Background Since November 2009, WHO recommends that adults infected with HIV should initiate antiretroviral therapy (ART) at CD4+ cell counts of ≤350 cells/µl rather than ≤200 cells/µl. South Africa decided to adopt this strategy for pregnant and TB co-infected patients only. We estimated the impact of fully adopting the new WHO guidelines on HIV epidemic dynamics and associated costs. Methods and Finding We used an established model of the transmission and control of HIV in specified sexual networks and healthcare settings. We quantified the model to represent Hlabisa subdistrict, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. We predicted the HIV epidemic dynamics, number on ART and program costs under the new guidelines relative to treating patients at ≤200 cells/µl for the next 30 years. During the first five years, the new WHO treatment guidelines require about 7% extra annual investments, whereas 28% more patients receive treatment. Furthermore, there will be a more profound impact on HIV incidence, leading to relatively less annual costs after seven years. The resulting cumulative net costs reach a break-even point after on average 16 years. Conclusions Our study strengthens the WHO recommendation of starting ART at ≤350 cells/µl for all HIV-infected patients. Apart from the benefits associated with many life-years saved, a modest frontloading appears to lead to net savings within a limited time-horizon. This finding is robust to alternative assumptions and foreseeable changes in ART prices and effectiveness. Therefore, South Africa should aim at rapidly expanding its healthcare infrastructure to fully embrace the new WHO guidelines.


ESSAYS IN PUBLIC ECONOMICS Pau Pereira Holger Sieg This dissertation consists of two chapters on topics in public economics. In the first chapter, I study the conflict over the provision of multiple public goods in U.S. cities. I use a rich data set of municipal spending and Census micro-data to provide evidence that different demographic groups do indeed have conflicting preferences over the composition of public goods and services provided at the local level. To account for endogeneity due to sorting I use a simulated instrumental variable approach where I simulate the demographic distribution in each city that would have occurred if each city's demographic composition had evolved in the same way as in the national level. I then propose a model that can accommodate multiple groups with conflicting preferences over each public good provided and different income distributions within groups and I estimate it using GMM. Using the estimated model, I use the projected evolution of each demographic group to generate predictions on the supply of different public goods in each city. I find that, if the current demographic trends continue, by 2030 there will an average decrease in the provision of public v education in U.S. cities of 2%, an average increase in basic public goods and redistributive spending of 20%, with substantial variability across cities. In the second chapter, I propose a new model of how the level and composition of public services are determined in a city. The model allows for an arbitrary number of groups with different preferences over public goods and within group income heterogeneity. I embed the political economy model of public good provision in the city into a location choice model between the central city and the suburbs in order to study the interactions between mobility and the political conflict over the composition of the budget. Through a numerical exercise I show that mobility and demographic conflict interact in a surprising way, generating a non-monotonic effect between increasing demographic heterogeneity and the size of the public sector. When heterogeneity is low, increasing it reduces the size of the public sector, but it also alters the demographic composition of the city as richer individuals of the minority group leave for the suburbs and the richer individuals from the majority move from the suburbs to the city. This leads to a more homogeneous city and to an inflection in the support for public spending. Eventually, increases in taste heterogeneity lead to increases in public spending per capita, and to a starker segregation between city and suburbs.


The problem of informal work and informal networks (blat) in Ukraine is long-standing. Until now, research on the informal economy in Ukraine has largely focused on measuring its size rather than exploring the nature and motives of the people engaged in informal activities. Moreover, few studies in relation to Ukraine have sought to evaluate the validity of the contrasting theorisations of the informal economy and no studies in Ukraine have considered the issue of contemporary informal networks (blat). The intention of this thesis is to fill these gaps. In doing so, the objective is to start to resolve the lack of knowledge on the nature of the informal economy which leads to ineffective and even destructive policy approaches to tackling it.
The aim of this thesis is to critically evaluate the existing theorisations of the informal economy and their applicability to Ukrainian society in order to start to enable a move towards developing policy solutions for tackling the informal economy. To achieve this aim, a mixed methods approach is adopted in this thesis. The survey, consisting of 200 semi-structured interviews, was carried out in an urban area of Ukraine – the city of Mykolayiv. The data collected was analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively.
The results of the survey affirm that informal activities are diverse in nature and are driven by a variety of motives. Thus, no single existing theory fully explains the informal economy in Ukraine; instead, there is evidence to support each theory of the informal economy. As such, policy responses need to be tailored in order to effectively deal with the challenges faced by the different types of informal activity. Such a response is more likely to result in the formalisation of such activities by removing the barriers to formalisation and nurturing fledgling business activities rather than simply trying to eradicate them.


Private expenditures on crime reduction have potentially important externalities. Observable measures such as barbed-wire fences and deadbolt locks may shift crime to those who are unprotected, imposing a negative externality. Unobservable precautions, on the other hand, may provide positive externalities since criminals cannot determine a priori who is protected. Focusing on one specific form of victim precaution, Lojack, we provide the first thorough empirical analysis of the magnitude of such externalities. Because installing Lojack does not reduce the likelihood that an individual car will be stolen, any decrease in the aggregate crime rates due to Lojack is an externality from the perspective of the individual Lojack purchaser. We find that the presence of Lojack is associated with a sharp fall in auto theft in central cities and a more modest decline in the remainder of the state. Rates of other crimes do not change appreciably. Our estimates suggest that, at least historically, the marginal social benefit of an additional unit of Lojack has been as much as 15 times greater than the marginal social cost in high crime areas. Those who install Lojack in their cars, however, obtain less than ten percent of the total social benefits of Lojack, causing Lojack to be undersupplied by the free market. Current insurance subsidies for the installation of Lojack appear to be well below the socially optimal level.


Platelet aggregation is one of the first stages in blood coagulation and it represents the phenomenon of interplatelet association under the action of released pro-aggregation factors (ADP, PG, Tx). Platelet agglomeration and union occurs when a blood vessel is injured. The study of platelet function allows assessing both the thrombosis risk and the bleeding risk. Also, it is possible to diagnose platelet disorders due to genetic abnormalities such as Glanzmann thrombasthenia and von Willebrand disease. If an abnormal aggregation pattern is noticed, it is recommended to perform the verification and assessment on another occasion within a time frame specified by the investigator. If aggregation tests are constantly abnormal and it is verified that the patient does not take medicines or substances known to interfere with platelet function, then other complementary tests should be performed.


Samuel Richardson (1689–1761), among the most important and influential English novelists, was also a prolific letter writer. Beyond its extraordinary range, his correspondence holds special interest as that of a practising epistolary novelist, who thought long and hard about the letter as a form. The Cambridge Edition of the Correspondence of Samuel Richardson is the first complete edition of his letters. The present volume contains his correspondences with Dr George Cheyne and Thomas Edwards, linked not only by their pronounced medical content but also by their generally unguarded character. An early admirer of Richardson's Pamela (1740–41), Cheyne elicits some of the novelist's most significant statements concerning his own literary practice and tastes. Edwards, an astute literary critic as well as notable sonneteer, draws Richardson into expressing some remarkable insights as a close reader of poetry and prose.


A feedback control upon nonlinear thermocapillary convections in a half-zone liquid bridge of a high Prandtl number fluid was conducted. In the liquid bridge, the convection changes from two-dimensional steady flow to three-dimensional oscillatory one at a critical temperature difference. The feedback control was realized by locally modifying the free surface temperature using local temperature measured at different positions. The present study aims to develop a new control scheme by taking spatiotemporal azimuthal distribution of temperature fluctuation into account. The performance of the control was evaluated with amplitude of the surface temperature with and without control. The behavior of the present controlled system was compared with that of our previous one on the spectral analysis. The new control scheme achieved significant attenuation of the temperature oscillation compared with the previous one for high Marangoni number region.


Within the migration-trade nexus literature, this paper proposes a more carefully defined measure of migration business networks, and quantifies its impact on bilateral trade. Using cross-sectional data and controlling for the overall bilateral stock of migrants, the share of migrants employed in managerial/business-related occupations has a strong additional effect on trade, and especially on exports. Those immigrants should be the ones directly involved in the diffusion and transmission of information relevant for companies trading with other countries. Their presence is found to increase the volume of trade beyond the already known effect of immigrants or highly educated immigrants. When we control for the presence of highly educated immigrants, the share of immigrants in business network occupations shows a particularly large effect on trade in differentiated goods. Specifically, we find that highly educated individuals in business-related occupations are those contributing to export by the largest margin. Business network effects seem particularly important in stimulating exports to culturally different countries, such as those with different legal origin.


