The overall effects of policy reforms enacted during the 1990s in Mexico on financial and economic profitability of Yaqui Valley agriculture are assessed in this study, which describes the reforms, examines how exogenous shocks affected the reform process, and documents how rural people and institutions adjusted to the changed circumstances. Virtually all of the reforms affected Yaqui Valley farmers because of the commercial character of their agriculture (relatively large, irrigated wheat farms), their close proximity to the US, and the new "openness" of Mexico's economy. By almost any standard, the reforms were both wide-ranging and successful, at least as measured in efficiency terms, yet the Yaqui Valley's rural communities face significant challenges at the start of the 21st century. The ejido communities have lost cohesiveness, and even larger-scale farmers in the private sector face serious income problems. More generally, farmers have yet to find profitable new production systems, including the associated marketing institutions, which are consistent with greater reliance on world agricultural prices and diminished dependence on explicit and implicit subsidies from the government.


With most of the easy gas and oil reserves discovered and prices rebounding, companies are now drilling far offshore in extreme weather condition environments. As deep water wells are drilled to greater depths, engineers and designers are confronted with new problems such as water depth, weather conditions, ocean currents, equipment reliability, and well accessibility. "Offshore Structure Design, Construction and Maintenance" covers all types of offshore structures and platforms employed worldwide. The ultimate reference for selecting, operating and maintaining offshore structures, this book provides a road map for designing structures which will stand up even in the harshest environments. The selection of the proper type of offshore structure is discussed from a technical and economic point of view. The design procedure for the fixed offshore structure will be presented and how to review the design to reach the optimum solution. Non-linear analysis (Push over) analysis will be presented as a new technique to design and assess the existing structure. Pile design and tubular joint with the effect of fatigue loading will be presented also from a theoretical and a practical point of view. With this book in hand, engineers receive the most up-to-date methods for performing a structural life cycle analysis; implement maintenance plans for topsides and jackets, using non destructive testing. Under water inspection is discussed for hundreds of platforms in detail. Advanced repair methodology for scour, marine growth and damaged or deteriorating members are discussed. Risk based under water inspection techniques are covered from a practical pint of view. In addition, the book will be supported by an online modelling and simulation program with will allow designers to save time and money by verifying assumptions online. It is a one stop guide to offshore structure design and analysis. It features easy to understand methods for structural life cycle analysis. It offers expert advice for designing offshore platforms for all types of environments. It saves time and money by verifying designs online.


The stellar inclination angle – the angle between the rotation axis of a star and our line of sight – provides valuable information in many different areas, from the characterization of the geometry of exoplanetary and eclipsing binary systems to the formation and evolution of those systems. We propose a method based on asteroseismology and a Bayesian hierarchical scheme for extracting the inclination angle of a single star. This hierarchical method therefore provides a means to both accurately and robustly extract inclination angles from red giant stars. We successfully apply this technique to an artificial data set with an underlying isotropic inclination angle distribution to verify the method. We also apply this technique to 123 red giant stars observed with Kepler. We also show the need for a selection function to account for possible population-level biases, which are not present in individual star-by-star cases, in order to extend the hierarchical method towards inferring underlying population inclination angle distributions.


This study examines the motivation for the increased reporting of non-GAAP earnings (NGE) by New Zealand companies following the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). The study contributes to the literature on the impacts of IFRS adoption at national levels and the relationship between statutory earnings and NGE information disclosed by listed companies. The annual reports of fifty-eight listed companies are examined for the period from 2004 to 2012. The number of companies reporting NGE figures has increased substantially over this period of time with NGE figures higher and significantly different to the audited net profit after tax (NPAT) figures in the post-IFRS period. There appears to be some merit in reporting NGE figures as they are better predictors of future earnings and contribute value to analysts' forecasts. NGE earnings are sometimes higher than NPAT earnings which could suggest that earnings are being used to create a more favourable impression of performance. However, results indicate that NGE compared to NPAT appear to have a higher quality of earnings, conveying additional information to the market.


When the yield curve is modelled using an affine factor model, residuals may still contain relevant information and do not adhere to the familiar white noise assumption. This paper proposes a pragmatic way to improve out of sample performance for yield curve forecasting. The proposed adjustment is illustrated via a pseudo out-of-sample forecasting exercise implementing the widely used Dynamic Nelson–Siegel model. Large improvement in forecasting performance is achieved throughout the curve for different forecasting horizons. Results are robust to different time periods, as well as to different model specifications.


Abstract Background and aims : Discharging compressed air through conventional single jet nozzles or open pipes is a common jet noise in industry. This study is aimed to reduce air blow gun jet noise by designing and fabrication of multiple jet nozzle as a substitute for conventional single jet nozzles. Methods : One of the most common commercial air blow gun equipped with a conventional single jet nozzles was considered as a reference. An air Nozzle's three dimensional model with multiple and smaller openings was designed by solid works software and the designed sketch was fabricated by a three dimensional printer. Noise measurement was made by a Cassella Cell 450 sound level meter with one octave band analyzer. Noise absorption foams were applied to mitigate noise reflection in the testing environment. Air thrust was measured using a digital scale that was placed 30 cm away from nozzle tips. Results : Multiple jet nozzle's sound pressure level was measured significantly lower than conventional nozzle's sound pressure level (p<0.04). Multiple jet and conventional nozzle's average sound pressure level in various angles from nozzle axis (30, 90 and 135 degree) was measured to be 75, 76, 76 dB A and 78, 83.3, 86.3 dB A in pressures of 2, 4 and 6 bar respectively. Multiple jet nozzle's noise reduction in frequencies higher than 500 Hz was significant in comparison with conventional nozzles. Conventional and multiple jet nozzle's average air thrust in pressures of 2,4 and 6 Bar was measured to be 1.39 and 1.19 N respectively and there was no significant relationship between air thrusts (p=0.7). Conclusion : Multiple jet nozzle with lower noise and the air thrust that is approximately equal to single jet nozzle, can be considered as an appropriate alternative for noise reduction in air blow guns.


