces of holes, the resultant catalyst exhibits superior capability towards catalyzing oxygen reduction, which affords a positive onset potential of 1.08 V vs. RHE, small Tafel slope of 72 mV dec−1 and half-peak potential of 0.85 V vs. RHE. Furthermore, its potential practical application is also evidenced by simply integrating it into an all-solid-state Zn–air battery.


In this paper we argue that modelling the cross-country distribution of per capita income as a mixture distribution provides a natural framework for the detection of convergence clubs. The framework yields tests for the number of component distributions that are likely to have more power than bump hunting tests and includes a natural method of assessing the cross-component immobility necessary to imply a correspondence between components and convergence clubs. Applying the mixture approach to cross-country per capita income data for the period 1960 to 2000 we find evidence of three component densities in each of the nine years that we examine. We find little cross-component mobility and so interpret the multiple mixture components as representing convergence clubs. We document a pronounced tendency for the strength of the bonds between countries and clubs to increase. We show that the well-known hollowing out of the middle of the distribution is largely attributable to the increased concentration of the rich countries around their component means. This increased concentration as well as that of the poor countries around their component mean produces a rise in polarization in the distribution over the sample period.


Fueled by recent public and private efforts to improve access to scholarly works, academic libraries and archives are increasingly digitizing their special collections and creating online repositories for scholarly works. This enhanced online presence has increased libraries' exposure to takedown requests from rightsholders and other concerned parties. Using survey questions and interviews, we examined academic libraries' interaction with both Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") and non-DMCA takedown notices. We found that academic libraries most commonly receive non-DMCA takedown requests that are based on non-copyright issues (such as privacy) or that target materials the library itself has placed online. In general, libraries have well-developed norms and practices in place to manage these types of requests to remove material. We also found, however, that formal DMCA notices directed to libraries have historically been rare, but that this may be changing as open access repositories hosted by libraries grow. In tracing the recent experience of academic libraries that have received DMCA takedown notices targeting material in their open access repositories, we found that libraries have not yet developed norms and practices for addressing these requests. We discuss why this might be, and suggest steps libraries, publishers, and authors can take to best manage copyright conflicts while supporting libraries' missions to preserve and provide access to knowledge.


Bark necrosis (BN), described and first studied in Côte d'Ivoire in the 1980s (2), affects most modern rubber plantations (i.e., grafted trees with high-yielding clones, intensive exploitation due to tapping frequency, and use of Ethrel as a yield stimulant) worldwide with a wide range of severity across sites. While previous (3) and recent (4) etiological analyses remain inconclusive, environmental factors were shown associated with BN. Numerous epidemiological surveys conducted in various African and Asian plantations on recently tapped blocks (less than 10-year-old trees) revealed the nonrandom location of the earliest single diseased trees. These risky areas are mainly characterized by the proximity of a swamp, plantation road, windrow, old bulldozer track, residual forest stump, or slope break. In BN emergence areas, while no significant correlation was found with chemical soil parameters, physical soil analyses (e.g., penetrometer) revealed higher soil compaction often associated with poorer rhizogenesis in BN trees (comparative root counts made in pits close to healthy or BN trees). Furthermore, initial BN symptoms were preferentially observed near the grafted bud at the rootstock/scion junction (RS/S). Numerous comparative ecophysiological measurements of leaf water potential, stem water potential, and predawn base potential using a plant moisture stress (PMS) pressure chamber indicated water stress in BN trees. These results and preliminary dye transfer studies at the RS/S junction suggested a nonoptimal vascular relation between the root system and the trunk of BN trees. In conclusion, compaction-associated reduced water availability of the soil and poor root capacity to meet the water demand during drier dry seasons combined with disturbed sap flows and recurrent local water drainage (latex flows) are now suspected to jointly act as the main exogenous causal stresses that induce the BN process at the RS/S bud zone before spreading upward to the tapping cut. This multidisciplinary approach gives a new comprehensive scenario for the emergence of this multifactorial physiological disease, now suspected to involve cyanide release (1) into the inner phloem of the rubber tree. References: (1) H. Chrestin. Plant Dis. 88:1047, 2004. (2) D. Nandris et al. Eur. J. For. Pathol. 21:325, 1991. (3) D. Nandris et al. Eur. J. For Pathol. 21:340, 1991. (4) F. Pellegrin et al. Plant Dis. 88:1046, 2004.


Geographic information systems deal with the exploration, analysis, and presentation of geo-referenced data. Virtual reality is a type of human-computer interface that comes close to the way people perceive information in the real world. Thus, virtual reality environments become the natural paradigm for extending and enhancing the presentational and exploratory capability of GIS applications in both the spatial and temporal domains. The main motivation of this thesis is the lack of a framework that properly supports the exploration of geographic information in a multi-dimensional and multi-sensorial environment (i.e., temporal virtual reality geographic information systems).
This thesis introduces a model for virtual exploration of animations. Virtual exploration of animations is a framework composed of abstract data types and a user interface that allow non-expert users to control, manipulate, analyze, and present objects' behaviors in a virtual-reality environment.
In the model for virtual exploration of animations, the manipulation of the dynamic environment is accomplished through a set of operations performed over abstractions that represent temporal characteristics of actions. An important feature of the model is that the temporal information is treated as first-class entities and not as a mere attribute of action's representations. Therefore, entities of the temporal model have their own built-in functionality and are able to represent complex temporal structures.
In an environment designed for the manipulation of the temporal characteristics of actions, the knowledge of relationships among objects' behaviors plays a significant role in the model. This information comes from the knowledge base of the application domain and is represented in the model through constraints among entities of the temporal model. Such constraints vary from simply relating the end points of two intervals to a complex mechanism that takes into account all relations between sequences of intervals of cyclic behaviors.
The fact that the exploration of the information takes place in a virtual reality environment imposes new requirements on the animation model. This thesis introduces a new classification of objects in a VR environment and describes the associated semantics of each element in the taxonomy. These semantics are used to direct the way an object interacts with an observer and with other objects in the environment.


In this paper the numerical simulations of a free surface flow over a sharp-crested weir are presented and compared to experimental results. The numerical model implemented consists of the meshless Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method which uses Navier-Stokes equations and the Tait equation of state for water. This numerical method has been developed in the framework of a master thesis and aimed to define the characteristics of the free jet. The validation of the results was performed through the analysis of the pressure field and the comparison of the numerical free surface profiles with experimental measurements conducted in the Hydraulic Laboratory of the University of Liege (ULg). A good qualitative agreement has been obtained.


This essay presents the findings of the 2004 Freedom House survey of Freedom in the World. The essay examines broad trends in political rights and civil liberties and finds 19 Free countries, 54 states are rated as Partly Free and 49 are rated as Not Free, with the widespread absence of liberties. Also, 199 countries now qualify as electoral democracies, which is two more than in 2003. This essay correlates levels of freedom with economic development and examines the tenure of freedom in every state as reflected by the 31-year times-series record of the survey. Freedom in the World is an annual comparative global survey of political rights and civil liberties as reflected in assessments conducted by 22 analysts and reviewed by 17 senior academic scholars.