In response to our review article on the role of plant trichomes on insect predators (Riddick & Simmons 2014), Krimmel (2014) acknowledged the challenges that are faced in bringing together the varied publications on the subject of impact of plant trichomes on predatory insects. He also suggested that predatory insects may perform better on plant trichomes in the field than one may think, notably because laboratory and field results do not always agree. Certain predatory insects in the field represent a subset of the overall assessment of the impact of plant trichomes on insect predators. We recognize that every publication on this subject was not listed in our review (Riddick & Simmons 2014). On the other hand, we believe that our review summarized the majority of the most relevant published research on this subject. As noted in our review, data for many insect predators are absent or scarce in regards to impact of plant trichomes; our overall conclusions were based on the published data. Moreover, as noted in our review, we excluded predatory mites because they were recently addressed in a review of the impact of plant trichomes on this group (Schmidt 2014). Nevertheless, the published reports in our review show that guilds of insect predators in assorted plant systems can have responses to plant trichomes that range from no effect to mild effect to major effect. Depending on whether research is conducted in a laboratory, greenhouse or field, there are obviously strengths and limitations for each study environment. Sometimes, there are cage effects or environmental effects on plants or insects in studies in either research environment (Simmons & Yeargan 1990; Richards & Coley 2008, Asiimwe et al 2013). For example, plant trichome type and density can vary based on day length (Snyder et al 1998). As illustrated in our review, a host of abiotic and/or biotic factors may even offer different results in the field between two seasons. Yet, data within tri-trophic relationships in different environments (laboratory, greenhouse or field) do not necessarily need to agree to be valid. Of course, the two practical systems for predators in horticultural production systems are protected environments (e.g. greenhouses) and the field. We do not expect plant trichomes to have the same (or lack of) impact on all insect predators in both protected and open field plant systems because of possible differences in insect densities, differences in prey complex, and possible differences in abiotic effects on plants and insect behavior. Although most studies in our review indicated a negative impact on the behavior of predators, the actual impact on fitness is not known. The range of responses lead us to conclude that some predators are apparently more adapted to certain plant trichomes. For some insect predators, the effect is positive, but it is neutral or negative for others. The majority of reports support a negative impact. Yet, much more data are needed to better define which predators are affected by plant trichomes.


This paper focuses on investigating students' reasons for their reluctance to attend faculty members' office hours. Study participants included 500 male and female students from the Colleges of Engineering (n = 248) and Arts and Social Sciences (CASS) (n = 252) at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU). The study followed a descriptive-analytical approach, and a questionnaire was utilized to collect people's views. The results of the study indicate that the rates of SQU students' attendance to office hours were low, and some students (11.2%) do not attend at all as they consider these office hours a waste of time. The main reasons behind the students' lack of interest in office hours were busy student timetables, conflicts between faculty office hours and students' timetables, and easier and faster ways of getting information than visiting faculty members. Additional reasons were related to faculty members' personalities and their discouraging attitudes toward attending office hours. The researchers recommend that SQU adopt a new strategy for encouraging faculty members to hold office hours, familiarizing students with the importance of office hours and assigning part of a course's grades to meeting with faculty members' office hours.


John Stubbs' "Reprobates" charts the rise and fall of the Cavaliers before, during and after the English Civil War. From disastrous foreign forays to syphilitic poets, from political intriguing to ambitious young playwrights keen to curry favour with the king, John Stubbs brings alive the vibrant cast of characters that were at the centre of the English Civil War. Stubbs shows the reader just how the country was brought to one of the most destructive moments in its history. "Dashing and daring, colourful, subtle and provocative ...stuffed almost to bursting-point with character and incident. Feasting on poems, diaries, plays, masques, letters and biographies, Reprobates introduces us to ...a flamboyant parade of chancers, dreamers, turncoats, heroes, idiots and hedonists who grab the reader's shoulders and force a drink on us as if in some dim-lit, tallow-smoked tavern of the 1630s". ("Independent"). "Swaggeringly splendid...Stubbs is a brilliant expositor of poetry ...one cannot resist being carried along the sheer boldness of the charge and the brilliance and elan of its execution". (John Adamson, "Sunday Telegraph"). John Stubbs was born in 1977 and studied English at Oxford and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge where he completed a doctorate in 2005. "Donne: The Reformed Soul" was published in 2006 and won the Glen Dimplex Irish Writers' Centre New Writer of the Year and a Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Award for non-fiction. It was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award and longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.


A survey was carried out to evaluate the diversity of VAMfungi associated with three exotic forest tree species,
Eucalyptus grandis Hill ex. Maid, Grevillea robusta A. Cunn. and Tectona grandis Lf in the Western
Ghats ecosystem, South India. The samples were collected from two locations, Kodaikanal (1500 m A.S.L.) and
Siruvani (700 m A.S.L.) from January 1992 to June 1993. Climatic factors, physico-chemical properties of
rhizosphere soils and VAMF spore counts and root colonization were recorded. Species isolated were Acaulospora,
Gigaspora, Glomus, Sc1erocystis and Scutellospora with Glomus constituting 73% of the total species
recorded. The mycorrhiza spore density was maximum from January to June in all samples collectedfrom all three
tree species at both sites. High root colonization was recorded between the months of September and November. In
both sites, the spore density was positively correlated with temperature and negatively with rainfall and soil moisture.
The reverse was recorded for root colonization. There was positive correlation between vesicle number and spore
number.


Now, almost two years into the worst financial crisis in Europe's recent history, CEPS CEO Karel Lannoo finds that the EU seems to be incapable of drawing the necessary lessons. If Europe is serious about tackling the crisis and wants to be seen as such, he argues that it needs to make proposals for a European system of financial supervisors, not a network. This means empowering a strong centre which can, following the principle of subsidiarity, effectively and unequivocally act on behalf of the European interest and police national supervisory authorities.


Economic crises in recent years, might be seen as a natural result of governments' unsustainable policies. Fiscal sustainability refers to the ability to maintain the government's current policies. The aim of this study is with the aid of intertemporal borrowing constraint approach imposed by Hamilton and Flavin (1986) to evaluate the sustainability of fiscal policies implemented in Turkey's economy, using the data between 1975 and 2012 period. Within the scope of this aim, as an indicator of budget deficit, the PSBR / GDP variable, the ratio of total public sector borrowing requirement to the gross domestic product is used. Also in this study the local authorities were compared with the central government in terms of fiscal sustainability. In the literature it has been proposed that taking into account the structural break in testing for the stationarity would be appropriate techniques to use. Therefore, with the current methods in the literature, years that occured a structural break have been identified and in the context of political economy, the effect of election years on structural break assessed. We could not obtain an evidence to support the strong form of budget deficit sustainability.


Switch to a Mac with ease using this practical, humorous guide Want to try life outside of Windows? You've come to the right place. Users are switching from PCs to Macs in droves, and now you can, too, with this helpful guide. In a fun, but practical way, the book walks you through the entire process-hardware and software-including selecting a Mac, moving files, setting up security, and getting the most out of all the fun stuff that makes Macs famous, such as the iLife suite, and more. This book is fully updated for the new generation of Mac hardware and software, including Mac OS X Snow Leopard, the iLife suite, and the latest trends and tools Explore running Windows on your Mac via Boot Camp, how to switch your applications, converting your business to a Mac, getting online, and more Plus, you don't even have to give up Microsoft Office, thanks to Microsoft Office for Mac-so get this indispensable book and join the fun!


We have witnessed a massive growth in wireless data, which almost doubles every year. The wireless data is expected to skyrocket further in the future due to the proliferation of devices and the emerging data-hungry applications. To accommodate the explosive growth in mobile traffic, a large amount of wireless spectrum is needed. With the limited spectrum resource, the current static spectrum allocation policy cannot serve well for future wireless systems. Moreover, it exacerbates the spectrum scarcity by resulting in severe spectrum underutilization. As a promising solution, dynamic spectrum access (DSA) is envisaged to increase spectrum efficiency by dynamic sharing all the spectrum. DSA can be enabled by cognitive radio technologies, which allow the unlicensed users (the secondary users, i.e., SUs) to dynamically access the unused spectrum (i.e., spectrum holes) owned by the licensed users (the primary users i.e., PUs). In order to identify the unused spectrum (spectrum holes), unlicensed users need to conduct spectrum sensing. While spectrum sensing might be inaccurate due to multipath fading and shadowing. To address this problem, user cooperation can be leveraged, with two main forms: cooperative spectrum sensing and cooperative cognitive radio networking (CCRN). For the former, SUs cooperate with each other in spectrum sensing to better detect the spectrum holes. For the latter, SUs cooperate with the PUs to gain access opportunities from the PUs by improving the transmission performance of the PUs. Whereas cooperation can also incur security issues, e.g., malicious users might participate into cooperation, corrupting or disrupting the communication of legitimate users, selfish users might refuse to contribute to cooperation for self-interests, etc. Those security issues are of great importance and need to be considered for cooperation in DSA. In this thesis, we study security-aware cooperation in DSA. First, we investigate cooperative spectrum sensing in multi-channel scenario such that a user can be scheduled for spectrum sensing and spectrum sharing. The cooperative framework can achieve a higher average throughput per user, which iii provides the incentive for selfish users to participate in cooperative spectrum sensing. Second, secure communication in CCRN is studied, where the SUs cooperate with the PU to enhance the latter's communication security and then gain transmission opportunities. Partner selection, spectrum access time allocation, and power allocation are investigated. Third, we study riskaware cooperation based DSA for the multiple channel scenario, where multiple SUs cooperate with multiple PUs for spectrum access opportunities, considering the trustworthiness of SUs. Lastly, we propose an incentive mechanism to stimulate SUs to cooperate with PUs when they have no traffic. The cooperating SUs are motivated to cooperate with PUs to enhance the security of the PUs by accumulating credits and then consume the earned credits for spectrum trading when they have traffic in the future.


