The issue of REDD+ benefit sharing has captured the attention of policymakers and local communities because the success of REDD+ will depend greatly on the design and implementation of its benefit-sharing mechanism. Despite a large body of literature on potential benefit-sharing mechanisms for REDD+, the field has lacked global comparative analyses of national REDD+ policies and of the political-economic influences that can either enable or impede the mechanisms. Similarly, relatively few studies have investigated the political-economic principles underlying existing benefit-sharing policies and approaches. This working paper builds on a study of REDD+ policies in 13 countries to provide a global overview and up-to-date profile of benefit-sharing mechanisms for REDD+ and of the political-economic factors affecting their design and setting. Five types of benefit-sharing models relevant to REDD+ and natural resource management are used to create an organising framework for identifying what does and does not work and to examine the structure of rights under REDD+. The authors also consider the mechanisms in light of five prominent discourses on the question of who should benefit from REDD+ and, by viewing REDD+ through a 3E (effectiveness, efficiency, equity) lens, map out some of the associated risks for REDD+ outcomes. Existing benefit-sharing models and REDD+ projects have generated initial lessons for building REDD+ benefit-sharing mechanisms. However, the relevant policies in the 13 countries studied could lead to carbon ineffectiveness, cost inefficiency and inequity because of weak linkages to performance or results, unclear tenure and carbon rights, under-representation of certain actors, technical and financial issues related to the scope and scale of REDD+, potential elite capture and the possible negative side effects of the decentralisation of authority. Furthermore, the enabling factors for achieving 3E benefit-sharing mechanisms are largely absent from the study countries. Whether REDD+ can catalyse the necessary changes will depend in part on how the costs and benefits of REDD+ are shared, and whether the benefits are sufficient to affect a shift in entrenched behaviour and policies at all levels of government. The successful design and implementation of benefit-sharing mechanisms - and hence the legitimacy and acceptance of REDD+ - depend on having clear objectives, procedural equity and an inclusive process and on engaging in a rigorous analysis of the options for benefit sharing and their potential effects on beneficiaries and climate mitigation efforts.


Because of the prevalence of antibiotic resistant pathogenic bacteria, infectious diseases are becoming more difficult and expensive to treat. In Kenya, high levels of flouroquinone resistance of a bacterium, Neisseria gonorrhea have been widely reported. Antimicrobial resistance may be coded on plasmids, mutational events or on transposons. A growing body of evidence indicates that metal tolerance and antibiotic resistance are often found together in many clinical isolates and that metal and antibiotic resistance is closely associated. Besides having clinical consequences, resistant bacteria of animal origin may be the source of determinants of resistance for the possible transfer to human strains. Most of the previous studies have concentrated on clinical isolates from human and animal stools while studies targeting environmental isolates are limited. This study aimed at identifying fecal indicators and pathogens recovered from wastewaters used to clean animal carcass and sludge used as manure, from cattle slaughterhouse in Kayole and the separate sheep and goat slaughterhouses both in Kiamaiko, Nairobi and to determine susceptibility of isolated bacteria against 13 antibiotics and 6 heavy metals, in addition to studying plasmid profiles. Isolation of fecal indicators and pathogens was carried out using standard laboratory methods. Sensitivity to antibiotics was determined by the agar diffusion technique on Mueller-Hinton agar. Heavy metals tolerance was determined by well diffusion and tube dilution methods. Plasmid DNA was isolated using the alkaline lysis method. The fecal bacteria load was found to be 6.2 x 10 6 , 5.3 x 10 5 , 2.5 x 10 4 , 2.9 x 10 4 and 5.0 x 10 6 CFU/100 mL for fecal streptococci and 3.4 x 10 5 , 4.1 x 10 3 , 3.0 x 10 4 , 2.7 x 10 3 and 3.9 x 10 5 MPN/100 mL for fecal coliforms in cattle wastewater, cattle sludge, goat wastewater, sheep wastewater and a mixture of goat and sheep sludge, respectively. Pearson correlation analysis showed positive correlation between prevalence of fecal streptococci and fecal coliforms (r=0.931 at 0.01 level). Vibrio and Salmonella species were more frequently detected in samples which also showed high incidence of indicator organisms. There was high resistance to lincomycin (90 %), ampicillin (80 %) and methicillin (72.5 %) and low resistance to chloramphenicol (22.5 %). Another potential environmental threat noticed was heavy metal tolerance of the indicator organisms and pathogens to nickel, mercury, copper, zinc, lead and cobalt. Results of the test of toxicity in solid media agreed with those in liquid, however, inhibitory concentrations in solid media were much higher compared to those in liquid. Lead and nickel were the least toxic metals. Mercury was the most toxic component for all bacteria, followed by cobalt and then copper. Among the 40 bacterial isolates studied only 18 (45%) harbored between 1 2 kb plasmid DNA bands which ranged in size from 4kb to 10kb. The results showed the dynamics of resistance development in warm blooded animals usually used or consumed by humans. This study provided data on the level and risks of microbiological contamination as well as baseline data for the future assessment and monitoring of pollution levels of wastewaters. With regard to the high contamination level of the wastewaters and sludge with resistant bacteria as revealed in this study, treating of wastewaters and sludge is recommended, before using or discharging them into the environment and also proper use and disposal of antimicrobial agents. The metalantibiotic double resistance detected in this study call for intervention measures to curb the potential health hazard that heavy metal pollution pose in the environment.


Mental Health Treatment for Children and Adolescents: Cost Effectiveness, Dropout, and Recidivism by Presenting Diagnosis and Therapy Modality David Fawcett School of Family Life, BYU Doctor of Philosophy As many as one in five children and adolescents may suffer from a mental health disorder, yet there are barriers that often prevent children from receiving optimal treatment. The current study explores the influence of practitioner license type, therapy modality, diagnosis, age, and gender on mental health therapy for children and adolescents. Data was provided by Cigna, a leading health care insurance provider in the United States. Participants include 106,374 boys (53.2%) and 93,753 girls (46.8%) ages 3 to 18 (M = 12.1, SD = 3.9) who were treated in outpatient facilities throughout the United States of America. Results indicate that there are differences in dropout, recidivism, cost, and treatment length by provider license, therapy modality, diagnosis, age, and gender. Specifically, results suggest that marriage and family therapists have the lowest percent recidivism and are among the lowest in terms of dropout and cost effectiveness. The results also suggest that family therapy is more cost effective than individual or mixed therapy and that mixed therapy has a much lower percent dropout than individual or family therapy. Analysis by diagnosis suggests a potential severity scale based on dropout, recidivism, and number of sessions. There are also significant differences in dropout and recidivism by age suggesting that younger children are more likely to dropout of treatment. These results provide valuable information about mental health treatment of children and adolescents. Specifically, utilizing a family based approach may help reduce the total length of treatment while utilizing a mixed mode approach to therapy may help reduce the risk of dropout from treatment. Also, some diagnoses appear to be more difficult to treat, with higher percentages of dropout and requiring more time and money for successful treatment. Limitations and future directions are discussed.


This article considers high-dimensional regression problems in which the number of predictors p exceeds the sample size n. We develop a model-averaging procedure for high-dimensional regression problems. Unlike most variable selection studies featuring the identification of true predictors, our focus here is on the prediction accuracy for the true conditional mean of y given the p predictors. Our method consists of two steps. The first step is to construct a class of regression models, each with a smaller number of regressors, to avoid the degeneracy of the information matrix. The second step is to find suitable model weights for averaging. To minimize the prediction error, we estimate the model weights using a delete-one cross-validation procedure. Departing from the literature of model averaging that requires the weights always sum to one, an important improvement we introduce is to remove this constraint. We derive some theoretical results to justify our procedure. A theorem is proved, showing that delete-one cross-validation achieves the lowest possible prediction loss asymptotically. This optimality result requires a condition that unravels an important feature of high-dimensional regression. The prediction error of any individual model in the class for averaging is required to be higher than the classic root n rate under the traditional parametric regression. This condition reflects the difficulty of high-dimensional regression and it depicts a situation especially meaningful for p > n. We also conduct a simulation study to illustrate the merits of the proposed approach over several existing methods, including lasso, group lasso, forward regression, Phase Coupled (PC)-simple algorithm, Akaike information criterion (AIC) model-averaging, Bayesian information criterion (BIC) model-averaging methods, and SCAD (smoothly clipped absolute deviation). This approach uses quadratic programming to overcome the computing time issue commonly encountered in the cross-validation literature. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.


The article discusses the principles of voluntariness, safety, and dignity in the context of refugee repatriation. It begins by setting out the applicable legal framework, and discusses how that framework has been elaborated upon and refined since 1951. The article then discusses how the principles of voluntariness, safety, and dignity have, in practice, been applied (or, in a few unfortunate cases, ignored). After noting that we are now living in an era of protracted refugee emergencies, the article concludes with a number of recommendations regarding alternatives to repatriation and the conditions under which repatriation can take place without offense to the principles of voluntariness, safety, and dignity.


