Natural Language Generation (NLG) is the automatic generation of Natural Language (NL) by computer in order to meet communicative goals. One aim of NL processing (NLP) is to allow more natural communication with a computer and, since communication is a two-way process, a NL system should be able to produce as well as interpret NL text. This research concerns the design and implementation of a NLG module for the LOLITA system. LOLITA (Large scale, Object-based, Linguistic Interactor, Translator and Analyser) is a general purpose base NLP system which performs core NLP tasks and upon which prototype NL applications have been built. As part of this encompassing project, this research shares some of its properties and methodological assumptions: the LOLITA generator has been built following Natural Language Engineering principles uses LOLITA's SemNet representation as input and is implemented in the functional programming language Haskell. As in other generation systems the adopted solution utilises a two component architecture. However, in order to avoid problems which occur at the interface between traditional planning and realisation modules (known as the generation gap) the distribution of tasks between the planner and plan-realiser is different: the plan-realiser, in the absence of detailed planning instructions, must perform some tasks (such as the selection and ordering of content) which are more traditionally performed by a planner. This work largely concerns the development of the plan- realiser and its interface with the planner. Another aspect of the solution is the use of Abstract Transformations which act on the SemNet input before realisation leading to an increased ability for creating paraphrases. The research has lead to a practical working solution which has greatly increased the power of the LOLITA system. The research also investigates how NLG systems can be evaluated and the advantages and disadvantages of using a functional language for the generation task.


Writing Church history has its own peculiar problems. No church exists simply in terms of its institutions because a church is not its institutions but the body of believers which pay allegiance to it. Belief in itself is difficult to quantify, for of its very nature it is internalized in the believer and, although sacramental churches can obtain some sense of how widespread belief is through people's participation in liturgical practices, statistics of baptisms, confirmations and partakings of the Eucharist make for dull history.
The historiography of missionary churches is even more difficult to handle. The central question that must be asked of any successful missionary enterprise is why it succeeded at all. Missionary success, after all, means that a people who had religion appropriate to their whole cultural experience chose to repudiate it and put in its place a set of alien beliefs which, more often than not, designated their former practices as works of the devil. One way of considering the success of missions is to invoke the power of the Spirit which draws people to Its light through Its own mysterious processes. Such an account of conversions may be satisfying in pious magazines, but history does not deal in mysteries. If missionary history is to satisfy, it must offer an account which pays some attention to crises in the culture of a people, the problems the old religion had in accommodating those crises, and the way in which the teaching and practices of the new church have a peculiar and engaging relevance.


The Hawaiian Island chain is surrounded by the open ocean and is an ideal place to conduct the application of QuikSCAT satellite-derived ocean surface winds to the detection of weather systems. With the help of QuikSCAT winds, the associated circulation of the weather systems over the open ocean around Hawaii can be identified. In this study, the obvious cyclonic circulation associated with a Kona storm, the significant wind shift and wind confluence related to the surface cold front, and the anticyclonic circulation related to high-pressure systems for both a strong-wind event and a trade-wind condition are revealed over the open ocean through QuikSCAT winds. The propagation of a cold frontal boundary, defined by the wind shift and wind confluence, also can be clearly detected using the reanalyzed ocean-surface winds. With the assimilation of QuikSCAT winds into the WRF 3D-Var system, the under-estimation of near-ocean surface winds in the Hawaiian Islands and the surrounding ocean by the Global Forecasting System (GFS) and NCEP reanalysis can be improved in the analyzed low-level winds and the associated short-term forecast, including the effects of the Island obstacle on near-ocean surface winds. To statistically evaluate the prediction of near-ocean surface winds under the influence of the most frequent weather systems and events in Hawaii, the numerical weather predictions with/without assimilated QuikSCAT wind data are performed. The results reveal that the predicted 10-m wind speed/direction during the 24-hr forecast results in a relatively smaller mean squared error (MSE) with assimilated QuikSCAT winds as compared with the GFS/NCEP-FNL run for the ocean surrounding Hawaii.


Entrepreneurs start their business by planning their business either documented or undocumented. The business plan is executed after considering various aspects of the related business has been met. Execution of business plan (Go / No-Go decision) is thought to be a repeating activity by entrepreneurs as well as innovation that always done for developing and sustaining the business. Effective decision-making method of business plan execution are required to generate time, energy and resource efficiency, especially in the business plan execution of the software development field. This research uses qualitative method with sample size of 9 of software development companies in Indonesia, and it is intended to answer research questions: "What method are effective for entrepreneurs / new entrepreneurs in the field of software development to take Go / No-Go decisions from business plans that have been compiled." The result of this research is Go / No-Go decision-making method on business development of software development can be decomposed into: Assumption Exploration, assumption selection, assumption testing and take a decision. Some of the main keys are: the business should consider market, product, technology, economy, competition and organization as group of assumptions; and when take a decision, several ways to be taken are: looking at difficulty level and resistance of assumptions, conducting trial and error (doing design fast, and tested to customer), conducting market test and seeing result, and interview with user. Research paper Keywords: Business Development, Decision, Go / No-Go, Method Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Taufik, C., & Karyadi (2018). Go/No-Go Decision-Making Method on Business Development of Software Development in Indonesia, Journal of Entrepreneurship, Business and Economics , 6 (2), 71–90.


Public quality labels are used to point out specific market segmentations: land, Bio, and taste quality. Their success in the retail industry prompts stores to use them as part of their own brand range. The food-processing industries fear that producing them as stores' own brands could run down their image. This paper shows, by analysing 6 products, that the supermarkets strategy is not to undercut the official quality brand names.


This contribution explores the historical development of modal verbs in Dutch. As opposed to their English counterparts, modals in present-day Dutch may be non-finite, and may appear under other auxiliaries in long verb clusters. This was not the case in Old Germanic languages. The first Dutch attestations of modal infinitives are in the complement of zullen , a verb which was undergoing a semanticchange from modality to futurity/ irrealis . This [ zullen + modal infinitive + main verb] construction was probably a Middle Dutch innovation, which most likely had its origin in southern Dutch dialects. From there, it gradually spread to other dialects in the course of the Early Modern Dutch period. The paper discusses the possible relationship between this syntactic innovation and the semantic changes that Dutch modal verbs underwent in the same period.


The goal of this FYI memo is to provide practical information to site
administrators and network managers. This memo provides information
for the Internet community. It does not specify any standard. It is
not a statement of IAB policy or recommendations. [Also FYI 2.] This
catalog contains descriptions of several tools available to assist
network managers in debugging and maintaining TCP/IP internets and
interconnected communications resources. Entries in the catalog tell
what a tool does, how it works, and how it can be obtained.


In this article we establish new second order necessary and suffi-cient optimality conditions for a class of control-affine problems with a scalar control and a scalar state constraint. These optimality conditions extend to the constrained state framework the Goh transform, which is the classical tool for obtaining an extension of the Legendre condition.


Nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) is used to derive a novel description for the timbre of musical sounds. Using NMF, a spectrogram is factorized providing a characteristic spectral basis. Assuming a set of spectrograms given a musical genre, the space spanned by the vectors of the obtained spectral bases is modeled statistically using mixtures of Gaussians, resulting in a description of the spectral base for this musical genre. This description is shown to improve classification results by up to 23.3% compared to MFCC-based models, while the compression performed by the factorization decreases training time significantly. Using a distance-based stability measure this compression is shown to reduce the noise present in the data set resulting in more stable classification models. In addition, we compare the mean squared errors of the approximation to a spectrogram using independent component analysis and nonnegative matrix factorization, showing the superiority of the latter approach.


While there is wide agreement that education supports development, there is also much scholarship to suggest that the potential benefits of education are only fully realised when education systems are well-adapted to local needs. Systems left by colonial in newly independent developing countries, for instance, can impede the achievement of their development goals.  This project focused on the plans and aspirations of secondary school students in Ermera subdistrict, a semi-rural region of Timor-Leste, in order to explore the relationship between education and local livelihoods. Three case study communities in Ermera vila, Ponilala and Mirtutu were examined. Guided by the concept of the 'good life', I sought to reveal what students, parents and educators hope to get out of education and development. This enabled me to assess whether the schooling that students are receiving is supporting their future goals.  The methodology combined ethnographic observation with other qualitative and quantitative data collection. It comprised twenty-two weeks in-country: volunteering, and conducting surveys and interviews. The ensuing data analysis draws on education theory, alternative development theory, and decolonisation theory.  Overall I found that the secondary school curriculum is Western-oriented, and focused on getting students into university rather than on preparing them for the kinds of lives they are likely to lead. Students overwhelmingly aspire to university or vocational study, once they leave school. Conceptions of the good life in the three communities centre on social connectedness and opportunities for the next generation. While there is an evident disconnect between the content of available secondary education and local livelihood realities, there have been successful initiatives from within all three communities to expand education over the past twenty years to include local skills and epistemologies. An extension of these efforts to create a more diverse education, with the inclusion of agriculture as a learning topic, could give students the best chance of gaining secure work and leading comfortable lives in the future.