It is not yet possible to determine whether global snow mass has changed over time despite collection of passive microwave data for more than thirty years. Physically-based, but computationally fast snow and soil models have been coupled to form the basis of a data assimilation system for retrievals of snow mass and soil moisture from existing and future satellite observations. The model has been evaluated against observations of snow mass and soil temperature and moisture profiles from Reynolds Creek Experimental Watershed, Idaho. Simulation of snow mass was improved early in the season due to more realistic representation of soil heat flux, but led to an overestimation of snow mass later in the season. Soil temperatures were generally simulated well; freezing of the surface layers was not observed but was simulated, which affected soil water transport. Limited knowledge of the soil lower boundary conditions is acceptable for snow mass and surface soil moisture retrievals, although improvements are required for more accurate simulations of deeper soil moisture at this site. Development of a data assimilation framework to retrieve snow mass and near-surface soil moisture is discussed.


Recent re-structurings of the National Health Service (NHS) in England have illustrated the British government's commitment to a policy of devolving resources and responsibilities to local levels. As a result, public health teams are now located in 303 primary care trusts, and are more numerous, and much smaller, than previously. These changes have coincided with a number of other changes within public health (the introduction of an accreditation process for non-medical specialists, and the reorganisation of health protection). The re-organisation has exacerbated existing anxieties about the capacity of the public health workforce. Two recent studies found public health practitioners to be very concerned about the fragmentation of their profession and the resulting isolation in which individuals would work. Directors of Public Health feared that their primary care trust responsibilities would limit the time for their public health work. Multiple local organisations are not well-placed to try to address strategically the long-term problem of an inadequate national public health work force. It was recognised that bringing resources nearer to local communities and the rest of the NHS offered great opportunities for public health to be more responsive to local needs and to harness local resources. Nevertheless, it appears that, not for the first time, the re-organisations of the NHS have not been designed with public health in mind, and it is not yet clear how the challenges of inadequate capacity will be met.


Neural autoregressive sequence models are used to generate sequences in a variety of natural language processing (NLP) tasks, where they are evaluated according to sequence-level task losses. These models are typically trained with maximum likelihood estimation, which ignores the task loss, yet empirically performs well as a surrogate objective. Typical approaches to directly optimizing the task loss such as policy gradient and minimum risk training are based around sampling in the sequence space to obtain candidate update directions that are scored based on the loss of a single sequence. In this paper, we develop an alternative method based on random search in the parameter space that leverages access to the maximum likelihood gradient. We propose maximum likelihood guided parameter search (MGS), which samples from a distribution over update directions that is a mixture of random search around the current parameters and around the maximum likelihood gradient, with each direction weighted by its improvement in the task loss. MGS shifts sampling to the parameter space, and scores candidates using losses that are pooled from multiple sequences. Our experiments show that MGS is capable of optimizing sequence-level losses, with substantial reductions in repetition and non-termination in sequence completion, and similar improvements to those of minimum risk training in machine translation.


This paper outlines water reform policy in Australia's Murray-Darling Basin area. Drawing on research with key informants and farm family members, it notes the significant social impacts in the communities in the region and the limits to adaptation evident amongst people in these areas. It outlines the vulnerability of individuals and communities and notes the need for actions to build resilience and to enable transformation in these areas. With this in mind, policy strategies are outlined that may assist long-term social sustainability in this region.


Two types of betting are common in sports betting: fixed odds betting and parimutuel betting. In fixed odds betting, the payout conditional on winning is fixed once the bet is placed and is not affected by the placing of subsequent bets. By contrast, winning bettors in a parimutuel contest share pro-rata in the total betting pool. This means that the payout to winning bettors in a parimutuel contest depends not only on selecting the winning outcome, but also on the amounts bet by other bettors (which cannot be observed at the time a bet is placed). Therefore a parimutuel contest can be viewed as a game at the level of individual bettors. Existing models in the parimutuel literature explain the data by either assuming a single, representative bettor with certain risk preferences or by assuming that a number of risk neutral bettors compete strategically within a game theoretic framework. Our contribution is to construct a novel theoretical framework of parimutuel markets in which we model both strategic interaction and risk preferences at the level of individual insiders, in the presence of exogenous outsiders. We solve this model analytically for the optimal insider betting amount in a static symmetric Nash equilibrium. Using a new dataset of 1.6 million individual horse race bets in New Zealand from 2006 to 2009, we document a strong inverse linear relationship between our model-implied insider risk preferences and the strength of insider beliefs relative to outsiders. That is, as the strength of insiders' beliefs relative to that of outsiders decrease, implied risk sensitivity moves from risk averse to risk loving. At a level of insider beliefs congruent with actual performance in the data, average implied risk preferences are close to zero, that is, insiders are effectively risk neutral. While risk neutrality is a standard assumption in strategic interaction models of parimutuel betting, our study is the first to provide empirical support for this assumption. Finally, we document a strong relationship (not previously reported in the literature) between the average bet size and the average payout ratio, suggesting that bettors with inside information self-select by placing larger bets.


The historical design approach for ensuring survivability in devices that operate at high voltages which would arc in air or that must survive substantial shock loadings employs an encapsulant whose dielectric strength prevents electrical breakdown and whose modulus prevents gross movement of the embedded components. While mostly successful, this approach presents some significant design challenges: (1) the high thermal expansion of the epoxy leads to large stresses during thermal cycles, (2) degassing of the epoxy before cure and careful encapsulation are essential to eliminate voids that could initiate dielectric breakdown, (3) the internal components are embedded deep within an impenetrable encapsulant and "removable" options have proven somewhat problematic, (4) the filled epoxy encapsulant adds weight. It is the intent of this study to develop a new design strategy that will eliminate these issues resulting in a cost effective, lighter and more robust component with fewer defects. The new paradigm rests on employing two materials, instead of just one, to achieve the desired effect. First, a thin coating applied to the board will provide both dielectric breakdown protection and/or support for components on boards. Second, a foam encapsulation will provide both bulk rigidity and damping in shock environments. This two-stage approach lessens dielectric requirements of the bulk encapsulant and shifts them to the coating. It also affords greater flexibility in optimizing materials and processing properties to achieve design objectives and enhanced manufacturability. Commercially available coatings have been chosen for the study to span a wide variety of application techniques and performance requirements. A standardized test, ASTM D149, was conducted on each coating to quantitatively compare dielectric coating strength at both room temp and a severe aging environment. For certain coatings it is proven that the dielectric strength degrades in a humid environment. These coatings were also placed on printed circuit board geometries with and without components and tested extensively using both DC and pulsed AC testing systems developed specifically for this study. In the absence of a coating, i.e., a bare board in an ambient air atmosphere, breakdown occurs at 10kV or less. For one of the geometries explored in this study, the results have shown that thin coatings of less than 5 mils (.127 mm) prevent breakdown up to or exceeding the 80kV or higher for flat wire traces. If, in addition to the thin coating, a bead coating is applied to high voltage electrical components with topographical contours, the breakdown voltage is in the 40-60 kV range for component gaps of 0.05 to 0.425 in. The use of a polyurethane foam encapsulant results in breakdown voltages of 50-70 kV for the same component gaps as long as the gap between components is not small enough to prevent the foam from filling it. Combining a foam and coating as the packaging can increase the breakdown voltage range to 50-80 kV for these component gaps. The adhesion strength of the polymer coatings was also characterized in its original state and after aging in a humid environment. In many cases, adhesion strength is known to degrade in humid environments. The adhesion strength of the coatings to the printed circuit board interface is considerably lower than that found for epoxy bonds using epoxy adhesives of equivalent glass transition temperatures. Foam adhesion to the coatings was also characterized. Adhesion between the packaging foam and coatings was found to be either maximized at 249 psi or minimized at 48 psi depending on the coating chosen. Contact angle measurements were made to study wetting ability. Equilibrium contact angles for all coatings on solder mask are reached in less than 3 minutes. The results of this study demonstrate the viability of this novel packaging strategy.


We study numerically the effect of periodicity on the plasmon-assisted scattering and absorption of visible light by infinite and finite gratings of circular silver nanowires. The infinite grating is a convenient object of analysis because of the possibility to reduce the scattering problem to one period. We use the well-established method of partial separation of variables however make an important improvement by casting the resulting matrix equation to the Fredholm second-kind type, which guarantees convergence. If the silver wires have sub-wavelength radii, then two types of resonances co-exist and may lead to enhanced reflection and absorption: the plasmon-type and the grating-type. Each type is caused by different complex poles of the field function. The low-Q plasmon poles cluster near the wavelength where dielectric function equals -1. The grating-type poles make multiplets located in close proximity of Rayleigh wavelengths, tending to them if the wires get thinner. They have high Q-factors and, if excited, display intensive near-field patterns. A similar interplay between the two types of resonances takes place for finite gratings of silver wires, the sharpness of the grating-type peak getting greater for longer gratings. By tuning carefully the grating period, one can bring together two resonances and enhance the resonant scattering of light per wire by several times.


Natural resources are rarely alone a sufficient reason for declaring war. Nevertheless, through human history natural resources have been an important motive, target, and resource for warfare. Until recently armies lived off the land; their logistical support systems were so rudimentary that nothing else was possible. This process provides the key to much of the damage caused by wars, from pre-historic tribal wars onwards. Colonial states initiated an era of systematic global looting of natural resources that affected above all indigenous people. Industrial warfare multiplied both qualitatively and quantitatively the consumption of strategic raw materials and energy sources. Today they are targets of a global power play that cover all continents, oceans and seabed.


The Department of Agriculture and Fisheries(DAF) provides catch and effort information for commercial fisheries in Queensland biannually (April and October). The following report provides a series of figures and tables displaying a summary of the most recent (2017/2018 financial year) catch, effort and Gross Value of Product (GVP) data for commercial fisheries in Queensland. Queensland's Fisheries are defined by a variety of characteristics, predominantly by species, fishing method (gear), and region. Summarised annual catch and effort data are reported by either calendar year or financial year which is dependent upon when the fishery operates seasonally. Table 1 displays a list of each commercial fishery in Queensland and an indication of when updated annual data is summarised and published.