Bisexual individuals experience poorer mental health than other sexual minority individuals. One explanation for this is that biphobia predisposes bisexual individuals to have a more ambiguous sexual identity and fewer opportunities for stress-ameliorating forms of coping and support. This study explores sexual identity and sexual identity dimensions—prominence, valence, integration, and complexity—in bisexual and other sexual minority individuals. We describe differences in sexual identity dimensions between bisexual and other sexual minority individuals and test two explanations for mental health disparities between them: whether sexual identity dimensions directly impact mental health and whether they moderate the impact of stress on mental health. Data came from a longitudinal study of a diverse sample of sexual minority individuals (N = 396, 71 bisexual respondents) sampled from community venues in New York City. Sexual identity was prominent for both bisexual and other sexual minority individuals, but bisexual individuals reported lower valence and integration of sexual identity in their identity structures. The hypothesis that sexual identity dimensions moderate the impact of minority stress on mental health was not supported. After several longitudinal assessments, however, we concluded that identity valence (but not integration or complexity) and depressive symptoms were bidirectionally associated so that differences in valence between bisexual and other sexual minority individuals explained, in part, disparities in depressive symptoms.


Twenty-six taxa of fish were present in eighteen lakes in the southwestern quadrant of the Adirondack Park, Herkimer and Hamilton Counties, New York. Species richness in the lakes ranged from 1 to 18 species. Here we assess the condition and composition of the fish assemblages in lakes and compare in-lake changes in species composition over an 80-yr period. To examine assemblage condition we estimated population size of species in the lakes using mark-and-recapture techniques. To examine change in composition we compared the assemblage structure of these lakes to that present in two previous surveys. Populations of all but the rarest species comprised several size classes, indicating successful recruitment for all common species in all lakes. Most lakes support a rich, viable assemblage, although all but one includes, and many are dominated by, exotic species. Although the lakes studied are in one ecoregion and often in the same subdrainage, species composition differed among lakes and composition and abundance differed within lakes over time. Assessments of the fish assemblage composition in these lakes, when compared over time showed marked differences. These differences might be the result of several factors, but the presence of exotic taxa and extirpation of native fishes can explain gross changes in fish assemblage composition in these Adirondack lakes.


This study examined the beliefs underlying people's decision-making, from a theory of planned behaviour (TPB) framework, in the prediction of curbside household waste recycling. Community members in Brisbane, Australia (N = 148) completed a questionnaire assessing the belief based TPB measures of attitudinal beliefs (costs and benefits), normative beliefs (important referents), and control beliefs (barriers) in relation to engaging in curbside household waste recycling for a 2-week period. Two weeks later, participants completed self report measures of recycling behaviour for the previous fortnight. The results revealed that the attitudinal, normative, and control beliefs for people who performed higher and lower levels of recycling differed significantly. A regression analysis identified both normative and control beliefs as the main determinants of recycling behaviour. For normative beliefs, high level recyclers perceived more approval from referents such as partners, friends, and neighbours to recycle all eligible materials. In addition, the strong results for control beliefs indicated that barriers such as forgetfulness, lack of time, and laziness were rated as more likely to hamper optimal recycling performance for low level recyclers. These findings provide important applied information about beliefs to target in the development of future community recycling campaigns.


Assessment of soil structure and soil aggregation remains a challenging task. Routine methods such as dry- and wet-sieving approaches are generally time consuming and tedious, which calls for a robust, fast, and nondestructive method of soil aggregate characterization. Over the last two decades, diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) has emerged as a rapid and noninvasive technique for soil characterization. Combined with chemometric and data-mining algorithms, it provides an effective way of measuring several soil attributes and has the added advantage of being amenable to a remote sensing mode of operation. The objective of this study was to determine if the DRS approach could be used as a rapid, noninvasive technique to estimate soil aggregate characteristics. The DRS approach was examined for the estimation of soil aggregate characteristics such as the geometric mean diameter and two statistical parameters of the lognormal aggregate size distribution (ASD) functions using 910 soil samples from India representing three important soil groups. Results showed that the geometric mean diameter and the median aggregate size parameter provided excellent predictions, with ratio of performance deviation (RPD) values ranging from 1.99 to 2.28. The RPD value for the standard deviation of the ASD ranged from 1.36 to 1.72, suggesting moderate prediction. It was further observed that soil aggregates influence the incident electromagnetic radiation on soils primarily in the visible region and to some extent the shortwave- and near-infrared regions. Electronic transitions of Fe-bearing minerals, clay minerals, and C–H functional groups of organic matter may be responsible for modifying the spectral reflectance from soils in addition to the self-shadowing effects of surface roughness. The results of this study suggest that the chemometric approach may be combined with DRS to estimate soil aggregate size characteristics.


Existing studies of mutual fund market timing analyze monthly returns and find little evidence of timing ability. We show that daily tests are more powerful and that mutual funds exhibit significant timing ability more often in daily tests than in monthly tests. We construct a set of synthetic fund returns in order to control for spurious results. The daily timing coefficients of the majority of funds are significantly different from their synthetic counterparts. These results suggest that mutual funds may possess more timing ability than previously documented.


Postural distortion of human bite marks on skin occurs when photographing a bite mark in a body position other than the position of the body at the time of biting. Postural distortion in the bite mark may introduce significant changes in both the shape and size of the recorded marks. As a result, the analysis of the marks may be hindered and a proper comparison between the bite mark and the causal dentition may be precluded. Therefore, a method by which postural distortion in a bite mark photographic record can be evaluated and eliminated with minimal operator subjectivity is required. This study describes the development of an objective technique for evaluating postural distortion in bite mark photographic records and for minimising postural distortion during photography of bite marks. The source for developing these techniques was provided by digitally analysing the symmetry of dental arches in a defined population including males and females (236 subjects) whose ages ranged between 20 and 30 years. The analysis resulted in quantifying a mathematical relationship between the biting edges of each homologous pair of the anterior teeth and specified reference lines. The validity of the analytical method of dental arch symmetry is discussed. The developed techniques were applied to posturally distorted (test) bite marks. The results demonstrate the validity of the developed techniques in determining postural distortion and recording correct images (shown to resemble the biters dentition) of the test bites. Suggestions for further work are proposed.