This work explores the effect of diversity of individuals on a community. The mechanisms generating diversity are explored, their effects on patterns of diversity are examined, and the impact of diversity on community properties (such as productivity and stability) is investigated. Three individual-based models are employed: 1) a meanfield differential equation model, 2) a simulation model of plant populations, and 3) a simulation model of interacting organisms. The mean-field model is used to show that the traits of individuals in a community affect community diversity. The mathematical analysis, supported by numerical simulations, demonstrates that trade-offs between the individual traits are required for community diversity to exist. Moreover, the form of the trade-offs defines the equilibrium distribution of the population over the trait values. The nature of interactions among individuals (in particular, competition) determines the stability of the equilibrium state. For a more realistic representation of the community, a more detailed and spatially explicit model of a community is defined. This model simulates each individual explicitly, with a fuller description of the physiological traits and interactions. The model is parameterised using experimental data from a grassland species R. acetosa. Diversity patterns in the modelled communities are of the same form as the patterns observed in biological communities. The mechanisms generating diversity patterns are examined. As in the mean-field model, analysis of the simulation model shows that a trade-off between physiological traits is responsible for generation of diversity in the simulation model also. Moreover, it affects the form of the diversity patterns. Community productivity results from the interplay of community diversity and environmental conditions. To further explore the effect of individual interactions on community diversity and stability, a model of interacting organisms is developed. This model is a modification of the plant model, with the possibility of two-way mutualistic interactions between organisms. The mutualistic interactions are found to increase community diversity in space and time and to promote community stability under environmental disturbance. The impact of individual-scale processes on community-scale dynamics has recently been recognised as an important factor contributing to ecosystem dynamics. This work defines and explores some of the links between individual and community scales within ecological communities. In particular, it shows that individual traits in a community can affect community-scale properties such as diversity patterns and productivity, while individual interactions are important for community diversity and stability.


Contributing to the debate on the multidimensional nature of resource-based conflicts in political ecology, and building upon Niklas Luhmann's Social Systems Theory, we have studied the persistent and shifting nature of conflicts as well as their dependencies on other conflicts in and around Loisaba conservancy. This private conservancy is situated in northern Laikipia (Kenya). For a long time, its management was focused on wildlife conservation, high-end tourism and commercial ranching. Developments and events at neighbouring ranches and community conservation areas shifted this focus. Decades of more or less peaceful regional co-existence has recently transformed into conflictual, sometimes even violent situations. At first sight, these emergent conflicts seem related to recurrent droughts, competing resource dependencies, national elections, or incitements by wealthy and influential politicians. For this study, however, we conceptualise conflicts as particular kinds of discourses that emerge, exist and change. This happens not only according to their own internal logics, but also through their dependencies with other conflict discourses. In this paper, we characterise the relations between conflicts on a range from tight to loose couplings and introduce three related forms of coupling (overpowering, resisting, and resonating) to provide a more detailed understanding of how conflicts may interrelate.


Vanadium dioxide (VO2), due to its well-known metal–insulator phase transition (MIT), is a promising candidate to realize optical modulation devices operating at terahertz (THz) frequencies. Moreover, the application of VO2 on modulation devices requires a narrow hysteresis width associated with a significant change in its optical properties, which is quite challenging in Si-based polycrystalline VO2 films. In this paper, by doping high-valence metal ions (W6+ or Nb5+) into polycrystalline VO2 films, a narrowed hysteresis width and a decreased phase transition temperature are observed. Intriguingly, these doped VO2 films always maintain a high THz field modulation depth despite the low phase transition temperature resulting from the usage of either W or Nb dopants. To sum up, the optimized VO2 film with 6.5% Nb doping deposited on high-purity silicon substrates exhibits the best MIT characteristics with a giant field THz modulation depth of 62.5%, a small hysteresis width down to 4.8 °C and a low phase transition temperature of around 31.1 °C, which is very excellent for practical applications. Furthermore, we synthetically investigate the influences of W and Nb doping on the microstructures and MIT characteristics of the polycrystalline VO2 films. Doping Nb5+ and W6+ ions has similar effects through a similar mechanism. In addition, the excellent balance between the THz modulation ability and phase transition temperature is related to the high crystallinity degree of the doped films. The annealing process may play a key role in this peculiar case. These results show that the excellent MIT properties of the polycrystalline VO2 films can be effectively tailored by our distinctive preparation method, which provides a feasible solution to the design and fabrication of VO2 films with suitable MIT properties for THz devices.


The Seventieth Anniversary of the Independence of India and Pakistan has addressed the sensitive nature of the Partition legacy through the media coverage. This year a new debate has been addressed: that less knowledge of this topic is being transferred to the next generation of the diaspora South Asians. There is a preconception that this community that migrated from South Asia to the UK cannot live side-by-side. The oral history account states some people were a little hesitant because of the traumatic memories of childhood, but wanted to move forward rather than dwell on the past. The existing oral history archive is focused on people's experience of settling in the UK, not about their ancestral history. It has only been in recent decades that there is a shift towards understanding this community's memories about the Partition. I explore the existing local and national oral history archive regarding the Partition legacy of community that migrated to Huddersfield during the 1950s and 1960s. This community started to live side-by-side again in Huddersfield despite the fact they had experienced the traumatic memories of the Partition during childhood. Working with a company Lets Go Yorkshire, my project leader, Mandeep Samra, Director of The White Line Project offered guidance on how a community heritage project can be incorporated with academic learning to bring together expertise and knowledge into the public spheres. The aim for this thesis was to start a dialogue between the second generation who had experienced the Partition with third generation who are unaware of their family history and to understand their memories through creative writing workshops, oral history archive, and a documentary.1 The documentary reflective questionnaire for participants during the screening reveals that people had little knowledge about this topic prior to the media coverage during the Seventieth Anniversary. In addition to this South Asian community third generation feel ashamed that they did not learn about this topic during school education. The reflective essay discusses my experience and perspective as a third-generation South Asian academic working with the local community heritage project to create a shared history an archive for the local communities in Huddersfield.


When engineers train deep learning models, they are very much 'flying blind'. Commonly used methods for real-time training diagnostics, such as monitoring the train/test loss, are limited. Assessing a network's training process solely through these performance indicators is akin to debugging software without access to internal states through a debugger. To address this, we present Cockpit, a collection of instruments that enable a closer look into the inner workings of a learning machine, and a more informative and meaningful status report for practitioners. It facilitates the identification of learning phases and failure modes, like ill-chosen hyperparameters. These instruments leverage novel higher-order information about the gradient distribution and curvature, which has only recently become efficiently accessible. We believe that such a debugging tool, which we open-source for PyTorch, is a valuable help in troubleshooting the training process. By revealing new insights, it also more generally contributes to explainability and interpretability of deep nets.


Abstract. Maintaining residual chlorine levels in a water distribution network is a challenging task, especially in the context of developing countries where water is usually supplied intermittently. To model chlorine decay in water distribution networks, it is very important to understand chlorine kinetics in bulk water. Recent studies have suggested that chlorine decay rate depends on initial chlorine levels and the type of organic and inorganic matter present in water, indicating that a first-order decay model is unable to accurately predict chlorine decay in bulk water. In this study, we employed the two-reactant (2R) model to estimate the fast and slow reacting components in surface water and groundwater. We carried out a bench-scale test for surface water and groundwater at initial chlorine levels of 1, 2, and 5 mg L−1. We used decay data sets to estimate optimal parameter values for both surface water and groundwater. After calibration, the 2R model was validated with two decay data sets with varying initial chlorine concentrations (ICCs). This study arrived at three important findings. (a) We found that the ratio of slow to fast reacting components in groundwater was 30 times greater than that of the surface water. This observation supports the existing literature which indicates the presence of high levels of slow reacting fractions (manganese and aromatic hydrocarbons) in groundwater. (b) Both for surface water and groundwater, we obtained good model prediction, explaining 97 % of the variance in data for all cases. The mean square error obtained for the decay data sets was close to the instrument error, indicating the feasibility of the 2R model for chlorine prediction in both types of water. (c) In the case of deep groundwater, for high ICC levels (> 2 mg L−1), the first-order model can accurately predict chlorine decay in bulk water.


Electronic devices that can simulate the dynamics of neurotransmission in the human body are of great interest for the development of artificial intelligence in modern information technology. An artificial nociceptor realized by a single metal‐oxide nanobelt device with a unique capacitive‐coupled threshold switching behavior is demonstrated. Via thermal admittance spectroscopy and temperature‐dependent sweeping study, the properties of the nanobelt devices are determined by Schottky emission at low bias and by defect‐assisted quantum tunneling at high bias subject to a threshold voltage. The low activation energy associated with dynamic electron trapping gives rise to a voltage‐dependent volatile threshold switching behavior. This threshold switching behavior allows the emulation of several characteristic features of a nociceptor, a critical type of sensory neuron in the human body, including "threshold," "relaxation," "no adaptation," "allodynia," and "hyperalgesia" behaviors, essential for the realization of electronic sensory receptors that detect noxious stimuli and signal rapid warning to the central nervous system. One‐dimensional metal oxide nanobelt devices of this type yield multifunctional nociceptor performance that is fundamental for applications in artificial intelligence systems, representing a key step in the realization of neural integrated devices via a bottom‐up approach.


Abstract. Excessive use of phosphorus (P) in farmland soil and improper disposal of crop residues such as straws accelerate the consumption of P resources and cause a high level of air and water pollution, which are the main limiting factors for sustainable agricultural development. The most important alternative is the introduction of organic fertilizers to replace mineral P fertilizer. However, the type of organic fertilizers and management methods differ significantly. In this study, we used solution 31-P nuclear magnetic resonance spectra and Hedley fractionation method to characterize the P compounds in the initial soil (in 2013; CK0), long-term unfertilized (CK) soil, and the soils treated with N+P+K mineral fertilizer (NPK), biochar in combination with NPK fertilizer (CNPK), and corn straw in combination with NPK fertilizer (SNPK). The results showed that adding biochar significantly increased the concentration of P. However, Olsen-P was found to be the highest (21.88 mg kg−1) in SNPK. The concentration of Hedley-P was the highest (574.76 mg kg−1) in CNPK. The inorganic P forms were significantly increased by adding biochar (up to 183.9 %). The concentration of orthophosphate is positively relative to Resin-P, NaHCO3-inorganic P (Pi; organic P (Po)), NaOH-Po, and Residual-P, which are absorbed and utilized to plants and microorganisms. Adenosine monophosphate (AMP) and inositol hexakisphosphate (IHP) are potential sources of P. Compared to the direct application of straw, adding biochar increases the available P in the different soil and reduces environmental pollution.