Antimicrobial activity of 05 ethnomedicinal plants extracts were evaluated against six bacterial strains Staphylococcus aureus , Niesseria gonorrohae , Pseudomonas aeruginosa , Escherichia coli Streptococcus pyogenes Bacillus subtilis. The collected ethnomedicinal plant were used in folk medicine in the treatment of diuretic stomachache , urinary tract, piles ,high fever ,  leprosy , ulcers, sexual diseases like gonorrhea and spermatorrhoea, dogbite ,snakebite, skin diseases, respiratory problems  asthma , bronchitis, nervous diseases and blood purification. Plants were collected from mekal hills, sonmura ,mai ki bagi, sammbhudhara ,laxmandhara , panchdhara ,dense vegetative forest ,dense rain isolated  eco-system , remote  valleys and  islands and the ethnomedicinal data were gathered from traditional healers who inhabit the study area. The traditional, chemosystematics and methanol extract were obtained by maceration method with antimicrobial activity was found using disc diffusion method phytochemical anaylysis, Minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimal bactericidal concentration (MBC). All microorganism were obtained from (ATCC), American type culture collection.The result indicate that out of 05 plants exhibited antimicrobial activity against one or more of the tested microorganism we observed that extract concentrations spanning from 25 I¼g/ml  to 2 mg/ml or even 40 mg/ml. Concentration of alkaloids, carbohydrates, flavonoids, saponins, terpens steroids associated to antioxidant activities and thus have curative properties. MIC and MBC for all 5 crude extracts (72%) showed positive results against bacterial strains.This study evaluate the antimicrobial ,phytochemical and Minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimal bactericidal concentration (MBC) activity of the some ethnomedicinal plants used in folkoric medicine compared to all test showed significant activity against tested microorganism . This study also showed that Selaginella bryopteris (Amarbatoooti Sanjivini), Lygodium flexuousm (Kalijar) Adiantum philippense (Kalijhant) , Drypteris eochleata (Jatashankari), Tectacria coadunate (Jatamasi) could be potential sources of new antimicrobial agents.   Keywords: key words, ethnomedicinal plant, Antimicrobial, Phytochemical,diseases


The purpose of this research was to examine gender issues in contemporary sermons. My sample consists of sermons delivered on BBC Radio 4 as part of acts of worship broadcast during 1993-4 which were examined to analyse how language, gender and power intersect to produce these discourses. In order to contextualize this material, chapter one focuses on the history of the sermon and its institutionalisation. Chapter two analyses the preachers' use of generic terms and their use of the second person plural mode of address. In chapter three, I examine the gendered illustrations offered in the sermon sample in order to investigate how they contribute to create alienating and exclusionary discourses. Chapter four deals with the ways in which self-disclosure and the use of personal experience provide a means by which knowledge can be assimilated and transferred to others as well as acting as an inclusive mechanism in preaching. In chapter five, I demonstrate that metaphors have the potential to function as an inclusive device but that this influence may be negated if the gender content of the metaphor conveys gender-biases. Chapter six centres on the form and structure of the sermons as a way of considering the issue of a participatory address. The conclusion focuses on the way in which aspects of the notions of inclusive language intersect with the ways in which authority is traditionally defined. This thesis demonstrates that contemporary broadcast sermons do not endeavour to reflect the demands for inclusive language or less authoritarian discourses which have been made by feminists and advocated by most denominations in the Christian churches


Pitt‐Hopkins syndrome (PTHS) is characterized by severe intellectual disability, typical facial gestalt and additional features, such as breathing anomalies. Following the discovery of the causative haploinsufficiency of transcription factor 4 (TCF4), about 60 patients have been reported. We looked for TCF4 mutations in 63 patients with a suspected PTHS. Haploinsufficiency of TCF4 was identified in 14 patients, as a consequence of large 18q21.2 chromosome deletions involving TCF4 (2 patients), gene mutations (11 patients) and a t(14q;18q) balanced translocation disrupting TCF4 (one patient). By evaluating the clinical features of these patients, along with literature data, we noticed that, in addition to the typical facial gestalt, the PTHS phenotype results from the various combinations of the following characteristics: intellectual disability with severe speech impairment, normal growth parameters at birth, postnatal microcephaly, breathing anomalies, motor incoordination, ocular anomalies, constipation, seizures, typical behavior and subtle brain abnormalities. Although PTHS is currently considered to be involved in differential diagnosis with Angelman and Rett syndromes, we found that combining the facial characteristics with a detailed analysis of both the physical and the neurological phenotype, made molecular testing for PTHS the first choice. Based on striking clinical criteria, a diagnosis of PTHS was made clinically in two patients who had normal TCF4. This report deals with the first series of PTHS patients of Italian origin. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


From the point of view manufacturer, machine tools fulfil technological requirements of manufacturing processes for part geometrical dimensions, shaping and material property change. Main machine tool functions are axis motions with sufficient power reserve drives to technological process loads, consuming energy. Participation of manufacturing systems and processes for sustainable life in industrial applications and limiting earth warming up is required. This paper is responding to a scientific demand in setting development trends for manufacturing systems, processes and environment. Here a scientific question arises: which technological requirements and machine functionalities to machine tool characteristics lead to their lowest resource consumption / losses and part manufacturing costs? The machine tool manufacturer methodology is following a relation and dependency analysis, combined with functional synthesis and resource optimization. The machine tool user applies the key performance indicator "Overall Equipment Effectiveness OEE" integrates efficiency values for productivity, availability, quality, targeting minimal part manufacturing costs.


The energy-level structure of the 3s23p3 configuration of the phosphorus sequence ions Mo xxviii and Zr xxvi has been determined from magnetic-dipole line wavelengths and emissivities measured in the Princeton Large Torus tokamak discharges. The new measurements have caused some changes in the tentative assignments reported earlier for this sequence, especially for the 4S3/2–2D3/2 transitions. Isoelectronic interpolations together with some experimental confirmations in the Se xx and Ge xviii spectra now permit a reasonably accurate and complete reconstruction of this configuration from Z = 42 to previously established Z ≤ 28 elements. The measured wavelengths and relative intensities are in substantial agreement with recent semiempirical evaluations and ab initio calculations.


Most countries are agonising over core dilemmas of affordability and performance of their health systems.
A successful health system has three attributes:
- healthy people, meaning a population that attains the highest level of health possible;
- superior care, meaning care that is effective, safe, timely, patient centred, equitable, and efficient;
- fairness, meaning that treatment is applied without discrimination or disparities to all individuals and families, regardless of age, group identity or place, and that the system is fair to the health professionals, institutions and businesses supporting and delivering care.


Water scarcity is spreading and intensifying in many regions of the world, with dire consequences for local communities, economies, and freshwater ecosystems. Current approaches tend to rely on policies crafted at the state or national level, which on their own have proved insufficient to arrest water scarcity. To be durable and effective, water plans must be informed by the culture, economics, and varied needs of affected community members. International water expert Brian Richter argues that sustainable water sharing in the twenty-first century can only happen through open, democratic dialogue and local collective action. In Chasing Water, Richter tells a cohesive and complete story of water scarcity: where it is happening, what is causing it, and how it can be addressed. Through his engaging and non-technical style, he strips away the complexities of water management to its bare essentials, providing information and practical examples that will empower community leaders, activists, and students to develop successful and long-lasting water programmes. Chasing Water will provide local stakeholders with the tools and knowledge they need to take an active role in the watershed-based planning and implementation that are essential for water supplies to remain sustainable in perpetuity.


This new edition of the Adoption Act Manual draws together in one volume the key legislation together with supporting Statutory Instruments and departmental circulars. Clause-by-clause annotations explain the implications of each regulation and place it in a wider, practical context. * A complete guide to this area of law * Detailed annotations guide you through the main Acts and principal regulations


We estimate determinants of growth among German dairy farms between 1997 und 2005 under the EU milk quota system. Higher milk yield per cow, more family labour, and higher milk prices increase the growth rate of growing farms, ceteris paribus. Older growing farmers tend to grow at lower rates. In line with Weiss' findings (1999) for Austrian farms, Gibrat's Law of relative firm growth being independent of initial firm size does not hold for our subsample of farms growing in milk production, either: the growth rate is quite high for small farms and has a minimum for farms around 325,000 kg of initial quota. For the 16% of growing farms that have more initial quota the growth rate increases up to some out-of-sample maximum. We corrected for selection bias by means of a multinomial logit model which explains the choice among different growth regimes in more detail than the well-known Heckman procedure. In our case, e.g. age impacts the choice between growth and stagnation but not between growth and exiting from milk production; crop subsidies only influence the decision between growth and exiting from milk production but not the decision between growth and decline or stagnation.