ABSTRACT Human papillomavirus type 18 (HPV18) and HPV45 account for approximately 20% of all cervix cancers. We show that HPV18, HPV45, and the recently discovered HPV97 comprise a clade sharing a most recent common ancestor within HPV α7 species. Variant lineages of these HPV types were classified by sequence analysis of the upstream regulatory region/E6 region among cervical samples from a population-based study in Costa Rica, and 27 representative genomes from each major variant lineage were sequenced. Nucleotide variation within HPV18 and HPV45 was 3.82% and 2.39%, respectively, and amino acid variation was 4.73% and 2.87%, respectively. Only 18 nucleotide variations, of which 10 were nonsynonymous, were identified among three HPV97 genomes. Full-genome comparisons revealed maximal diversity between HPV18 African and non-African variants (2.6% dissimilarity), whereas HPV18 Asian-American [E1 (AA)] and European (E2) variants were closely related (less than 0.5% dissimilarity); HPV45 genomes had a maximal difference of 1.6% nucleotides. Using a Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method, the divergence times of HPV18, -45, and -97 from their most recent common ancestors indicated that HPV18 diverged approximately 7.7 million years (Myr) ago, whereas HPV45 and HPV97 split off around 5.7 Myr ago, in a period encompassing the divergence of the great ape species. Variants within the HPV18/45/97 lineages were estimated to have diverged from their common ancestors in the genus Homo within the last 1 Myr (<0.7 Myr). To investigate the molecular basis of HPV18, HPV45, and HPV97 evolution, regression models of codon substitution were used to identify lineages and amino acid sites under selective pressure. The E5 open reading frame (ORF) of HPV18 and the E4 ORFs of HPV18, HPV45, and HPV18/45/97 had nonsynonymous/synonymous substitution rate ratios (dN/dS) over 1 indicative of positive Darwinian selection. The L1 ORF of HPV18 genomes had an increased proportion of nonsynonymous substitutions (4.93%; average dN/dS ratio [M3] = 0.3356) compared to HPV45 (1.86%; M3 = 0.1268) and HPV16 (2.26%; M3 = 0.1330) L1 ORFs. In contrast, HPV18 and HPV16 genomes had similar amino acid substitution rates within the E1 ORF (2.89% and 3.24%, respectively), while HPV45 E1 was highly conserved (amino acid substitution rate was 0.77%). These data provide an evolutionary history of this medically important clade of HPVs and identify an unexpected divergence of the L1 gene of HPV18 that may have clinical implications for the long-term use of an L1-virus-like particle-based prophylactic vaccine.


This article examines trends in the South African collective bargaining system over the past two to three decades and compares them with trends in certain other - mainly European - countries. The issues the article focuses on are the trends in centralisation and decentralisation of collective bargaining, coverage of collective bargaining and trade union densities, representivity of bargaining councils and whether the centralisation of bargaining in South Africa has ensured adequate flexibility within the broader context of the South African economy and employment.
The findings are that coverage of the bargaining council system in South Africa has expanded, that trade union density has increased and collective bargaining has become more centralised. However, flexibility in the centralised system has decreased to the point where it is harmful to employment. This stands in marked contrast to the position in European and other countries, where collective bargaining has generally become more decentralised, coverage has remained stable or gone down, trade union densities have declined and the whole employment relationship has become more flexible.
The opposing trends in South Africa are explained as being due to the rise of a powerful Black trade union movement that has made a big impact on the collective bargaining system.


Twenty-five years have passed since courts first adopted market share liability, a theory under which a plaintiff unable to identify the manufacturer of the product that caused his injury can recover on a proportional basis from each manufacturer that might have made the product. Courts have severely restricted the reach of this potentially powerful theory by insisting that it can apply only to products that are perfectly fungible. Most products vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, posing different levels of risk, and therefore do not satisfy the fungibility requirement. As a result, courts have applied market share liability to a very small number of products. This Article argues that courts should eliminate the fungibility requirement by recognizing that market share liability is just one variant of a broader concept that the author calls proportional share liability. Rather than deny recovery in cases involving products that pose varying degrees of danger, courts should consider whether proportional share liability can be imposed by using information other than market share data to make a reasonable and fair allocation of liability among the defendants. This Article examines the potential application of proportional share liability in a wide variety of contexts, including vaccines or lead paint causing brain damage, violence fueled by negligent distribution and sales of firearms, disease resulting from exposure to asbestos or tobacco, and damage to spacecraft from collisions with orbital debris.


ST analysis of the fetal ECG as an adjunct to FHR monitoring in labour – a clinical validation. Noren Hakan 2008. Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Sahlgrenska Academy at Goteborg University, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, S-413 45 Goteborg, Sweden. The ability to make an accurate assessment of fetal well-being during labour is a great challenge. Animal and human studies have shown that fetal hypoxemia during labour can alter the shape of the fetal electrocardiogram (FECG) waveform, notable elevation of the T-wave and depression of the ST segment. A new medical device (STAN, Neoventa Medical, Molndal, Sweden) has been developed to monitor the FECG during labour as an adjunct to continuous electronic FHR monitoring (CTG+ST analysis). Before a more general clinical use the technique has been the object of three randomised trials. The present thesis concerns the implementation of this new technique into clinical practice. At Sahlgren's hospital, Goteborg, Sweden, 4830 out of 14687 (32.9%) term deliveries were monitored between October 2000 and September 2002. While the number of monitored cases increased from 28.1% in the first year to 37.7% during the second year, the frequency of metabolic acidosis (pH 12mmol/L) decreased from 0.76% to 0.44% in all patients and from 1.12% to 0.56% in the CTG+ST monitored group assessed to be in need of close surveillance. The number of operative deliveries was unaltered (Paper I). In a retrospective study at Varberg district hospital labour ward, covering the total population of deliveries during 2004 and 2005, 59% of the deliveries (1875/3193) were monitored with CTG+ST. The metabolic acidosis rate was 0.5%. Crash Caesarean sections (CS) were significantly reduced from 1.5% in the conventionally monitored (CTG) group to 0.3% in the CTG+ST group (Paper II). It was concluded that the frequency of metabolic acidosis in this large number of deliveries from Goteborg and Varberg is the same as noted in the CTG+ST group in a Swedish randomised trial on CTG+ST analysis. Cases originating from a European Union commission supported multi centre study where CTG+ST had been used together with fetal blood sampling (FBS) were analysed. Of the 911 cases, 53 had cord artery pH<7.06 and 44 had cord artery pH 7.06 -7.09. These cases were analysed together with 97 control cases. CTG+ST clinical guidelines identified all adequately monitored cases with metabolic acidosis requiring special neonatal care. These cases were identified at least 19 minutes prior to delivery. In 22 cases, FBS was obtained 13 (7-24) minutes after CTG+ST guidelines had indicated abnormality and in eight no ST changes had occurred at time of FBS. The corresponding FBS data were pH 7.10 (7.01 – 7.15) and pH 7.21 (7.08 – 7.31), respectively, p=0.01. In cases of metabolic acidosis, scalp-pH fell 0.01 units per minute after a ST change rise had been recorded during second stage of labour. In 43 out of 53 cases with cord artery pH <7.06 CTG + ST indicated intervention. In five cases no ST data existed and in the rest of the cases there were no ST indications. One of these newborn had metabolic acidosis but was clinically unaffected (Paper III and IV). The time factor, i.e. the time between onset of significant ST events and delivery can be illustrated by the observation that of those with CTG+ST events recorded within 16 minutes of delivery, 61% had cord artery pH ≥7.20. The corresponding figure for cases where CTG+ST indications occurred more than 16 minutes before delivery was 19% (OR 6.66, 2.29 – 19.86, p<0.001). In conclusion, these data indicate that ST analysis of the FECG identifies a term fetus exposed to hypoxia during labour in a reliable way. FBS has a role in fetal monitoring, e.g. when a CTG+ST recording starts late in labour with abnormal CTG.


Multiwire Proportional Counter (MWPC), a particle studied under this project is an indispensable part of all nuclear physics experiments involving the study of compound nucleus and fission fragments. The work done under this project involves the fabrication, assembly and testing of a MWPC. The experimental work has been done at Inter University Accelerator Center (IUAC), New Delhi. The MWPC fabricated at IUAC had an active area of 16x11 cm 2 . Timing resolution and gain of the fabricated MWPC was made to improve over that of already available MWPCs at IUAC by reducing the anode wire pitch and using a ten micrometer diameter wire for anode frame. The fabricated MWPC was thoroughly tested with an alpha source and it was observed that the detector could handle heavy count rate exceeding 20 KHz without any breakdown. Fabricated MWPC was also used in a nuclear physics experiment in the NAND experimental set up of IUAC to extract information about mass, kinetic energy and angular distribution of fission fragments. All the detailed investigations done with the detector were part of the M.Sc. Dissertation work of the first two authors. During under graduation and postgraduation, students study about proportional counters with emphasis on their construction and basic principle of operation. However, this project work provided the first two authors with a unique opportunity of getting a practical experience on how these proportional counters are fabricated and their importance in the field of nuclear physics. Thus, project based learning leaves a larger impact on the mind of the students as far as understanding of concepts of science is concerned


Abstract From mineralogical and chemical characterization of two waste-rock piles from Vigonzano and Libiola sulphide mines in the northern Apennines, two types of fine-grained weathering products were recognized, One, from the Vigonzano mine, has a typical blue colour and consists of the Cu-Al sulphate of the woodwardite group. Its formation is related to an alkaline geochemical barrier, it is rather stable in acidic solution, and it controls Cu and Zn dispersion in the surrounding environment. The other group of sediments has a typical ochreous colour. Vigonzano samples consist mostly of goethite, whereas ferrihydrite is abundant in the Libiola sample. The ochreous sediments are enriched in Co, As, Mo, Se and Mn, thus significantly reducing the potential environmental hazard of the site, whereas solubility tests indicated possible problems due to Al dissolution at Libiola.


New technologies are shifting the nature of how identity is understood. A wide range of information is being put into computers on a daily basis. This project endeavours to illuminate some of the embodied effects coming out of this human relationship to technology. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) will be used to track virtual identities and store their associated data. The model of recessive inheritance and the concept of the 'meme' will be applied to the data to expose hidden (recessive) effects emerging out of our interaction with computers. Issues of surveillance, gender, work and play, all specifically relating to new technology, are also addressed in this project.