The existence and stability of invariant distributions for stochastically monotone processes is studied. The Knaster-Tarski fixed point theorem is applied to establish existence of fixed points of mappings on compact sets of measures that are increasing with respect to a stochastic ordering. Global convergence of a monotone Markov process to its unique invariant distribution is established.under an easily verified assumption. Topkis's theory of supermodular functions is applied to stochastic dynamic optimization, providing conditions under which optimal stationary decisions are monotone functions of the state and induce a monotone Markov process. Applications of these results to investment theory, stochastic growth and industry equilibrium dynamics are given. Copyright 1992 by The Econometric Society.


Cell division and cell elongation are fundamental processes for growth. In contrast to animal cells, plant cells are surrounded by rigid walls and therefore loosening of the wall is required during elongation. On the other hand, vacuole size has been shown to correlate with cell size and inhibition of vacuolar expansion limits cell growth. However, the specific role of the vacuole during cell elongation is still not fully resolved. Especially the question whether the vacuole is the leading unit during cellular growth or just passively expands upon water uptake remains to be answered. Here, we review recent findings about the contribution of the vacuole to cell elongation. In addition, we also discuss the connection between cell wall status and vacuolar morphology. In particular, we focus on the question whether vacuolar size is dictated by cell size or vice versa and share our personnel view about the sequential steps during cell elongation.


The launch of the Iraqi National Action Plan (INAP) to implement the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (1325) on Women, Peace and Security (WPS) in 2014 is a significant step towards enabling women's participation and protection in the processes of conflict resolution and peace-building in Iraq. Iraq's National Action Plan identifies actions for increasing women's participation at executive levels, enhancing gender equality in legal documents, removing legislation that violates women's rights and for preventing violence against women. It mainly focuses on political participation and improving rights in non-war contexts. However, it does not specifically address some of the key areas of 1325: women's participation in conflict resolution and reconciliation; prevention of violence against women; protection of women's rights; and women's specific relief needs in conflict and post-conflict. The Plan also suffers from other limitations. It is not the outcome of a participatory drafting process that included a wide-range of civil society organisations, state institutions and security and military forces. It does not have well-defined timelines, comprehensive implementation and monitoring mechanisms or clearly allocated budgets. Most importantly, the Plan is not sufficiently focused on the issues covered by 1325 and hence its effectiveness is undermined. Iraq is the first country in the Middle East to launch a national plan to implement 1325. This plan is an important and timely policy indicating the government's commitment to the 'Women, Peace and Security' agenda.1 The current plan runs until 2018 and a revision should follow. This report offers recommendations for the next steps. INAP is a tremendously important development for Iraqi women and it is crucial to build on the positive momentum it has generated.


PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES
To explore ethical conflicts in oncology practice and the nature of healthcare contexts in which ethical conflicts can be averted or mitigated.

RESEARCH APPROACH
Ethnography.

SETTING
Medical centers and community hospitals with inpatient and outpatient oncology units in southern California and Minnesota.

PARTICIPANTS
30 oncology nurses, 6 ethicists, 4 nurse administrators, and 2 oncologists.

METHODOLOGIC APPROACH
30 nurses participated in six focus groups that were conducted using a semistructured interview guide. Twelve key informants were individually interviewed. Coding, sorting, and constant comparison were used to reveal themes.

FINDINGS
Most ethical conflicts pertained to complex end-of-life situations. Three factors were associated with ethical conflicts: delaying or avoiding difficult conversations, feeling torn between competing obligations, and the silencing of different moral perspectives. Moral communities were characterized by respectful team relationships, timely communication, ethics-minded leadership, readily available ethics resources, and provider awareness and willingness to use ethics resources.

CONCLUSIONS
Moral disagreements are expected to occur in complex clinical practice. However, when they progress to ethical conflicts, care becomes more complicated and often places seriously ill patients at the epicenter.

INTERPRETATION
Practice environments as moral communities could foster comfortable dialogue about moral differences and prevent or mitigate ethical conflicts and the moral distress that frequently follows.


All vertebrates have consistent left–right structural asymmetry, and deviations from the typical asymmetry in humans are clinically important. Studies elucidating the mechanisms that establish left–right asymmetry have lead to some of the most elegant advances in the field of embryology. In the past several decades, while we have gained an extensive understanding of the development of left–right asymmetry during embryogenesis, many questions remain to be addressed to fully appreciate the molecular mechanisms underlying its establishment. In this review article, the authors summarise the gene regulatory network that controls left–right patterning. They also focus on our current understanding of how left–right symmetry is broken.

Key Concepts:

Primary cilia rotating in a clockwise direction generate a unidirectional leftward fluid flow at a structure called the node, resulting in left–right symmetry breakage in mouse embryos. Similar leftward flow is observed in many vertebrate embryos.

Planar cell polarity (PCP) signalling, initially identified in the fruitfly, controls the uniform orientation of hairs and bristles on the body.

A primary cilium is a microtubule-based antenna-like structure lacking the central pairs of microtubules. This '9+0' microtubular structure and lack of dynein arms render them immotile, whereas motile cilia have a '9+2' microtubular structure with dynein arms.

BMP signalling negatively regulates cell cycle at the ventral surface of the node.

The posterior tilt of nodal cilia regulated by planar cell polarity is critical to generate a unilateral leftward flow from the rotation of the nodal cilia.

The ventral surface of the node is quiescent that allows formation of cilia.

Keywords:

chick;
cilia;
gene expression;
left–right patterning;
mouse;
node


The synthesis and characterisation of cobalt(III) chelates of 3-nitroformazans have been described. These chelates have been characterized as tris chelates on the basis of elemental analysis, IR and 1 H NMR studies. These studies reveal that the coordination of the cobalt(III) to the ligands occurs through the nitrogen atoms 1 and 5 of the formazyl group and that the NO2 group of the ligand does not take part in coordination. The structure of these chelates contains three symmetric six membered CN4Co rings.


We present a case of a 35-year-old man with fever and pancytopenia, who had rapid progression to acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), multiorgan failure, and disseminated intravascular coagulopathy secondary to disseminated tuberculosis (TB). Although both sputum and bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid smears were negative for acid-fast bacilli, the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay on the BAL fluid was positive for Mycobacterium tuberculosis. This case emphasizes the need to include TB in the differential for ARDS and the value of PCR testing of BAL fluid, especially in high-risk patients.


This work introduces a new shared segment protection scheme that ensures both node and link protection in an efficient manner in terms of cost and bandwidth, while taking full advantage of the optical hop endpoints of the primary logical hops (induced by the routing) without adding extra ones for protection. As opposed to the link or path protection schemes, the segment protection scheme has been less studied although it offers an interesting compromise between those two protection schemes, attempting to encompass all their advantages. We investigate two different Shared Segment Protection (SSP) schemes: Basic Shared Segment Protection (BSSP) and Shared Segment Protection with segment Overlap (SSPO), and propose design of 100% single segment protections. In SSPO, we study the extra protection capabilities, node failure and dual link failure survivability, offered by the single 100% segment protection. For both BSSP and SSPO schemes, we propose two novel efficient ILP formulations, based on a column generation mathematical modeling. While (SSPO) offers the advantage over (BSSP) to ensure both node and link protection, it is not necessarily much more costly. Indeed, depending on the network topology and the traffic instances, it can be shown that none of the two SSP schemes dominates the other one. Therefore, the SSPO protection scheme should be favored as it offers more protection, i.e., it adds the node protection to the link protection at the expense of a minor additional cost.


A phrase book that aims to provide a complete kit for effective communication abroad. The book contains useful phrases for travel and communication, menus, common signs and a selection of popular slang and colloquial expressions, as well as a pronunciation guide and a 5000-word dictionary.


Journalism is often thought of as the 'fourth estate' of democracy. This book suggests that journalism plays a more radical role in politics, and explores new ways of thinking about news media discourse. It develops an approach to investigating both hegemonic discourse and discursive fissures, inconsistencies and tensions. By analysing international news coverage of post-Soviet Russia, including the Beslan hostage-taking, Gazprom, Litvinenko and human rights issues, it demonstrates the (re)production of the 'common-sense' social order in which one particular area of the world is more developed, civilized and democratic than other areas. However, drawing on Laclau, Mouffe and other post-foundational thinkers, it also suggests that journalism is precisely the site where the instability of this global social order becomes visible. The book should be of interest to scholars of discourse analysis, journalism and communication studies, cultural studies and political science, and to anyone interested in 'positive' discourse analysis and practical counter-discursive strategies.