The main purpose of this study is to explore the reasons for students' weaknesses in
grammar at Jordanian schools, taking as an example the upper basic stage (ages 14-16
years) in the Al-karak district. The study consists of nine chapters; the first three
chapters explain the background and context of the study, the teaching of Arabic
grammar in Jordan and the heart of the problem together with an outline of previous
research. The fourth chapter explains the methodology and procedures of the study.
The fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth chapters present the findings of the study and a
discussion of the findings. And finally the ninth chapter is the conclusion and
recommendations of the study. This chapter points out that some further research is
needed in the area of grammar learning and teaching.
The methods of data collection were the questionnaire and interview. One
questionnaire was developed, directed to the teachers of Arabic and the students of the
upper basic stage (eighth, ninth and tenth grades). The interviews were conducted
with teachers of Arabic, students and the education supervisors. The sample of the
questionnaire was 700 students and 135 teachers. The sample of the interview was 10
teachers, 15 students who were selected upon their willingness to be interviewed. 7
education supervisors who form the whole population were also interviewed.
The collected data was analysed based on the frequencies and percentages of the
responses. They showed several reasons for students' weaknesses in grammar which
attracted high percentages of the participants' acceptance. For instance, 70 per cent of
students considered the unavailability of audiovisual aids one of the reasons for their
weaknesses in grammar. About half (58.6 per cent) of the students considered the
lack of standard Arabic being used by the teachers of other subjects as one of the
reasons for the weaknesses. From the teachers' point of view, two reasons attracted
the vast majority (89.6 per cent) of their agreement. The first one was students' belief
that the formal assessment for students' achievement is lenient. The second one was
the lack of previous knowledge of grammar amongst students. The next strong reason
for the weaknesses was students' belief that grammar is difficult to understand.
Students' carelessness with previous preparation for grammar lessons was also
considered one of the strong reasons for the weaknesses in grammar.
Education supervisors emphasised that the procedures of teachers appointments are
not based on the criteria of teachers' quality and that makes it possible to nominate
some teachers who are not able to teach grammar successfully. They also blamed the
lack of effective preparation for grammar lessons by the teachers. The supervisors
stressed the teachers' weaknesses in grammar. There were many other more subtle
reasons for the students' problems which are discussed in depth. The study came up
with several recommendations to develop grammar teaching in Jordan as well as some
further research related to this study. The original contribution of this study is the
combination between the perceptions of students, teachers and education supervisors
which enriches the data. It also discussed the procedures of teachers' appointing as
one of the issues most neglected by most of the previous studies.


The increasing density of globally distributed datacenters reduces the network latency between neighboring datacenters and allows replicated services deployed across neighboring locations to share workload when necessary, without violating strict Service Level Objectives (SLOs). We present Kurma, a practical implementation of a fast and accurate load balancer for geo-distributed storage systems. At run-time, Kurma integrates network latency and service time distributions to accurately estimate the rate of SLO violations for requests redirected across geo-distributed datacenters. Using these estimates, Kurma solves a decentralized rate-based performance model enabling fast load balancing (in the order of seconds) while taming global SLO violations. We integrate Kurma with Cassandra, a popular storage system. Using real-world traces along with a geo-distributed deployment across Amazon EC2, we demonstrate Kurma's ability to effectively share load among datacenters while reducing SLO violations by up to a factor of 3 in high load settings or reducing the cost of running the service by up to 17%.


This paper examines the effect of the two tax cuts enacted by President Bush in 2001 and 2003 on consumer spending over time. Our analysis, using macroeconomic variables affecting consumer spending, is based on a sample of 210 time series quarterly data of the U.S. population from 1960 to 2012. The previous studies based on the original consumption model defines consumption depends according to disposable income and autonomous consumption but fail to consider the omitted variables resulting from the negative intercept. This research paper uses an instrumental variable, independent from consumption, incorporated in the different models in order to prevent bias and multicollinearity while analyzing disposable income as a function of consumption. We also study an interaction between disposable income and the tax cuts and we find that the percentage change in consumption derived from the 2001 and 2003 tax policies is not significant. Besides, we control for other variables such as unemployment rate which have significantly affected the level of consumption.


With the development of materials science and technology, Iron-based powder metallurgy (P/M) antifriction materials gradually used to scroll compressor. In this paper, three kinds of Iron-based powder metallurgy antifriction materials, which are Fe-C-Cu, Fe-C-Cu-Ni-Mo and Fe-P were prepared by the common compacting sintering method. Microstructure and mechanical properties were studied, tribological properties were tested on the friction tester, and surface topographical characteristics and wear mechanism of the Iron-based powder metallurgy materials antifriction were observed and analyzed by scanning electron microscope (SEM). The results showed that, the strength of Fe-C-Cu and Fe-C-Cu-Ni-Mo are higher than Fe-P. The microstructure of Fe-C-Cu and Fe-C-Cu-Ni-Mo are mainly composed of pearlite, Fe-P is ferrite. The impact toughness of Fe-P is better than the other two. Compared the tribological properties of aluminum alloys YZAlSi11Cu3 and powder metallurgy antifriction materials under oil lubrication condition, Fe-C-Cu and Fe-C-Cu-Ni-Mo have excellent wear resistance. The wear rate of Fe-C-Cu-Ni-Mo is equivalent to one sixth of YZAlSi11Cu3. The wear mechanism of YZAlSi11Cu3 was deformation and adhesion. Powder metallurgy antifriction materials were dominated by fatigue and deformation, and accompanied by a small amount of abrasive wear.


The software architectures of safety and mission-critical systems are designed to satisfy and balance an exacting set of quality concerns describing characteristics such as performance, reliability, and safety. Unfortunately, practice has shown that long-term maintenance activities can erode these architectural qualities. In this paper we present a novel solution for preserving architectural qualities through the use of Tactic Traceability Information Models (tTIMs). A tTIM provides a reusable infrastructure of traceability links focused around a commonly implemented architectural tactic, as well as a set of mapping points for tracing the tactic into the architectural design and the implemented code. The use of tTIMs significantly reduces the effort needed to create and maintain traceability links, provides support for visualizing the rationale behind various architectural components, and delivers timely information to maintainers so that they can preserve critical architectural qualities while implementing modifications. Our approach is described and evaluated within the context of a mission-critical software-intensive system.


Risk analysis—a coping mechanism for the uncertainties we see everywhere around us— is on the rise, including at the international level. It now informs, for instance, the work of the Security Council and human rights law and practice. While the story of how risk analysis has inflected international environmental law is frequently told, there has been little attention paid to the way in which risk is increasingly relevant to other areas of international law, including through "due diligence" standards. This Article fills this gap, describing risk's propagation across different international legal fields. It also offers a taxonomy of the ways in which risk is relevant. This Article distinguishes, for instance, between the way risk sometimes authorizes the state to take an action and situations where the existence of risk obligates the state to react. Finally, this Article seeks to explain potential reasons for risk's rise and indicate some of the consequences thereof, both salutary (such as greater participation in international legal decision-making) and less so (such as greater horizontal fragmentation of international law).


Engineers are faced with two major challenges when carrying out the thermal-fluid design of a complex system consisting of many interacting components such as the PBMR power plant. The first challenge is to predict the performance of all the individual thermal-fluid components. The second challenge is to predict the performance of the integrated plant consisting of all its sub-systems. The complexity associated with the thermal-fluid design of complex systems requires the use of a variety of analysis techniques and simulation tools. These range from simple one-dimensional models that do not capture all the significant physical phenomena, to large-scale three-dimensional CFD codes that, for practical reasons, can not simulate the entire plant as a single integrated model. In the systems CFD approach a network code serves as the framework to link the models of the various components together and to control the solution. The models of the components can be of varying degrees of complexity. These can range from simple lumped models to complex fully three-dimensional CFD models. This paper gives a brief overview of the systems CFD (SCFD) approach and an overview of the SCFD model of the pebble bed nuclear reactor that was developed.Copyright © 2010 by ASME


Citizenship has been taught in school around the world for many years now, and is due to be introduced to the UK curriculum over the next few years. Teachers, Headteachres, administrators and policy makers have the opportunity to develop citizenship education programs for all their students. This book takes a pragmatic approach to the issue, and answers many of the crucial questions that will be emerging: what definitions of citizenship are to be followed, and how is citizenship taught? What approaches will be taken by teachers and what is the likely shape of best practice for citizenship education? How will the issue impact on schools and teacher training, and how should they rise to the challenge? What are the key factors influencing or threatening the development of good citizens? Based on the analysis of data collected form over 700 teachers the book provides real solutions to questions raised by citizenship education, and makes recommendations for practice in schools and in the training and development of teachers.


The theory of large cardinals is currently a broad mainstream of modern set theory, the main area of investigation for the analysis of the relative consistency of mathematical propositions and possible new axioms for mathematics. The first of a projected multi-volume series, this book provides a comprehensive account of the theory of large cardinals from its beginnings and some of the direct outgrowths leading to the frontiers of contemporary research. A "genetic" approach is taken, presenting the subject in the context of its historical development. With hindsight the consequential avenues are pursued and the most elegant or accessible expositions given. With open questions and speculations provided throughout the reader should not only come to appreciate the scope and coherence of the overall enterprise but also become prepared to pursue research in several specific areas by studying the relevant sections.