Rapid growth of the Chinese economy in the past decade and its potential for strong growth into the foreseeable future have caused anxieties in the rest of the world. Some commentators see Chinese growth wholly in terms of competition for trade and investment opportunities with other developing economies and a major cause of structural adjustments in the advanced industrialized economies. In particular there have been warnings of severe consequences for international agricultural markets. In this paper we use a dynamic general equilibrium model called the G-CUBED model (developed by McKibbin and Wilcoxen) to explore possible future paths of the Chinese economy based on projections of population growth, sectoral productivity growth, energy efficiency and technical change in the Chinese economy. This model captures not only the composition of the direct trade impacts of developments in the Chinese economy but also the implications of the endogenous flows of financial capital on macroeconomic adjustment in the world economy. The study focuses on the period from 1990 to 2020. Rather than being a problem for the world economy, we find strong growth in China is beneficial for the world economy directly through raising world incomes.


Groups are traditionally defined in terms of the interpersonal bonds that exist between group members and thus cohesion is based on the strength of those bonds. The transition of this definition of the group onto online groups leads to attempts to emulate face to face behaviour through presentation of group member pictures, video and detailed personal descriptions. However, this can be problematic due to reduced bandwidth and individual cues necessary for supporting interpersonal behaviour. A social identity approach to groups, in contrast, defines the group in terms of group members' cognitive representation of the group identity, rather than interpersonal bonds. From this perspective cohesion is defined in terms of the strength and salience of the group identity and is not dependent on the transference of interpersonal cues, or constrained by group size. Indeed, interpersonal information can act to the detriment of group cohesion. This counter-intuitive approach to cohesion in online groups has a number of implications in terms of group development and group behaviour in online groups. Two longitudinal field studies of computer-mediated collaborative learning groups investigated these issues. Cohesion in the groups was achieved through the application of this approach to both the design of the group tasks and communication environment, and results showed amongst other things, that cohesion was determined by identification with the group, and that this identification was associated with increased accountability, decreased conflict and, furthermore, positively influenced group productivity (measured by the group mark) through group member prototypicality. This paper discusses the theoretical approach outlined here, the specifics of the two longitudinal studies and the wider implications of this approach to online groups.


In the present paper we aim to study the visual decision support based on Cellular machine CASI (Cellular
Automata for Symbolic Induction). The purpose is to improve the visualization of large sets of association rules,
in order to perform Clinical decision support system and decrease doctors' cognitive charge. One of the major
problems in processing association rules is the exponential growth of generated rules volume which impacts
doctor's adaptation. In order to clarify it, many approaches meant to represent this set of association rules under
visual context have been suggested. In this article we suggest to use jointly the CASI cellular machine and the
colored 2D matrices to improve the visualization of association rules. Our approach has been divided into four
important phases: (1) Data preparation, (2) Extracting association rules, (3) Boolean modeling of the rules base
(4) 2D visualization colored by Boolean inferences.


This paper aims to focus on the design of algorithms and techniques for an effective set expansion. A tool that finds and extracts candidate sets of tuples from the World Wide Web was designed and implemented. For instance, when a given user provides , , as seeds, our system returns tuples composed of countries with their corresponding capital cities and currency names constructed from content extracted from Web pages retrieved.,The seeds are used to query a search engine and to retrieve relevant Web pages. The seeds are also used to infer wrappers from the retrieved pages. The wrappers, in turn, are used to extract candidates. The Web pages, wrappers, seeds and candidates, as well as their relationships, are vertices and edges of a heterogeneous graph. Several options for ranking candidates from PageRank to truth finding algorithms were evaluated and compared. Remarkably, all vertices are ranked, thus providing an integrated approach to not only answer direct set expansion questions but also find the most relevant pages to expand a given set of seeds.,The experimental results show that leveraging the truth finding algorithm can indeed improve the level of confidence in the extracted candidates and the sources.,Current approaches on set expansion mostly support sets of atomic data expansion. This idea can be extended to the sets of tuples and extract relation instances from the Web given a handful set of tuple seeds. A truth finding algorithm is also incorporated into the approach and it is shown that it can improve the confidence level in the ranking of both candidates and sources in set of tuples expansion.


In robotics, controllers make the robot solve a task within a specific context. The context can describe the objectives of the robot or physical properties of the environment and is always specified before task execution. To generalize the controller to multiple contexts, we follow a hierarchical approach for policy learning: A lower-level policy controls the robot for a given context and an upper-level policy generalizes among contexts. Current approaches for learning such upper-level policies are based on model-free policy search, which require an excessive number of interactions of the robot with its environment. More data-efficient policy search approaches are model based but, thus far, without the capability of learning hierarchical policies. We propose a new model-based policy search approach that can also learn contextual upper-level policies. Our approach is based on learning probabilistic forward models for long-term predictions. Using these predictions, we use information-theoretic insights to improve the upper-level policy. Our method achieves a substantial improvement in learning speed compared to existing methods on simulated and real robotic tasks.


The importance of phytohormone balance is increasingly recognized as central to the outcome of plant-pathogen interactions. Next to their well-known developmental role, brassinosteroids (BR) were recently found to be involved in plant innate immunity. In this study, we examined the role of BR in rice (Oryza sativa) innate immunity during infection with the root-knot nematode Meloidogyne graminicola, and we studied the inter-relationship with the jasmonate (JA) pathway. Exogenous epibrassinolide (BL) supply at low concentrations induced susceptibility in the roots whereas high concentrations of BL enforced systemic defense against this nematode. Upon high exogenous BL supply on the shoot, quantitative reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) confirmed a strong feedback inhibitory effect, leading to reduced BR biosynthesis in the root. Moreover, we demonstrate that the immune suppressive effect of BR is at least partly due to negative cross-talk with the JA pathway. Mutants in the BR biosynthesis or signaling pathway accumulate slightly higher levels of the immediate JA-precursor 12-oxo-phytodienoic acid, and qRT-PCR data showed that the BR and JA pathway are mutually antagonistic in rice roots. Collectively, these results suggest that the balance between the BR and JA pathway is an effective regulator of the outcome of the rice-M. graminicola interaction.


As we step out of the traditional intimate and secluded private sphere to take up our virtual lives on the net and socialize on Facebook or Twitter after having shopped on Amazon or eBay, privacy seems to wither away. But does it mean that Internet users be they "digital natives" or "digital immigrants" just need to go over it once and for all? Paradoxically such a renunciation is advocated at the very time when judges are extending the remit of British privacy law. Does it mean then that privacy law only protects the interests of few famous users? While recent developments may be interpreted in this sense, this article seeks to explain why privacy law should not be dropped too quickly. Indeed it may well be that the British action for breach of confidence is mutating to become an instrument of its own to secure information privacy. This shift from the seclusion of intimate spheres to the empowering of individuals while acting in an intermediate sphere is likely to make the action for breach of confidence a more "democratic" regulatory instrument finally of interest to the "ordinary" people


High-resolution multibeam bathymetry data collected with an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) complemented by compressed high-intensity radar pulse (Chirp) profiles and remotely operated vehicle (ROV) observations and sediment sampling reveal a distinctive rough topography associated with seafloor gas venting and/or near-subsurface gas hydrate accumulations. The surveys provide 1 m bathymetric grids of deep-water gas venting sites along the best-known gas venting areas along the Pacific margin of North America, which is an unprecedented level of resolution. Patches of conspicuously rough seafloor that are tens of meters to hundreds of meters across and occur on larger seafloor topographic highs characterize seepage areas. Some patches are composed of multiple depressions that range from 1 to 100 m in diameter and are commonly up to 10 m deeper than the adjacent seafloor. Elevated mounds with relief of >10 m and fractured surfaces suggest that seafloor expansion also occurs. Ground truth observations show that these areas contain broken pavements of methane-derived authigenic carbonates with intervening topographic lows. Patterns seen in Chirp profiles, ROV observations, and core data suggest that the rough topography is produced by a combination of diagenetic alteration, focused erosion, and inflation of the seafloor. This characteristic texture allows previously unknown gas venting areas to be identified within these surveys. A conceptual model for the evolution of these features suggests that these morphologies develop slowly over protracted periods of slow seepage and shows the impact of gas venting and gas hydrate development on the seafloor morphology.


In some irrigated regions, the disposal of agricultural drainage waters poses significant environmental challenges. Efforts are underway to develop irrigation water management practices that reduce the volume of drainage generated. One such management strategy involves restricting flow in subsurface drains in an effort to raise the water table and induce the consumption of groundwater by crops. A potential complication with this management approach is that upward groundwater flow may salinize the soil and increase concentrations of phytotoxic elements such as B. In this study, salinity and B concentrations were monitored for 3 yr in a 60‐ha agricultural field located in San Joaquin Valley, California. The irrigated field was managed according to a restricted drainage, shallow groundwater management technique. Salinity and B measurements were made biannually at approximately 75 sites within the field. Soil salinity and B concentrations were found to be highly correlated in the field. The observed spatial and temporal variability in B and salinity was largely a product of soil textural variations within the field and the associated variations in salt leaching. During the 3‐yr study, the field changed very little from one year to the next, although within a given year there were fluctuations related to cropping and irrigation practices and to environmental conditions. However, any changes arising during the growing season were erased in the fallow season by winter rainfall and preplant irrigations that uniformly leached salts from approximately the top 1 m of the field. Overall, it appears that the shallow groundwater management program used in this study could be continued and sustained in this field without increasing soil salinity or B concentrations, and without decreases in yield.