We present experimental results which test whether diffusion engineering can increase the energy resolution of a single-photon superconducting tunnel-junction spectrometer. When a UV photon is absorbed in superconducting Al, it creates an excess number of quasiparticles. If the superconducting absorber is the electrode of a tunnel junction, the quasiparticles tunnel across the voltage-biased junction. The collected charge is proportional to the number of excess quasiparticles. For small energy photons, the initiallycreated charge can be amplified by backtunnelling. The quasiparticles confined around the junction can backtunnel as holes after tunnelling, doubling the output charge, and then tunnel again. The charge multiplication is proportional to the confinement time. When the counterelectrode is terminated with a long, narrow lead, the quasiparticles diffuse out on a time scale set by the dimensions of the leads and of the electrodes, and the diffusion constant of the material. We show how the charge created by the photon varies with the purity of the Al film and with different lead geometries. The experimental results are compared to theoretical predictions of our model. We achieve an energy resolving power of 3 for a photon energy of 3.68 eV. Further investigation of losses in our materials should improve the energy resolution of our diffusion-engineered devices.


Summary.  Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) increases the risk of ischemic stroke 5‐fold and may not only be responsible for as many as 15% of all strokes that occur but also for larger and more disabling strokes than those attributable to other causes which increase the associated costs of care. Anticoagulation with warfarin in the target INR of 2.5 is a major clinical challenge in real‐life practice, given that the complex relationship between warfarin dosage and response is readily altered by a variety of factors such as concurrent medications, illnesses, genetic influences, and dietary/lifestyle changes. Consequently, INR values are out of the target range approximately half of the time in real‐life studies compared to clinical trial setting. Current anticoagulation therapies are less likely to be cost‐effective in routine clinical practice and need improvement. The aim of this review is to discuss the pharmacoeconomic consequences of this management strategy by analysing the optimal treatment option within specific age and risk groups, confirming current guidelines for a health economic perspective and considering the economic impact on health care policy. Methods: An electronic search of the Medline/PubMed database from 1966 to 2005 was performed to identify articles dealing with all pharmacoeconomic aspects of stroke prevention in atrial fibrillation. The following search terms were used: 'atrial fibrillation', 'stroke', 'cost', 'warfarin'. Results: Treatment with warfarin is cost‐effective (versus aspirin or no therapy) in patients with AF at moderate‐to‐high risk of stroke. The cost‐effectiveness of anticoagulation therapy is driven by the achieved risk reduction rather than the potential benefits estimated from clinical trials. Failure to maintain optimal anticoagulation places patients at risk of complications, the management of which is a significant cost driver. Conclusion: Improvement could be achieved by optimising physicians and patient's knowledge driven through prevention campaigns by health care policy.


B lymphocytes can synthesise Ig heavy chains that are either secreted or membrane-bound, the latter having a transmembrane domain and a short cytoplasmic domain. Membrane-bound Ig heavy chains and Ig light chains assemble in the ER with each other and with a heterodimer of Igα and Igβ, which mediate signalling and internalisation functions. The complex of these four polypeptides is called the B cell antigen receptor (BCR). BCR signalling occurs via three types of tyrosine kinases. Src-family kinases phosphorylate the two tyrosine-containing motif in the cytoplasmic domains of Igα and Igβ (the ITAMs), which recruits a second type of tyrosine kinase Syk. Syk is responsible for most downstream signalling, although calcium and diacylglycerol also require a third tyrosine kinase Btk. BCR signalling pathways are central to virtually all aspects of B cell biology, as they are required for B cell development, tolerance induction, survival and activation.

Key Concepts

Naive B cells express their immunoglobulin as a cell surface receptor for antigen, called the BCR (B cell receptor for antigen).
In developing precursors of B cells, the successful generation of an immunoglobulin heavy chain is sensed by the incorporation of that heavy chain into pre-BCR molecules, which exhibit constitutive signalling.
Signalling by the BCR controls development, survival and activation of B cells in a manner that is dependent on the developmental stage or activation state of the B cell. This signalling is important both for tolerisation of self-reactive B cells and for activation of B cells recognising foreign antigen.
Co-receptors that recognise complement components, sialic acid residues, or IgG bound to antigens strongly enhance or inhibit signalling by the BCR to aid in self-non-self-discrimination.
The BCR is also an endocytic receptor that delivers antigen to internal compartments where protein antigens are processed into peptides and loaded onto MHC class II molecules to facilitate interactions with T cells, which are essential for production of high-affinity antibodies.
Defects in generation of BCRs or signalling components of the BCR result in B cell immunodeficiencies, the most common of which is due to loss-of-function mutations of the intracellular protein tyrosine kinase Btk, referred to as X-linked agammaglobulinemia.
B cell malignancies often have activated BCR signalling as a driver of their proliferation and/or survival, and selective Btk inhibitors are now approved therapeutics for some types of B cell malignancies.

Keywords:

antibody;
membrane immunoglobulin;
BCR;
pre-BCR;
protein tyrosine kinase;
Syk;
Btk;
ITAM;
phosphoinositide signalling


The effect of employing coherent illumination (such as a laser source in scanning optical systems) upon image content is investigated with particular reference to the microdensitometer system. The method of investigation involves the application of coherence theory to the imaging process in systems where the small-angle approximations can be made and the optics of the system are diffraction limited. The output of the system is determined for a sharp-edged object as the area illuminated in the object plane or the width of the illuminating slit is varied. A system configuration is found in which the edge image does not exhibit the usual ringing or diffraction fringes associated with coherent illumination.


Ethical considerations and governance approaches of AI are at a crossroads. Either one tries to convey the impression that one can bring back a status quo ante of our given "onlife"-era [1,2], or one accepts to get responsibly involved in a digital world in which informational self-determination can no longer be safeguarded and fostered through the old fashioned data protection principles of informed consent, purpose limitation and data economy [3,4,6]. The main focus of the talk is on how under the given conditions of AI and machine learning, data sovereignty (interpreted as controllability [not control (!)] of the data subject over the use of her data throughout the entire data processing cycle [5]) can be strengthened without hindering innovation dynamics of digital economy and social cohesion of fully digitized societies. In order to put this approach into practice the talk combines a presentation of the concept of data sovereignty put forward by the German Ethics Council [3] with recent research trends in effectively applying the AI ethics principles of explainability and enforceability [4-9].


ABSTRACT This work aims at identifying the thymocyte subpopulation able to support human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) replication under the biological stimuli of the thymic microenvironment. In this report we demonstrate that interaction with thymic epithelial cells (TEC) induces a high-level replication of the T-tropic primary isolate HIV-1B-LAIp exclusively in the mature CD4+CD8− CD3+ thymocytes. Tumor necrosis factor (TNF) and interleukin-7 (IL-7), secreted during this interaction, are critical cytokines for HIV long terminal repeat transactivation through NF-κB-dependent activation. TNF is the major inducer of NF-κB and particularly of the p50-p65 complex, whereas IL-7 acts as a cofactor by sustaining the expression of the p75 TNF receptor. The requirement for TNF is further confirmed by the observation that the inability of the intermediate CD4+ CD8− CD3−thymocytes to replicate the virus is associated with a defect in TNF production during their interaction with TEC and correlates with the absence of nuclear NF-κB activity in these freshly isolated thymocytes. Addition of exogenous TNF to the intermediate thymocyte cultures induces NF-κB activity and is sufficient to promote HIV replication in the cocultures with TEC. The other major subpopulation expressing the CD4 receptor, namely, the double-positive (DP) CD4+ CD8+ CD3± thymocytes, despite the entry of the virus, do not produce a significant level of virus, presumably because they are unresponsive to TNF and IL-7. Together, these data suggest that in vivo, despite an efficient entry of the virus in all the CD4+ subpopulations, a high viral load may be generated exclusively within the mature CD4+CD8− CD3+ subset of thymocytes. However, under conditions of inflammatory response after infection, TNF might also be present in the intermediate thymocyte compartment, leading to efficient HIV replication in these cells.


Occupational exposures were assessed in a case-control study on testicular cancer using self administered questionnaires. Answers were obtained for 148 (91%) cases and 314 (87%) controls. Of the cases 101 had seminoma and 47 had embryonal testicular cancer. Occupational plastics work yielded odds ratio (OR) 2.9 with 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.3-6.5. Increased risk was found for embryonal cancer regarding farming (OR 3.1; CI 1.03-9.1) and contact with farm animals (OR 3.3; CI 1.00-10.9), but not for seminoma. For all testicular cancer exposure to insects repellents, mostly containing N,N-diethyl-m-toluamide (DEET) gave OR 1.7; CI 1.03-2.8, with a dose-response effect. Somewhat increased risks were found for amateur radio operators (OR 2.2; CI 0.7-6.6), work with radar equipment (OR 2.0; CI 0.3-14.2) and engineers in electronics and telecommunication industry (OR 2.3; CI 0.8-6.7) based on few exposed subjects, however. Video display unit work gave OR 1.5; CI 0.98-2.3 and for exposure 480 working days (median number) the risk increased further to OR 1.8; CI 1.1-3.2. Because of low numbers of exposed subjects in some calculations some of these results might be spurious and need to be further studied.


Isotope effects of ECRH plasma in LHD were investigated in detail. A clear difference of transport and turbulence characteristics in H and D plasmas was found in the core region, with normalized radius ρ < 0.8 in high collisionality regime. On the other hand, differences of transport and turbulence were relatively small in low collisionality regime. Power balance analysis and neoclassical calculation showed a reduction of the anomalous contribution to electron and ion transport in D plasma compared with H plasma in the high collisionality regime. In core region, density modulation experiments also showed more reduced particle diffusion in D plasma than in H plasma, in the high collisionality regime. Ion scale turbulence was clearly reduced at ρ < 0.8 in high collisionality regime in D plasma compared with H plasma. The gyrokinetic linear analyses showed that the dominant instability ρ = 0.5 and 0.8 were ion temperature gradient mode (ITG). The linear growth rate of ITG was reduced in D plasma than in H plasma in high collisionality regime. This is due to the lower normalized ITG and density gradient. More hollowed density profile in D plasma is likely to be the key control parameter. Present analyses suggest that anomalous process play a role to make hollower density profiles in D plasma rather than neoclassical process. Electron scale turbulence were also investigated from the measurements and linear gyrokinetic simulations.