The thesis presents an examination of children's nurse mentor experience of undertaking assessments at sign-off stage. There is a need to determine student nurse competence and competencies throughout preparatory training and pre-registration nursing students are supported by mentors or other suitably prepared supervisors (NMC, 2006; 2008a). Sign-off mentors (SOMs) were introduced by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) in order to strengthen mentorship. In the nursing profession, SOMs support and assess students who are undertaking their final practice learning experience to confirm the student nurse as either having achieved, or not, the practice requirements necessary in order to enter the professional register (NMC, 2008a, 2010a; 2010b).
The area of nurse SOM experiences in the assessment of pre-registration students at the end of the nurse training programme has received little attention. Using an interpretivist, qualitative, case study research approach the experiences of twelve children's nurse sign-off mentors in the North West of England have been explored and analysed. Data was collected from individual and focus group interviews and analysed using thematic analysis.

The study identified six key themes which were: professional responsibility and development; expectations of students undertaking their final practice learning experience; previous mentor decisions; the need for sign-off mentor support following difficult decisions; experiences of passing and failing students and the physical impact of undertaking the sign-off mentor role. Findings from this study provide new insight and understanding of children's nurse SOM experiences. There was no evidence children's nurse sign-off mentors were failing to fail students.

This study is important to those interested in the assessment of student competency including: mentors and sign-off mentors, employers, educators, patients, policy makers and researchers.


The Davis Strait is a bathymetric high that separates the southern Baffin Bay and the northern Labrador Sea. These basins are the result of Cretaceous and Paleogene rifting and seafloor spreading between the North American plate and Greenland. Being one of the main tectonic features of the Davis Strait, the Ungava Fault Zone is associated with transform motion related to a northward movement of Greenland relative to North America during rifting and seafloor spreading in Baffin Bay and Labrador Sea. The plate tectonic reconstruction of the Davis Strait contributes significantly to the understanding of the geodynamic history of the North-American - Greenland plates, not only the Davis Strait area but also the area of Lancaster Sound and Nares Strait, where it could shed light into the so-called Nares Strait Conflict. It is still under debate whether the spreading between Greenland and Baffin Island was compensated by sinistral transform motion along the proposed Wegener-Fault. Thus Nares Strait (trace of the Wegener Fault) and Lancaster Sound (failed arm rift) are relicts of this scenario. The lack of evidence for transform motion between Greenland and Ellesmere Island contradicts this model and provokes the conflict. As major compression along the Eurekan Fold Belt overprinted the proposed transform motion along the Wegener Fault, the Ungava Fault Zone in the Davis Strait could give the missing information for the plate tectonic reconstruction. The onshore-offshore geology and structural setting of Baffin Island is analysed by recent publications that show an essentially non-volcanic continental margin at Baffin Island that is interrupted by a volcanic-style margin around Cape Dyer. Intensive magmatic activity during the initial opening phase is indicated by widespread seaward-dipping-reflector sequences (SDRS) north of Cape Dyer. On the other hand, the structural setting of the Greenland margin side is unclear. The identification of the corresponding conjugate pattern on Greenland side provides fundamental information for the historic motion along the Ungava Fault Zone. The geophysical data of the DAVIS GATE cruise in 2008 provide new data to determine structure and type of conjugate margin segments of Greenland and Baffin Island. As part of the DAVIS GATE project, a set of multichannel seismic, refraction seismic, magnetic and gravity profiles across the Davis Strait was acquired with RV Maria S. Merian in 2008. In detail, three crossing refraction lines with up to 25 ocean-bottom seismographs, and 1500 nm multichannel seismic lines (3000 m streamer length, 240 channels and 50 litres airgun-array) build the framework of the DAVIS GATE project. This presentation illustrates first results from the multichannel seismic survey in addition with first results from magnetic and gravity profiling.


In these hilarious stories of perverse meetings, casual dates and romantic encounters, we are enthralled, saddened, inspired and surprised by the encounters we witness. McCall Smith, a master of the unexpected and a seamless storyteller, revels in offering us the quirky complications inherent in entanglements which human beings engineer for themselves - entanglements that can be shocking, edifying, compulsive, complicated and sometimes, completely disastrous. This is an exceptional collection of stories from an author whose rapidly growing audience delights in his extraordinary imagination and delicious insights into the endlessly fascinating peculiarities of the human condition.


This article undertakes the anthropology of an equation that constitutes the essence of an algorithm that underlies a variety of computational technologies—most notably spam filters, but also data-mining tools, diagnostic tests, predictive parsers, risk assessment techniques, and Bayesian reasoning more generally. The article foregrounds the ways ontologies are both embodied in and transformed by such algorithms. And it shows the stakes such ontological transformations have for one particularly widespread and powerful metaphor and device—the sieve. In so doing, this inquiry shows some of the complex processes that must be considered if we are to understand some of the key relations linking semiosis and statistics. Reflexively, these processes perturb some core ontological assumptions in anthropology, science and technology studies, and critical theory.


As the complexity of evolutionary design problems grow, so too must the quality of solutions scale to that complexity. In this research, we develop a genetic programming system with individuals encoded as tree-based generative representations to address scalability. This system is capable of multi-objective evaluation using a ranked sum scoring strategy. We examine Hornby's features and measures of modularity, reuse and hierarchy in evolutionary design problems. Experiments are carried out, using the system to generate three-dimensional forms, and analyses of feature characteristics such as modularity, reuse and hierarchy were performed. This work expands on that of Hornby's, by examining a new and more difficult problem domain. The results from these experiments show that individuals encoded with those three features performed best overall. It is also seen, that the measures of complexity conform to the results of Hornby. Moving forward with only this best performing encoding, the system was applied to the generation of three-dimensional external building architecture. One objective considered was passive solar performance, in which the system was challenged with generating forms that optimize exposure to the Sun. The results from these and other experiments satisfied the requirements. The system was shown to scale well to the architectural problems studied.


Rainwater harvesting in micro-catchments such as contour ridges and semicircular bunds is an option for utilizing the limited rainfall, improving productivity and combating land degradation in dry rangeland areas (Badia). However, implementation of this practice using manual labor or traditional machinery is slow, tedious and costly, and often impractical on a large scale. These limitations can be overcome using the 'Vallerani' plow for quickly constructing continuous and intermittent ridges. The plow (model Delfino (50 MI/CM), manufactured by Nardi, Italy) was tested and adapted to dry steppe (Badia) conditions in Jordan. The performance of the machine, its weaknesses and potential improvements were assessed in the 2006/07 season at three sites on 165 hectares of various terrain, slope and soil conditions. The performance parameters included effective field capacity (EFC), machine efficiency (ME) and fuel consumption (FC). Field tests were carried out at different tractor (134 HP) traveling speeds, pit sizes and contour spacings. Overall mean performance indicators gave an EFC of 1.2 ha/h, 51% ME and an average FC of 5.15 liter/ha. Increasing ridge spacing had a small effect on ME where, increasing traveling speed had a greater effect. A guide table was developed, relating performance parameters with ridge spacing, speed, and bund size setting. This could be a useful reference for the implementation and management of mechanized microcatchment construction in the Badia. The system performed well in the construction of continuous ridges. However, it was unable to construct intermittent ridges at speeds over 4 km/h; problems were encountered in properly staggering the bunds at successive contours.


