For data to be used effectively, it needs to be structured and annotated to make it amenable to machine processing. The Web Consortium's XML markup language promises to allow this, and increasing quantities of data are now available in the format. XML's support for namespacing allows information from diverse data sources to be combined and communicated reliably, making XML the keystone of the emerging Semantic Web. Rather than searching the web by giving a number of text strings which pages must contain, as is common now, this semantically enriched web will allow searches on precisely specified concepts, identified by the page's meta-data. Inferencing engines can be applied to this web of formally expressed facts, so that searches return information which has been deduced from the knowledge on the web, without it having been stated explicitly. There is a strong need for tools that provide flexible ways to create and manipulate XML documents. Just as the usefulness of having scientific data available in computer-readable CSV (comma separated values) format is greatly enhanced by the existence of the spreadsheet, so this new XML-based data requires a new general purpose end-user processing tool. XML is a tree-structured format, and we propose in this thesis the tree-sheet: a general purpose end-user tool for the manipulation of tree structured data. In this thesis we present Dome, our implementation of a tree-sheet. Dome is operated through a familiar direct manipulation style interface, with a 'record' mode being used to create programs. Programming features such as looping and conditional execution are also created while editing samples of actual data, making them easier to comprehend. We demonstrate several uses for Dome, including web harvesting, web page creation and visual programming.


This study aimed to determine and compare the nature of supervision children received in two settings that have different levels of environmental risk, an aquatic setting (public pools) and a nonaquatic setting (playgrounds). An observational design was implemented to examine caregiver and child behaviors at six indoor public pools and four playgrounds. Chi-square tests of homogeneity were conducted to determine associations between caregiver and child variables. Preschool children received significantly higher levels of supervision than school-aged children in both settings. For school-aged children the level of supervision varied between settings, with children significantly more likely to be unsupervised in public pools and poorly supervised on playgrounds. Reasons for the lack of supervision in aquatic settings remain unclear, particularly as this setting was considered to present higher environmental risk, because drowning rates are high for young children. Because evidence indicates inadequate supervision is common in aquatic settings, further investigations are required to identify ways to promote closer supervision practices and determine caregiver perceptions regarding their responsibilities when supervising young children in aquatic settings.


In this study, the nature of electronic transport in quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) has been extensively investigated using an ultrafast time-resolved, degenerate, pump-probe optical technique. Our investigations enable a comprehensive understanding of the gain recovery dynamics in terms of a coupling of the electronic transport to the oscillating intracavity laser intensity. In QCLs that have a lasing transition diagonal in real space, studies of the near-threshold reveal that the transport of electrons changes bias region from phonon-limited relaxation (tens of picoseconds) below threshold to photon-driven transport via stimulated emission (a few picoseconds) above threshold. The gain recovery dynamics in the photon-driven regime is compared with conventional four-level lasers such as atomic, molecular, and semiconductor interband lasers. The depopulation dynamics out of the lower lasing state is explained using a tight-binding tunneling model and phonon-limited relaxation. For the superlattice relaxation, it is possible to explain the characteristic picosecond transport via dielectric relaxation; Monte Carlo simulations with a simple resistor model are developed, and the Esaki-Tsu model is applied. Subpicosecond dynamics due to carrier heating in the upper subband are isolated and appear to be at most about 10% of the gain compression compared with the contribution of stimulated emission. Finally, the polarization anisotropy in the active waveguide is experimentally shown to be negligible on our pump-probe data, supporting our interpretation of data in terms of gain recovery and transport.


Elastic light scattering by mature red blood cells (RBCs) was theoretically and experimentally analyzed by use of the discrete dipole approximation (DDA) and scanning flow cytometry (SFC), respectively. SFC permits measurement of the angular dependence of the light-scattering intensity (indicatrix) of single particles. A mature RBC is modeled as a biconcave disk in DDA simulations of light scattering. We have studied the effect of RBC orientation related to the direction of the light incident upon the indicatrix. Numerical calculations of indicatrices for several axis ratios and volumes of RBC have been carried out. Comparison of the simulated indicatrices and indicatrices measured by SFC showed good agreement, validating the biconcave disk model for a mature RBC. We simulated the light-scattering output signals from the SFC with the DDA for RBCs modeled as a disk-sphere and as an oblate spheroid. The biconcave disk, the disk-sphere, and the oblate spheroid models have been compared for two orientations, i.e., face-on and rim-on incidence, relative to the direction of the incident beam. Only the oblate spheroid model for rim-on incidence gives results similar to those of the rigorous biconcave disk model.


From the Book:
Introduction Welcome to learning Macromedia FreeHand. If you are like most people who are just starting out with the program, you may find it a little overwhelming. This Visual QuickStart Guide has been written to help you sort out the many different features. FreeHand is one of the most versatile graphics programs for the computer. At its simplest, FreeHand is a vector drawing program. It allows you to create varied artwork such as drawings, logos, and illustrations.
FreeHand also lets you add scanned artwork from programs such as Macromedia Fireworks or Adobe Photoshop. This makes it an excellent layout program to create ads, book covers, posters and so on. FreeHand has a multiple-page feature that allows you to create newsletters and flyers, as well as multi-page presentations with differently sized pages.
Finally, FreeHand uses the newest Flash technology to turn FreeHand artwork into animations. FreeHand also lets you save your files in formats that can be posted directly onto the World Wide Web.
Using This Book The first few chapters provide overviews of the program. You may find that you do not create any artwork in those chapters. Do not skip them. They contain information that will help you later.
The middle chapters of the book contain the most artistic information. This is where you can see how easy it is to create sophisticated artwork using FreeHand. The final chapters are about printing, preferences, and using your artwork with other applications and the Web. Some of this information refers to technical printing terms. If you are not familiar with these terms, speak to the print shop that will be printing your artwork.
Using the Exercises
If you have used any of the Visual QuickStart Guides, you will find this book very similar. Each of the chapters consists of numbered exercises that deal with a specific technique or feature of the program. As you work through each exercise, you gain an understanding of the technique or feature. The illustrations for each of the exercises help you judge if you are following the steps correctly.
Instructions
Working with a book such as this, it is vital that you understand the terms I am using. This is especially important since some books use terms somewhat incorrectly. Therefore, here are the terms I use in the book and explanations of what they mean. Click refers to pressing down and releasing the mouse button on the Macintosh, and the left mouse button on Windows. You must release the mouse button or it is not a click.
Press means to hold down the mouse button, or the keyboard key.
Press and drag means to hold the mouse button down and then move the mouse. In later chapters, I use the shorthand term drag, just remember that you have to press and hold as you drag the mouse.
Menu commands
FreeHand has menu commands that you follow to open dialog boxes, change artwork, and invoke certain commands. These menu commands are listed in bold type. The typical direction to choose a menu command might be written as Window > Panels > Style. This means that you should first choose the Window menu, then choose the Panels submenu, and then choose the Style command.
Keyboard shortcuts
Most of the menu commands for FreeHand 10 have keyboard shortcuts that help you work faster. For instance, instead of choosing New from the File menu, it is faster and easier to press the keys on the keyboard. On the Macintosh, the keys are Cmd-N. On indows, the keys are Ctrl-N.
Keyboard shortcuts are sometimes listed in different orders by different software companies or authors. For example, I always list the Command or Ctrl keys first, then the Option or Alt key, and then the Shift key. Other people may list the Shift key first. The order that you press those modifier keys is not important. However, it is very important that you always add the last key (the letter or number key) after you are holding the other keys.
Learning keyboard shortcuts
While keyboard shortcuts help you work faster, you really do not have to start using them right away. In fact, you will most likely learn more about FreeHand by using the menus. As you look for one command, you may see others that you would like to explore.
Once you feel comfortable working with FreeHand, you can start adding keyboard shortcuts to your repertoire. My suggestion is to look at which menu commands you use a lot. Then each day choose one of those shortcuts.
For instance, if you do a lot of blends, you might decide to learn the shortcut for the Blend command. For the rest of that day use the Blend shortcut every time you need to make a blend. Even if you have to look at the menu to refresh your memory, still use the keyboard shortcut to actually apply the blend. By the end of the day you will have memorized the Blend shortcut. The next day you can learn a new one.
Onscreen element appearances
Some of the onscreen elements, such as the toolbars, may look different in this book from your settings. That's because I changed those panels to make them easier to read. For more information on customizing the toolbars, see Chapter 32.
Cross-platform issues One of the great strengths of FreeHand is that it is almost identical on both the Macintosh and Windows platforms. In fact, at first glance it is hard to tell which platform you are working on. However, because there are some differences between the platforms, there are some things you should keep in mind.
Modifier keys
Modifier keys are always listed with the Macintosh key first and then the Windows key second. So a direction to hold the Command/Ctrl key as you drag means to hold the Command key on the Macintosh platform or the Ctrl key on the Windows platform. When the key is the same on both computers, such as the Shift key, only one key is listed. Generally the Command key on the Macintosh (sometimes called the Apple key) corresponds to the Ctrl key on Windows. The Option key on the Macintosh corresponds to the Alt key on Windows. The Control key on the Macintosh platform does not have an equivalent on the Windows platform. Notice that the Control key for the Macintosh is always spelled out while the Ctrl key for Windows is not.
Platform-specific features
A few times in the book, I have written separate exercises for the Macintosh and Windows platforms. These exercises are indicated by (Mac) and (Win).
Most of the time this is because the procedures are so different that they need to be written separately. Sometimes features exist only on one platform. Those features are then labeled as to their platform.
Mac OS X
Macromedia FreeHand is one of the first applications to take advantage of the new Mac OS X (ten) operating system. If you are learning FreeHand on a computer that uses OS X, you will find much of the interface to look different. Don't worry, though. The differences are cosmetic. There is nothing that FreeHand running in OS X can do that can't be done in Mac OS 9 or Windows.
Learning FreeHand With a program as extensive as FreeHand, there will be many features that you never use. For instance, if you are an illustrator, you may never need any of FreeHand's text or layout features. Or you may never need to create charts or graphs. And if you are strictly a print person, you may never need to do any exporting as Web animations. Do not worry. It may be hard to believe but even the experts do not use all of FreeHand's features.
Find the areas you want to master, then follow the exercises. If you are patient, you will find yourself creating your own work in no time.
And don't forget to have fun!
Sandee Cohen (email@example.com) July 2001