This article aims to analyze different types of Social Networks, its purpose, success and evolution, and also its advantages for people and businesses in particular in Real Estate mediation in Portugal. This article includes some research related to the use of Social Networks and its relationships with Real Estate. First the social networks and issues related to investment and Marketing relations are analysed, structured and classified, and it is also analysed the Real Estate business. Then there are presented some statistics based on data according to Social Networking use in Real Estate companies in Portugal and in particular, the use of Facebook. Finally, some conclusions of this study are presented and highlighted the main limitations of this research as well as some recommendations for future studies. According to statistics made by Real Estate companies in Portugal, in a universe of 3231, and given a sample of about 500 companies in the Real Estate business, 15% have their own sites and in these, Facebook subscription is over 12%, 4% on Twitter, 1% on LinkedIn, and no more than 1% on YouTube. By Adding and adapting technologies and new trends like Social Networks and using the Internet, we can expect a better understanding of consumers and new ways of doing business and new business opportunities. There are few articles referring to Social Networks and Real Estate and in Portuguese reality this is even more uncommon. This kind of researches should be more frequent and compared, when possible, with other countries and other situations.


Part I. Looking Back. Chapter 1. The Discovery of the Human Newborn: A Brief History (J. Kevin Nugent, PhD). Part II. Contemporary Research And Practice: International Perspectives Research on Newborn Behavior and Development. Chapter 2. Predicting Development for Extremely Low Birth Weight Infants: Sweden (Karin Stjernqvist, PhD). Chapter 3. The Effects of Newborn Massage: U.S.A. (Tiffany Field, PhD). Chapter 4. Perinatal Factors Influencing Development: Spain (Carme Costas-Moragas, PhD). Chapter 5. Supporting Parents of At-Risk Infants: Lessons from Japan (Shohei Ohgi, PhD and Tomitaro Akiyama, MD). Chapter 6. The Cultural Context of the Mother-Infant Relationship: Korea (Yeonghee Shin, RN, PhD and Byunghi Park, EdD). Chapter 7. Moments of Meeting: Pivotal Moments in Mother, Infant, Father Bonding: Switzerland (Nadia Bruschweiler-Stern, MD). Chapter 8. The Developmental Niche of the Young Infant: Kenya (Charles M. Super, PhD and Sara Harkness, PhD, MPH). Early Intervention with Infants and Families. Chapter 9. Early Intervention and Fatherhood: Denmark(Hanne Munck, Cand. Psych.). Chapter 10. A Model for Working in Community Health Settings: The U.K. (Joanna Hawthorne, PhD and Betty Hutchon, SROT). Chapter 11. Using the NBO with At-Risk Infants and Families: U.S.A. (Yvette Blanchard, ScD, PT). Chapter 12. Early Intervention in an Australian Setting (Beulah Warren, MA Hons). Chapter 13. Reaching Out to Rural Communities: A Community Health Model: Thailand (Nittaya Jirathiyut Kotchabhakdi, MD, MS (MCH) and Naiphinich Kotchabhakdi, PhD). Chapter 14. Maternal-Child and Family Nursing and Preventive Intervention: U.S A. (Kristie Brandt, RN, CNM, MSN, ND). New Models in Training Health Care Professionals. Chapter 15. The Touchpoints Approach (Ann Coleman Stadtler, MSN, CPNP and John Hornstein, EdD). Chapter 16. The Newborn as a Touchpoint: Training Pediatricians in Portugal (Joao Gomes-Pedro, PhD, MD). Chapter 17. Humanizing the Infant: France (Drina Candilis-Huisman, PhD and Marie Fabre-Grenet, MD). Chapter 18. The NBAS in a North Carolina Clinical Setting: Hospital and Home (James M. Helm, PhD and Marie A. Reilly, PT, PhD). Chapter 19. Relationship-Based Practice in the Newborn Nursery: Thoughts for the Pediatric Professional: USA (Constance Keefer, MD, Lise Carolyn Johnson, MD, and Susan Minear, MD). Chapter 20. Preparing Professionals to Work with Newborns: The Brazelton Institute Experience: USA ( Jean Gardner Cole, MS, Cecilia F. Matson, MA, and Thembi Ranuga, MPH, MS, APRN-BC). Chapter 21. Integrating Developmental Principles into the Daily Work of Health Professionals: Italy (Gherardo Rapisardi, MD Adrienne Davidson, MS, BPT, Roberto Paludetto, MD, and Giuseppina Mansi, PhD). Part III. Looking Towards The Future. Chapter 22. A View from the Lab (Rachel Keen, PhD). Chapter 23. Parent-Infant Bonding and Doula Support (John H. Kennell, MD). Chapter 24. The Brazelton Baby: The Other Side of the Coin (Ed Tronick, PhD). Chapter 25. Evolving Family Dynamics and Neonatal Assessment (Bonnie J. Petrauskas). Chapter 26. Future Dialogue Between the Neurosciences and the Behavioral Observation of Infants (Daniel N. Stern, MD and Nadia Bruschweiler-Stern, MD). Chapter 27. The Role of the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale: Personal Reflections (T. Berry Brazelton, MD).


Heteronuclear lanthanide terephthalate coordination polymers with the general chemical formula [Ln2-2xLn2x(bdc)3(H2O)4], for which bdc2- symbolizes benzene-1,4-dicarboxylate (or terephthalate) and Ln and Ln represent trivalent rare earth ions, were synthesized and structurally characterized. Analysis of the Y/Lu compounds by 89Y and 13C solid-state NMR spectroscopy was carried out, and the results support the hypothesis of randomly distributed lanthanide ions. The spectroscopic and colorimetric properties of this family of compounds were investigated in detail. The resulting data demonstrate that this series of compounds presents highly tunable luminescence properties and clearly indicate that intermetallic deactivation processes play an important role in the emission mechanism. Playing with intermetallic distances allows one to tune the color and the brightness of the lanthanide emission in these coordination polymers.


Context and objectives The dominant majority of the oil and gas reservoirs in the Middle East and in Qatar in particular are composed of carbonate porous media. Therefore, a better description of the heterogeneous carbonate porous media is a key challenge that will ultimately lead to efficiently unlock and develop new reserves. One of the main characteristics of carbonate rocks is their high reactivity in contact with hydrochloric acids. Therefore, matrix acidizing producer wells in carbonate formations is a common operational practice that helps to increase the permeability of the damaged or tight near wellbore region. One of the main objectives of matrix acid stimulation is to achieve a good zonal coverage with the acid, especially to stimulate hydrocarbon production from low permeability zones, especially in the presence of high permeability contrasts. However, field applications show that matrix acid stimulation leads often to an insufficient increase of permeability in the targeted region as well as an increase in water production from watered zones. Solution In this context, Qatar Petroleum and TOTAL are jointly investigating improved acid stimulation methodologies in carbonates. Within our testing facilities at Qatar Science and Technology Park (a member of the Qatar Foundation) and in liaison with TOTAL's research headquarters in France, we performed high pressure and temperature single and dual core flooding experiments over a range of four different carbonate rocks with different permeability and pore structures. Results Live and emulsified acids were used as well as Relative Permeability Modifiers (RPMs) and particle-laden diverters. Changes in permeability were measured in real time during the injection across the length of the cores. In addition, pre and post-injection micro-CT scanning allowed the visualization of different dissolution patterns (mainly dominant worm-holing). Changes in porosity induced by the chemical reactions were also deduced based on image analysis. We compared the response of different acid types and assess the impact of RPMs on brine and oil flow. Conclusions The test results will serve as a basis for elaborating new acid pumping sequences for well stimulation an also to benchmark different commercial and academic acid stimulation software. The results can be used to different applications such as carbon storage in heterogeneous carbonates.


In the clamour of predictions about future climate changes, it can be difficult to get hold of facts. However, by drilling ice cores from polar ice sheets and analysing them, we can obtain data on the atmosphere – its temperature and composition – as far back as a million years ago. The resulting patterns can help us to predict what climatic conditions we might expect in the future.


We will study open and hidden charm scalar meson resonances within two different models. The first one is a direct application of a chiral Lagrangian already used to study flavor symmetry breaking in Skyrme models. In another approach to the problem a SU(4) symmetric Lagrangian is built and the symmetry is broken down to SU(3) by identifying currents where heavy mesons are exchanged and suppressing those. Unitarization in coupled channels leads to dynamical generation of resonances in both models, in particular, a new hidden charm resonance with mass 3.7 GeV is predicted. The small differences between these models and with previous works is discussed. We also perform an error analysis of the results, checking their stability and determining the uncertainties in masses and couplings of the heavy resonances.


Lawmaking bodies in one polity sometimes incorporate the law of another polity "dynamically," so that when the law of the foreign jurisdiction changes, the law of the incorporating jurisdiction changes automatically. Dynamic incorporation can save lawmaking costs, lead to better legal rules and standards, and solve collective action problems. Thus, the phenomenon is widespread. Dynamic incorporation does, however, delegate lawmaking power. Further, as the formal and practical barriers to revocation of the act of dynamic incorporation become higher, that act comes closer to a cession of sovereignty, and for democratic polities, such cessions entail a democratic loss. Accordingly, dynamic incorporation of foreign law has proven controversial both within federal systems and at the international level. The problem is most acute when nation states agree to delegate lawmaking power to a supranational entity. In order to gain the reciprocal benefits of cooperation and coordination, the delegation must be functionally irrevocable or nearly so. Representation of the member nation states within the decision-making structures of the supranational entity can ameliorate, but cannot fully compensate for, the resulting democratic losses suffered by those nation states. More broadly, the benefits of dynamic incorporation must always be balanced against its costs, including the cost to selfgovernance.