It is a sad fact that at most university law schools in South Africa, a student can graduate without ever having set foot in a courtroom, and without ever having spoken to, or on behalf of, a person in need of advice or counsel. The past several years have witnessed a swelling chorus of complaints that the current LLB curriculum produces law graduates who were "out of their depth" in practice. My purpose is to make a case for the inclusion in the LLB curriculum of a course in trial advocacy. This endeavour of necessity invokes the broader debate over the educational objectives of a university law school – a debate memorably framed by William Twining as the two polar images of "Pericles and the plumber". My thesis is that the education of practising lawyers should be the primary mission of the university law school. The first part of this contribution is a response to those legal academics who hold that the role of the law school is to educate law students in the theories and substance of the law; that it is not to function as a trade school or a nursery school for legal practice. With reference to the development of legal education in the United States, I argue that the "education/training" dichotomy has been exposed as a red herring. This so-called antithesis is false, because it assumes that a vocational approach is necessarily incompatible with such values as free inquiry, intellectual rigour, independence of thought, and breadth of perspective. The modern American law school has shown that such so-called incompatibility is the product of intellectual snobbery and devoid of any substance. It is also often said that the raison d'etre of a university legal education is to develop in the law student the ability "to think like a lawyer". However, what legal academics usually mean by "thinking like a lawyer" is the development of a limited subset of the skills that are of crucial importance in practising law: one fundamental cognitive skill – analysis – and one fundamental applied skill – legal research. We are not preparing our students for other, equally crucial lawyering tasks – negotiating, client counselling, witness interviewing and trial advocacy. Thinking like a lawyer is a much richer and more intricate process than merely collecting and manipulating doctrine. We cannot say that we are fulfilling our goal to teach students to "think like lawyers", because the complete lawyer "thinks" about doctrine and about trial strategy and about negotiation and about counselling. We cannot teach students to "think like lawyers" without simultaneously teaching them what lawyers do. An LLB curriculum that only produces graduates who can "think like lawyers" in the narrow sense ill-serves them, the profession and the public. If the profession is to improve the quality of the services it provides to the public, it is necessary for the law schools to recognise that their students must receive the skills needed to put into practice the knowledge and analytical abilities they learn in the substantive courses. We have an obligation to balance the LLB curriculum with courses in professional competence, including trial advocacy – courses that expose our students to what actually occurs in lawyer-client relationships and in courtrooms. The skills our law students would acquire in these courses are essential to graduating minimally-competent lawyers whom we can hand over to practice to complete their training. The university law school must help students form the habits and skills that will carry over to a lifetime of practice. Nothing could be more absurd than to neglect in education those practical matters that are necessary for a person's future calling. Keywords: Trial advocacy; legal skills; legal education; LLB curriculum


The interactions between yohimbine (selective alpha 2-antagonist) with noradrenaline (mixed agonist) and phenylephrine (selective alpha 1-agonist) were studied in the canine dorsal pedal artery in an attempt to characterize the peripheral vascular response to adrenergic agents before and after the development of congestive heart failure in the dog. The contractile responses of the dorsal pedal artery to potassium chloride were also examined. Both noradrenaline and phenylephrine contracted the dorsal pedal artery in a concentration-dependent manner before and at peak heart failure, the responses to the agonists being enhanced at heart failure. The responses of the artery to potassium were not modified by congestive heart failure. Yohimbine caused concentration-dependent antagonism of noradrenaline, without altering the magnitude of the maximum response, providing pA2 values ranging from 8.26 to 7.06 against low and high concentrations of noradrenaline, respectively, before heart failure development. Following heart failure, the pA2 values for yohimbine against noradrenaline remained unchanged, but slopes from the Arunlakshana-Schild plots were significantly different from unity, implying a noncompetitive antagonism. The pA2 values of yohimbine against phenylephrine were at least 10 orders of magnitude lower than those against noradrenaline. After congestive heart failure, yohimbine was even less effective against high concentrations of phenylephrine. These findings suggest that enhanced vasoconstriction during heart failure results, in part, from increased alpha 1-adrenoceptor mechanisms in peripheral arterial smooth muscle.


The aim of this study was to analyze the effects of oral consumption of curcumin and piperine in combination on the recovery kinetics after exercise-induced muscle damage. Forty-eight hours before and following exercise-induced muscle damage, ten elite rugby players consumed curcumin and piperine (experimental condition) or placebo. A randomized cross-over design was performed. Concentric and isometric peak torque for the knee extensors, one leg 6 seconds sprint performance on a non-motorized treadmill, counter movement jump performance, blood creatine kinase concentration and muscle soreness were assessed immediately after exercise, then at 24h, 48h and 72h post-exercise. There were moderate to large effects of the exercise on the concentric peak torque for the knee extensors (Effect size (ES) = -1.12; Confidence interval at 90% (CI90%): -2.17 to -0.06), the one leg 6 seconds sprint performance (ES=-1.65; CI90% = -2.51to -0.80) and the counter movement jump performance (ES = -0.56; CI90% = -0.81 to -0.32) in the 48h following the exercise. There was also a large effect of the exercise on the creatine kinase level 72h after the exercise in the control group (ES = 3.61; CI90%: 0.24 to 6.98). This decrease in muscle function and this elevation in creatine kinase indicate that the exercise implemented was efficient to induce muscle damage. Twenty four hours post-exercise, the reduction (from baseline) in sprint mean power output was moderately lower in the experimental condition (-1.77 ± 7.25%; 1277 ± 153W) in comparison with the placebo condition (-13.6 ± 13.0%; 1130 ± 241W) (Effect Size = -1.12; Confidence Interval 90%=-1.86 to -0.86). However, no other effect was found between the two conditions. Curcumin and piperine supplementation before and after exercise can attenuate some, but not all, aspects of muscle damage.


Significance: Conjugated polyenynes are a unique class of polymers with backbones consisting entirely of spand nonaromatic sp2-hybridized carbon atoms. Despite its attractive electronic properties and potential application in materials science, the discovery of new polyenyne motifs remains challenging because of the dearth of suitable precursors and preparatory methods. Herein, Pietrangelo and co-workers report the synthesis of poly(cyclopentadienylene ethynylene)s (PCEs) and poly(p-phenylene ethynylene)/poly(cyclopentadienylene ethynylene) copolymers (PPECEs), in which a cyclopentadiene motif is incorporated into their monomeric structures. Comment: Interestingly, the authors' results suggest that the solubilizing group structure of the PCEs has an effect on the polymer molecular weight and optical absorption profiles. In contrast, the solubilizing group structure of copolymer PPECEs has little effect on their optical absorption. Taken together, these results indicate that the cyclopentadiene constituents are responsible for the low-energy electronic transitions of PCEs. Evaluation of PPEs as semiconductors in organic electronic devices is under way. R O


Abstract Members of the so-called Islamic State (IS) have used subterranea in Syria and Iraq as a core part of their control over territories and their military capability. Around Mosul they exploited existing natural sinkholes, caves and tunnels. The use of tunnels and the completion of new ones between 2014 and 2017 impacted the advance of Iraqi and Peshmerga forces in the battle for Mosul. IS created complex tunnel networks using hand tools, power tools and improvised tunnel-boring machines. To avoid detection, tunnels were started in buildings and spoil was hidden in rooms. The tunnels range from those large enough for one person to crouch in to those large enough for a vehicle. The most sophisticated tunnel complexes had dormitories, hospitals, armouries, kitchens, latrines, and command centres complete with CCTV, solar panels, computers, phones, electricity, respirators and ventilation facilitating underground occupation for long periods. IS tunnelled in almost all urban areas they controlled, demonstrating an enormous effort: moving from hand tools to tunnel-boring machines was a logical progression. The size of tunnel-boring machines and the amount of spoil generated defined the type of building they started in and the length of the tunnel they bored. Buildings with tunnels under them risk collapse.


Power line accident by nest building of crows has a big influence to users, such as stopping an electric power supply. Therefore, in order to prevent the accident beforehand, we developed a real-time monitoring system for a coming-flying crow which supports a steel tower inspection etc.. (1) Technology - As image compression technology, MPEG-4 (Moving Picture Experts Group Phase 4) is used. (2) The crow recognition technique. It became clear that a luminosity value of a crow is lower than a background a little. Then, the system which compares the luminosity value of a crow with the luminosity value of the background, and recognizes a crow was adopted. (3) Effect - As a result of the experiment by this system, the high rate of recognition was obtained and it was checked that this system is effective about the monitoring of a coming-flying crow.


Evaluation is crucial for determining the effectiveness of social programs and interventions. In this nuts and bolts handbook, social work and health care professionals are shown how evaluations should be done, taking the intimidation and guesswork out of this essential task. Current perspectives in social work and health practice, such as the strengths perspective, consumer empowerment, empowerment evaluation, and evidence-based practice, are linked to evaluation concepts throughout the book to emphasize their importance. This book makes evaluation come alive with comprehensive examples of each different type of evaluation, such as a strengths-based needs assessment in a local community, a needs assessment for Child Health Plus programs, comprehensive program descriptions of HIV services and community services for the aged, a model for goals and objectives in programs for people with mental illness, a monitoring study of private practice social work, and process evaluations of a Medicare advocacy program and a health advocacy program to explain advance directives. Equal emphasis is given to both quantitative and qualitative data analysis with real examples that make statistics and concepts in qualitative analysis un-intimidating. By integrating both evaluation and research methods and assuming no previous knowledge of research, this book makes an excellent reference for professionals working in social work and health settings who are now being called upon to conduct or supervise program evaluation and may need a refresher on research methods. With a pragmatic approach that includes survey design, data collection methods, sampling, analysis, and report writing, it is also an excellent text or classroom resource for students new to the field of program evaluation.