The Enchanted Years of the Stage: Kansas City at the Crossroads of American Theater, 1870-1930 Felicia Hardison Londre, Columbia: U of Missouri Press, 2007 Felicia Hardison Londre's The Enchanted Years of the Stage not only offers a flashback to a post-Civil War era cow-town trying to transition into a culturally-affluent city through a series of performances of everything from opera to burlesque, but it also shows a richly detailed representation of the exploding national theatre scene as a whole-from a Midwest perspective. While Londre's detailed research might be overwhelming to the casual reader, the anecdotes are so alluring, and sometimes humorous, that everybody-not just historians and academics-will enjoy being drawn into this strange world of the first golden age of theatre. During this golden era from 1870-1930, visitors to Kansas City not only featured "superstar" actors such as Sarah Bernhardt, Sir Henry Irving, and Edwin Booth, but a colorful array including everyone from Jesse James to President Grover Cleveland and North Pole explorer Dr. Frederick A. Cook. While most of the information comes directly from newspaper accounts and the writings of theatre critic Austin Latchaw, some of the stories turned into urban legends, making it tough to differentiate fact from fantasy. The annual Priests of Pallas festival, featuring a parade of elaborate floats depicting detailed dragons and other fantasy characters, may have inspired traveling salesman L. Frank Baum to write The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and thirteen other Oz books if he visited Kansas City-or perhaps the annual festival merely adapted their floats after the turn of the century when The Wizard of Oz became popular. This is an example of rumor and fact becoming indistinguishable after so many years. It is interesting to note, though, that the Priests of Pallas festival began in 1887 and continued every year until its "final" festival in 1924. After a lapse of over eighty years, it was revived in 2005 at Kansas City's revamped Union Station. Even the newspaper reporting of the era was notoriously unreliable. Sir Henry Irving was a perfectionist who still preferred limelight-or calcium light-over modern electrical lighting. While the softer lighting was preferable to his eye, his insistence on this older form of lighting was not without a price: Irving had to travel with an entire railway car full of oxygen tanks to fuel it. …


Joint behavior of drought characteristics under climate change is evaluated using copula method which has recently attained popularity in analysis of complex hydrologic systems with correlated variables. Trivariate copulas are applied in this study to analyze the major drought variables; duration, severity, and intensity in the Upper Klamath River basin in Oregon. Results show that, among the variables, duration-severity is the most correlated pair whereas duration-intensity is the least correlated one. The impact of climate change on future droughts is evaluated using five Global Climate Models (GCMs) under one emission scenario. Comparing to the historical events, an overall decrease in drought duration and severity is estimated for the time period of 2020-2090 and the maximum duration is shown a decrease from 8 months to 5 months. Among the five GCMs employed in this study, GFDL-CM2.1 and CSIRO-MK3.0 are recognized as the wettest and driest projections, respectively. High uncertainty associated with GCM products is demonstrated in the analysis of return period by means of bivariate copulas; however, all projections result in larger return periods; i.e., less frequent droughts comparing to historical droughts during the reference period. Drought Characteristics


In communities across America today, from Ferguson, Missouri, to Flint, Michigan, too many people—especially young people and people of color—live trapped by the weight of poverty and injustice. They suffer the disparate impact of policies driven by, at best, benign neglect, and at worst, deliberate indifference. And they see how discrimination stacks the deck against them. So today, as we discuss the inequality that pervades our criminal justice system—a defining civil rights challenge of the 21st century—we must also acknowledge the broader inequalities we face in other segments of society. Because discrimination in so many areas—from the classroom, to the workforce, to the marketplace—perpetuates the inequality we see in our justice system. And for those already living paycheck-to-paycheck, a single incident—whether an arrest by the police or a fine by the court—can set off a downward spiral. It can lead to a cycle of profound problems that ruin lives and tear apart families. Problems like losing your health care, your job, your children, or your home. As someone who focuses on civil rights work and criminal justice reform, I see these problems every day. But today in America, I also see a country on the cusp of change. Across a wide range of political perspectives, policymakers and advocates have come together to bridge divides and support meaningful criminal justice reform. And I'm proud to say that this administration—and this Department of Justice—has made criminal justice reform a top priority. We believe that our country needs, and deserves, a criminal justice system that more effectively protects our communities, more fairly treats our people, and more prudently spends our resources. And we believe that no matter how deeply rooted and long-standing the injustices that underlie inequality in our criminal justice system—with clear thinking, hard work and collaboration—we can make real progress.


AIMS
We studied the respective added value of the quantitative myocardial blood flow (MBF) and the myocardial flow reserve (MFR) as assessed with (82)Rb positron emission tomography (PET)/CT in predicting major adverse cardiovascular events (MACEs) in patients with suspected myocardial ischaemia.

METHODS AND RESULTS
Myocardial perfusion images were analysed semi-quantitatively (SDS, summed difference score) and quantitatively (MBF, MFR) in 351 patients. Follow-up was completed in 335 patients and annualized MACE (cardiac death, myocardial infarction, revascularization, or hospitalization for congestive heart failure or de novo stable angor) rates were analysed with the Kaplan-Meier method in 318 patients after excluding 17 patients with early revascularizations (<60 days). Independent predictors of MACEs were identified by multivariate analysis. During a median follow-up of 624 days (inter-quartile range 540-697), 35 MACEs occurred. An annualized MACE rate was higher in patients with ischaemia (SDS >2) (n = 105) than those without [14% (95% CI = 9.1-22%) vs. 4.5% (2.7-7.4%), P < 0.0001]. The lowest MFR tertile group (MFR <1.8) had the highest MACE rate [16% (11-25%) vs. 2.9% (1.2-7.0%) and 4.3% (2.1-9.0%), P < 0.0001]. Similarly, the lowest stress MBF tertile group (MBF <1.8 mL/min/g) had the highest MACE rate [14% (9.2-22%) vs. 7.3% (4.2-13%) and 1.8% (0.6-5.5%), P = 0.0005]. Quantitation with stress MBF or MFR had a significant independent prognostic power in addition to semi-quantitative findings. The largest added value was conferred by combining stress MBF to SDS. This holds true even for patients without ischaemia.

CONCLUSION
Perfusion findings in (82)Rb PET/CT are strong MACE outcome predictors. MBF quantification has an added value allowing further risk stratification in patients with normal and abnormal perfusion images.