The principal theme of this thesis is the effect of yoked prisms on body posture and egocentric perception. Yoked prisms have been clinically used in the management of a variety of visual and neuro-motor dysfunctions. Most studies have been conducted in pathological populations by studying the effects of prismatic adaptation, without distinguishing short and long term effects. In this study, postural and perceptual prismatic effects have been studied by preventing prism adaptation. A healthy population was selected in order to investigate the immediate prismatic effects, when there is no obvious benefit from their use for the individual. Posturography was used to assess changes in weight distribution and shifts in centre of pressure (barycentre). In addition, photographic analyses were used to assess effects on posture on the x and z axis. Experiments with space board and visual midline shift were used for the evaluation of spatial perception and egocentric localisation. One pair of 8 Δ yoked prisms base left (BL) and one pair of 8 Δ yoked prisms base up (BU) were applied randomly and compared to a pair of plano lenses. Results suggest that immediate prismatic effects take place on a perceptual level and are reflected on an altered body posture respectively without significant changes in weight distribution. Yoked prisms BL showed a rightward rotational effect on spatial perception by expanding space on the z axis when viewing through the base of the prism and constricting space through the apex of the prism. Body posture responded respectively to what was visually perceived by altering posture. A rightward shift and tilt of the head was recorded along with the hips shift and shoulders tilt in the dame direction. Additionally, right shoulder shifted backwards and an angular midline shift to the right was recorded. The egocentric localisation was affected by shifting the midline perception to the left. Yoked prisms BU resulted on a head shift forward and a reduction of the head-neck angle by bringing the chin closer to the chest. The egocentric localisation was altered on the vertical axis providing subjects the perception that their eye level was higher during the experiment. In conclusion, yoked prisms seemed to induce changes in body posture, mainly in the upper body and head, without any significant changes in weight distribution. These changes are partially reflected in spatial perception tests and egocentric localisation before any prismatic adaptation takes place.


The bacterial mercury resistance determinant carried on the IncJ plasmid pMERPH has been characterized further by DNA sequence analysis. From the sequence of a 4097 bp Bg/II fragment which confers mercury resistance, it is predicted that the determinant consists of the genes merT, merP, merC and merA. The level of DNA sequence similarity between these genes and those of the mer determinant of Tn21 was between 56 center dot 4 and 62 center dot 4%. A neighbour-joining phylogenetic tree of merA gene sequences was constructed which suggested that pMERPH bears the most divergent Gram-negative mer determinant characterized to date. Although the determinant from pMERPH has been shown to be inducible, no regulatory genes have been found within the Bg/II fragment and it is suggested that a regulatory gene may be located elsewhere on the plasmid. The cloned determinant has been shown to express mercury resistance constitutively. Analysis of the pMERPH mer operator/promoter (O/P) region in vivo has shown constitutive expression from the mer PTCPA promoter, which could be partially repressed by the presence of a trans-acting MerR protein from a Tn21-like mer determinant. This incomplete repression of mer PTCPA promoter activity may be due to the presence of an extra base between the -35 and -10 sequences of the promoter and/or to variation in the MerR binding sites in the O/P region. Expression from the partially repressed mer PTCPA promoter could be restored by the addition of inducing levels of Hg2+ ions. Using the polymerase chain reaction with primers designed to amplify regions in the merP and merA genes, 1 center dot 37 kb pMERPH-like sequences have been amplified from the IncJ plasmid R391, the environmental isolate SE2 and from DNA isolated directly from non-cultivated bacteria in River Mersey sediment. This suggests that pMERPH-like sequences, although rare, are nevertheless persistent in natural environments.


Human Activity Recognition (HAR) has been a topic of investigation for multiple decades. Researchers have explored a variety of approaches including a service running in the background on a mobile phone, cameras in the environment, RFID readers on people, and many more. In this note, we advocate that for HAR to make the leap from interesting research area to a mainstream technology that enhances our day-to-day experiences with computing it must utilize many parts of a person's computing ecosystem: from low-power embedded hardware that runs continuously and can be mounted directly in a phone to a service in the Cloud that tracks a person's activities over the long-term and computes current activity from every available input. We provide a brief discussion of how such a system might be constructed and used.


Joints are physiological connections formed by the association of two or more bones that confer mobility to the skeleton of vertebrates. Composed of several structures, these are often related to pathologies of varied origins, which determine symptomatology of varying degrees of intensity and impairment, responsible for the decrease in life expectancy and the well-being of affected populations. Most of the time, the treatment for these diseases is only symptomatic, aiming at the relief of pain and the return of the patient to daily activities. Thus, there has been an increasing interest in the search for new knowledge about the mechanisms that lead to joint disorders and effective therapeutic resources that may contribute to the fight against pain and to the definitive treatment of joint dysfunctions. To this aim, the knowledge of diagnostic methods, especially imaging methods, is of fundamental importance for the recognition of articular affections, enabling a targeted and effective treatment. Among these auxiliary exams currently used to evaluate the joints, the noninvasive ones are the first choice, where radiography, ultrasonography, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography, and arthroscopy are inserted.


Background: It is accepted that COVID-19 will have considerable long-term consequences, especially on people's mental and physical health and wellbeing. Although the impacts on local communities have been immense, there remains little data on long term outcomes among patients with COVID-19 who were managed in general practice and primary care. This study seeks to address this knowledge gap by examining how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the medium and long-term health and wellbeing of patients attending general practice, especially their mental health and wellbeing.  Methods: The study will be conducted at 12 general practices in the catchment area of the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, i.e. the North Dublin area, an area which has experienced an especially high COVID-19 incidence. Practices will be recruited from the professional networks of the research team. A member of the general practice team will be asked to identify patients of the practice who attended the practice after 16/3/20 with a confirmed or presumptive diagnosis of COVID-19 infection. Potential participants will be provided with information on the study by the clinical team. Data will be collected on those patients who consent to participate by means of an interviewer-administered questionnaire and review of clinical records. Data will be collected on health (especially mental health) and wellbeing, quality of life, health behaviours, health service utilisation, and wider impacts of COVID-19 at recruitment and at two follow up time points (6, 12 months). Deliverables: The project involves collaboration with Ireland's Health Service Executive, Ireland East Hospital Group, and the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, Dublin. The study is funded by the Health Research Board. Findings will inform health policies that attenuate the adverse impacts of COVID-19 on population mental health and health generally.


This paper examines gender differences among top business executives using a large executive-employer matched data set spanning the last quarter century. Female executives make up 6.2% of the sample and we find they exhibit more labor market churning – both higher entry and higher exit rates. Unconditionally, women earn 26% less than men, which decreases to 7.9% once executive characteristics, firm characteristics, and in particular job title are accounted for. The paper explores the extent to which firm-level temporal flexibility and corporate culture can explain these gender differences. Although we find that women tend to select into firms with temporal flexibility and a female-friendly corporate culture, there is no evidence that this sorting drives the gender pay gap. However, we do find evidence that corporate culture affects pay gaps within firms: the within-firm gender pay gap disappears entirely at female-friendly firms. Overall, while both corporate culture and flexibility affect the female share of employment, only corporate culture influences the gender pay gap.


Forest management planning is increasingly relying on airborne laser scanning (ALS) in forest inventory. The area-based method to interpret ALS data requires sample plots measured in the field. The aim of this study was to assess and trace the impacts of the positioning errors of field plots along the entire forest management planning process, from their effect on forest inventory results to the outcome of forest management planning. This research links plot positioning errors with the spatio-temporal allocation of forest treatments and calculates the inoptimality losses arising from plot positioning errors in ALS-based forest inventory. The study area was a forest management unit in Central Spain. Growing stock attributes were predicted for a grid of square-shaped cells. Alternative management schedules were simulated for the grid cells by using growth and yield models. Then, a spatial forest planning problem aiming at maximizing timber production with even-flow cuttings was formulated. Spatial objective variables were used to cluster management prescriptions into dynamic treatment units. We used simulated annealing to conduct spatial optimization. First, the true plot locations were used and then the whole process was repeated with normally distributed random errors with standard deviation equal to 2.5, 5 and 10 m, resulting in an average error of 1.47, 3.06 and 8.34 m, respectively. Increasing the level of positioning errors resulted in higher variability in the estimated growing stock attributes and in the achieved values of management goals. Sub-optimal prescriptions caused by the tested plot positioning errors caused up to 4.62% losses in timber production and up to 3.35% losses in utility. The losses increased with increasing plot positioning error.


One possible path for exploring the Earth's far-from-equilibrium homeostasis is to assume that it results from the organisation of optimal pulsating systems, analogous to that in complex living beings. Under this premise it becomes natural to examine the Earth's organisation using physiological-like variables. Here we identify some of these main variables for the ocean's circulatory system: pump rate, stroke volume, carbon and nutrient arterial-venous differences, inorganic nutrients and carbon supply, and metabolic rate. The stroke volume is proportional to the water transported into the thermocline and deep oceans, and the arterial-venous differences occur between recently-upwelled deep waters and very productive high-latitudes waters, with atmospheric CO 2 being an indicator of the arterial-venous inorganic carbon difference. The metabolic rate is the internal-energy flux (here expressed as flux of inorganic carbon in the upper ocean) required by the system's machinery, i.e. community respiration. We propose that the pump rate is set externally by the annual cycle, at one beat per year per hemisphere, and that the autotrophic ocean adjusts its stroke volume and arterial-venous differences to modify the internal-energy demand, triggered by long-period astronomical insolation cycles (external-energy supply). With this perspective we may conceive that the Earth's interglacial-glacial cycle responds to an internal organisation analogous to that occurring in living beings during an exercise-recovery cycle. We use an idealised double-state metabolic model of the upper ocean (with the inorganic carbon/nutrients supply specified through the overturning rate and the steady-state inorganic carbon/nutrients concentrations) to obtain the temporal evolution of its inorganic carbon concentration, which mimics the glacial-interglacial atmospheric CO 2 pattern.