Majorana polarization, previously introduced by Sticlet et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 096802 (2012)], is studied for wires in a topological superconductive state with varying orientation of the magnetic field. Numerical calculations show that in the case of a canted field, this polarization can differ in sign, as well as absolute magnitude, at the opposite ends of a wire. Since the Majorana polarization changes sign at one end when the orientation of the magnetic field is changed from perpendicular to longitudinal, there is always a range of angles for which this quantity is significantly suppressed or equals zero. Thus, the Majorana polarization does not always appear as a local order parameter for an arbitrary angle of the magnetic field in the plane perpendicular to the effective Rashba spin-orbital interaction field. It is shown that the introduction of disorder does not lead to qualitatively new effects. At the same time, additional regions with weak Majorana polarization do show up in high magnetic ...


Bartonella spp. bacteria can be found around the globe and are the causative agents of multiple human diseases. The most well-known infection is called cat-scratch disease, which causes mild lymphadenopathy and fever. As our knowledge of these bacteria grows, new presentations of the disease have been recognized, with serious manifestations. Not only has more severe disease been associated with these bacteria but also Bartonella species have been discovered in a wide range of mammals, and the pathogens' DNA can be found in multiple vectors. This review will focus on some common mammalian reservoirs as well as the suspected vectors in relation to the disease transmission and prevalence. Understanding the complex interactions between these bacteria, their vectors, and their reservoirs, as well as the breadth of infection by Bartonella around the world will help to assess the impact of Bartonellosis on public health.


Culture is often defined as the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of human groups. It is the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes a group of like individuals. That is why every society tries to protect itself against alien cultures, though they often criticize and modify their systems and ways of life according to the improvement of means and ends to be reached.

Multicultural societies have people (s) with different backgrounds living in them. Since the 1960s most of the Western countries (Europe) have experienced sweeping changes in their social structures. People from ex-colonial countries migrated into those societies (legally & illegally) with their own ways of doing things. In the United States of America multiculturalism was associated with the Civil Revolution as a result of the huge population movement (migration) into the Western (California) and Southern States (Florida) from Cuba and Latin America. Families comprising three generations (grand father, father, and children) moved into the American society with different language, customs, and ways of doing things. The situation created a huge burden on the American society at the local and federal levels.


Stemmatology studies aspects of textual criticism that use genealogical methods to analyse a set of copies of a text whose autograph has been lost. This handbook is the first to cover the entire field, encompassing both theoretical and practical aspects of traditional as well as modern digital methods and their history. As an art ( ars), stemmatology's main goal is editing and thus presenting to the reader a historical text in the most satisfactory way. As a more abstract discipline ( scientia), it is interested in the general principles of how texts change in the process of being copied. Thirty eight experts from all of the fields involved have joined forces to write this handbook, whose eight chapters cover material aspects of text traditions, the genesis and methods of traditional "Lachmannian" textual criticism and the objections raised against it, as well as modern digital methods used in the field. The two concluding chapters take a closer look at how this approach towards texts and textual criticism has developed in some disciplines of textual scholarship and compare methods used in other fields that deal with "descent with modification". The handbook thus serves as an introduction to this interdisciplinary field.
– First systematic coverage of stemmatology as a field within textual criticism.
– Written by 38 experts in fields from various philologies to biology and information theory.
– Illustrations and many practical examples from a wide range of disciplines are provided to render the content more accessible.


A green synthetic approach for the highly stable, size controlled synthesis of gold nanoparticles is being described. The study explores the use of aqueous extract of garlic cloves as reducing/stabilizing agent for the synthesis of gold nanoparticles. The synthesis is achieved by heating the mixture of aqueous garlic extract and HAuCl4 at 95oC in water bath at pH-10 for 2 hrs. The formation of gold nanoparticles was confirmed from the appearance of pink color and an absorption maximum at 530 nm. Further, extract concentration and type of alkali (NH4OH/NaOH) has been varied to tune the size of nanoparticles. The size of the synthesized gold nanoparticles was found to decrease (56.5 ± 13.6 to 24.7 ± 8.2) with increasing extract concentration (0.5%-1.0%) in the presence of NH4OH. In the presence of NaOH, the synthesis time was reduced to 20 min, with an average particle size of 5.5 ± 2.7. Transmission electron microscopy analysis indicated that non-aggregated gold nanoparticles of various sizes could be synthesized by simple change in reaction conditions. The synthesized gold nanoparticles were found to be pure face centered cubic crystals as suggested by selected area electron diffraction and X-ray diffraction patterns. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy revealed possible role of S-allyl-cysteine as the major component responsible for reduction of Au to Au and protein/amino acids as stabilizing agents. The gold nanoparticles were found to have remarkable in vitro stability: showed no sign of aggregation at room temperature storage for a long time (more than 6 months), could resist aggregation in aqueous media with high concentrations of NaCl, in various buffers including: cysteine, histidine, bovine serum albumin and at host of pH ranges. Further, cytotoxicity evaluations on S. cerevisiae have shown non-toxic nature of the synthesized gold nanoparticles up to 100 μM of concentration as assessed by well diffusion and inhibition of colony forming efficiency assay. Ease in size control, high stability and biocompatible nature of garlic extract reduced, stabilized gold nanoparticles suggests that they could be potential candidates for drug delivery applications. Copyright © 2013 VBRI press.


Lunar cycles are commonly observed in the movement, feeding and reproduction of marine fishes and invertebrates. The statistical techniques employed to examine these cycles are unstandardized, complex, and typically lacking in statistical power. Here we suggest a simple, sensitive and robust alternative for the detection of cyclical patterns: periodic regression. We use Monte Carlo simulation to demonstrate that periodic regression is more powerful and less sensitive to missing data than categorical ANOVA (the most commonly employed technique in the literature). Finally, we use real seahorse bycatch data to show that periodic regression is superior to categorical ANOVA for the detection and description of more complex cycles. We encourage researchers to use periodic regression in the analysis of lunar cycles and other cyclical patterns of known period.


The scholarly consensus says that of the constitutional plans which received consideration at the Federal Convention in 1787, the plan introduced by the Virginia delegation (the so-called "Virginia Plan") exerted the greatest influence on the final document. The opposite judgment has befallen the plan for reform introduced by the New Jersey delegation in mid-June—the so-called New Jersey Plan. Citing the nationalists' tirades against it, its purportedly backward-looking provisions, and the delegates' ultimate vote to table it on June 19, scholars have all but relegated the New Jersey Plan to the ash heap of history.
This article challenges the cutting-room floor narrative surrounding the New Jersey Plan. It demonstrates that, notwithstanding the June 19 vote, the New Jersey Plan's core tenets went on to shape the fundamental structure of the American union as memorialized in the Constitution to a much greater degree than scholars have recognized. Its influence on the Constitution breaks down into three primary components, analyzed respectively in Parts I, II, and III. First, introduction of the New Jersey Plan effectuated a shift in the proposed constitutional order whereby the "national" government envisaged by the Virginia Plan became a "federal" one that preserved the sovereignties of the several states. Second, provisions from the New Jersey Plan that the delegates later reincorporated into the Constitution, deserve primary credit for constitutionalizing judicial review of legislation. Finally, the New Jersey Plan significantly influenced the Committee of Detail's determination to replace the government with unenumerated police powers proposed by the Virginia Plan, with a government of defined powers.
In short, arguably the Constitution's most distinctive structural features came from the New Jersey Plan and not the Virginia Plan. Yet the New Jersey Plan's influence on the American constitutional order did not terminate with the signing of the Constitution in September 1787. Concluding remarks show that during the ratification debates and in the decade or so after ratification, early Americans placed enduring constructions on the Constitution that reflected the core principles underlying the New Jersey Plan, even where the Constitution's text counseled a contrary result.


This chapter discusses the propagation of TM and TE waves in the one-dimensional gyrotropic magnetophotonic crystals with ferrite and plasma-like layers. Elements of the transfer matrix are calculated in closed analytical form on the base of electrodynamic problem rigorous solution for arbitrary location of the gyrotropic elements on the structure period. Dispersion equation of the layered periodic structure with gyrotropic ele- ments is obtained. Dispersion properties of the structure for TE and TM modes are analyzed for different configurations of magnetophotonic crystals (ferrite and plasma- like layers). Existence areas of transmission bands for surface and bulk waves are obtained. The effect of problem parameters on the dispersion properties of magne- tophotonic crystals for TM and TE modes is investigated. Regimes of complete transmission of wave through limited magnetophotonic crystal are analyzed for bulk and surface waves.