We exploit a large-scale natural experiment - the rollout of a nationwide electronic prescribing system in Finland - to study how digitization of prescriptions affects pharmaceutical use and health outcomes. We use comprehensive administrative data from patients treated with benzodiazepines, which are globally popular, effective but addictive psychotropic medications. We find no impact on benzodiazepine use on average, but among younger patients e-prescribing increases repeat prescription use. Younger patients' health outcomes do not improve but adverse outcomes, such as prescription drug abuse disorders and suicide attempts, increase dramatically. Improving access to medication through easier ordering may thus increase medication overuse.


Abstract. Detailed information about 3D forest structure is vital in forest science for analyzing the spatio-temporal development of plants as well as precise harvest forecasting in forest industry. Up to now, the majority of methods focus on complete structural reconstruction of trees from multiple scans, which might not be a suitable starting point with respect to modeling forest scenes over larger areas. For this reason, we propose a strategy to obtain skeletal structures of trees from single scans following a divide-and-conquer approach well-known from computer science. First, we split the range image into components representing surface patches and trace each component's boundary, which is essential for our skeleton retrieval method. Therefore, we propose an extension to standard boundary tracing that takes a component's interior depth discontinuities into account. Second, each component is processed separately: A 2D skeleton is obtained via the Voronoi Diagram and refined. Subsequently, a component is segmented into subsets of points depending on their proximity to skeleton nodes. Afterwards, the skeleton is split into paths and a Principal Curve is computed from each path's point cluster in order to retrieve the component shape as a set of 3D polygonal lines. Our method retrieves the intricate branching structure of components representing tree crown parts reliably and efficiently. The results are fitting with respect to a visual inspection. At present, results are fragments of tree skeletons, but it opens an attractive perspective to complete tree skeletons from skeletal parts, which we currently regard as future work.


Background: There is currently little evidence of a theoretical base for the
development and delivery of multimedia teaching in medicine. In this thesis I have;
(1) reviewed the principles of adult learning and Instructional Design (ID) (2)
proposed an evidence based model for a novel multimedia learning framework (3)
developed the model (4) delivered the program to medical students who evaluated its
functionality and content and (5) identified learning points for future investigators.
Method: Interview style scripts were authored, recorded and integrated to produce
"AnswersIn Gastroenterology". A focus group based pilot study tested the robustness of
the program and need for modification. Following a survey of medical student access to
multimedia computers, AnswersIn was made available on the university server. The
technical challenges of web-delivery were documented and the program made available to
four consecutive student groups during their gastroenterology blocks. At the end of each
block, students formatively evaluated the resource via a questionnaire. Additionally, the
variety of data available using a web-tracker was examined as well as the effect upon usage
of a series of advertising emails.
Results: 8.5 hours of content were developed. The focus group recommended
modifications which were implemented. The survey demonstrated that medical students
have high levels of access to multimedia computers. Despite problems encountered during
the implementation phase, a total of 178 students had access over four blocks. 21 percent
considered AnswersIn as an alternative to lectures and 33 percent indicated that they would
use AnswersIn as their main learning resource. Students gave reasons why they continued
to favour traditional teaching methods but almost all stated that they would like to see
AnswersIn extended to other subjects. Web tracking demonstrated that advertising increased usage.
Conclusion: AnswersIn is a novel framework formulated using principles of adult learning
and Instructional Design. Formative assessments indicate that students respond favourably
to its introduction and its usage can be influenced by advertising.


NF-κB modulates coding genes for adaptive, innate immunity and inflammation. Some toxins activates α smooth muscle actin (α SMA), a marker of kidney myofibroblast, which is enhanced by Smads over expression. The current study estimated the efficacy of silymarine (SIL) in combination with dandelion (DA) and (-)-epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) against kidney damage induced via CCl4 in rats. This is demonstrated by the suppression of α-SMA, Smad-2 and NF-κB protein expressions in renal tissue. CCl4 was injected as a single intraperitoneal dose, followed by one month treatment with SIL, DA and EGCG. Serum urea and creatinine levels were significantly increased upon CCl4 intoxication whereas, uric acid level was slightly affected compared to the control values. Immunohistochemical analysis of kidney sections revealed that CCl4 induced an increase in immune response of NF-κB, α-SMA and Smad-2 protein expressions. While, treatment with the aforementioned natural products either alone or in combination showed mild immune reactivity in blood vessels and glomeruli with the combination regimen of the three antioxidants showing the most significant effect. This was also confirmed by histopathological examinations.


The large (7 m×4 m cylinder, 84 m 3 ) AIDA (Aerosol Interactions and Dynamics in the Atmosphere) cloud chamber facility at Forschungszentrum, Karlsruhe, Germany was used to test the ice nucleating ability of two desert dust samples from the Sahara and Asia. Aerosol samples were lognormally distributed with a mode diameter of 0.4(±0.1) μm and geometric standard deviation of ~1.7(±0.2). At temperatures warmer than −40°C droplets were formed before ice crystals formed and there was generally no deposition nucleation observed. At temperatures colder than −40°C both dust samples exhibited dual nucleation events that were observed during the same expansion experiment. The primary nucleation event occurred at ice saturation ratios of 1.1 to 1.3 and is likely to be a deposition nucleation mode. The secondary nucleation event occurred at ice saturation ratios between 1.35 and 1.5. We cannot categorically determine whether this ice nucleation event is via a further deposition mode or a condensation mode, but the presence of some soluble material in the dust samples leads us to favour the latter process. The activated fractions of desert dust ranged from ~5–10% at −20°C to 20–40% at temperatures colder than −40°C. There was no obvious difference between the nucleation behaviour of the two dust samples.


A small population of plasmacytoid DCs (pDCs) in mouse tumor-draining LNs can express the immunoregulatory enzyme indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO). We show that these IDO+ pDCs directly activate resting CD4+CD25+Foxp3+ Tregs for potent suppressor activity. In vivo, Tregs isolated from tumor-draining LNs were constitutively activated and suppressed antigen-specific T cells immediately ex vivo. In vitro, IDO+ pDCs from tumor-draining LNs rapidly activated resting Tregs from non-tumor-bearing hosts without the need for mitogen or exogenous anti-CD3 crosslinking. Treg activation by IDO+ pDCs was MHC restricted, required an intact amino acid-responsive GCN2 pathway in the Tregs, and was prevented by CTLA4 blockade. Tregs activated by IDO markedly upregulated programmed cell death 1 ligand 1 (PD-L1) and PD-L2 expression on target DCs, and the ability of Tregs to suppress target T cell proliferation was abrogated by antibodies against the programmed cell death 1/PD-L (PD-1/PD-L) pathway. In contrast, Tregs activated by anti-CD3 crosslinking did not cause upregulation of PD-Ls, and suppression by these cells was unaffected by blocking the PD-1/PD-L pathway. Tregs isolated from tumor-draining LNs in vivo showed potent PD-1/PD-L-mediated suppression, which was selectively lost when tumors were grown in IDO-deficient hosts. We hypothesize that IDO+ pDCs create a profoundly suppressive microenvironment within tumor-draining LNs via constitutive activation of Tregs.


Objective To investigate the association of volume of total hip arthroplasty (THA) between consultants and within the same consultant in the previous year and the hazard of revision using multilevel survival models. Design Prospective cohort study using data from a national joint replacement register. Setting Elective THA across all private and public centres in England and Wales between April 2003 and February 2017. Participants Patients aged 50 years or more undergoing THA for osteoarthritis. Intervention The volume of THA conducted in the preceding 365 days to the index procedure. Main outcome and measure Revision surgery (excision, addition or replacement) of a primary THA. Results Of the 579 858 patients undergoing primary THA (mean baseline age 69.8 years (SD 10.2)), 61.1% were women. Multilevel survival found differing results for between and within-consultant effects. There was a strong volume–revision association between consultants, with a near-linear 43.3% (95% CI 29.1% to 57.4%) reduction of the risk of revision comparing consultants with volumes between 1 and 200 procedures annually. Changes in individual surgeons (within-consultant) case volume showed no evidence of an association with revision. Conclusion Separation of between-consultant and within-consultant effects of surgical volume reveals how volume contributes to the risk of revision after THA. The lack of association within-consultants suggests that individual changes to consultant volume alone will have little effect on outcomes following THA. These novel findings provide strong evidence supporting the practice of specialisation of hip arthroplasty. It does not support the practice of low-volume consultants increasing their personal volume as it is unlikely their results would improve if this is the only change. Limiting the exposure of patients to consultants with low volumes of THA and greater utilisation of centres with higher volume surgeons with better outcomes may be beneficial to patients.


Over the past 15 years, labor-quality growth has been very strong—defying nearly all earlier projections—and has added around 0.5 percentage points to an otherwise modest U.S. productivity picture. Going forward, labor quality is likely to add considerably less and may even be a drag on productivity growth in the medium term. Using a variety of methods, we project that potential labor-quality growth in the longer run (7 to 10 years out) is likely to fall in the range of 0.1 to 0.25 percent per year. In the medium term, labor-quality growth could be lower or even negative, should employment rates of low-skilled workers make a cyclical rebound towards pre-recession levels. The main uncertainties in the longer run are whether the secular decline in employment of low-skilled workers continues and whether the Great Recession pickup in educational attainment represents the start of a new boom or is simply a transitory reaction to a poor economy.