Conversational Cased-Based Reasoning (CCBR) is an interactive, dialogoriented method within Cased-Based Reasoning (CBR) that provides a mixed-initative dialog for guiding users to construct their problem description incrementally through a question-answering sequence. A query case is created as the problem description and will often contain one or several explicit initial features provided by the user. The query case is used to retrieve a set of candidate cases, and a group of informative features are identified to generate discriminative questions. In order to design and implement a CCBR question answering system, it is important to find an appropriate question selection strategy and conversation process. Our study includes an overview of different methods to be used in a question selection strategy, and some existing application of CCBR. Which question selection strategy to apply in a CCBR system depends of the application's domain. Factors such as purpose and real life conversation style will influence the design of a CCBR question answering system. Based on our research, we designed and partly implemtend a CCBR question selection system called CCBR Diagnose. The CCBR Diagnose is planned to be a CCBR tool to use within pallatative care, and is based on the CBR Core System developed by Odd Erik Gundersen. The CCBR Diagnose is designed and implemented as a knowledge-poor CCBR application, but should in future work be extended to be knowledge-intensive. Information gain is implemented for selection of a feature to be ask about, and has improved the system effiency in form of shorter conversation length. The system uses information from the knowledge model to make sure that the questions is comprehensible. By including knowledge-intensive methods in the question selection strategy, the system will improve performance by reducing the cognitive load on the patient, and is highly recommended for the final tool. A knowledge-intensive selection strategy can improve the conversation by avoid asking implictly answered questions and presenting a more coherent sequence of questions. Additional, the system is missing a graphical user interface. Such an interface can be based on the already developed computerzed version of the paper-based questionarries, but should also follow our guidelines. Clearly more work lies ahead in order to achieve the final CCBR system for pallatative care, but future work can be based on our research contributions and our implemented CCBR Diagnose can be us a basis for further development of a final tool within pallatative care. We have proven that CCBR improves the conversation in form of shorther conversation length, and we have suggested how additional improvements can be achieved by supplying the implemented question selection method with knowledge-intensive methods. Which knowledge-intensive strategy to apply is up to future work to decide.


Rationale: Most sarcomere gene mutations that cause hypertrophic cardiomyopathy are missense alleles that encode dominant negative proteins. The potential exceptions are mutations in the MYBPC3 gene (encoding cardiac myosin-binding protein-C [MyBP-C]), which frequently encode truncated proteins. Objective: We sought to determine whether there was evidence of haploinsufficiency in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy caused by MYBPC3 mutations by comparing left ventricular muscle from patients undergoing surgical myectomy with samples from donor hearts. Methods and Results: MyBP-C protein and mRNA levels were quantitated using immunoblotting and RT-PCR. Nine of 37 myectomy samples had mutations in MYBPC3: 2 missense alleles (Glu258Lys, Arg502Trp) and 7 premature terminations. No specific truncated MyBP-C peptides were detected in whole muscle homogenates of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy tissue. However, the overall level of MyBP-C in myofibrils was significantly reduced (P<0.0005) in tissue containing either a truncation or missense MYBPC3 mutation: 0.76±0.03 compared with 1.00±0.05 in donor and 1.01±0.06 in non-MYBPC3 mutant myectomies. Conclusions: The absence of any detectable truncated MyBP-C argues against its incorporation in the myofiber and any dominant negative effect. In contrast, the lowered relative level of full length protein in both truncation and missense MYBPC3 mutations argues strongly that haploinsufficiency is sufficient to cause the disease.


We investigated the photofragmentation properties of two three-membered ring heterocyclic molecules, C(2)H(4)O and C(2)H(4)S, by total and partial ion yield spectroscopy. Positive and negative ions have been collected as a function of photon energy around the C 1s and O 1s ionization thresholds in C(2)H(4)O, and around the S 2p and C 1s thresholds in C(2)H(4)S. We underline similarities and differences between these two analogous systems. We present a new assignment of the spectral features around the C K-edge and the sulfur L(2,3) edges in C(2)H(4)S. In both systems, we observe high fragmentation efficiency leading to positive and negative ions when exciting these molecules at resonances involving core-to-Rydberg transitions. The system, with one electron in an orbital far from the ionic core, relaxes preferentially by spectator Auger decay, and the resulting singly charged ion with two valence holes and one electron in an outer diffuse orbital can remain in excited states more susceptible to dissociation. A state-selective fragmentation pattern is analyzed in C(2)H(4)S which leads to direct production of S(2+) following the decay of virtual-orbital excitations to final states above the double-ionization threshold.


An important issue in nanoelectromechanical systems is developing small electrically driven motors. We report on an artificial nanofabricated motor in which one short carbon nanotube moves relative to another coaxial nanotube. A cargo is attached to an ablated outer wall of a multiwalled carbon nanotube that can rotate and/or translate along the inner nanotube. The motion is actuated by imposing a thermal gradient along the nanotube, which allows for subnanometer displacements, as opposed to an electromigration or random walk effect.


Since direct numerical simulations cannot be computed at high Reynolds numbers, a
dynamically less complex formulation is sought. In the quest for such a formulation, we consider regularizations of the convective term that preserve the symmetry and conservation properties exactly. This requirement yielded a novel class of regularizations (Computers & Fluids 37 (2008) 887) that restrain the convective production of smaller and smaller scales of motion in an unconditionally stable manner, meaning that the velocity cannot blow up in the energy-norm (in 2D also: enstrophy-norm). The numerical algorithm used to solve the governing equations must preserve the symmetry and conservation properties too. To do so, one of the most critical issues is the discrete filtering. The method requires
a list of properties that, in general, are not preserved by classical filters for LES unless they are imposed a posteriori. In the present paper, we propose a novel class of discrete filters that preserves such properties per se. They are based on polynomial functions of the discrete diffusive operator, ˜D, with the general form F = I + PM m=1 dm ˜D m. Then, the
coefficients, dm, follow from the requirement that, at the smallest grid scale kc, the amount by which the interactions between the wavevector-triples (kc, kc − q, q) are damped must become virtually independent of the q-th Fourier-mode. This allows an optimal control of the subtle balance between convection and diffusion at the smallest grid scale to stop the vortex-stretching. Finally, the proposed method is tested for an air-filled differentially
heated cavity of height aspect ratio 4.