We propose a nonlinear hybrid decision feedback equalizer (NHDFE) for single-carrier (SC) block transmission systems with nonlinear transmit high power amplifier (HPA), which significantly outperforms our previous nonlinear SC frequency-domain equalization (NFDE) design. To obtain the coefficients of the channel impulse response (CIR) as well as to estimate the nonlinear mapping and the inverse nonlinear mapping of the HPA, we adopt a complex-valued (CV) B-spline neural network approach. Specifically, we use a CV B-spline neural network to model the nonlinear HPA, and we develop an efficient alternating least squares scheme for estimating the parameters of the Hammerstein channel, including both the CIR coefficients and the parameters of the CV B-spline model. We also adopt another CV B-spline neural network to model the inversion of the nonlinear HPA, and the parameters of this inverting B-spline model can be estimated using the least squares algorithm based on the pseudo training data obtained as a natural byproduct of the Hammerstein channel identification. The effectiveness of our NHDFE design is demonstrated in a simulation study, which shows that the NHDFE achieves a signal-to-noise ratio gain of 4dB over the NFDE at the bit error rate level of  $10^{-4}$ .


Here are the famous sutras, or sermons, of the Buddha, the gathas, or hymns, the intriguing philosophical puzzles known as koan, and the dharanis, or invocations to expel evil spirits. Included also are the recorded conversations of the great Buddhist monksintimate dialogues on the subjects of momentous importance. In addition to the written selections, all of them translated by Dr. Suzuki, there are reproductions of many Buddhist drawings and paintings, including religious statues found in Zen temples, each with an explanation of its significance, and the great series of allegorical paintings The Ten Oxherding Pictures. "


A visionary work of science fiction that introduced the word "robot" Written in 1920, premiered in Prague in 1921, and first performed in New York in 1922 garnered worldwide acclaim for its author and popularized the word robot. Mass-produced as efficient laborers to serve man, Capek s Robots are an android product they remember everything but think of nothing new. But the Utopian life they provide ultimately lacks meaning, and the humans they serve stop reproducing. When the Robots revolt, killing all but one of their masters, they must strain to learn the secret of self-duplication. It is not until two Robots fall in love and are christened Adam and Eve by the last surviving human that Nature emerges triumphant. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators."


A hypervelocity electromagnetic (EM) launch system is designed and employed to observe the special phenomenon when the projectile velocity is more than 3km/s. The whole launch system consisted of a 9MJ capacitive pulse power supply (PPS) and railgun device. The capacitive PPS is composed of 180 pulse forming units (PFU). Each PFU has a compact capacitor (1mF/10kV), a pulse shaping inductor (20μH), a crowbar diode and thyristor switch. The whole length of railgun is 5.5m, and with a travel length of 5.3m.Test results show that the PPS can afford a pulse current, which the peak current and full width at half maximum (FWHM) is more than 500kA and 4ms, respectively. The EML device can accelerate a 181.0g projectile to 3550.0m/s muzzle velocity when the input energy is 3.5MJ.And the whole system launch efficiency is nearly 32.0%.


Salmonellosis has a worldwide relevance in aspects associated with public health, as only in 2009 were reported 93.8 million cases in humans. The objective of the study was to establish the prevalence, risk factors and bacteriological and molecular identification of Salmonella spp in stray dogs in urban, rural and coastal areas of Mexicali, a city in northwest Mexico. From May 2014 to February 2015, 385 dogs were tested. Sampling was performed by rectal swab and conventional bacteriological techniques were applied, for later implementation of the API 20E system and molecular identification by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The data were analysed statistically by means of descriptive statistics and multiple logistic regression modelling. A prevalence of 6.27% was obtained in the dogs examined, the samples obtained were characterised to subspecies ( Salmonella enterica subspecies enterica and Salmonella enterica subspecie arizonae ). The geographical region with the highest prevalence in the study was the coast (10%), followed by the rural area (8.57%) and the urban area (5.8%), however, no significant statistical differences were detected. There was significant difference in the prevalence by age of dogs under one year ( P <0.05). The identification of Salmonella in dogs from northwest Mexico could correspond to serovars of zoonotic importance indicating a potential risk for the population. Key words : Salmonella spp, prevalence, stray dogs, public health.


There is large public and political interest in the predictability of weather and climate, in particular in the influence of human activities on the likely climate change during the next century. Numerical models are the main tools which enable the nonlinear processes involved in the dynamics and physics of the atmosphere and other components of the climate system to be integrated in an effective way. The performance of such models used for weather forecasting has continued to improve as more accurate data with better coverage has become available, as improved descriptions of the physics and dynamics have been incorporated and as computing capacity and speed have increased. Studies of the predictability with models suggest that with further improvements in data and models deterministic forecasting of detailed weather may ultimately have useful skill up to 2-3 weeks ahead. Beyond the limit of deterministic forecasting, some skill remains for the forecasting of general weather patterns which can be pursued by studying ensembles of model forecasts from slightly varying initial conditions. The largest difficulty with further improvements of numerical models lies in their inadequate treatment of the motions too small to be explicitly resolved. Interactions between the atmosphere and the ocean are responsible for substantial variations on seasonal, interannual and longer timescales. Forecasts are being provided of seasonal precipitation in the Sahel region of Africa based on a knowledge of global sea surface tem perature (SST) anomalies together with the assumption that such anomalies tend to persist from one season to the next. Attempts to forecast SST anomalies have centred on tropical regions in particular on the El Nino. Simple models show some skill in forecasting El Nino events 3-9 months in advance. Studies with more elaborate models which as yet only show partial success in simulating these events demonstrate the complex nature of the interactions involved. Turning to the likely changes in climate next century: if no changes occur in the atmosphere other than the increase in C02 and other greenhouse gases due to human activities, the increase in radiative forcing due to a doubling of atmospheric C02 concentration would lead to an increase of about 1.2 °C in global average temperature. Water vapour and ice-albedo feedbacks raise this to a figure of about 2.5 °C (with an uncertainty range of 1.5—4.5 °C) as estimated by the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change. Such a change would dominate over forcing likely to arise from other factors, and this estim ated rate of change next century is probably greater than any which has occurred on earth during the past 10000 years. The main uncertainties in climate change predictions arise from the inadequacies of the models in their descriptions of cloud-radiation and ocean circulation feedbacks. Until there is more confidence in the treatment of these feedbacks there are bound to be large uncertainties associated with any predictions of regional climate change. To reduce the uncertainties there need to be improvements in computer power, in model formulation and in our understanding of climate processes together with a large programme of observations of climate parameters to provide early detection of climate change and to provide validation of climate models and to provide data for initialization of model integrations. An important question is whether changes in climate due to changes in radiative forcing are predictable. It is pointed out that the response to climate over the past half million years to changes in forcing due to the variations in the Earth 's orbit (Milankovitch cycles) is a regular one; some 60% of variations in the global temperature as established from the palaeontological record occur near frequencies of the Milankovitch cycles. We can, therefore, expect the changes in climate due to increasing greenhouse gases to be a largely predictable response. Large, but probably predictable, changes in the circulation of the deep ocean have modified climate change during past epochs and could have significant influence on future climate change.


When lawyers confronted the welfare system in the 1960's, they charged it with oppressive moralism, personal manipulation, and invasion of privacy. They focused attention on the "man-in-the-house" rules that disqualified families on the basis of the mother's sexual conduct and the "midnight raids" in which welfare workers forced their way into recipients' homes searching for evidence of cohabitation.' When I represented welfare recipients from 1979 to 1981, the workers showed little interest in policing their morals or intruding on their private lives. The "man-in-the-house" rule and the practice of unannounced or nighttime visits had been repudiated.2 Yet the pathologies emphasized by the lawyers of the 1960's seemed to have been mitigated at the cost of exacerbating others that were in some respects their mirror images: indifference, impersonality, and irresponsibility. The new pathologies were typified by cases in which newly arrived Cuban refugees were denied assistance because they could not produce appropriately certified copies of birth certificates for their children or in which people who sought assistance from the wrong worker were sent away without explanation, thinking mistakenly that they were entitled to nothing. I have a particularly vivid memory of a woman whose grant was terminated when she failed to produce a recently dated letter from the school of one of her children verifying his enrollment. She had produced letters from the three other schools her children attended and had produced let-