The assessment of Justice Clarence Thomas as the lone principled federalist - supported on its face by his concurrence in Wyeth v. Levine, which solidifies his rejection of implied obstacle preemption, coupled with his resolute rejection of the dormant Commerce Clause - is far more complicated, due to the chimerical nature of abstract federalism arguments in preemption and statutory interpretation cases. Preemption jurisprudence is notably variegated. One dimension of the analysis is akin to statutory interpretation - how best to read and interpret the precise words used or implied by Congress in the statutes it enacts. Another layer consists of federalism-based presumptions, driven by a vision of the appropriate constitutional balance of power and authority between the federal and state governments. Embedded within this doctrinal edifice is another valence of political or policy predilections including affinities for regulation writ large and preferences toward bureaucratic versus common law jury enforced norms. And finally, an oft-overlooked piece of the puzzle is the interpretive and regulatory role assumed by the underlying federal agency. From these various dimensions of preemption analysis one might construct a series of representative matrices of institutional actors along which one could classify judicial philosophies: Congress vs. courts; courts vs. agencies; courts vs. states; agencies vs. states. Something like a rotating tetrahedron might be necessary to capture variation along each of these dimensions simultaneously.Understanding Justice Thomas's worldview of preemption along these dimensions provides a window into larger debates about how theories of statutory interpretation should intersect with and inform debates about preemption. Thomas's position rests far more on fidelity to statutory text and preference for Congress over courts and agencies as a constitutional and institutional matter than it does on principles of abstract federalism or states' rights. Thomas is guided by an overarching principle: a judge should refrain from acting unless constitutionally commanded to do something by Congress or an agency - in which case, text provides the roadmap for action. A core principle emerges: as between Congress, federal agencies, and courts, the decision rests with Congress. This proposition covers Thomas's embrace of express preemption where Congress has definitively spoken, and concomitant rejection of implied obstacle preemption and the dormant Commerce Clause, each of which involves judicial assertion of a decision-making prerogative. But a second principle - a formalistic separation of the spheres of statutory interpretation and preemption - is key to reconciling Thomas's views. This proposition makes sense of Thomas's steadfast embrace of Chevron deference to agencies in statutory interpretation contexts that seem to be at odds with federalist principles, as well as his aversion to agency deference in preemption matters. The most significant strain in Thomas's jurisprudence may be above all, a principled aversion to courts, and their "judicially manufactured policies."


One major goal of eGovernment is the provision of an efficient and cost-effective infrastructure enabling access to online resources for all citizens. While at the beginning this goal was basically related to Internet, today there is growing demand for providing access anywhere and anytime also where wired networks are not available. Major drivers of this development are emerging technologies as WLAN and the growing mobility of inhabitants as well as increasing usage and penetration of mobile phones. Another driver are emerging opportunities for new services for citizens based on mobile technology summarized under the term mGovernment. In order to enable mobile applications on a larger scale an efficient infrastructure is necessary. In this paper the approach of Turku, Southwest Finland, in creating a wireless infrastructure will be described based on a case study.


Stochastic Network Calculus (SNC) emerged from two branches in the late 90s:
the theory of effective bandwidths and its predecessor the Deterministic Network
Calculus (DNC). As such SNC's goal is to analyze queueing networks and support
their design and control.
In contrast to queueing theory, which strives for similar goals, SNC uses in-
equalities to circumvent complex situations, such as stochastic dependencies or
non-Poisson arrivals. Leaving the objective to compute exact distributions behind,
SNC derives stochastic performance bounds. Such a bound would, for example,
guarantee a system's maximal queue length that is violated by a known small prob-
ability only.
This work includes several contributions towards the theory of SNC. They are
sorted into four main contributions:
(1) The first chapters give a self-contained introduction to deterministic net-
work calculus and its two branches of stochastic extensions. The focus lies on the
notion of network operations. They allow to derive the performance bounds and
simplifying complex scenarios.
(2) The author created the first open-source tool to automate the steps of cal-
culating and optimizing MGF-based performance bounds. The tool automatically
calculates end-to-end performance bounds, via a symbolic approach. In a second
step, this solution is numerically optimized. A modular design allows the user to
implement their own functions, like traffic models or analysis methods.
(3) The problem of the initial modeling step is addressed with the development
of a statistical network calculus. In many applications the properties of included
elements are mostly unknown. To that end, assumptions about the underlying
processes are made and backed by measurement-based statistical methods. This
thesis presents a way to integrate possible modeling errors into the bounds of SNC.
As a byproduct a dynamic view on the system is obtained that allows SNC to adapt
to non-stationarities.
(4) Probabilistic bounds are fundamentally different from deterministic bounds:
While deterministic bounds hold for all times of the analyzed system, this is not
true for probabilistic bounds. Stochastic bounds, although still valid for every time
t, only hold for one time instance at once. Sample path bounds are only achieved by
using Boole's inequality. This thesis presents an alternative method, by adapting
the theory of extreme values.
(5) A long standing problem of SNC is the construction of stochastic bounds
for a window flow controller. The corresponding problem for DNC had been solved
over a decade ago, but remained an open problem for SNC. This thesis presents
two methods for a successful application of SNC to the window flow controller.


An algebraic derivation of the Kruppa equations is presented. This derivation is much simpler and thus easier to understand than the conventional derivation based on projective geometry. Using the newly derived Kruppa equations, we further propose a new algorithm for determining a camera's intrinsic parameters. Experimental results and discussions are given for both synthetic and real images.


In the last ten years, concerns about location privacy have evolved from an academic topic that struggled to justify concerns about security to a mainstream issue that is affecting consumers, businesses and the legal system. Much of this proliferation of concerns arises from telecommunication and mobile computing platforms. Smart phones and GPS-assisted devices play an increasing role in people's lives, and the technology of precise and easily obtained location information has imbued mobile and social media with location in advance of the public knowing how that information will be used and fully grasping the implication of pervasive location information. Furthermore, social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, Buzz and many others have adopted location as a key part of the information they communicate. While social networks are not critical parts of the communication landscape, they are used by hundreds of millions of people who are only beginning to understand the potential problems with providing easily accessible location information to an industry with a checkered history of transparent privacy policies. At the same time, telecommunication networks use GPS, assisted GPS and other location technologies to enhance localization as a necessary part of the Emergency-911 services. On an increasing basis, consumers' location information is being distributed with and without their knowledge. To what extent are users of these new technologies exposing themselves to identity attacks through sharing location information?How can consumers understand and control how and when their information is being used or distributed and who has access to it? In this paper, we briefly describe the technologies that underlie location-based services, their access and the notion of how location can be linked or inferred from multiple sources. We then survey common visible and hidden uses of location services, including social networks and emergency services. The technical community has developed a number of methods to hide or mask locations to provide a degree of anonymity while still preserving the benefit of location services. We briefly survey those methods and the "threat models" they seek to counter. We then describe threat models, or disclosures of location information, not commonly considered by the research community and their implications. We lastly turn our attention to the policy implications of these technologies and the potential concerns that they present in terms of user privacy and safety. The technical community has long used automated policy descriptions to inform users about how their data will be used, but these mechanisms do not address location privacy. We theorize that it may be possible to enhance these methods to support location services based on some of the threat models that researchers have specified, but that broader concerns about location privacy can not rely on technical solutions and will need to rely on both education, good corporate citizenship and regulation.


A scour hole developed inside the Shinnecock Inlet channel near the tip of the west jetty. Over the years, this hole deepened to about 70 ft below the mean low water level with the average channel depth at the inlet throat approximately 20 ft. A similar situation occurred at Moriches Inlet, 15 miles west of Shinnecock Inlet, where a scour hole about 50 ft deep developed at the ocean end of the west jetty. Both holes contributed to the failure of the jetties with the head sections collapsing into the holes. An attempt to remedy the situation by filling the hole at Shinnecock Inlet with dredged material did not yield satisfactory results. The New York District developed a plan using a riprap scour blanket to stabilize the scour hole area. A field study of tidal current distribution at the inlet vicinity and a review of the history of scour hole development were performed for better understanding of the inlet hydrodynamics in relation to the scour hole formation.


Net radiation, at the Earth's surface, is a key variable of interest in fields such as hydrology, climate research, and agriculture. Retrieval algorithms for estimation of the surface radiation budget (SRB) from remote sensing data generally suffer from two major shortcomings: difficulty in dealing with cloudy-sky conditions and reliance on study-site specific ancillary ground data. In this paper, we use the methodology of Bisht and Bras (BB10) to estimate SRB and its components, using only remote sensing data under all sky conditions. The BB10 framework is applied over seven sites of the Surface Radiation Budget network in the CONtinental United States (CONUS), along with 21 sites of the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement program in the Southern Great Plains. The data from both the Aqua and Terra satellites are used for entire 2006. The study examines instantaneous upwelling and downwelling shortwave, longwave, net shortwave, and net radiations, as well as daily average net shortwave and net radiations. The root-mean-square errors of estimated daily average net radiation and daily average net shortwave radiation when compared to ground observations are 52.42 and 52.21 W · m-2, respectively. An example of the retrieved instantaneous and daily average net radiation is also presented, which highlights the limitation of using only polar-orbiting satellite data in estimating the diurnal cycle of net radiation. Two adaptations to the algorithm are presented that make the production of SRB estimates over the CONUS feasible. Finally, the methodology is applied to produce daily SRB maps for the CONUS, and monthly SRB maps are presented.