Introduction The military is not commonly perceived as a career that women would voluntarily pursue. And yet, women have voluntarily served in all of America's wars and in the military since the beginning of our history. For most of this time they served as temporary or auxiliary workers, or in a separate but unequal corps, such as the Army and Navy nurse corps. It was not until after World War II, with the Army-Navy Nurse Act of 1947 and the Women's Armed Services Integration Act of 1948, that women had a permanent place in the U.S. military. Although there were many restrictions, one of the most enlightened aspects was that due to the military's rank structure, women were paid equally to men of the same rank, which is still unusual for most working women. Today, military women have opportunities that 30 years ago were not possible, such as leading troops in a combat zone, commanding sailors at sea, or flying combat air strikes. The demands of a military career, including long hours, geographic relocation, separation from loved ones, and participating in military conflicts, are not seen as conducive to the social expectations of women, especially if they wish to pursue marriage and family. (1) Yet, some women have been able to maintain a fulfilling personal life and still thrive in a military career. This article is part of a larger sociological study of the women who have broken through the "brass" ceiling to achieve the rank of General or Flag Officer (GFO). This paper focuses on the demographic trends for women GFOs, including retirees, reservists and active duty women, by year group cohort (in decades), specialty area, branch of service and rank achieved, as well as some biographical comparisons including family background, and marital and child-bearing status. The primary research question of this article asks: "Who are the women who achieved career success in the U.S. military?" Military executive or military elite is defined in this paper as a person who has risen to the upper ranks of the military, to General or Flag Officer (GFO). The men and women who have achieved this status are a very rare group of individuals. There are only about 900 regular GFOs on active duty in the Department of Defense (DoD), (2) out of an officer corps of about 220,000. (3) The Coast Guard, under the Department of Homeland Security, has about 40 Flag officers. The officers at this level of the military are equivalent to corporate CEOs or company presidents and have responsibility for millions of dollars and thousands of people. Very few of those who have dedicated themselves to a military career make it into these elite ranks, and even fewer of those are women. Of the 1538 GFOs currently on active duty in both the regular and reserve components, only 121 (8%) are women. Table 1 shows the variation in percentages of women GFOs between the different branches, and the regular and reserve components, with the Marine Corps having the lowest and the Coast Guard having the highest percentage overall, while the Navy reserve has the highest percent of women GFOs of any branch or component. It is not surprising that the reserve forces generally have a higher percentage of women, as the reserves have traditionally been seen as an alternative to remaining on full-time active duty, as discussed below. Requirements of a career in the military The military as a career is very demanding. It is a closed labor force, meaning a person starts at the bottom of the hierarchy and works their way up. Officers enter at pay grade O-1 and the first four years are spent becoming experts in their specialty areas. Career advancement depends on a combination of their military/naval skills, organizational skills, leadership skills, understanding of the national security environment, and military experience. (5) The military is an "up or out" system; if an officer fails to promote within certain time constraints, then that officer must leave the service. …


Colonization of the rhizoplane habitat is an important activity that enables certain microorganisms to promote plant growth. Here we describe various types of computer-assisted microscopy that reveal important ecological insights of early microbial colonization behavior within biofilms on plant root surfaces grown in soil. Examples of the primary data are obtained by analysis of processed images of rhizoplane biofilm landscapes analyzed at single-cell resolution using the emerging technology of CMEIAS bioimage informatics software. Included are various quantitative analyses of the in situ biofilm landscape ecology of microbes during their pioneer colonization of white clover roots, and of a rhizobial biofertilizer strain colonized on rice roots where it significantly enhances the productivity of this important crop plant. The results show that spatial patterns of immature biofilms developed on rhizoplanes that interface rhizosphere soil are highly structured (rather than distributed randomly) when analyzed at the appropriate spatial scale, indicating that regionalized microbial cell-cell interactions and the local environment can significantly affect their cooperative and competitive colonization behaviors.


The most important viral pathogens of the cultivated potato are Potato virus X (PVX) and Potato virus Y (PVY), which can reduce potato production up to 80%. Thus resistance breeding is one of the major goals of plant breeders. Wild potato species are good sources of resistance (R) genes. The resistant plants respond to viral infection with hypersensitive reaction (HR) or extreme resistance (ER). HR is accompanied by programmed cell death, while ER localizes the virus at the primary infection site and limits virus replication without visible symptoms. While HR is generally strain-specific, ER can act against a broad spectrum of viral pathogens. This review aims to describe the molecular mechanisms of resistance against PVX and PVY in potato.


Reproduction patterns in three populations of southern Australian amphipods were examined to investigate the suggestion that a basic difference exists in reproduction patterns between northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere stream invertebrates. The species considered were Pseudomoera gabrieli, sampled in Sassafras Creek, Victoria, and Austrochiltonia australis, sampled at Dandenong Creek, Victoria, and Aldgate Creek, South Australia. The former species showed continuous breeding, the latter, seasonal. These results, together with a review of published studies, indicated that for Amphipoda no such basic reproductive difference exists.


This paper focuses on studying Cairo's urban fabric, which is composed of a mixture of planned districts built by the government and private sector, and informal districts, self-generated to fulfil the needs of a rapidly expanding population. The case studies selected are continuous parts of the city that show variation in the urban fabric and a distinction between planned and informal districts. This paper argues that even though there is a high percentage of unplanned districts in close proximity to planned districts, the city as a whole functions and is connected. This indicates that there exists an underlying, naturally generated global structure, a super-grid, which can be used to better integrate between the different districts, both planned and informal (Peponis et al., 2015). The study will show variations between the selected districts in terms of emergence, morphology and syntactical structure. The study will analyse syntactically the selected districts as they currently exist both locally within the district and globally in the entire case study. A similar analysis was conducted on informal settlements in Santiago, Chile. One of the principle findings was that the more spatially integrated the existing settlement is on its edge boundary with the surrounding urban layout, in terms of vehicular movement and local accessibility, the higher the level of self-generated economic activity and community development (Hillier, Greene, & Desyllas, 2000). This paper aims to build upon that, by exploring ways in which the existing informal settlements can be better integrated with the surrounding urban form to benefit the entire community by harnessing the super-grid. The analysis indicates that the highway super-grid is based on the pre-existing canal system in Cairo, but it is incomplete and creates a boundary around informal settlements rather than becoming a connector. The analysis also indicates that the main roads in informal settlements have developed using the same canal system super-grid and that this can be used to reconnect them to the city. After the initial syntactical and morphological analysis of the existing fabric, different approaches to create 'syntactic stitching' between the districts are suggested following the previous analysis and underlying global structure. The focus is on adjusting the existing fabric, such as aligning existing streets, creating new thoroughfares to increase edge movement and consolidation into the main urban form.