Predictors of substance abuse treatment completion have the potential to help professionals conduct comprehensive assessments and develop effective treatment plans. According to the Treatment Improvement Protocol (TIP) 38, developed by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT) a part of the Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), research has shown that predictors of substance abuse treatment completion include successful employment, family support, and lack of coexisting mental illness (CSAT, 2000). Specifically, Magura, Staines, Blankertz, and Madison (2004) found clients who were employed or became employed during treatment, completed treatment more often than those who were not employed. However, Sinclair and Olmstead (2004), as cited in West (2008), found only 31% of the substance abuse treatment facilities in the U.S. prioritize employment by offering a vocational counseling component. Coviello, Zanis, Wesnowski, and Domis (2009) added additional support for the importance of incorporating a vocational counseling component in substance abuse treatment. Coviello et al. reported that employment not only attributed to a reduction in drug use but also reduction in crime rates and risky behaviors. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the 12-step addiction treatment model is the most widely used form of treatment within substance abuse programs. The 12-step addiction treatment model is largely based on the Minnesota Model which states the "primary goal of treatment is lifetime abstinence from alcohol and other mood-altering chemicals" whereas personality change is an "ultimate goal." Vocational services are not mentioned in the 12 -step addiction treatment model or the Minnesota Model. Leukefeld, McDonald, Staton, and Mateyoke-Scrivner (2004) discussed the importance of vocational rehabilitation and the trend of these services being secondary among substance abuse treatment programs. Their research indicates clients are more successful in treatment and have longer abstinent rates when they are employed. West (2008) purported that despite the evidence that vocational counseling is a predictor of substance abuse treatment completion, many treatment programs still lack a vocational component. Important to note is that employment has been shown as a predictor of successful treatment completion but this does not indicate a causative relationship. The Vocational Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1965 expanded vocational services to include people with substance abuse issues (Maki & Riggar, 1997). Even with the passage of this legislation, vocational counseling and substance abuse counseling remain separated. There is contrast within the separated professions, substance abuse professionals view sobriety as the primary goal that will improve a person's life (Hester & Miller, 2003) whereas vocational rehabilitation professionals view employment as the way to improve quality of life (Wright 1980). Magura and Blankertz (2004) purported there is no clear evidence that vocational counseling is effective when implemented within substance abuse treatment because there is not a standard or clear definition of what vocational counseling means for professionals providing substance abuse treatment. Elliot and Leung (2004) provided one definition, "Vocational rehabilitation (VR) traditionally refers to the provision of some type of service to enhance the employability of an individual who has been limited by a disabling physical condition" (p. 320). Significance of the Problem According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), 22.3 million people met criteria by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM IV-TR) for substance abuse or dependence in 2007 (Walls, Batiste, Moore, & Loy, 2009). Moreover, according to the SAMSHA Treatment Episodes Data Set (TEDS), unemployment rates for those admitted to a substance abuse treatment agency were 33. …


This thesis presents an automated, data-driven integration process for relational databases. Whereas previous integration methods assumed a large amount of user involvement as well as the availability of database meta-data, we make no use of meta-data and little end user input. This is done using a novel join and translation finding algorithm that searches for the proper key/foreign key relationships while inferring the instance transformations from one database to another. Because we rely only on the relations that bind the attributes together, we make no use of the database schema information. A novel searching method allows us to search the database for relevant objects without requiring server side indexes or cooperative databases.


As France's oldest team sport, rugby football has throughout its 125-year history reflected major changes in French society. This book analyzes for the first time the complex variety of motives that have led the French to adopt and remake this rather unlikely British sport in their own image. A major site for the construction of masculine, class-based regional and national identities, France's tradition of 'Champagne rugby' continues to be as subject to dramatic upheavals as the society that produced it. The game's precocious professionalism and endemic violence have not infrequently caused the French to be cast as international pariahs. Such isolation, exacerbated by internal politics, has led the French not only to encourage the extension of the sport beyond its British imperial base (into Italy and Romania, for instance), but also to engage in some uncomfortable tactical alliances, most obviously with apartheid South Africa.Taking his analysis both on and off the field, the author tackles these issues and much more: the relationship of sport and the state (including particularly the Vichy period and the period under de Gaulle); professionalization; the persistence of colonial and postcolonial structures (including the role of ethnic minorities); and gender issues - especially masculine identities. At the same time he links the evolution of the sport to the broader context of French socio-economic, political and cultural history.This book will be essential reading for anyone interested in the cultural analysis of sport or French popular culture.


Objective Although plenty of researchers have reported systemic effects originating from chronic periodontitis (CP) on potentially distal inflammatory processes, such as those leading to coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, and cancer, no study has reported the association between CP and sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL). The present study explored the association between CP and SSNHL using a large, population-based dataset in Taiwan. Study Design A case-control study. Setting Taiwan. Patients We used administrative claims data from the Taiwan National Health Insurance program to identify 2,436 subjects with SSNHL and to randomly select 7,308 controls. Main Outcome Measures A conditional logistic regression analysis was conducted to calculate the odds ratio (OR) for having been previously diagnosed with CP between cases and controls. Results In total, 1,663 (17.1%) of the 9,744 sampled subjects had received a CP diagnosis before the index date; 520 (21.4%) were cases and 1143 (15.6%) were controls. The &khgr;2 test suggested that there was a significant difference in the prevalence of previous SSNHL between cases and controls (p < 0.001). The conditional logistic regression revealed after adjusting for hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, renal disease, coronary heart disease, obesity, and stroke, the OR of having previously received a CP diagnosis among cases was 1.44 (95% CI = 1.29∼1.63) that of controls. Conclusion This study found that SSNHL was significantly associated with a previous diagnosis of CP. Further prospective studies are warranted to confirm our findings and clarify the underlying pathomechanism.


The workshop on new trends in Parallel Computing and Optimization aims at providing a forum for scientific researchers and engineers on recent advances in the field of parallel or distributed computing for difficult combinatorial optimization problems, like 0-1 multidimensional knapsack problems and cutting stock problems, large scale linear programming problems, nonlinear optimization problems and global optimization problems. Emphasis will be placed on new techniques for the solution of these difficult problems like cooperative methods for integer programming problems and polynomial optimization methods. Aspects related to Combinatorial Scientific Computing (CSC) will also be treated. Finally, the use of new approaches in parallel computing like GPU or hybrid computing, peer to peer computing and cloud computing will be considered. Application to planning, logistics, manufacturing, finance, telecommunications and computational biology will be considered. Topics covered include:


Data scientists often develop machine learning models to solve a variety of problems in the industry and academy. To build these models, these professionals usually perform activities that are also performed in the traditional software development lifecycle, such as eliciting and implementing requirements. One might argue that data scientists could rely on the engineering of traditional software development to build machine learning models. However, machine learning development presents certain characteristics, which may raise challenges that lead to the need for adopting new practices. The literature lacks in characterizing this knowledge from the perspective of the data scientists. In this paper, we characterize challenges and practices addressing the engineering of machine learning models that deserve attention from the research community. To this end, we performed a qualitative study with eight data scientists across five different companies having different levels of experience in developing machine learning models. Our findings suggest that: (i) data processing and feature engineering are the most challenging stages in the development of machine learning models; (ii) it is essential synergy between data scientists and domain experts in most of stages; and (iii) the development of machine learning models lacks the support of a well-engineered process.


Our research examines the role of airports in regional development. Specifically, we examine two things: (1) the factors associated with whether or not a metro will have an airport, and (2) the effect of airport activities on regional economic development. Based on multiple regression analysis for U.S. metros, our research generates four key findings. First, airports are more likely to be located in larger metros with higher shares of cultural workers and warmer winters. Second, airports add significantly to regional development measured as economic output per capita. Third, the effect of airports on regional development occurs through two channels – their capacity to move both people and cargo, with the former being somewhat more important. Fourth, the impact of airports on regional development varies with their size and scale.


Based on his speech to the European Parliament on July 15th, following his election as President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker has clearly opted for 'more Union' during his five-year term, offering up an ambitious agenda that raises a host of expectations. In this CEPS Commentary, Karel Lannoo outlines the most salient items on Juncker's agenda, focusing on the most laudable and those that will pose the greatest challenges.


A character network represents relations between characters from a text; the relations are based on text proximity, shared scenes/events, quoted speech, etc. Our project sketches a theoretical framework for character network analysis, bringing together narratology, both close and distant reading approaches, and social network analysis. It is in line with recent attempts to automatise the extraction of literary social networks (Elson, 2012; Sack, 2013) and other studies stressing the importance of character- systems (Woloch, 2003; Moretti, 2011). The method we use to build the network is direct and simple. First, we extract co-occurrences from a book index, without the need for text analysis. We then describe the narrative roles of the characters, which we deduce from their respective positions in the network, i.e. the discourse. As a case study, we use the autobiographical novel Les Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. We start by identifying co-occurrences of characters in the book index of our edition (Slatkine, 2012). Subsequently, we compute four types of centrality: degree, closeness, betweenness, eigenvector. We then use these measures to propose a typology of narrative roles for the characters. We show that the two parts of Les Confessions, written years apart, are structured around mirroring central figures that bear similar centrality scores. The first part revolves around the mentor of Rousseau; a figure of openness. The second part centres on a group of schemers, depicting a period of deep paranoia. We also highlight characters with intermediary roles: they provide narrative links between the societies in the life of the author. The method we detail in this complete case study of character network analysis can be applied to any work documented by an index.