Abstract The anomalous radial transport generated by drift wave turbulence is a fundamental open physics question in magnetic confinement systems, both in modern tokamaks and current and next generation mirror machines. The role of self-generated zonal flows (ZF) in transport regulation via its shear is a potent concept and a physics issue. ZF are believed to be spontaneously excited by drift wave turbulence via Reynolds stress from small-scale fluctuations to large-scale flow. A basic physics experimental study of zonal flows associated with ITG (ion temperature gradient) drift modes has been performed in the Columbia Linear Machine (CLM). The difficult problem of detection of ZF has been solved via a novel diagnostic using the paradigm of FM (frequency modulation) in radio transmission. We find a power spectrum peak at ITG ('carrier') frequency of ~120 kHz and FM sidebands at frequency of ~2 kHz. We have definitively identified ZF with azimuthal and axial symmetry (kθ = 0, k// ≈ 0) and radially inhomogeneous (kr [not equal] 0) flow structures in cylindrical plasmas in uniform axisymmetric magnetic field. However, quantitatively, the stabilizing effect of ZF shear appears to be small and no significant isotopic effects are observed. The unique complementary roles of ion acoustic damping and ZF shearing in the saturation of ITG have been experimentally demonstrated using stabilizing and destabilizing feedback techniques. Theoretically ZF is supposed to be saturated via νii. As this is very small both in tokamaks and CLM, we investigate the scaling ZF with in νin which can be significant in CLM.


Use of microbial inoculants during silage making have drawn interest to silage producers including those who are feeding their livestock on silage produced from by-products (e.g. pulps). Many farmers in the developing countries rely on agro-industrial by-products to feed their livestock, which is limited by the high moisture content of the by-products. This review pertains to issues related to silage production from high moisture plant by-products (e.g. pulps or pomaces), challenges involved in the ensiling of these resources, the use of additives (e.g. microbial additives), and growth performance of the animals that are fed silage from these resources. This information will be helpful to better understand the key roles of silage production from these resources.


Business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce is an innovative use of information and communication technologies and refers to the exchange of goods and related information between companies supported by Internet-based tools such as electronic marketplaces (also called electronic trade platforms) or online shops. It provides opportunities for cost-efficiency in supply chain management processes and access to new markets. With regard to the food sector with its chain levels input – agriculture – industry – retail – consumer, B2B e-commerce would take place in the exchange of food products between all levels except retail to consumer (business-to-consumer e-commerce). It is evident and widely known that B2B e-commerce brings key advantages and potentials for European consumers and the European food sector: - The affordability of high quality, traceable food for European consumers is supported as the innovation potentials from e-commerce technologies for cost-efficient processes along the food chain. The healthy choice of quality food will become the easy and affordable choice for European consumers. - The competitiveness of the European food sector with the majority of SMEs increases as B2B e-commerce technologies support cost-efficient transaction processes in food supply chains. In recent years, the availability of sophisticated B2B e-commerce technology has improved tremendously. The "European e-Business Market Watch" initiative from the Directorate-General Enterprise and Industry from the European Commission has shown that only large multinationals exploit the potentials of B2B e-commerce in the food sector for their supply chain management with their business partners. SMEs however, which create the majority of turn over in the European food sector and therefore create jobs and welfare in Europe, are reluctant to take up existing B2B e-commerce technologies into their food supply of selling. The crucial barrier to adoption is that trust between companies is not mediated appropriately by existing e-commerce technology. Currently, the barrier for food sector SMEs towards B2B e-commerce come from - the difficulty to examine the quality and safety of food products. This refers to all kinds of transactions in the food sector, whether supported by e-commerce or not. However, when it comes to e-commerce, the difficulty of physical product examination plays a much larger role as physical product inspection is not possible; - the (perceived) risk of performing a transaction via e-commerce. This includes concerns regarding secure transfer of data, or the possibly unknown transaction partner. Elements for the generation of trust between companies in the food chain and therefore of trustworthy B2B e-commerce environments for the food sector include guaranties regarding food quality, multimedia food product presentations to signal their quality, secure e-commerce technology infrastructures, third-party quality signs to be provided. As trust is highly subjective and depends on culture, food chains in different European countries with a different cultural background require different combinations of trust generating elements regarding the quality and safety of food. Different food chain scenarios with their transaction processes and risks regarding food quality and food safety and related trust elements need to be analysed and differences in trust in different European food chains need to be considered. It is the objective of this paper to identify food chains with trans-European cross-border exchange of food products (e.g., fresh vegetables, fresh fruits, meat, grain) and international food chains from Brazil and the US to Europe and to analyse the these food chains with their transaction processes along the food chain and typical risks regarding food quality and food safety. This WP mainly builds on expert interviews with food chain business leaders and food chain business associations from the advisory board. It is therefore an essential part of the communication with the stakeholders of the project' results and will create awareness and sensibility towards the topic. It includes the analysis of the transaction process phases and the analysis of particular risks involved in the food product distribution chains, respectively. Risks regarding food quality and food safety provide hints for the necessity of B2B trust elements to compensate the risks. The analysis focuses on trans-European cross-border and international food chains with their chain levels (e.g. production to wholesale trade, wholesale trade to industry, or wholesale trade to retail). In particular, it regards the food product groups meat, grain, olive oil, fresh vegetables, and fresh fruits and the particular risks regarding food quality and safety along the chains.


This study is a meta-analysis on the results of eight projects undertaken by the first author and his research team in Hong Kong and Macau. The purpose of the present meta-analysis was to understand the pathways development of recreational and problem gambling. These eight research projects were all qualitative studies on different groups of active gamblers, which included day-traders (N=16), elderly gamblers in public housing estates (N=25), working class women (N=15), young gamblers primarily interested in soccer-betting (N= 18), a group of gamblers with criminal background (N=11), female sex workers (N=20), male sex workers and taxi drivers (N=20) and working adults (N=20). All the participants were clinically interviewed by the first author, who is an experienced clinical psychologist or his assistants. The interviews were structured on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual 4th edition, text revision (American Psychiatric Association, 2000). The questions covered the participant? developmental history, his/her recollections on the acquisition and maintenance of the gambling habits, his career and family development and the current state of gambling. In addition, personality tests and the Problem Gambling Severity Index ((Ferris & Wayne, 2001) will be given to the participants in order to assess their personality and gambling involvement. Results indicated that 25% of the participants can be classified as pathological gamblers. Most of the pathological gamblers came from the groups of sex workers and gamblers with criminal background. Further analysis on the participants? Background and history and their trajectory of gambling development demonstrate that the pathways development of problem gambling does not follow a linear model, whereby problem gambling is always preceded by recreational gambling. The current study clearly indicates that the basic differences between recreational and problem gambling are more qualitative than quantitative. When compared to recreational gamblers, pathological gamblers were found to have significant deficits in impulse control, which resulted in frequent chasing of losses, the preoccupation of gambling and the failure to pursue a law-abiding lifestyle. Further, most of the pathological gamblers show a general lack of adequate moral development. While the current study supports the claims of Volberg (2002) and Blaszczynski and Nower (2002) model, it proposes a new model that focuses the subjective experiences of gambling and the influences of one? work and social environment.


The Second Meeting of the Vegetables Network (VEGNET) of the European Cooperative Programme for Plant Genetic Resources (ECPGR) was held on 26-28 June 2007 in Olomouc, Czech Republic. The meeting was organized jointly with the Third Meeting of the ECPGR Working Group on Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (MAP WG), which had been formally included in the VEGNET from January 2004 to September 2006. The local organization of the meetings was arranged by the Crop Research Institute, Prague-Ruzyne, Division of Plant Genetics, Breeding and Product Quality, and its local Department of Vegetables and Special Crops in Olomouc. The first introductory session was attended jointly by the VEGNET and MAP Working Groups.


The study reported in this paper investigated the pragmatic aspects of task-performance in a series of argumentation tasks that 24 Hungarian learners of English performed over a period of two years. The aim of our research project was to determine how task-repetition, the long-term development of language skills, and a short-term focused intervention influenced various pragmatic measures of task-performance such as the pragmalinguistic markers of argumentation, the number of claims, counterclaims, supports and counter-supports. We also analysed how these variables differed when the participants performed the same type of task in their mother tongue. The results showed that in the repeated version of the task, familiarity with the task structure helped learners pay more attention to the informational content of their message, which was reflected in the higher number of supportive moves they produced. Participants were found to have better argumentation skills in their mother tongue and used a wider variety of pragmalinguistic markers than in L2. The language development assumed to have taken place during one year and the argumentation training, however, did not result in better pragmatic and pragmalinguistic performance.