One of the great challenges of lung transplantation is the development of progressive small airway fibrosis leading to pulmonary function decline and allograft loss. Termed as chronic lung allograft dysfunction (CLAD), it is the leading cause of shortened long-term survival among lung transplant recipients and estimated to affect at least half of all recipients within 5 years after transplant.1 Risk factors for CLAD include type of transplant (single vs bilateral), infections, gastro-oesophageal reflux, graft ischaemic time, ischaemia–reperfusion injury, air pollution exposure, acute cellular rejection (ACR) episodes and specific antibody development.2 In this issue of Thorax , Faust and colleagues propose a new risk factor for CLAD: short donor telomere length (TL).3

Telomeres consist of repetitive DNA sequences bound to shelterin protein complex at chromosome ends to provide protection from degradation during cell division. Short TL has been identified as a major contributor to lung disease, most notably as a genetic mediator of a subset of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). In particular, mutations in multiple telomere-related genes that code for components of the telomerase enzyme complex are known to be associated with familial idiopathic interstitial pneumonia (IIP), as well as a smaller subset of patients with sporadic …


While moderate acute exercise has been associated with strong anti-inflammatory mechanisms, strenuous exercise has been linked to deleterious inflammatory perturbations. It is therefore fundamental to elucidate the mechanisms that regulate the exercise-induced inflammatory cascade. Information on novel regulators such as circulating inflammatory microRNAs (c-inflammamiRs) is incomplete. In this study, we evaluated the response of a panel of c-inflammamiRs to different doses of acute aerobic exercise. We first studied the exercise-induced inflammatory cascade in serum samples of nine active middle-aged males immediately before and after (0 h, 24 h, 72 h) 10-km, half-marathon, and marathon races. Next, we analyzed the circulating profile of 106 specific c-inflammamiRs immediately before) and after (0 h, 24 h) 10-km (low inflammatory response) and marathon (high inflammatory response) races. Analysis of classical inflammatory parameters revealed a dose-dependent effect of aerobic exercise on systemic inflammation, with higher levels detected after marathon. We observed an increase in miR-150-5p immediately after the 10-km race. Levels of 12 c-inflammamiRs were increased immediately after the marathon (let-7d-3p, let-7f-2-3p, miR-125b-5p, miR-132-3p, miR-143-3p, miR-148a-3p, miR-223-3p, miR-223-5p, miR-29a-3p, miR-34a-5p, miR-424-3p, and miR-424-5p). c-inflammamiRs returned to basal levels after 24 h. Correlation and in silico analyses supported a close association between the observed c-inflammamiR pattern and regulation of the inflammatory process. In conclusion, we found that different doses of acute aerobic exercise induced a distinct and specific c-inflammamiR response, which may be associated with control of the exercise-induced inflammatory cascade. Our findings point to c-inflammamiRs as potential biomarkers of exercise-induced inflammation, and hence, exercise dose.


By extrapolating Gordon's (1990) measures of the quality-bias in the official price indexes, we construct quality-adjusted price indexes for 24 types of equipment and software (E&S) from 1947 to 2000 and use them to measure technical change at the aggregate and at the industry level. Technological improvement in E&S accounts for an important fraction of postwar GDP growth and plays a key role in the productivity resurgence of the 1990s. Driving this finding is 4 percent annual growth in the quality of E&S in the postwar period and more than 6 percent annual growth in the 1990s. The acceleration in the 1990s occurred in every industry, consistent with the idea that information technology represents a general purpose technology. Furthermore, we measure for the aggregate economy and different sectors the "technological gap": how much more productive new machines are compared to the average machine. We show that the technological gap explains the dynamics of investment in new technologies and the returns to human capital, consistent with Nelson and Phelps' (1966) conjecture. Since the technological gap continues to increase - it more than doubled in the past 20 years - our evidence supports the view that at least some of the recent increase in productivity growth is sustainable.


We present a systematic search for variability among the ROSAT All-Sky Survey (RASS) X-ray sources. We gen- erated lightcurves for about 30 000 X-ray point sources detected sufficiently high above background. For our variability study different search algorithms were developed in order to recognize flares, periods and trends, respectively. The variable X-ray sources were optically identified with counterparts in the SIMBAD, the USNO-A2.0 and NED data bases, but a significant part of the X-ray sources remains without cataloged optical counterparts. Out of the 1207 sources classified as variable 767 (63.5%) were identified with stars, 118 (9.8%) are of extragalactic origin, 10 (0.8%) are identified with other sources and 312 (25.8%) could not uniquely be identified with entries in optical catalogs. We give a statistical analysis of the variable X-ray population and present some outstanding examples of X-ray variability detected in the ROSAT all-sky survey. Most prominent among these sources are white dwarfs, apparently single, yet nevertheless showing periodic variability. Many flares from hitherto unrecognised flare stars have been detected as well as long term variability in the BL Lac 1E1757.7+7034.


Over the last two decades, a substantial body of geographical research has emerged examining the mutually generative relations between music, space, place, landscape, identity and locality. This work has revealed the complex ways in which specific geographical identities and imaginaries can be reinforced and created through differences in sound, through lyrics, and through the acts and meanings of making music. Yet, these identities and imaginaries can also perform important economic functions, representing geographical discourses that musicians can employ to develop distinctiveness to make themselves marketable, particularly in the context of a heavily-saturated contemporary global music market. In this paper, we examine this with specific relation to the Icelandic band, Of Monsters and Men. We provide an account of how references to landscape and folklore in the band's music, lyrics and imagery represent not only expressions of intimate connections with local landscape, cultural identity and lived experience, but also embody awareness of a pre-existing Icelandic imaginary. The use of folk music instruments, cultural references and motifs, we argue, acts to legitimise the band's use of this imaginary. Further, we highlight explicit attempts to brand Icelandic music under a single 'label' as representative of the way in which this Icelandic imaginary comes to represent a powerful, if potentially homogenising, geographical discourse to mark out Icelandic music in a crowded global music market.


We give an overview of the circuit optimisation methods used by tket, a compiler system for quantum software developed by Cambridge Quantum Computing Ltd. We focus on a novel technique based around phase gadgets, a family of multi-qubit quantum operations which occur naturally in a wide range of quantum circuits of practical interest. The phase gadgets have a simple presentation in the ZX-calculus, which makes it easy to reason about them. Taking advantage of this, we present an efficient method to translate the phase gadgets back to CNOT gates and single qubit operations suitable for execution on a quantum computer with significant reductions in gate count and circuit depth. We demonstrate the effectiveness of these methods on a quantum chemistry benchmarking set based on variational circuits for ground state estimation of small molecules.


This is a survey model descriptive study which aims at testing the impact of the way the first grade students in primary school hold the pencil, grip the pencil and the compressive strength on the writing speeds and mistakes. The survey has been made with the first grade students (n=412) in the primary schools located in the city center of Kutahya. According to the data obtained, it can be said that the pencil gripping style of the students is a kind which is supported with thumb, index and middle finger; there is low negative level meaning correlation between writing mistake point and compressive strength and there is low positive level meaning correlation between writing speed and gripping strength.