This thesis will cover the principle, design, and construction of an automatic esophageal intubation detector. This device uses a giant magneto recitative sensor to and a magnetized stylet to automatically measure the position of an ET tube in a person's throat. This method is less subjective than currently used methods such as end tidal CO2, as it does not rely on user interpretation of data or physiological state of the patient. The device developed during this project was tested on an anatomical mockup, a porcine airway model, and an intubation training dummy. In all three tests, the device performed well, accurately indicating tracheal intubation when the tube was placed in the trachea. Only one instance of a false positive indication of tracheal intubation was recorded and this occurred in an atypical and avoidable situation. As of now, the device functions in non-obese adult male patients, but plans are in place to increase usability for the entire population.


With the increase in electricity demand, new sources of power generation and transmission lines are needed. Thus, because of the need to meet the demand for electricity, transmission lines and substations are increasingly present in urban and local areas near the movement of people. Since electromagnetic fields are a result of the electrical installation, there are rules governing the field exposure levels due to the possibility of causing adverse health effects. The institution which sets the levels of exposure limits is ANEEL (Agência Nacional de Energia Elétrica), with the Normative Resolution n° 398. The analysis of electromagnetic fields can be performed by measurements, analytical calculations, or through computer numerical solutions. This study aims to determine the electromagnetic fields from computer numerical solutions of an output line of a gas-insulated substation, determining the minimum distances for operation and pedestrian traffic.


An experiment was conducted to investigate the absorption and utilization of nitrogen by rice seed treatment with Nitrate salts (halo priming) and distilled water (hydro-priming) in two successive years. Results revealed that seed priming with Mg (NO3)2, KNO3 and Distilled water always perform better than non-primed control sets in enhancing seed germination and nitrate reductase enzyme activity in leaves that promote to nitrogen accumulation in different plant parts. This seed priming technique further enhanced soluble and insoluble nitrogen content in seed, and also the nitrogen gathering capacity in seed and straw (Kg h-1). Seed priming was also found beneficial in encouraging grain yield after applying Kg-1 nitrogen in the soil. This technique proved promising in more nitrogen accumulation and less nitrogen loss. Among seed priming treatment Mg (NO3)2 performed the best in respect to all measured parameters followed by KNO3 and hydro-primed one in comparison to control sets. These results clearly indicated that higher yield in rice can be achieved via improving the nitrogen absorption and utilization by growing crop, raised with seed priming treatment especially using Mg (NO3)2 salts.


Toxoplasmosis, leptospirosis, and brucellosis are global zoonoses, with humans as accidental participants in their transmission cycles. The can also be considered occupational diseases, because certain professionals are at greater risk of contact and infection by such zoonoses. These three diseases have different epidemiological characteristics because of the distinct environmental, social, cultural, and economic conditions where these pathogens circulate. Because of the importance of these diseases and their associations with specific occupations, we performed a seroepidemiological survey of Toxoplasma, Leptospira, and Brucella antibodies, with an analysis of the association between positive serum and certain occupational and environmental variables, in students of a veterinary medicine course (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th year) in a university in the northwestern region in the state of Parana, Brazil. From May to November 2014, blood samples were collected from 157 volunteers by professionals trained in nursing and biomedicine from the same university as the veterinary students. At the time of blood collection, the students did not present any clinical signs of the three diseases of interest. To detect anti-Toxoplasma gondii, anti-Leptospira spp., and anti-Brucella antibodies, indirect immunofluorescence test (IIF), microscopic agglutination test (MAT), fast agglutination test (a screening test), and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were performed. To determine variables associated with these infections, the students were interviewed to complete an epidemiological questionnaire with environmental, behavioral, and occupational information. The associations between these variables and infections were assess by chi-square or Fischer's exact tests, with a 5% significance level (?). Of the 157 serum samples analyzed, 29.29% reacted to Toxoplasma antigens, with titers ranging from 16 to 4096 by IIF, 1.27% to Leptospira antigens, with titers ranging from 100 to 800 by MAT using Hardjo and Wolffi serovars, and 0.63% to Brucella antigens by ELISA; however, no variables were found to be associated with infection with any of these pathogens. The results of this study show that one-third of the students in the veterinary medicine course were exposed to Toxoplasma gondii, Leptospira spp., and Brucella spp. at some stage in their lives; however, it is not possible to determine whether these infections were acquired at the university, because no associations between occupational risk variables and these infections were found. An understanding of the transmission of each etiological agent and methods to prevent infection is important to maintain low prevalence levels of these zoonotic diseases during the veterinary medicine course and extra-curricular internships, when there is increased exposure to these pathogens.


For mitigation and monitoring of endangered North Atlantic Right whales, identifying their presence from their vocalisations is the essential principle of Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) system. The most common vocalisations of Right whales are characterized as frequency modulated up sweeps with duration of ~1s and a frequency range from 50 to 200 Hz. These species favour shallow waters during their seasonal migration. Such shallow-water acoustic environments act as a waveguide and cause the mono-component up call emitted by the vocalising whale to become a dispersive multimode signal with different time arrivals and relative energy at the receiver. As well as the natural variation in species vocalisation, another variation in the characteristic features extracted from dispersive calls results from the dispersion effect. In this thesis normal mode modelling was used to better understand the influence of shallow water on the parameters of Right whale up calls. Also, examples from data recorded in Cape Cod Bay shows the dispersion influence. Visual scanning indicates that 93% of the data are dispersive and the first mode in 85% of these calls is less excited than the second mode due to the dependence of mode excitation on the depth of the calling whale. The discrimination between the Northern Right whale up calls and background noise has been investigated using the Support Vector Machine classifier. To perform this task, a region-based active contour segmentation method is proposed. This approach is based on the evolution of the contour within the spectrogram image searching for the uniformity of the target object. In this work both synthesized data based on typical Right whale vocalisations and real data recorded in Cape Cod Bay are used to evaluate the proposed method. To illustrate the variation in the data caused by the channel effect we compare the descriptive statistics of the call duration using both the single mode and the multi-mode approaches. The single mode analysis was performed by extracting the frequency contour of the first mode.


Title of dissertation: PROBLEMS IN SELECTIVE MODAL ANALYSIS AND CONTROL Mohamed S. Saad, Doctor of Philosophy, 2007 Dissertation directed by: Professor Eyad H. Abed Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering In this dissertation, we develop monitoring and control systems for improving the performance of systems that are required to operate at the edge of their stability envelopes. The concept of modal participation factors, which is an essential construct in the theory of Selective Modal Analysis, is used extensively in this work. The basic definition of modal participation factors that was originally given for unforced linear time-invariant systems is revisited, and related notions of output participation factors and input-to-output participation factors are introduced, studied and applied to models of electrical power systems. A signal-based approach for real-time detection of impending instability in nonlinear systems is considered. The main idea pursued involves using a small additive white Gaussian noise as a probe signal and monitoring the spectral density of one or more measured states or outputs for certain signatures of impending instability. Input-to-state and input-to-output participation factors are used as tools to aid in selection of locations for probe inputs and states or outputs to be monitored, respectively. Since these participation factors are model-based, the work presented combines signal-based and model-based ideas toward achieving a robust methodology for instability monitoring. Case studies from power systems are used to illustrate the developed monitoring system, one of which involves the WSCC 3-generator, 9-bus network. Feedback algorithms are developed for assigning modal participation factors in general linear time-invariant systems using eigenvector assignment-based techniques. The goal is to reduce the interaction between a selected group of states (the high-value group) and an undesirable mode (for example a critical mode, i.e., one corresponding to an eigenvalue or pair of eigenvalues approaching the imaginary axis in the complex plane). In particular, we address two cases, one in which the mode of interest corresponds to a real eigenvalue approaching zero, and the other in which the mode involves a complex conjugate pair of eigenvalues that may be approaching the imaginary axis. A novel procedure for computing the desired closed-loop right eigenvector(s) associated with the critical mode (based on given constraints on the desired closed-loop participation factors) is presented. An example from power systems is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the controller. The example used is the WSCC 3-generator, 9-bus network. PROBLEMS IN SELECTIVE MODAL ANALYSIS AND CONTROL


Background Mammographic density (MD) is a strong intermediate risk factor for breast cancer (BC) and, having both genetic and environmental determinants, may account for the over 6-fold international variations in BC incidence rates. The International Pooling Project of Mammographic Density is a worldwide collaborative project of MD targeting populations spanning the BC incidence range. The aims of the project are to (i) describe international variations in overall and age-specific distributions of MD, (ii) assess whether international variations in MD are explained by variations in the distributions of individual-level determinants of this marker and (iii) examine whether international variations in MD correlate with corresponding BC incidence rates. Methods Each contributing study provided comparable data on MD risk factors and mammographic images from a random sample of ˜ 400 general population women, who had undergone screening mammography. Images were transferred in digitised screen-film, full-field or computed radiography digital DICOM format (raw or processed). Images were randomly allocated into batches for MD reading using the Cumulus 6 thresholding software, by experienced readers who were blinded to study and individual-level factors. Data on MD determinants were pooled and linked with MD readings. Results are calibrated according to type of digital image (raw to processed), and adjusted for image type. Results 22 countries and approximately 12,000 women are included, spanning populations with age-standardised BC incidence rates (ASR) of 25.8 (India) to 99 (The Netherlands) per 100,000 woman-years. To date, for 9,635 participants data have been pooled (results will be updated). The MD risk factors vary greatly across populations, for example: mean age at menarche (in years) was 14.3 (95% CI 14.1–14.5) in Korean women and 12.6 (12.5–12.8) in Mexican women; mean parity was 3.8 (3.6–4.1) in Egyptian women and 1.3 (1.1–1.4) in those from Hong Kong; and mean BMI (in kg/m2) was 33.7 (33.1–34.3) in Egyptian women compared to 22.3 (21.6–22.9) in those from India. Differences in MD according to these distributions will be presented. Discussion The international perspective of this study generated large exposure heterogeneity enabling a wider investigation of MD determinants and the extent to which MD is an intermediate marker of BC risk, both within and between populations.