The endemic landbirds of the Seychelles granitic islands have suffered considerable losses due to predation by introduced rats and cats and extensive habitat destruction. With less than 100 individuals, the Critically Endangered Magpie Robin Copsychus sechellarum Newton, faces the greatest risk of extinction. Translocations to three predator-free islands, Aride, Cousin and Cousine, have provided valuable opportunities for gaining insights into the ecology of the species. Of particular interest are links between the Magpie Robin, endemic skinks Mabvya spp., groundliving invertebrates and seabird colonies. Magpie Robin faecal pellet and skink gut content analysis demonstrated a high degree of dietary overlap between the species. A widespread exotic cockroach Pycnoscelus indicus.was the favourite prey item for each species. However, behavioural observations and a dietary choice experiment indicated that there is no significant competition for food during the main seabird breeding season. Invertebrate sampling on Cousine identified 52 species which were available in all habitat types currently in use or those considered suitable for the Magpie Robin. Seabird and skink density counts on Cousine demonstrated the considerable magnitude of vertebrate organic food also available. Invertebrate sampling results on Cousin and Cousine were used to determine territory quality and the carrying capacity of each island for the Magpie Robin. While most seabirds are not breeding, skink survival depends on invertebrate abundance. M. wrightii weight declined throughout this period but that of M sechellensis remained fairly stable. The data were insufficient to conclude that inter-specific competition for food exists between M. sechellensis and the Magpie Robin during this period. Further expansion of the Magpie Robin population depends on eradicating mammalian predators from other islands and maximising the potential carrying capacities of those already supporting the species.


Background: A deep discussion of the phases of planning by all stakeholders will help to identify the challenges faced by countries that are embarking on large-scale restoration actions to comply with international agreements.
Question: Was the planning phase of restoration projects done according to international guidance? We evaluated six of the eight aspects of the international guidance for the planning phase of restoration projects carried out in Mexico between 1979 and 2016.
Methods: The information about the restoration projects was compiled using a digital survey composed of 137 questions.
Results: Seventy-five projects with a total area of 1,556,840 hectares were analyzed, mainly in temperate, humid, and deciduous forest. More projects measured the baseline with biotic than with abiotic variables, and social variables were seldom evaluated. Most projects aimed to recover biodiversity or ecosystem services, and they identified a reference ecosystem. Planned budgets included mainly field work.
Conclusions: To promote the integration of ecological, social, and economic priorities, landscape restoration is suggested, since it is done at a scale which maximizes the benefits for nature and people. The inclusion of only field work in the budgets may decrease the total cost, but it may jeopardize project success due to poor planning. Careful and detailed planning of a national strategy constructed by all stakeholders that includes restoration of original ecosystems, agroforestry systems (which facilitate social participation and increase land productivity) and patches under natural succession, and investing in highly trained human resources will allow successful compliance with international restoration commitments.


Ghana has been using the Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) approach since 2010 and adistrict wide ODF has been difficult to achieve. Nandom district in the Upper West Region of Ghana seems to be on a promising path towards achieving the status. The Sustainable Sanitation and Hygiene for All (SSH4A) programme implemented by SNV, The Netherlands Development Organisation and Eight district Assemblies in Ghana has been a ladder the Nandom district leans on striving to achieve a district wide ODF status. The SSH4A Programme, funded by DFID integrates best practices in sanitation demand creation, supply chain strengthening, hygiene behaviour change communication, governance, gender and social inclusion. Nandom district is poised to being first to be declared ODF with only eight communities remaining. Over 50,000 new people have access to improved sanitation in the district accounting for an 80% coverage. This writeup show cases key lessons learnt which would be used by government and developmental partners to optimize and sustain future outcomes.


Late Miocene plutons in coastal Chiapas, Mexico, represent the roots of an extinct magmatic arc. Miocene granitoids of calc-alkaline composition and arc chemistry intruded into and were deformed within the Tonala mylonite belt in the middle to upper crust. The mylonite belt is a crustal-scale shear zone extending along the western margin of the Chiapas Massif for ∼150 km. Deformation is characterized by a dominantly subhorizontal lineation and subvertical foliation along a strikingly linear zone that trends ∼310°. Mylonitic fabrics contain ambiguous but dominantly sinistral shear indicators. Intrusions are interpreted as syntectonic on the basis of similar U-Pb zircon crystallization age estimates (ca. 10 Ma) and the cooling age estimates obtained on neoformed micas in the mylonite. The plutons are elongated, their long axis is parallel to shear zone, and some plutons show markedly asymmetric outcrop patterns, with sheared tails that trail behind the intrusions and that are consistent with sinistral displacement. Parts of plutons were mylonitized by continuous deformation in the Tonala shear zone, locally developing intricate pseudotachylyte and cataclasite veins slightly oblique to the mylonite foliation. Outside of the shear zone, plutons preserve magmatic fabrics. These observations are consistent with features common to syntectonic granites interpreted to have been emplaced along strike-slip shear zones in a transpressional setting. We interpret the Tonala mylonites as representing a relict transform boundary that was slightly oblique to the Polochic-Motagua fault system, which accommodated over 100 km of sinistral displacement between the Chortis block (on the Caribbean plate) and Chiapas (on the North America plate) in late Miocene time.


Knowledge of the evolutionary history of birds has much improved in recent decades. Fossils from critical time periods are being described at unprecedented rates and modern phylogenetic analyses have provided a framework for the interrelationships of the extant groups. This book gives an overview of the avian fossil record and its paleobiological significance, and it is the only up-to-date textbook that covers both Mesozoic and more modern-type Cenozoic birds in some detail. The reader is introduced to key features of basal avians and the morphological transformations that have occurred in the evolution towards modern birds. An account of the Cenozoic fossil record sheds light on the biogeographic history of the extant avian groups and discusses fossils in the context of current phylogenetic hypotheses. This review of the evolutionary history of birds not only addresses students and established researchers, but it may also be a useful source of information for anyone else with an interest in the evolution of birds and a moderate background in biology and geology.


In the exploration of the Russian Arctic German-spelling names of scientists occurred since the 18th century. Geographers and geologists like Alexander von Middendorff, Ernst von Bar, Alexander Bunge, Eduard von Toll studied the frozen ground in Siberia and established by doing so permafrost research.
Today joint Russian-German research continues in Siberia, mainly hosted by the Mel'nikov Permafrost Institute (Yakutsk), the faculties of Geology, of Geography and of Soil Science of the Moscow State University (Moscow), the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (St. Petersburg), the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems in Soil Science (Pushchino), and the Alfred Wegener Institute (Potsdam), the Institute of Soil Science (Hamburg University). The major scientific topics of this long-term research are permafrost archives, paleoclimate and landscape dynamics; coastal dynamics and subsea permafrost; permafrost degradation and modern changes of permafrost landscapes. More than 30 joint expeditions since 1993 took Russian and German scientists to Central and East Siberia.


Rotational zoning systems (RZSs) have been applied as a spatial management tool for fisheries in developed countries. Fishing grounds are divided into numerous plots and assigned a cyclical periodicity for harvest. This is a distinct spatial management measure that differs from more common measures in the tropics, like periodic closures or marine protected areas. We find that biological prerequisites for rotational closures are tenuous for many tropical reef species, and they are likely to put stocks of threatened species at further risk. RZSs can be successful if enough is known about the biology and ecology of target species, if the rotational cycles are long enough to allow population recovery, and if there is enough technical capacity to plan, implement and enforce management measures. However, RZSs are likely to fail in small-scale fisheries in the Pacific Islands and low-income countries owing to a combination of modest technical capacity for planning and monitoring, weak enforcement, complex access rights to fishing grounds, and high numbers of fishers.


In May 1861, Jefferson Davis issued a general call for volunteers for the Confederate Army. Men responded in such numbers that 200,000 had to be turned away. Few of these men would have attributed their zeal to the cause of states' rights or slavery. As All That Makes a Man: Love and Ambition in the Civil War South makes clear, most southern men saw the war more simply as a test of their manhood, a chance to defend the honor of their sweethearts, fiances, and wives back home. Drawing upon diaries and personal letters, Stephen Berry seamlessly weaves together the stories of six very different men, detailing the tangled roles that love and ambition played in each man's life. Their writings reveal a male-dominated Southern culture that exalted women as "repositories of divine grace" and treasured romantic love as the platform from which men launched their bids for greatness. The exhilarating onset of war seemed to these, and most southern men, a grand opportunity to fulfill their ambition for glory and to prove their love for women-on the same field of battle. As the realities of the war became apparent, however, the letters and diaries turned from idealized themes of honor and country to solemn reflections on love and home. Elegant and poetic, All That Makes a Man recovers the emotional lives of unsung Southern men and women and reveals that the fiction of Cold Mountain mirrors a poignant reality. In their search for a cause worthy of their lives, many Southern soldiers were disappointed in their hopes for a Southern nation. But they still had their women's love, and there they would rebuild.


We demonstrate EGG (Evolving Graph Generator), an open-source framework for generating evolving RDF graphs based on finely-tuned temporal constraints given by the user. During the demonstration, we will showcase the highly-expressive constraints that the user can specify in EGG to generate evolving graphs over various real-world use cases, the accuracy and scalability of the generator, and the ease of using EGG in performance comparisons of evolving graph processing systems.