VI THE ARGUMENT THAT STUDENTS of Murray make in defense of liberal or constitutional democracy as the best regime simply for the Catholic understanding can be found in Murray's own writings, at least in outline. It is a historical argument, and runs as follows. Unlike the liberal or laicist democracies of nineteenth-century Europe, which were in fact more or less what I have described as Hobbesian or Lockean, American constitutional democracy is not characterized by an indifference to the truth of religion or, worse, by a rationalist faith that seeks to rid the world of "superstition." The American political order is quite different. As its Declaration of Independence says, it conceives of rights as endowed by a sovereign God, and the belief in those rights as a "holding of truths." (2) In addition, the First Amendment's free exercise clause makes clear that the political agreement reached by the Framers was an agreement of religious men or representatives of a religious people, who wished their government to have a care for the protection of their religion from government interference. This people was, certainly, a Protestant people; they shared a Protestant consensus or "public philosophy," and their disagreements presupposed this more fundamental consensus or agreement. But the principles that they articulated in the First Amendment are in fact truly Catholic principles. They evince a care for religion. Moreover, the distinction between the State and civil society is, both historically and theologically, a Catholic principle, for the Galatian doctrine of the two swords, altogether unknown to antiquity but required by Christianity, is what has eventually borne fruit as the distinction between the state and society. Finally, the complementary notion of indirect government through a secular state, which informs the American political order, is first found in the writings of John of Paris. Now to be sure, the modern understanding of all of these notions found its initial expression in writers such as Hobbes and Locke, and was largely directed against the Catholic Church, which failed to follow John of Paris and instead sought confessional Catholic states. But this too was a historical accident. The Church had, after the collapse of the Roman Empire, to fill the civilizational void of rule left by that collapse. Having done its work and assisted the maturation of Western man, however, the Church failed to step aside as its own principles, had they been fully understood, would have dictated. And so it was left to the Church's secularist opponents to articulate the doctrines that gave rise to constitutional democracy. Now, standing as it were at the end of this maturation, if not at the end of history, the Church recognizes the fully awakened consciousness of human freedom and reclaims as her own the principle of human liberty that informs constitutional democracy. She recognizes the truth and justice of American Constitutional democracy as the best regime simply. (3) That is Murray's historical, and historicist, argument. There is an initial difficulty with it: while there are undoubtedly Christian influences on the American Founding, hard historical evidence indicates that Jefferson and Madison--upon whose work the American Founding rests--were Hobbesian or Lockean, intent on promoting a soft or easygoing indifference in their fellow citizens in the name of comfortable self-preservation. (4) Murray's broad reading of the free exercise clause, which finds that the American regime intended to favor religious practice, mistakes a difference of tactics for a difference of intent. "Our sister states in Pennsylvania and New York," says Jefferson, "have made the happy discovery that the way to silence religious disputes, is to take no notice of them. Let us too give this experiment fair play." (5) More broadly, Murray's argument is supported by rather thin evidence, including appeals to the true thought of Roger Williams (who was not one of the Framers),6 and an uncritical dependence on Clinton Rossiter and on the Carlisle brothers' neo-Hegelian history of political thought. …


Increasing demand for quality and reliability of the asset is progressively seen as a motivation for improved maintenance procedure and management. Always the role of qualitative maintenance data is neglected in the maintenance recovery level identification. Human factor parameter in the maintenance and qualitative technical data, for instance, maintenance experience, maintenance knowledge, training, quality before maintenance, number of previous maintenance, maintenance documentation and environmental condition can be collected and evaluated to increase the accuracy of maintenance recovery estimation. This information always expressed linguistically and considering their effect in the recovery model is challenging. The aim of this study is to propose a symbolic model to capture the effect of above qualitative factor on maintenance recovery level. Fuzzy inference systems are applied to qualitative expert knowledge to extract the percentage effect which can be incorporated in the recovery level model. The tamping railway case study is considered to validate the model. The results show that the maintenance experience and environmental condition are playing main role in maintenance quality. The application of above method can be extended to asset condition assessment in combination with data driven and physical model


An org. redox couple (McMT-/BMT) was used in dye-sensitized solar cells. Based on a low-cost org. dye, TH305, an efficiency of 4.0% was achieved under simulated sunlight (100 mW/cm2). Photoelectrochem. measurements provided insight into the difference between the org. redox couple and traditional I-based electrolytes.


Generally, the traditional layered protocol architecture is used to design protocols for wireless sensor networks in which MAC and Routing protocols act independently and this may cause counteraction between them. Cross-layer protocols are known to be more efficient. In this paper, we present MAR-WSN, a MAC-aware Routing protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks, in which the next hop decisions are made based on the TDMA scheduling and the two-hop neighbourhood knowledge. Coherent decisions in space, taken by the routing protocol, with those taken by the MAC protocol, in time, prove to be efficient against several metrics: delay, energy consumption and hop number. The simulation results show good performance of our strategy in medium and high density networks compared to the state of the art.


The matching to solar-cell generators of both separately excited and series DC motors driving pumping loads is addressed. It is shown that the maximum gross mechanical power can be obtained at slightly higher voltages and slightly lower currents compared to the maximum electrical-power points on the solar-cell generator characteristics at different insolation levels. Guidelines for constructing the loci of the motor voltage-current points for maximum mechanical power and for determining the optimal motor parameters to match the solar generator are derived in terms of the mechanical load characteristics and the solar array parameters. Results of applying these design criteria to practical case studies enabled the assessment and comparison of both kinds of motors, especially as far as the daily utilizable output mechanical energy is concerned. The superiority of the separately excited motors in such systems is quantitatively indicated. The results are also compared to corresponding information available in the literature. >


Background sustained virological response (SVR) can be achieved in high percentage of HCV patients with the availability of direct acting antiviral agents DAAs. However, the effect of DAAs on insulin resistance and glycemic control has to be clearly documented in patients with HCV infection and type 2diabtes mellitus. We hypothesize that treatment of HCV with novel direct-acting antiviral medications may have effect on glycemic control and decreased requirement for DM-modulating medications at the time of SVR. Patients and methods: the present study involved 50 patients with Chronic HCV attended to outpatient hepatology clinic of One Day Surgery Hospital for treatment with DAAs. Measurement of HbA1c, FPG, fasting insulin hormone, c-peptide and calculation of HOMA-IR before and 3 months after DDAs therapy is done. Statistical analysis was done for these data. Results : After achievement of SVR; HbA1c decreased from 9.57±1.39 to 7.22 ± 0.7 in diabetic patients, HOMA-IR decreased significantly also there was a significant improvement of lipid profile after completion of


This monograph examines how European Union law and regulation address concentrations of private economic power which impede free information flows on the Internet to the detriment of Internet users' autonomy. In particular, competition law, sector specific regulation (if it exists), data protection and human rights law are considered and assessed to the extent they can tackle such concentrations of power for the benefit of users. Using a series of illustrative case studies, of Internet provision, search, mobile devices and app stores, and the cloud, the work demonstrates the gaps that currently exist in EU law and regulation. It is argued that these gaps exist due, in part, to current overarching trends guiding the regulation of economic power, namely neoliberalism, by which only the situation of market failure can invite ex ante rules, buoyed by the lobbying of regulators and legislators by those in possession of such economic power to achieve outcomes which favour their businesses. Given this systemic, and extra-legal, nature of the reasons as to why the gaps exist, solutions from outside the system are proposed at the end of each case study. This study will appeal to EU competition lawyers and media lawyers.


The aim of this study is to examine the bank-specific and macroeconomic determinants of the banks profitability in Turkey over the time period from 2002 to 2010. The bank profitability is measured by return on assets (ROA) and return on equity (ROE) as a function of bank-specific and macroeconomic determinants. Using a balanced panel data set, the results show that asset size and non-interest income have a positive and significant effect on bank profitability. However, size of credit portfolio and loans under follow-up have a negative and significant impact on bank profitability. With regard to macroeconomic variables, only the real interest rate affects the performance of banks positively. These results suggest that banks can improve their profitability through increasing bank size and non-interest income, decreasing credit/asset ratio. In addition, higher real interest rate can lead to higher bank profitability.


Reliable results are crucial when working with medical decision support systems. A decision support system should be reliable but also be interpretable, i.e. able to show how it has inferred its conclusions. In this thesis, the preprocessing perceptron is presented as a simple but effective and efficient analysis method to consider when creating medical decision support systems. The preprocessing perceptron has the simplicity of a perceptron combined with a performance comparable to the multi-layer perceptron. The research in this thesis has been conducted within the fields of medical informatics and intelligent computing. The original idea of the production line as a tool for a domain expert to extract information, build decision support systems and integrate them in the existing system is described. In the introductory part of the thesis, an introduction to feed-forward neural networks and fuzzy logic is given as a background to work with the preprocessing perceptron. Input to a decision support system is crucial and it is described how to gather a data set, decide how many and what kind of inputs to use. Outliers, errors and missing data are covered as well as normalising of the input. Training is done in a backpropagation-like manner where the division of the data set into a training and a test set can be done in several different ways just as the training itself can have variations. Three major groups of methods to estimate the discriminance effect of the preprocessing perceptron are described and a discussion of the trade-off between complexity and approximation strength are included. Five papers are presented in this thesis. Case studies are shown where the preprocessing perceptron is compared to multi-layer perceptrons, statistical approaches and other mathematical models. The model is extended to a generalised preprocessing perceptron and the performance of this new model is compared to the traditional feed-forward neural networks. Results concerning the preprocessing layer and its connection to multivariate decision limits are included. The well-known ROC curve is described and introduced fully into the field of computer science as well as the improved curve, the QROC curve. Finally a tutorial to the program trainGPP is presented. It describes how to work with the preprocessing perceptron from the moment when a data file is provided to the moment when a new decision support system is built.