The recession that began with a cyclical peak in December 2007 originated in a combination of real shocks because of a fall in housing wealth and a fall in real income from an increase in energy prices. The most common explanation for the intensification of the recession that began in the late summer of 2008 is the propagation of these shocks through dysfunction in credit markets. The alternative explanation offered in this article emphasizes propagation through contractionary monetary policy. The first explanation stresses the importance of credit-market interventions (credit policy). The second emphasizes the importance of money creation (money-creation policy). According to Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) Chairman William McChesney Martin, "The System should always be engaged in a ruthless examination of its past record" (FOMC Minutes, 11/26/68, 1,456).


Signal propagation delays are hardly a problem for target tracking with standard sensors such as radar and vision due to the fact that the speed of light is much higher than the speed of the target. This contribution studies the case where the ratio of the target and the propagation speed is not negligible, as in the case of sensor networks with microphones, geophones or sonars for instance, where the signal speed in air, ground and water causes a state dependent and stochastic delay of the observations. The proposed approach utilizes an augmentation of the state vector with the propagation delay in a particle filtering framework to compensate for the negative effects of the delays. The model of the physics rules governing the propagation delays is used in interaction with the target motion model to yield an iterative prediction update step in the particle filter which is called the propagation delayed measurement particle filter (PDM-PF). The performance of PDM-PF is illustrated in a challenging target tracking scenario by making comparisons to alternative particle filters that can be used in similar cases.


This paper considers the problem of estimating the direction-of-arrival (DOA) of one or more signals using an array of sensors, where some of the sensors fail to work before the measurement is completed. Methods for estimating the array output covariance matrix are discussed. In particular, the maximum-likelihood (ML) estimate of this covariance matrix and its asymptotic accuracy are derived and discussed. Different covariance matrix estimates are used for DOA estimation together with the MUSIC algorithm and with a covariance matching technique. In contrast to MUSIC, the covariance matching technique can utilize information on the estimation accuracy of the array covariance matrix, and it is demonstrated that this yields a significant performance gain.


This
seminar will present the key insights and practical implications for targeted
management strategies that have emerged from analysis of 3 years of smart water
meter measurements on a representative set of 100-150 households in Adelaide.
It will be of interest to a wide range of personnel within SA Water including
water network planners and operators who use demand and waste water predictions
to optimize planning and operational decisions, and to community engagement and
policy personnel who wish to better understand the relationship between
household behavior and water use. The topics to be covered include:

Drivers of Indoor Use

The
key drivers of indoor water use were identified by combining end use
measurements with household surveys of demographics, behavior, appliance usage
and attitude. Key findings include:

•
Distinct
household usage groups (related to demographics such as income/age/attitude)
were identified with different water end-use patterns.

•
This
has implications for the development of targeted strategies for effective
demand management and water use prediction to optimise planning and operations
of water networks.

•
The
Behavioural End Use Stochastic Simulator (BESS) that utilises differences in
behaviour and water using appliances to provide end-use predictions was found
to be highly accurate (~5-10% errors) when calibrated with local end-use
measurements.

•
This
implies BESS can provide reliable water use predictions that incorporate changes
in behaviour and household characteristics. BESS was used to attribute
water-use reduction during the 2007-2009 drought and provide predictions of
demand management scenarios (uptake of water efficient appliances) in the
future (2025 and 2050).

Drivers of Outdoor Use and Peak Demands

The key
drivers of outdoor water use and peak demand were analyzed by combining the three
years of smart water measurements with climate and household characteristics (garden
size/irrigation type etc). Key findings are:

•    Potential impacts of future climate change on peak demands.

•    Identification of the key drivers of outdoor water use and its
implications for water prediction and demand management strategies.

•    Identification of the key drivers of peak water and its
implications for peak demand prediction and peak demand reduction strategies. An
important finding being that a small proportion of the households with certain
characteristics contribute a large amount to the peak demand.

The
majority of these findings emerged from the "Identifying the Key Drivers of
Household Water Use" component of the Goyder Institute for Water Research
Optimal Water Resource Mix (OWRM) for Greater Adelaide project of which SA
Water was a key stakeholder.


Phenomenon perfilman which many presenting hardness scene has many circulating in public, researcher chooses film Slumdog Millionaire as research object because this film
many containing hardness scene of physical of because poorness background of dalm background film and because getting 8 cup OSCAR out of 10 nominations which in participating. Problem formula which in telling in this research concerning question how much is hardness scene amounts of physical of in displaying film Slumdog Millionaire. This research aim to know how big duration displays containing element of hardness scene of
physical done by figures in this film. Researcher applies analytical method contents of to calculate overall of duration of hardness scene of the displaying film based on category which has been determined by researcher to can see does this film many containing hardness scene of physical or no.
Result of research indicates that apparition of hardness scene of physical of at displaying this 68 times. Duration which hardness scene that is at longest is hardness scene of physical of to children that is 620 seconds with percentage of equal to 59%. Second sequence is hardness
scene of physical of to men that is 203 seconds with percentage of equal to 20%. At sequence three is duration of hardness scene of physical of to woman that is 143 seconds with percentage of equal to 14%. Last sequence is duration of hardness scene of physical of to group of that is 68 seconds with percentage of equal to 7%. From overall of amounts the duration duration of hardness scene of the physical, hence hardness to chlid hardly predominates displaying this film. Hardness is in the form of hitting and kick so exploitation to physical of child of many in displaying at displaying this film.
Conclusion from this research indicates that hardness scene which many done at this film is to children, and then to men, to woman and then to group. Result of this in obtaining from apparition amounts every category in film Slumdog Millionaire.
From result of above research hence earning in katakana that hardness of physical of doesn't get out of life reality, even mass media also gives loaded information physical hardness would. Levying of campaign and multiplies anti hardness information especially to child of is
business that is effective enough. Because chlid is having rights to subsistence that is competent and gets protection from old fellow and adult people residing in vinicity. This duty better earn in emban by all people family, school and also public and mass media as information source.


We evaluate a method based on the two-dimensional directional wavelet transform and the introduction of a spatial carrier to retrieve optical phase distributions in singular scalar light fields. The performance of the proposed phase-retrieval method is compared with an approach based on Fourier transform. The advantages and limitations of the proposed method are discussed.


In the atmosphere, aerosols play an important role in climate change, the Earth's environment and human health. The purpose of this study is to investigate the direct and semi-direct aerosol effects on weather forecasting, focusing on the Iberian Peninsula (IP). To that end, two Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF)-Chem simulations (with and without aerosol feedback) for an entire year (2015) were performed. The model setup includes two nested domains run in two-way mode, allowing the downscaling for the IP domain at a 5 × 5 km2 high-horizontal resolution. The results were explored through agreement of pairs of time series and their spatial variability in order to analyse the importance of including the online-coupled aerosol radiative effect on the meteorological variables: shortwave (solar) radiation, air temperature and precipitation. Significant variations of agreement were found when capturing both temporal and spatial patterns of the analysed meteorological variables. While the spatial distribution of temperature and precipitation is similar throughout the IP domain, with agreement values ranging from 0.87 up to 1.00, the solar radiation presents a distinct spatial pattern with lower agreement values (0.68–0.75) over ocean and higher agreement (0.75–0.98) over land regions. With regard to the spatial differences between simulations, the aerosol contributed to a considerable decrease in annual mean and maximum radiation (up to 20 and 40 Wm−2, respectively), slightly impacting the temperature variation (up to 0.5 °C). These results suggest that the aerosol feedback effects should be accounted when performing weather forecasts, and not only for purposes of air quality assessment.


Objectives Genetic therapies replace or inactivate disease-causing genes or introduce new or modified genes. These therapies have the potential to cure in a single application rather than treating symptoms through repeated administrations. This evidence map provides a broad overview of the genetic therapies that have been evaluated in randomised controlled trials (RCTs) for efficacy and safety. Eligibility criteria Two independent reviewers screened publications using predetermined eligibility criteria. Study details and data on safety and efficacy were abstracted from included trials. Results were visualised in an evidence map. Information sources We searched PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, ClinicalTrials.gov and grey literature to November 2018. Risk of bias Only RCTs were included in this review to reduce the risk of selection bias in the evaluation of genetic therapy safety and efficacy. Included studies We identified 119 RCTs evaluating genetic therapies for a variety of clinical conditions. Synthesis of results On average, samples included 107 participants (range: 1–1022), and were followed for 15 months (range: 0–124). Interventions using adenoviruses (40%) to treat cardiovascular diseases (29%) were the most common. Description of the effect In RCTs reporting safety and efficacy outcomes, in the majority (60%) genetic therapies were associated with improved symptoms but in nearly half (45%) serious adverse event (SAEs) were also reported. Improvement was reported in trials treating cancer, cardiovascular, ocular and muscular diseases. However, only 19 trials reported symptom improvement for at least 1 year. Strengths and limitations of evidence This is the first comprehensive evidence map of RCTs evaluating the safety and efficacy of genetic therapies. Evidence for long-term effectiveness and safety is still sparse. This lack of evidence has implications for the use, ethics, pricing and logistics of genetic therapies. Interpretation This evidence map provides a broad overview of research studies that allow strong evidence statements regarding the safety and efficacy of genetic therapies. Most interventions improve symptoms, but SAE are also common. More research is needed to evaluate genetic therapies with regard to the potential to cure diseases.