The polygon action and the meshing impact of silent chain can be reduced by the change of the link plate structure. However, the change of the link plate structure may result in the complexity of manufacture. A new modified involute profile for sprocket is put forward based on the law of motion between the link plate and the driving sprocket. The modified involute profile is obtained by use of a unified program between VB and AutoCAD. The kinematic and dynamic simulation of silent chain with the new profile is performed by use of ADAMS. The results show that the polygon action of silent chain mechanism can be reduced and the smoothness of the silent chain drive is effectively improved as the sprocket is of the new modified involute profile.


The perceptual significance of enhancing amplitude contrasts at the onset of formant transitions in CV-syllables and of reducing the "speaking" tempo was studied with a group of normally developing school children. Natural and synthetic speech stimuli were used in the perception experiments. A total of 83 children, second and third graders, were tested on their ability to discriminate between CV syllables presented in pairs. The results indicate that the children's discrimination performance resisted acoustic manipulations of both the natural and synthetic stimuli. Neither spectral nor timing manipulations rendered significant differencesin discrimination results.


Mysteries of the Jaguar Shamans of the Northwest Amazon tells the life story of Mandu da Silva, the last living jaguar shaman among the Baniwa people in the northwest Amazon. In this original and engaging work, Robin M. Wright, who has known and worked with da Silva for more than thirty years, weaves the story of da Silva's life together with the Baniwas' society, history, mythology, cosmology, and jaguar shaman traditions. The jaguar shamans are key players in what Wright calls "a nexus of religious power and knowledge" in which healers, sorcerers, priestly chanters, and dance-leaders exercise complementary functions that link living specialists with the deities and great spirits of the cosmos. By exploring in depth the apprenticeship of the shaman, Wright shows how jaguar shamans acquire the knowledge and power of the deities in several stages of instruction and practice. This volume is the first mapping of the sacred geography ("mythscape") of the Northern Arawak-speaking people of the northwest Amazon, demonstrating direct connections between petroglyphs and other inscriptions and Baniwa sacred narratives as a whole. In eloquent and inviting analytic prose, Wright links biographic and ethnographic elements in elevating anthropological writing to a new standard of theoretically aware storytelling and analytic power.


The award to the experts who have made outstanding contributions to advancing in Materials Science and Nano Technology. It is the foremost prestigious award of the total conference and is labelled as scientific service action award. The eligibility criteria for achieving this award is that one should have minimum of 20+ years of experience in the Material Engineering, Nano Technology, Polymer Engineering, Bio Materials Green Technologies in public or private sector. The receiver of this award should have a dedicated fascination and should take initiative in researching the recent trends and developments towards the related subjects.


The results obtained from a study into the influences of certain technological factors on separation efficiencies of a fluidised layer of granular material (FLGM) are summarised. This study shows that the mechanism of interception of destabilised impurities on the surface of a granular medium corresponds to the mechanism of mutual particle aggregation of destabilised impurities. The efficiency of this process is influenced by the degree of destabilisation and degree of aggregation of the particles of impurities. The highest efficiencies are obtained when the particles of impurities enter a FLGM immediately after the completion of their destabilisation and their aggregation takes place entirely in the FLGM.


Transferring knowledge from a teacher neural network pretrained on the same or a similar task to a student neural network can significantly improve the performance of the student neural network. Existing knowledge transfer approaches match the activations or the corresponding hand-crafted features of the teacher and the student networks. We propose an information-theoretic framework for knowledge transfer which formulates knowledge transfer as maximizing the mutual information between the teacher and the student networks. We compare our method with existing knowledge transfer methods on both knowledge distillation and transfer learning tasks and show that our method consistently outperforms existing methods. We further demonstrate the strength of our method on knowledge transfer across heterogeneous network architectures by transferring knowledge from a convolutional neural network (CNN) to a multi-layer perceptron (MLP) on CIFAR-10. The resulting MLP significantly outperforms the-state-of-the-art methods and it achieves similar performance to the CNN with a single convolutional layer.


Urban planning as a networked field of governance can be an essential contributor for de-colonising planning education and shaping pathways to urban equality. Educating planners with the capabilities to address complex socio-economic, environmental and political processes that drive inequality requires critical engagement with multiple knowledges and urban praxes in their learning processes. However, previous research on cities of the global South has identified severe quantitative deficits, outdated pedagogies, and qualitative shortfalls in current planning education. Moreover, the political economy and pedagogic practices adopted in higher education programmes often reproduce Western-centric political imaginations of planning, which in turn reproduce urban inequality. Many educational institutions across the global South, for example, continue teaching colonial agendas and fail to recognise everyday planning practices in the way cities are built and managed. This article contributes to a better understanding of the relation between planning education and urban inequalities by critically exploring the distribution of regional and global higher education networks and their role in de-colonising planning. The analysis is based on a literature review, quantitative and qualitative data from planning and planning education networks, as well as interviews with key players within them. The article scrutinises the geography of these networks to bring to the fore issues of language, colonial legacies and the dominance of capital cities, which, among others, currently work against more plural epistemologies and praxes. Based on a better understanding of the networked field of urban planning in higher education and ongoing efforts to open up new political imaginations and methodologies, the article suggests emerging room for manoeuvre to foster planner's capabilities to shape urban equality at scale.


The study was conducted among Intervida beneficiaries (Students) on October 2010. Total number of students was 46. The purpose of the study was to assess the nutritional status and dietary intake of the orphan children. All of the children were abandoned and got admitted to the ICH within one year of age. Among them 89.1% were Muslim, 2.2% were Christian and 8.7% were Hindu. 8.70 % students got enrolled in special education as they were either physically or mentally disabled. The mean±Sd of age, height and weight were 104.65±16.51 months, 126.37±6.98cm and 26.87±6.98kg respectively. While BMI was considered, it was found that 60.87% (28) students were normal, 21.74% (10) student were overweight, 6.5% (3) students were and 10.87% (5) students were underweight. Considering HAZ (Height for age Z-score), 89.1% (41) were normal, 8.7% (4) Stunted and 2.2% (1) tall. While WAZ (Weight for age Z-score) was considered, 84.8% (39) were normal, 2.2% (1) was overweight and 13% (6) were underweight. On the other hand, when, WHZ(Weight for Height Z-score) was used, it was found that 83.8% (31) students were normal, 8.1% (3) student were overweight , 5.4% (2) students were obese and 2.7% (1) student was Wasted. The mean calorie, protein, carbohydrate and fat intake were 2270 kcal, 65 gram, 335 gram and 73 gram respectively. Carbohydrate, protein and fat provided 59%, 12% and 29% of total calorie respectively. Average intake of calcium, iron, vitamin A, carotene, vitamin B1, vitamin B2, niacin, vitamin C and zinc intake was 826 mg, 31 mg, 6462 IU, 10508 μg, 1.60 mg , 1.64 mg, 19 mg , 111 mg and 10.2 mg respectively. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bjnut.v24i0.14034 Bangladesh J. Nutr. Vol. 24-25 Dec 2011-2012 pp.23-30


. The selection of appropriate hyperpriors for variance parameters is an important and sensible topic in all kinds of Bayesian regression models involving the specification of (conditionally) Gaussian prior structures where the variance parameters determine a data-driven, adaptive amount of prior variability or precision. We consider the special case of structured additive distributional regression where Gaussian priors are used to enforce specific properties such as smoothness or shrinkage on various effect types combined in predictors for multiple parameters related to the distribution of the response. Relying on a recently proposed class of penalised complexity priors motivated from a general set of construction principles, we derive a hyperprior structure where prior elicitation is facilitated by assumptions on the scaling of the different effect types. The posterior distribution is assessed with an adaptive Markov chain Monte Carlo scheme and conditions for its propriety are studied theoretically. We investigate the new type of scale-dependent priors in simulations and two challenging applications, in particular in comparison to the standard inverse gamma priors but also alternatives such as half-normal, half-Cauchy and proper uniform priors for standard deviations.


The interaction between an interviewee and an interviewer in a narrative life story interview is a relevant topic in oral history as well as in empirical social sciences in general. This relationship seems to be central especially with regard to the validity of memories produced in interviews as it affects in various ways the narrative and memory alike. The interview situation has immediate influence onto what is being remembered at all, which memories are being narrated and which are not.Following such general considerations concerning the various problems of life story interviews this article sheds light upon some questions raised by philosophy of history, e.g. how the past becomes a "historic item". The major question addressed is how the present circumstances and conditions shape the way the past is narrated and how this has to be considered when dealing with life story interviews.


Energy-Based Models (EBMs) present a flexible and appealing way to represent uncertainty. Despite recent advances, training EBMs on high-dimensional data remains a challenging problem as the state-of-the-art approaches are costly, unstable, and require considerable tuning and domain expertise to apply successfully. In this work, we present a simple method for training EBMs at scale which uses an entropy-regularized generator to amortize the MCMC sampling typically used in EBM training. We improve upon prior MCMC-based entropy regularization methods with a fast variational approximation. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach by using it to train tractable likelihood models. Next, we apply our estimator to the recently proposed Joint Energy Model (JEM), where we match the original performance with faster and stable training. This allows us to extend JEM models to semi-supervised classification on tabular data from a variety of continuous domains.


Optimum proportional-plus-integral control settings for speed - fuel-flow control, determined by minimization of integral criteria, correlated well with analytically predicted optimum settings. Engine response data are given for a range of control settings around the optimum. An inherent nonlinearity in the speed-area loop necessitated the use of nonlinear controls. Response data for two such nonlinear control schemes are presented.