Confocal laser endomicroscopy (CLE) has found an increasing number of applications in clinical and pre-clinical studies, for it allows intraoperative in-situ tissue morphology at cellular resolution. CLE is considered as one of the most promising systems for in-vivo pathological diagnostics. Miniaturized imaging probes are designed for intraoperative applications. Due to less sophisticated optical design, CLE systems are more prone to image aberrations and distortions. While diagnostics with CLE takes reference from the corresponding histological images, the determination of the resolution and aberrations of the CLE systems becomes essential. Thereby on-site quality check of system performance is required. Additionally, these compact systems enable a field of view of less than half square millimeter without zooming function, which makes it difficult to correlate human vision to the microscopic scenes. Therefore, it is necessary to have defined microstructures working as a test target for CLE systems. We have extended the 2D bar pattern in 1951 USAF test chart to 3D structures for both lateral and axial resolution assessment, since axial resolution represents the optical sectioning ability of CLE systems and is one of the key parameters to be assessed. The test target was produced by direct laser writing. Yellow-green fluorescence emission can be excited at 488 nm. It can also be used for other fluorescence microscopic imaging modalities in the corresponding wavelength range.


Objective: Memantine is a noncompetitive N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR)ant  agoni st that im proves or stabilizes cognitive impairment in moderate to severeAlzheimer's disease (AD). However, the effects of memantine on regional brain metabolic activity and perfusion are not fully known. To clarify these effects, we investigated the efficacyof memantine monotherapy using multimodal neuroimaging in drug-naive patients withmoderate AD.

Methods: This was a prospective open-labeled study of patients with drug- naive  modera  teAD  ( Mini-Mental State Examination scores of 14-19) before and after 12 weeks of treatmentwith memantine, conducted between April 2015 and December 2016. Imaging was performedusing 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose-positron emission tomography (18F-FDG-PET) and 99mTcethylcysteinate dimer-single photon emission computed tomography (99mTc-ECD-SPECT),to assess brain metabolic activity and perfusion, respectively. The imaging data, registered toa probabilistic anatomical atlas, were evaluated by voxel-based analysis.

Results: A total of 20 patients were enrolled and 17 patients' datasets were a nalyzed. T  heaver age Mini-Mental State Examination was 16.6 (1.8) at baseline and 16.9 (4.1) posttreatment.The average Neuropsychiatric Inventory score was 2.8 (7.6) at baseline and 3.9(9.2) post-treatment. Brain regions with increased metabolic activity following memantinetreatment in previously drug-naive AD patients included a wide range of cerebral cortexes,
particularly the right inferior pari etal lobule, right supramarginal gyrus, right angular gyru s,and right paracentral lobule (p < 0.01, paired t-test). Only small regions had increased brainperfusion (p < 0.01, paired t-test).

Conclusion: We believe this is the first stu dy focusing on brain metabolic activity and perfusioni   n  the same drug-naive moderate AD patients before and after memantine treatment. Therewere inconsistencies between the regions with increased metabolic activity and perfusionafter memantine treatment in drug-naive AD patients, suggesting that brain metabolism mayincrease without a concurrent increase in blood perfusion. This study may help elucidate themechanism of action of memantine.


Background Chronic inflammatory diseases (CID) are globally highly prevalent and characterized by severe pathological medical conditions. Several trials were conducted aiming at measuring the effects of manipulative therapies on patients affected by CID. The purpose of this review was to explore the extent to which osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT) can be benefi-cial in medical conditions also classified as CID. Methods This review included any type of experimental study which enrolled sub-jects with CID comparing OMT with any type of control procedure. The search was conducted on eight databases in January 2014 using a pragmatic literature search approach. Two independent re-viewers conducted study selection and data extraction for each study. The risk of bias was evaluated according to the Cochrane methods. Heterogeneity was assessed and meta-analysis performed where possible. Results 10 studies met the inclusion criteria for this review enrolling 386 subjects. The search identified six RCTs, one laboratory study, one cross-over pilot studies, one observation-al study and one case control pilot study. Results suggest a potential effect of osteopathic medicine on patients with medical pathologies associated with CID (in particular Chronic Obstructive Pul-monary Disease (COPD), Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Asthma and Peripheral Arterial Disease) com-pared to no treatment or sham therapy although data remain elusive. Moreover one study showed possible effects on arthritis rat model. Meta-analysis was performed for COPD studies only show-ing no effect of any type of OMT applied versus control. No major side effects were reported by those receiving OMT. Conclusion The present systematic review showed inconsistent data on the effect of OMT in the treatment of medical conditions potentially associated with CID, however the OMT appears to be a safe approach. Further more robust trials are needed to determine the direction and magnitude of the effect of OMT and to generalize favorable results.


From the summer of 1926 to the summer of 1927, Louis Armstrong entered into a partnership at the Sunset Cafe in Chicago with a husband-and-wife dance team called Brown and McGraw. In doing so, he took part in a long-forgotten tradition of early jazz trumpet players accompanying dancers. The practice began in 1924 with pantomime artist Johnny Hudgins and his many trumpet-playing assistants. Like these trumpeters, Armstrong appeared on-stage with the dancers, playing rehearsed—though not written—solos that closely matched their steps, movements, or facial expressions. Dancers Brown and McGraw had Armstrong9s lines notated in an arrangement, allowing them to hire other trumpet players to accompany them whenever they went out on tour. They were known for a dancing style that was fast, acrobatic, and unpredictable—attributes that also describe Armstrong9s playing from this period. The rhythmic sensibility the three of them shared seems to have produced fertile interactions. During the time of their collaboration, Armstrong made a major shift in his approach to rhythm. Whereas previously he had tended to rely on more or less fixed rhythmic modules, some of which he inherited from ragtime, his recordings in late 1926 and 1927 reveal a rhythmic vocabulary that is free, flexible, and endlessly inventive—the foundation for the new jazz language that would emerge in the Swing Era.


We analyze the short- and long-term effects of the U.S. Vietnam-era military service on veterans' health outcomes using a restricted version of the National Health Interview Survey 1974-2013 and employing the draft lotteries as an instrumental variable (IV). We start by assessing whether the draft lotteries, which have been used as an IV in prior literature, satisfy the exclusion restriction by placing bounds on its net or direct effect on the health outcomes of individuals who are non-veterans regardless of their draft eligibility (the "never takers"). Since we do not find evidence against the validity of the IV, we assume its validity in conducting inference on the health effects of military service for individuals who comply with the draft-lotteries assignment (the "compliers"), as well as for those who volunteer for enlistment (the "always takers"). The causal analysis for volunteers, who represent over 75% of veterans, is novel in this literature that typically focuses on the compliers. Since the effect for volunteers is not point-identified, we employ bounds that rely on a mild mean weak monotonicity assumption. We examine a large array of health outcomes and behaviors, including mortality, up to 40 years after the end of the Vietnam War. We do not find consistent evidence of detrimental health effects on compliers, in line with prior literature. For volunteers, however, we document that their estimated bounds show statistically significant detrimental health effects that appear 20 years after the end of the conflict. As a group, veterans experience similar statistically significant detrimental health effects from military service. These findings have implications for policies regarding compensation and health care of veterans after service.


Workplace deviance harms the well-being of an organization and its members. Unfortunately, theory and prior research suggest that deviance is associated with job stressors, which are endemic to work organizations and often cannot be easily eliminated. To address this conundrum, we explore actions individuals can take at work that serve as buffering conditions for the positive relationship between job stressors and deviant behavior. Drawing upon conservation of resources theory, we examine a resource-building activity (i.e., learning something new at work) and a demand-shielding activity (i.e., taking time for relaxation at work) as potential boundary conditions. In 2 studies with employee samples using complementary designs, we find support for the buffering role of learning but not for relaxation. When employees learn new things at work, the relationship between hindrance stressors and deviance is weaker; as is the indirect relationship mediated by negative emotions. Taking time for relaxation at work did not show a moderating role in either study. Therefore, although relaxation is a response that individuals might be inclined to turn to for counteracting work stress, our findings suggest that, when it comes to addressing negative emotions and deviance in stressful work environments, building positive resources by learning something new at work could be more useful. In that way, doing more (i.e., learning, and not relaxing) is associated with less (deviance) in the face of job stressors.


The Association of American Railroads (AAR) initiated the Heavy Axle Load (HAL) Research Program in 1988 in order to "provide guidance to the North American railroad industry about whether to increase axle loads and to determine the most economic payload consistent with safety" (Kalay and Martland 2001). The research demonstrated the technical feasibility and economic desirability of increasing axle loads and the ability of technology to mitigate the adverse effects of heavier loads. In 1991, the industry decided to accept cars with 286,000 lb. gross vehicle weight (286k GVW) in interchange service. Since then, more than 90% of all bulk equipment acquired has been rated for 286k GVW. By 2010, nearly 100% of coal traffic and 30% of general freight moved in 286k loads. Technological improvements resulting from the HAL research program have been critical in enabling the industry to reduce costs of 286k operations. Stronger materials, better designs, and improved maintenance techniques reduced life cycle costs for rail and other track components. Bridge costs did not increase as much as expected, because of technological developments and better understanding of their ability to withstand HAL loads. Net benefits of HAL operations to railroads, suppliers, and their customers were approximately $6 billion between 1994 and 2010. Annual net benefits exceeded $600 million in 2010. Benefits included reductions in equipment expense, more efficient operations, and increases in line capacity. Given the technological advances in railroad engineering over the past 20 years, further increases in GVW or loading density should now be considered. OVERVIEW OF THE HAL RESEARCH PROGRAMThis paper has two major objectives. First, it estimates the net benefits achieved by increasing the maximum GVW to 286k, taking into account impacts on operations and infrastructure. Second,


The wing vibrations of courting male Drosophila melanogaster Meigen produced pulsations of sound, with each pulse apparently caused by 1 to 2 cycles of wing movement. The average repetition rate at 25�C was 29.8 pulses per second. The rate was dependent on temperature, increasing at 1.4 pulses per additional degree Celsius.