Locating American Studies is a collection of seventeen essays first printed in American Quarterly, the journal of the American Studies Association. To mark the Association's celebration of its 50th anniversary in 1998, Lucy Maddox has brought together works by a distinguished group of scholars which "provide a useful window into the history and the evolution of the practice of American studies from its early, formational days to the present." Each essay, originally published between 1950 and 1996, is accompanied by a commentary in which a scholar from a related field provides useful critical information for understanding the continuing importance of the work to the American Studies field. Contributors include Gene Wise, Henry Nash Smith, Bruce Kuklick, R. Gordon Kelly, Robert Berkhofer Jr., Barbara Welter, Linda Kerber, Nina Baym, Janice Radway, Alexander Saxton, Houston Baker, Jr., George Lipsitz, Ramon Gutierrez, Kevin Mumford, and K. Scott Wong. "If the frequency with which an essay is cited in subsequent scholarship and assigned as required reading in academic courses may be taken as an indication of the respect it has achieved and the importance it has been granted, then many of the essays in this volume have come to be considered milestones, even classics, in the scholarly literature of American studies."-from the Introduction by Lucy Maddox


Royal jelly (RJ) has diverse physiological and pharmacological functions. We observed its weak estrogenic activity in the previous study. RJ stimulated the proliferation of mouse osteoblast-like MC3T3-E1 cells at 0.1 mg/ml, and the effect was blocked by the specific estrogen receptor antagonist ICI 182,780. The addition of 0.1–1.0 mg/ml RJ enhanced collagen production in culture medium. Oral administration of RJ to normal female mice for 9 weeks increased the ash content of their tibiae. DNA microarray analysis revealed significant changes in gene expression related to extracellular matrix formation when the femurs of mice fed RJ were analyzed. Quantitative reverse transcriptase-PCR (RT-PCR) confirmed up-regulation of procollagen I α1 gene expression. These data suggest that RJ as a whole or some of its individual components stimulates production of type I collagen and other activities for bone formation through action on osteoblasts.


Objective: To explore Somali new mothers' experiences with the Norwegian health care system and their experienced needs during the hospital stay and the postpartum period.
Methods: A qualitative design with individual semistructured interviews. Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze the transcripts from the interviews.
Results: Ten women aged 25 to 34 years were interviewed. The women had lived in Norway 4-16 years and had 1-4 children. Analyses of the interviews indicated that there were cultural differences between Somalia and Norway, and that these affected the women during pregnancy and childbirth. Four main categories were central in the women's stories: (1) inadequate integration into Norwegian society; (2) need for and fear of a caesarean delivery; (3) family support around the postpartum period; and (4) support from health services.
Conclusion: Even though these women lived in Norway, their language skills were poor and they were poorly integrated into Norwegian society. Health professionals should use an interpreter when dealing with Somali women with poor language skills, especially when discussing issues relating to birth and the hospital stay. To help integrate these women into society, they should be encouraged to learn the Norwegian language. Well-child clinics should offer immigrant mothers the opportunity to participate in maternity groups to strengthen their social relationships and to integrate better. Public health nurses play an important role in supporting immigrant mothers. The findings of this study will help broaden the understanding of the support immigrant women need during the hospital stay and the postpartum period.


Abstract As expatriate literature continues to grow, this review presents a quantitative analysis of the expatriate field, utilizing advances in bibliometric science mapping and social network analysis to examine 1650 articles published from 1998 to 2017. This approach offers a conceptual, relational and analytic framework for examining the foundations, structure and interconnections of the expatriate field. The results of a co-occurrence keyword analysis show four interconnected clusters: 'strategic management of international organizations', 'expatriates' context', 'managing expatriates' and 'adapting to the local environment'. A bibliometric coupling analysis of articles published from 2015 to 2017 identifies the current research fronts, which centre on the topics of 'expatriate adjustment', 'expatriates and multinational companies', 'careers' and 'methodological advances'. Using social network metrics, central keywords and articles are identified. Each cluster and research front is discussed. Three downloadable, searchable maps are provided, enabling further examination. The results offer a visual and structured overview of the field, and indicate both areas of research concentration and areas that are neglected.


The starting point of this research was the belief that manufacturing and similar industries need help with the concept of e-business, especially in assessing the relevance of possible e-business initiatives. The research hypotheses was that it should be possible to produce a systematic model that defines, at a useful level of detail, the probable e-business requirements of an organisation based on objective criteria with an accuracy of 85%-90%. This thesis describes the development and validation of such a model. A preliminary model was developed from a variety of sources, including a survey of current and planned e-business activity and representative examples of e-business material produced by e-business solution providers. The model was subject to a process of testing and refinement based on recursive case studies, with controls over the improving accuracy and stability of the model. Useful conclusions were also possible as to the relevance of e-business functions to the case study participants themselves. Techniques were evolved to synthesise the e-business requirements of an organisation and present them at a management summary level of detail. The results of applying these techniques to all the case studies used in this research were discussed. The conclusion of the research was that the case study methodology employed was successful. A model was achieved suitable for practical application in a manufacturing organisation requiring help with a requirements definition process.


T cells responsive to macrophages (M phi) in the autologous mixed lymphocyte reaction (AMLR) contain those cells that can be induced to proliferate by soluble antigens. Negative solution (5-bromo-2- deoxyuridine and light) of T cells activated by autologous M phi also removed those cells required for reactivity to Candida albicans and purified protein derivative. Positive selection of T cells responsive to autologous M phi yields a population that is simultaneously enriched in antigen reactivity. Some patients demonstrating cutaneous anergy and diminished in vitro blast transformation in response to soluble antigen also lack T cells responsive to the AMLR to M phi. When considered in conjunction with previously reported data, these findings indicate the AMLR occurring between T cells and M phi in the absence of soluble antigen represents self recognition occurring between antigen-reactive T cells and antigen-presenting M phi.


Philosophy has to be communicable in language, and therefore, whatever it has to say must be expressible in (some) language. But in order to make progress, philosophy has to gradually extend and improve its terminological apparatus. It is argued that logical formalization is a highly useful tool for discovering and confirming distinctions that are not present in ordinary language or in pre-existing philosophical terminology. In particular, it is proposed that if two usages of a word require different logical formalizations, then that is a strong reason to distinguish between them also in informal philosophy. The distinction between two types of normative conditionals, conditional veritable norms and conditional normative rules, is used as an example to corroborate this proposal.


In this paper, the effect of parametric amplifier pump phase noise on the cooling of a micromirror in an optomechanical system with an optical parametric amplifier inside the optical cavity is investigated theoretically. It has been demonstrated that the photon number distribution of a parametric amplifier near the threshold of instability leads to improved cooling of the micromirror. But due to the presence of the parametric amplifier, there is a resonance detuning frequency for transferring noise energy to the potential and kinetic energy fluctuations of the mirror which causes the mirror mechanical oscillation mode temperature to increase. In low quality factor cavities, this effect occurs in a nonequilibrium thermodynamic process, while in high quality factor cavities, this process is a thermal equilibrium one. The effects of the Lorentzian two-time correlations of laser phase noise on the mirror mechanical mode temperature are considered in this paper.


Pulmonary arterial occlusion pressure (Ppao) may not accurately reflect left ventricular filling pressure (LVFP) during ventilation with positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP) because increases in pleural pressure (Ppl) increase measured intrathoracic vascular and cardiac chamber pressures relative to atmospheric while decreasing LVFP by decreasing venous return. Steady-state values of Ppao off PEEP are not useful in understanding the hemodynamics on PEEP because of changes in blood volume distribution and ventricular afterload associated with the removal of PEEP. We hypothesized that changes in Ppao immediately after abrupt airway disconnection from PEEP selectively reflect removal of PEEP-associated Ppl changes prior to other physiological changes. In pentobarbital-anesthetized closed-chest dogs, we compared absolute left atrial pressure and left atrial pressure relative to Ppl (Platm) prior to abrupt disconnection from 15 cmH2O PEEP (on-PEEP), with Ppao at its nadir (nadir Ppao) following airway disconnection in three sequential conditions: control (normal), after propranolol-induced acute ventricular failure, and after oleic acid-induced lung injury. For all conditions at low LVFP (less than 9 Torr), nadir Ppao reflects Platm better than on-PEEP Ppao, while at higher LVFP (greater than 9 Torr), on-PEEP Ppao better reflects Platm than nadir Ppao (P less than 0.05). Accurate predictions of on-PEEP Platm can be made using both on-PEEP and nadir Ppao values in a multiple regression equation.


A traffic planning model can improve the public agency's ability to forecast future traffic and plan appropriate roadway intrastructure. However, the usefulness of these models depends significantly on how well they are validated. This paper presents a discussion on validating a traffic planning model; the paper discusses modeling at a citywide scale, but most of the concepts and techniques are also applicable at smaller or larger scales. The validation process should not be viewed as only the testing and adjustment phase of model development. Successful validation actually starts with defining the intended model purpose and applications, and also includes structuring the model, assembling the data inputs, and making reasonable adjustments during the testing process.


In this 2 × 2 factorial, outcome-assessor blinded, feasibility randomised trial we explored the effect of a non-pharmaceutical multi-component intervention on periodontal health and metabolic and inflammatory profiles among pregnant women with periodontitis receiving prenatal care in a Brazilian public health centre. 69 pregnant women (gestational age ≤20 weeks, T0) were randomly allocated into four groups: (1) fortified sachet (vitamin D and calcium) and powdered milk plus periodontal therapy during pregnancy (early PT) (n = 17); (2) placebo sachet and powdered milk plus early PT (n = 15); (3) fortified sachet and powdered milk plus late PT (after delivery) (n = 19); (4) placebo sachet and powdered milk plus late PT (n = 18). Third trimester (T1) and 6–8 weeks postpartum (T2) exploratory outcomes included periodontal health (% sites with bleeding on probing (BOP)), glucose, insulin, C-Reactive Protein, serum calcium and vitamin D. The mean BOP was significantly reduced in the early PT groups, while BOP worsened in the late PT groups. No significant effect of fortification on BOP was observed. Changes in glucose levels and variation on birthweight did not differ among groups This feasibility trial provides preliminary evidence for estimating the minimum clinically important differences for selected maternal outcomes. A large-scale trial to evaluate the interventions' clinical benefits and cost-effectiveness is warranted.