We disentangle the effects of monetary policy announcements on real economic variables into an interest rate shock component and a central bank information shock component. We identify both components using changes in interest rate futures and in exchange rates around monetary policy announcements. While the volatility of interest rate surprises declines around the Great Recession, the volatility of exchange rate changes increases. Making use of this heteroskedasticity, we estimate that a contractionary interest rate shock appreciates the dollar, increases the excess bond premium, and leads to a decline in prices and output, while a positive information shock appreciates the dollar, decreases prices and the excess bond premium, and increases output.


Abstract : This thesis explores the use of an artificial physics framework to provide centralized control of a collection of agents in close proximity to a human operator. Based on the spatial separation between agents, agents to way-point, and agents to operator, the artificial physics framework calculates virtual forces that are summed and translated into velocity commands. The virtual forces are modeled after real physical forces such as gravitational and Coulomb, forces but are not restricted to them, for example, the force magnitude may not be proportional to one divided by separation distance squared. These virtual forces allow the collection of agents, or the swarm, to autonomously find the operator, create a formation, and navigate way-points. The operator has high-level control of the agents via a hand held-controller. This framework is applicable to a scenario where an operator in the field needs to work with several autonomous vehicles but is unable to devote a high-level of focus to controlling agent behavior.We implemented an artificial physics framework in two simulation environments and in physical indoor experiments with a team of three unmanned aerial vehicles. The results from the physical experiments show that an artificial physics-based framework is an effective way to allow multiple agents to follow a human operator inside a small arena with only minimal operator input.


Characteristics of stroke cases, acute stroke care, and outcomes after stroke differ according to geographical and cultural background. To provide epidemiological and clinical data on stroke care in South Korea, we analyzed a prospective multicenter clinical stroke registry, the Clinical Research Center for Stroke-Fifth Division (CRCS-5). Patients were 58% male with a mean age of 67.2±12.9 years and median National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale score of 3 [1-8] points. Over the 6 years of operation, temporal trends were documented including increasing utilization of recanalization treatment with shorter onset-to-arrival delay and decremental length of stay. Acute recanalization treatment was performed in 12.7% of cases with endovascular treatment utilized in 36%, but the proportion of endovascular recanalization varied across centers. Door-to-IV alteplase delay had a median of 45 [33-68] min. The rate of symptomatic hemorrhagic transformation (HT) was 7%, and that of any HT was 27% among recanalization-treated cases. Early neurological deterioration occurred in 15% of cases and were associated with longer length of stay and poorer 3-month outcomes. The proportion of mRS scores of 0-1 was 42% on discharge, 50% at 3 months, and 55% at 1 year after the index stroke. Recurrent stroke up to 1 year occurred in 4.5% of patients; the rate was higher among older individuals and those with neurologically severe deficits. The above findings will be compared with other Asian and US registry data in this article.


This paper examines new civic engagement practices unfolding during the 2017 referendum on independence in Catalonia. These practices constitute one of the first signs of some emerging trends in the use of the Internet for civic and political action: the adoption of horizontal, distributed, and privacy-enhancing technologies that rely on P2P networks and advanced cryptographic tools. In this regard, the case of the 2017 Catalan referendum, framed within conflicting political dynamics, can be considered a first-of-its kind in participatory democracy. The case also offers an opportunity to reflect on an interesting paradox that twenty-first century activism will face: the more it will rely on private-friendly, secured, and encrypted networks, the more open, inclusive, ethical, and transparent it will need to be.


Economics have significantly changed the way people think about work processes in several sectors, especially the mining industry. Mining companies search for suitable technologies to improve key operational areas, as operating processes efficiency is important to production economics. Many prior research studies indicate that hauling cost accounts for more than 50% of the total operational cost in open-pit mines. Therefore, in line with these findings, the purpose of this paper is to examine the benefits from applying a global positioning system (GPS) to a coal hauling operation in Indonesia. Understanding the strategic potential of GPS technology adoption in mining industries requires knowledge of actual working methods. One also needs to understand the process of simulation which is formulated by constructing mathematical models to represent working methods. Once the simulation is obtained, it can explain changing or unexpected circumstances in the mine, and support decisions for solving problems in mining operations.


The creation of a number of very large and sometimes increasingly complex financial institutions, resulting in part from the on-going consolidation of the financial system, has raised concerns that the degree of systemic risk in the financial system may have increased. We argue that firm interdependencies, as measured by correlations of stock returns, provide an indicator of systemic risk potential. We analyze the dynamics of the stock return correlations of a sample of U.S. large and complex banking organizations (LCBOs) over 1988-1999, and find a significant positive trend in stock return correlations. In addition, we relate firms' return correlations to their consolidation activity. Consolidation at the sample LCBOs appears to have contributed to LCBOs interdependencies. However, consolidation elasticities of correlation exhibit substantial time variation, and likely declined in the latter part of the decade. Thus, factors other than consolidation have also been responsible for the upward trend in return correlations.


In wireless sensor networks, power consumption is one of the key design issues because a large number of sensor nodes are powered by cheap batteries. Switching the RF transceiver, which is one of the biggest power consumers in a sensor node, to low-power sleep mode as much as possible has been proven to be a very efficient way to save power with a factor of tens or even hundreds. So far, several schemes have been proposed to reduce the duty cycle of the RF transceiver by MAC layer scheduling. Among them, the wake-up-frame scheme and the WiseMAC are two very efficient protocols based on the so-called preamble sampling technology. This paper proposes combining these two schemes to obtain a further optimized low-power MAC protocol, called SyncWUF, for low-traffic wireless sensor network. Analytical and simulation results prove that our proposal achieves significant battery lifetime gain in different application cases without negatively affecting other important system parameters such as channel capacity and latency


If current trends continue, 44 percent of U.S. adults will be obese within 20 years, with rates exceeding 60 percent in 13 states. For geographic areas with less of an obesity problem, the solution is usually solved by purchasing machines that can accommodate 450-500 pounds, Raul Uppot, MD, interventional radiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and assistant professor at Harvard Medical School told Diagnostic Imaging. "But even if you have trouble getting one person on the machine, this is a problem," he said. The Reality Statistics are one thing, but for radiological technologists like Curtis Carpenter in Vero Beach, Fla., the problem seems to be growing. "It's a major problem not only for seasoned technologists, but for students coming out of school who don't know what to do when they have someone who is so large," he said. Carpenter's current employer just purchased a new lithography machine because the previous one wasn't robust enough. "We kept canceling patients because they exceeded the 300 pound weight limit," Carpenter said. "We had to make a $650,000 expenditure because of the obesity problem." It's an issue for everyone involved in imaging, said Uppot. As the front-line people moving the patients onto the scanner tables or turning over patients during an ultrasound, technologists have to worry about injury. Newer equipment with pulleys help do this more safely. MRI scanners tend to have a lower weight limit and smaller gantry, while CT machines are slightly larger. "The most common point at which hospitals get into an issue, is when the patient can't fit into the CT scanner," Uppot said. Some outpatient open MRI units can support a slightly larger weight limit. And ultrasounds can be used if the patient isn't mobile, but due to tissue amount, you can't always get a good image. When this happens, you revert to pre-imaging days, relying on a physical and clinical exam, said Uppot, to help determine the diagnosis. "With imaging, we've been spoiled. They come in, and we scan them for an answer," he said. "If imaging equipment isn't available, you have to revert back to your clinical skills." It might result in the patient getting exploratory surgery, which is already more difficult on bariatric patients. If the patient is stable, Uppot said, they'd be observed after a clinical exam and treated empirically. Manufacturing Challenges While making larger machines is a business opportunity, it's also a challenge. And they're not just creating these machines to handle obese patients, but also to accommodate those who are tall, athletic or pregnant, all of whom can be difficult to image said Michael Wendt, senior vice president of the imaging and therapy systems division at Siemens Healthcare in the U.S. and Canada. "We're not singling out or making products purely for obese patients, but a wider population," he said. The most limiting part of the anatomy isn't fat, but the shoulders, said Lawrence Murphy, chief designer at GE Healthcare. A 65–70 cm bore often restricts the shoulders more than a large abdomen. When people lie down, they puddle, meaning their body relaxes and tissue spreads out, helping them fit into the machine, said Murphy. However, large and athletic people have large shoulders, making it difficult to fit them into the bore. Newer imaging machine design specifications include several categories, Wendt said, including table weight capacity, gantry size and image quality/patient safety. While increasing table weight capability, the machine must still be able to lift, tilt and advance accurately. Patients have to fit in the gantry. And image quality must be sufficient and uniform enough for diagnostic-quality images,


In this study, the authors propose an optical microwave (MW) radio-over-fibre system in which an integrated dual-parallel Mach-Zehnder modulator (DP-MZM) is biased at the maximum transmission biasing point. A single drive Mach-Zehnder modulator, in series with the DP-MZM, is used to modulate the 1 GHz radio frequency data onto the optical carrier. They characterise the efficiency of the practical system in terms of power penalty and error vector magnitude. Two modulation schemes are investigated, namely binary phase shift keying (BPSK) and quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) over fibre spans of 10 and 25 km of standard single mode fibre. The results show that the second-order sideband of MW has the potential to provide error free transmission for BPSK and QPSK. The error free communication system is achieved for BPSK at 10 and 25 km fibre spans at optical launch power (OLP) of 7 dBm, whereas for QPSK, the OLP is ~11 and ~12 dBm for 10 and 25 km fibre spans, respectively.