ABSTRACT Objective: The 2007 American Thoracic Society/Infectious Diseases Society of America (ATS/IDSA) guidelines recommend that community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) patients admitted to hospital wards initially receive respiratory fluoroquinolone monotherapy or β-lactam plus macrolide combination therapy. There is little evidence as to which regimen is preferred, or if differences in medical resource utilization exist between therapies. Thus, the authors compared length of hospital stay (LOS) and length of intravenous antibiotic therapy (LOIV) for patients who received initial levofloxacin 750 mg daily versus ceftriaxone 1000 mg plus azithromycin 500 mg daily ('combination therapy'). Research design and methods: Adult hospital CAP cases from January 2005 to December 2007 were identified by principal discharge diagnosis code. Patients with a chest infiltrate and medical notes indicative of CAP were included. Direct intensive care unit admits and healthcare-associated cases were excluded. A propensity score technique was used to balance characteristics associated with initial antimicrobial therapy using multivariable regression to derive the scores. Propensity score categories, defined as propensity score quintiles, rather than propensity scores themselves, were used in the least squares regression model to assess the impact of LOS and LOIV. Results: A total of 495 patients from six hospitals met study criteria. Of these, 313 (63%) received levofloxacin and 182 (37%) received combination therapy. Groups were similar with respect to age, sex, most comorbidities, presenting signs and symptoms, and Pneumonia Severity Index (PSI) risk class. Patients on combination therapy were more likely to have heart failure and receive pre-admission antibiotics. Adjusted least squares mean (±SE) LOS and LOIV were shorter with levofloxacin versus combination therapy: LOS, 4.6 ± 0.17 vs. 5.4 ± 0.22 days, p < 0.01; and LOIV, 3.6 ± 0.17 vs. 4.8 ± 0.21 days, p < 0.01. Results for PSI risk class III or IV patients were: LOS, 5.0 ± 0.30 vs. 5.9 ± 0.37 days, p = 0.07; and LOIV, 3.7 ± 0.33 vs. 5.2 ± 0.39 days, p < 0.01. Due to the retrospective study design, limited sample size, and scope (single health-network), the authors encourage replication of this study in other data sources. Conclusions: Given the LOS and LOIV reductions of 0.8 and 1.2 days, respectively, utilization of levofloxacin 750 mg daily for CAP patients admitted to the medical floor has the potential to result in substantial cost savings for US hospitals.


The accurate focusing of ultrashort laser pulses is extremely important in multiphoton microscopy. Using adaptive optics to manipulate the incident ultrafast beam in either the spectral or spatial domain can introduce significant benefits when imaging. Here we introduce pulse front adaptive optics: manipulating an ultrashort pulse in both the spatial and temporal domains. A deformable mirror and a spatial light modulator are operated in concert to modify contours of constant intensity in space and time within an ultrashort pulse. Through adaptive control of the pulse front, we demonstrate an enhancement in the measured fluorescence from a two photon microscope.


In this work, multi-band (multi-color) detector structures considering different semiconductor device concepts and architectures are presented. Results on detectors operating in ultraviolet-to-infrared regions (UV-to-IR) are discussed. Multi-band detectors are based on quantum dot (QD) structures; which include quantum-dots-in-a-well (DWELL), tunneling quantum dot infrared photodetectors (T-QDIPs), and bi-layer quantum dot infrared photodetectors (Bi-QDIPs); and homo-/heterojunction interfacial workfunction internal photoemission (HIWIP/HEIWIP) structures. QD-based detectors show multi-color characteristics in midand far-infrared (MIR/FIR) regions, where as HIWIP/HEIWIP detectors show responses in UV or near-infrared (NIR) regions, and MIR-to-FIR regions. In DWELL structures, InAs QDs are placed in an InGaAs/GaAs quantum well (QW) to introduce photon induced electronic transitions from energy states in the QD to that in QW, leading to multi-color response peaks. One of the DWELL detectors shows response peaks at ∼ 6.25 μm, ∼ 10.5 μm and ∼ 23.3 μm. In T-QDIP structures, photoexcited carriers are selectively collected from InGaAs QDs through resonant tunneling, while the dark current is blocked using AlGaAs/InGaAsAlGaAs/ blocking barriers placed in the structure. A two-color T-QDIP with photoresponse peaks at 6 and 17 μm operating at room temperature and a 6 THz detector operating at 150 K are presented. Bi-QDIPs consist of two layers of InAs QDs with different QD sizes. The detector exhibits three distinct peaks at 5.6, 8.0, and 23.0 μm. A typical HIWIP/HEIWIP detector structure consists of a single (or series of) doped emitter(s) and undoped barrier(s), which are placed between two highly doped contact layers. The dual-band response arises from interband transitions of carriers in the undoped barrier and intraband transitions in the doped emitter. Two HIWIP detectors, p-GaAs/GaAs and p-Si/Si, showing interband responses with wavelength thresholds at 0.82 and 1.05 μm, and intraband responses with zero response thresholds at 70 and 32 μm, respectively, are presented. HEIWIP detectors based on n-GaN/AlGaN show an interband response in the UV region and intraband response in the 2-14 μm region. A GaN/AlGaN detector structure consisting of three electrical contacts for separate UV and IR active regions is proposed for simultaneous measurements of the two components of the photocurrent generated by UV and IR radiation. INDEX WORDS: Infrared Detectors, Multi-Color Detectors, Multi-Spectral, Dual-Band, Ultraviolet Detectors, Terahertz Detectors, Quantum Dot, Quantum Well, Resonant Tunneling, Double-Barrier, Dark Current Blocking, III-V Material, InAs, InGaAs, InAlAs, GaAs, AlGaAs, GaN, AlGaN, Si, Homojunction, Heterojunction, Workfunction, Photoemission, Impurity States. SEMICONDUCTOR QUANTUM STRUCTURES for ULTRAVIOLET-to-INFRARED MULTI-BAND RADIATION DETECTION


Abstract Background Internationally there is an increasing amount of peer-reviewed literature pertaining to disaster nursing. The literature includes personal anecdotes, reflections, and accounts of single case studies. Furthermore, issues such as the willingness of nurses to assist in disasters, the role of nurses in disasters, leadership, competencies, and educational preparedness for nurses have been the focus of the literature. Aim The aim of this research was to determine the international research priorities for disaster nursing. Method This research used a three-round Delphi technique. The first round used a face-to-face workshop to generate research statements with nursing members of the World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine (WADEM). The second and third rounds included the ranking of statements on a 5-point Likert scale with nursing members of WADEM and the World Society of Disaster Nursing (WSDN). Statements that achieved a mean of four or greater were considered a priority and progressed. Results Participants were from multiple countries. Research statements were generated in the areas of: education, training, and curriculum; psychosocial; strategy, relationship, and networking; and clinical practice. Psychosocial aspects of disaster nursing ranked the highest, with five statements appearing in the top ten research areas, followed by statements relating to: education, training, and curriculum; clinical practice; and finally, strategy, relationship, and networking. Conclusions Future disaster nursing research should focus on the area of psychosocial aspects of disaster nursing, in particular, both the psychosocial needs of a disaster-affected community and the psychosocial wellbeing of nurses who assist in disaster health activities. RanseJ, HuttonA, JeeawodyB, WilsonR. What are the research needs for the field of disaster nursing? An international Delphi study. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2014;29(5):1-7.