The Collector's Library volumes of short stories - "Best Ghost Stories", "Best Fairy Stories", "Celtic Fairy Tales" and "Tales of the Macabre" have proved popular throughout the world. This new collection of detective stories of the golden age includes intriguing tales by Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Wallace, G.K. Chesterton, 'Sapper', E.W. Hornung, and Arnold Bennett. These masters of the genre are joined by less well-known but equally skilled writers such as Arthur B. Reeve, Maurice LeBlanc, Ernest Bramah, Mrs Henry Wood, Stacy Aumonier and Herbert Jenkins among others.


Many associative memory traces are charged with emotion that can either impair or enhance subsequent retrieval. Various factors may influence such emotion effects, including the nature of associations and type of emotions. We show that long-term recognition memory of very close verbal associations was enhanced for emotionally charged material, and these effects differed between two negative emotion categories matched for arousal level. Specifically, memory was better for word pairs related to disgust than word pairs related to fear. Furthermore, these two emotions distinctively modulated neural processes during encoding and its relationship with retrieval, regardless of arousal evoked by word pairs. Amygdala and perirhinal cortex activity were associated with enhanced memory for disgust-related unitizations, whereas better memory for fear-related unitizations engaged parahippocampal cortex and hippocampus. Finally, the magnitude of amygdala activation during encoding was related to the subsequent fidelity of hippocampal activity patterns during retrieval. These results show that dissociable neural pathways and reinstatement mechanisms are involved in associative memory for different emotion categories and that arousal alone cannot fully explain emotional influences on associative memory.


AIMS
This paper reports the findings of a national study of the variations in the provision and correlates of respite breaks to families. Background.  Internationally, respite breaks are a major support service to family carers, demand for which often exceeds supply for persons with an intellectual disability. Hence, the length of breaks available to families has to be rationed. Nurses are often involved in such decisions.

METHOD
National data on the use of respite breaks by over 4000 families in a full calendar year (2008) were analysed to examine the variation within the Republic of Ireland on two indicators: namely the proportion of carers who had any access to breaks and the median number of days they had received.

FINDINGS
Striking differences across health service areas were found on both indicators of usage. These were not solely attributable to the availability of provision but also reflected variations in the criteria local services used to allocate places. However, those persons with more severe disabilities were given priority, whereas carer characteristics were not a major influence. Contact with social workers and community nurses also increased the likelihood of carers receiving respite breaks.

CONCLUSION
Intra-country comparisons of service delivery should assist planners in creating more equitable access to respite breaks and the development of more explicit eligibility criteria for their use. Nurses are well placed to lead on this.


Kinesin-3 are the fastest and most processive motors of the three neuronal transport kinesin families, yet the sequence of states and rates of kinetic transitions that comprise the chemomechanical cycle are poorly understood. We used stopped-flow fluorescence spectroscopy and single-molecule motility assays to delineate the chemomechanical cycle of the kinesin-3, KIF1A. Our bacterially expressed KIF1A construct, dimerized via a kinesin-1 coiled-coil, exhibits fast velocity and superprocessivity behavior similar to wild-type KIF1A. We established that the KIF1A forward step is triggered by hydrolysis of ATP and not by ATP binding, meaning that KIF1A follows the same chemomechanical cycle as established for kinesin-1 and-2. The ATP-triggered half-site release rate of KIF1A was similar to the stepping rate, indicating that during stepping, rear-head detachment is an order of magnitude faster than in kinesin-1 and kinesin-2. Thus, KIF1A spends the majority of its hydrolysis cycle in a one-head-bound state. Both the ADP off-rate and the ATP on-rate at physiological ATP concentration were fast, eliminating these steps as possible rate limiting transitions. Based on the measured run length and the relatively slow off-rate in ADP, we conclude that attachment of the tethered head is the rate limiting transition in the KIF1A stepping cycle. The fast speed, superprocessivity and load sensitivity of KIF1A can be explained by a fast rear head detachment rate, a rate-limiting step of tethered head attachment that follows ATP hydrolysis, and a relatively strong electrostatic interaction with the microtubule in the weakly-bound post-hydrolysis state.


Solanum aethiopicum Shum group is a nutrient-rich and income-generating crop enterprise in various sub-Saharan Africa countries. Despite its importance, the development of its improved varieties has not been prioritized. Until now, no field-based descriptor development reference for the crop is available for testing candidate varieties for distinctiveness, uniformity and stability. The purpose of this study is to identify morphological variables that provide identity of S. aethiopicum Shum group accessions across environments. With ten accessions across three test locations, it was observed that the highly polymorphic morphological variables were majorly vegetative and a few reproductive ones. They include plant height at flowering, plant canopy breadth, plant branching, petiole color, petiole length, leaf blade length, leaf blade width, leaf lobbing, leaf tip angle, flowering time, style length, fruit position, fruit flesh density, fruits per inflorescence and fruit flavor. A static stability analysis, a common selection technique for obtaining consistence in performance of genotypes, showed that accessions varied in their interaction with environments for different descriptors. The most statically stable accessions were 184P and 163P while the least stables were 168P, 148, 141, and 137. The findings indicate the potential for identifying unique and stable varieties of S. aethiopicum Shum group for the processing of official release to farmers.

 Key words: Polymorphic morphological markers; static stability coefficient; field characterization; Solanum aethiopicum Shum; genotype by environment interaction.


In this paper, we define the method that is used to merge high-resolution multisensor chlorophyll-a (chl-a) data on the Ireland-Biscay-Iberia Regional Ocean Observing System area from 1998 to the present at a resolution of 1.1 km. The method is based on geostatistics and is known as kriging. The merged variable is the daily anomaly of chl-a, with the anomaly being defined as the difference between the daily image and the mean historical field for the considered day. For each day, the continuous anomaly image is generated using the kriging method, and the mean historical field is then added to obtain the cloudless field of chl- a. The initial satellite chl-a data set used in the merging procedure is derived from the daily level-2 water leaving radiances of three ocean color sensors: the Sea-Viewing Wide Field of View Sensor on the Orbview platform, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer on the Aqua platform, and the Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer Instrument on the ENVISAT platform. The chl-a concentration is obtained using a specific algorithm developed by Ifremer, known as OC5 product. Before merging, each satellite-derived chl-a product has been compared to in situ data and has been validated using a matchup data set. After this validation against in situ data, intercomparisons between the satellite data sets have been performed. As the chl-a anomaly variability depends, in this region, on the season and the distance from the shore, local space-time semivariograms have been calculated to estimate the spatiotemporal dependence or covariance of the chlorophyll anomalies. The semivariograms, used in the estimation of the kriged anomaly, are defined by their nuggets (noise), their spatial and temporal range (maximum distance for a nonnull covariance between the anomalies), and their sill (maximum variance). The spatial range of the semivariogram has been approximated locally on a regular grid. The nuggets and the sills have been deduced from the square of the mean of the chl-a concentration (the climatological reference) as we have observed a classical proportionality effect between the square of the chl-a mean, the variance of the distribution, and the parameters of the semivariograms. Compared to each original product, the analysis shows a complete coverage and differences with the in situ data that are statistically equivalent to those observed with the initial satellite data set. The merged product offers a number of applications for environmental monitoring such as the monitoring of the eutrophication risk required by the Water Framework Directive of the European Union.


This paper explores conceptualisations of xoshbaxti ('happiness / prosperity') and baxt ('fate / luck') in Persian, adopting a combined historical and contemporary analysis. The expression xoshbaxti consists of the free morphemes xosh ('pleasant') and baxt ('fate').
The root of baxt originates from the Proto-Indo-European language (bʰeh₂g). An historical analysis returning all the way to the Proto-Indo-Iranian religion shows that the concept of baxt captured the idea of a pre-determined destiny by conceptualising Bhaga as a god who dispenses fortune. Data from a number of Persian encyclopaedias, dictionaries and weblogs, as well as a word association task carried out by a group of speakers of Persian, revealed that xoshbaxti in contemporary Persian is largely associated with what is considered to be a "good" married life. Overall, the findings of this study illustrate the usefulness of combining diachronic and synchronic approaches when analysing cultural conceptualisations. The study also shows that attempts to trace the historical roots of cultural conceptualisations may benefit from insights gained in other fields, such as the history of religions. In this context, the multidisciplinary nature of the newly developed field of Cultural Linguistics provides an effective basis for cross-disciplinary openness, which has the potential to deepen the scope of analyses undertaken.


Hurricane Katrina devastated the city of New Orleans in late August 2005, and debates are now underway across the country concerning strategies for reconstructing the City. A key to redevelopment involves encouraging former citizens and businesses to return. Both of New Orleans's professional sports teams, the National Football League Saints and the National Basketball Association Hornets, have taken up residence in other cities, and the question of what the city should provide in the way of financial accommodation to encourage them to return should be considered in devising a reconstruction plan. Infrastructure to facilitate professional sports and mega-events constitutes a significant fraction of capital budgets for even the largest cities. New Orleans has hosted a disproportionate share of mega-sports events in the United States given its size and demographics. An important question concerns whether these events have contributed enough to the New Orleans economy to justify reinvestment in infrastructure to restore New Orleans's place as a leading host of professional sports and mega-events in the United States. A careful review of the evidence suggests that the redevelopment efforts of New Orleans are better directed at first providing infrastructure that will encourage the return of its middle class citizenry and the restoration of its culture. Playing host to professional sports and megaevents does have symbolic significance, but it is arguable that the city cannot afford to invite guests until it has the means to accommodate them.


Abstract Over 25 implementations of different functional languages are benchmarked using the same program, a floating-point intensive application taken from molecular biology. The principal aspects studied are compile time and execution time for the various implementations that were benchmarked. An important consideration is how the program can be modified and tuned to obtain maximal performance on each language implementation. With few exceptions, the compilers take a significant amount of time to compile this program, though most compilers were faster than the then current GNU C compiler (GCC version 2.5.8). Compilers that generate C or Lisp are often slower than those that generate native code directly: the cost of compiling the intermediate form is normally a large fraction of the total compilation time. There is no clear distinction between the runtime performance of eager and lazy implementations when appropriate annotations are used: lazy implementations have clearly come of age when it comes to implementing largely strict applications, such as the Pseudoknot program. The speed of C can be approached by some implementations, but to achieve this performance, special measures such as strictness annotations are required by non-strict implementations. The benchmark results have to be interpreted with care. Firstly, a benchmark based on a single program cannot cover a wide spectrum of 'typical' applications. Secondly, the compilers vary in the kind and level of optimisations offered, so the effort required to obtain an optimal version of the program is similarly varied.


There is increasing pressure on institutions of higher education to accurately measure student success. What was once thought of as a way to develop students holistically via a liberal arts degree, higher education is now often regarded as a means to an end: a well-paying job. Lost in the drive for quantifiable data is the holistic development of individuals who are capable of interacting with and influencing the world around them. Thus, higher education struggles to respond to market pressures while maintaining a focus on wholly developing individuals. In this research study, it is proposed that student "success" should include household income, critical thinking, psychological capital, and psychological well-being. Furthermore, research is needed to identify predictors that lead to whole student development. Interpersonal relationships were proposed as a critical predictor of holistically developed students; specifically, interpersonal relationships with fellow students and faculty mentorships. It was further purposed that these factors are moderated by student internship/work experience. This study was conducted using an online survey of 250 respondents and utilized regression analyses to assess the relationships between the predictors and the proposed outcomes of holistic education. Amazon's Mechanical Turk was used to recruit participants (N = 369) who completed an online survey. The sample included slightly more males (57%) than females (43%), and a median age of 32. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to analyze results. Strong positive main effects were found for both personal relationships (β = .636; R = .405, p < .001) and faculty mentorship (β = .551; R = .304, p < .001) on holistic student development. Internship/work experience value also exhibited a positive relationship with holistic student development (β = .376; R = .141, p < .001). Together, the three factors accounted for a substantial proportion of the variance in the holistic student development (R = .496, p < .001). The hypothesized two-way and three-way interactions were COLLEGE FOR THE SAKE OF WHAT? x not significant. Results suggested that there is a link between personal relationships, faculty mentorships, internship/work experiences, and the outcome of wholly developed students, but those relationships did not interact in a synergistic manner.


Summary Background Treatment of respiratory exacerbations in Cystic Fibrosis (CF) is important in slowing disease progression. The treatment may be given either at home or at the hospital. The aim of our study was to compare both treatment settings. Material/Methods We retrospectively analyzed data of 139 treatments in 54 CF patients (age range12–47 y) treated for respiratory exacerbations at the hospital (n=84) and/or at home (n=55). Primary outcomes were improvement in pulmonary function tests (PFTs), weight gain and duration of treatment in relation to treatment setting. Secondary outcomes were these same parameters, but in relation to different clinical preconditions and CF-related complications. Results Mean improvement in FEV1 (% predicted) was similar between the hospital and home treatments (14.3±34.4% vs. 14.3±20.2%, respectively; NS), yet treatment duration was significantly shorter at the hospital (9.7±6.7 vs. 16.3±9.1 days, respectively; P<0.02), especially for patients colonized with Pseudomonas aeruginosa (11.1±5.5 vs. 18.0±11.0 days, respectively; p<0.01). At the hospital, a subgroup of patients with CF-related complications improved their FEV1 significantly more than those at home (13.1±19.4% vs. 1.9±14.9%, respectively; P<0.02), particularly patients with CF-related diabetes mellitus (CFRDM) (11.4±18.7% vs. 1.7±14.6%, respectively; P<0.05). Patients tended to gain more weight at the hospital compared to home treatment (1.36±4.6 kg and 0.49±3.6 kg respectively; P=0.06). Conclusions Hospital treatment for acute respiratory exacerbations in CF may be superior to home treatment, as indicated by a shorter duration of hospitalization, better improvement in FEV1 in patients with CF-related complications, CFRDM in particular and a trend toward better weight gain.


In order to sense the mood of a city, we propose first looking at festivals. In festivals such as Glastonbury or Burning Man we see temporary cities where the inhabitants are engaged afresh with their environment and each other. Our position is that not only are there direct equivalences between larger festivals and cities, but in festivals the phenomena are often exaggerated, and the driving impulses often exploratory. These characteristics well suit research into sensing and intervening in the urban experience. To this end, we have built a corpus of sensor and social media data around a 18,000 attendee music festival and are developing ways of analysing and communicating it.


Two divergent responses to Haussmann's remaking of nineteenth-century Paris—a desire to open up cities even further, and a movement to protect older urban contexts—have usually been studied as distinct traditions: one as the emergence of the modernist city, the other as the birth of urban preservation. Their products, the spacious modern city and the restored old town, have typically also been treated separately, with preservation as a niche product and modernism as the driving force of urban development. Central European examples, however, beginning with the influence of Camillo Sitte on urban planning, reveal that older, enclosed urban forms have offered a persistent alternative to the open, modernist city. The continuing appeal of enclosed, pedestrian spaces and of traditional architectural forms has influenced not just preservation but also new construction and planning.


The lipocalins and fatty acid-binding proteins (FABPs) are two recently identified protein families that both function by binding small hydrophobic molecules. We have sought to clarify relationships within and between these two groups through an analysis of both structure and sequence. Within a similar overall folding pattern, we find large parts of the lipocalin and FABP structures to be quantitatively equivalent. The three largest structurally conserved regions within the lipocalin common core correspond to characteristic sequence motifs that we have used to determine the constitution of this family using an iterative sequence analysis procedure. This afforded a new interpretation of the family, which highlighted the difficulties of determining a comprehensive and coherent clas-sification of the lipocalins. The first of the three conserved sequence motifs is also common to the FABPs and corresponds to a conserved structural element characteristic of both families. Similarities of structure and sequence within the two families suggests that they form part of a larger "structural superfamily"; we have christened this overall group the calycins to reflect the cup-shaped structure of its members.


We investigate the problem of mining graph-based usage patterns for large, object-oriented frameworks like Android—revisiting previous approaches based on graph-based object usage models (groums). Groums are a promising approach to represent usage patterns for object-oriented libraries because they simultaneously describe control flow and data dependencies between methods of multiple interacting object types. However, this expressivity comes at a cost: mining groums requires solving a subgraph isomorphism problem that is well known to be expensive. This cost limits the applicability of groum mining to large API frameworks. In this paper, we employ groum mining to learn usage patterns for object-oriented frameworks from program corpora. The central challenge is to scale groum mining so that it is sensitive to usages horizontally across programs from arbitrarily many developers (as opposed to simply usages vertically within the program of a single developer). To address this challenge, we develop a novel groum mining algorithm that scales on a large corpus of programs. We first use frequent itemset mining to restrict the search for groums to smaller subsets of methods in the given corpus. Then, we pose the subgraph isomorphism as a SAT problem and apply efficient pre-processing algorithms to rule out fruitless comparisons ahead of time. Finally, we identify containment relationships between clusters of groums to characterize popular usage patterns in the corpus (as well as classify less popular patterns as possible anomalies). We find that our approach scales on a corpus of over five hundred open source Android applications, effectively mining obligatory and best-practice usage patterns.


Poor thermal transport within lithium-ion batteries fundamentally limits their performance, safety, and lifetime, in spite of external thermal management systems. All prior efforts to understand the origin of batteries' mysteriously high thermal resistance have been confined to ex situ measurements without understanding the impact of battery operation. Here, we develop a frequency-domain technique that employs sensors capable of measuring spatially resolved intrinsic thermal transport properties within a live battery while it is undergoing cycling. Our results reveal that the poor battery thermal transport is due to high thermal contact resistance between the separator and both electrode layers and worsens as a result of formation cycling, degrading total battery thermal transport by up to 70%. We develop a thermal model of these contact resistances to explain their origin. These contacts account for up to 65% of the total thermal resistance inside the battery, leading to far-reaching consequences for the thermal design of batteries. Our technique unlocks new thermal measurement capabilities for future battery research.


This application note describes a fully working and highly flexible software application for using the dsPIC30F to control brushless DC (BLDC) motors without position sensors. The software makes extensive use of dsPIC30F peripherals for motor control. The algorithm implemented for sensorless control is particularly suitable for use on fans and pumps. The program is written in C and has been specifically optimized and well annotated for ease of understanding and program modification.