This monograph addresses morphology and its interfaces with phonology and syntax by examining comparative data from the Uto-Aztecan language family, and analyses involving reduplication as well as noun incorporation and related derivational morphology are provided within the framework of Distributed Morphology. Reduplication is treated by analyzing reduplicative morphemes (reduplicants) as morphological pieces (Vocabulary Items) inserted into syntactic slots at Morphological Structure. Noun incorporation constructions are analyzed as involving either incorporation (head movement in syntax, a la Baker 1988), or conflation, involving direct merger of a nominal root into verbal position (a la Hale and Keyser 2002). It is argued that denominal verb constructions should be treated as a sub-case of NI, as in Hale and Keyser (1993). Finally, the historical development of the polysynthesis parameter in Nahuatl is discussed, and a reconstruction of the likely stages of development, each of which is attested elsewhere in the family, is presented.


Abstract The flora from the Montceau-les-Mines Lagerstätte (Massif Central, France, Late Pennsylvanian) is preserved in small sideritic concretions and was studied in three locations in the (1) Saint-Louis, (2) Saint-François, and (3) Sainte-Hélène opencast mines. Qualitative and quantitative analyses of plant diversity and floristic composition in 6812 nodules indicate substantial variations in the floral composition of these opencast mines. More than 50 taxa are recognized and belong to groups typical of the Late Pennsylvanian flora (lycopsids, sphenopsids, tree ferns, and pteridosperms). Arborescent sphenopsids and tree ferns were the major components at Saint-Louis, whereas the flora from Saint-François consisted mainly of pteridosperms; the one from Sainte-Hélène has a more balanced composition. Taphonomic and sedimentological data show that the flora contained in the nodules was hypoautochthonous to parautochthonous. The Montceau Basin displayed a mosaic of paleoenvironments (e.g., deltaic lacustrine, paludal to fluvial) which favored colonization by plants and animals.


It is now clearly established that steroids can be synthesized de novo by the vertebrate brain. Such steroids are called neurosteroids. To understand neurosteroid action in the brain, data on the regio- and temporal-specific synthesis of neurosteroids are needed. In the middle 1990s, the Purkinje cell, an important cerebellar neuron, was identified as a major site for neurosteroid formation in vertebrates. This discovery has allowed deeper insights into neuronal neurosteroidogenesis and biological actions of neurosteroids have become clear by the studies using the Purkinje cell as an excellent cellular model, which is known to play an important role in memory and learning processes. From the past 10 years of research on mammals, we now know that the Purkinje cell actively synthesizes progesterone and estradiol de novo from cholesterol during neonatal life, when cerebellar neuronal circuit formation occurs. Both progesterone and estradiol promote dendritic growth, spinogenesis, and synaptogenesis via each cognate nuclear receptor in the developing Purkinje cell. Such neurosteroid actions that may be mediated by neurotrophic factors contribute to the formation of cerebellar neuronal circuit during neonatal life. Allopregnanolone, a progesterone metabolite, is also synthesized in the cerebellum and acts on Purkinje cell survival in the neonate. The aim of this review is to summarize the current knowledge regarding the biosynthesis and biological actions of neurosteroids in the Purkinje cell during development.


Most state court judges are elected to office, and thus must be attentive to voter preferences just like other elected officials. Critics of judicial elections fear that subjecting judges to majoritarian pressures jeopardizes the rights of disfavored groups and undermines the rule of law, and accordingly call for their abolition. The reality, however, is that judicial elections are firmly entrenched in thirty-eight states, and thus appear to be a permanent part of the legal landscape. This article suggests that the so-called "majoritarian difficulty" posed by elected judges can be tempered by regular interactions with appointed, life-tenured federal judges, who are better insulated from public opinion. By constitutional design, the federal courts work closely with their state counterparts, overseeing state court decisions and sharing jurisdiction over questions of both state and federal law. As a result, federal courts have the potential to offset majoritarian influences on state courts by reviewing state court decisions, issuing binding and persuasive precedent on questions of federal and state law, and providing state courts with political cover for unpopular decisions. Most important, litigants can often frame their cases to get into federal court when they fear that an elected state court judge would be likely to rule against them. After describing the important role that federal courts can play in diluting majoritarian influences on elected state court judges, the article then examines empirical evidence suggesting that federal courts are, in fact, more involved in overseeing elected state court judges than their appointed counterparts. The article concludes by asserting that federal courts should assume a more proactive role in mitigating the majoritarian difficulty by taking a state's judicial selection method into account when making jurisdictional choices.


Hepatic steatosis is a recognized problem in patients after orthotopic liver transplant (OLT). However, de novo development of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has not been well described. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence and predictors of de novo NAFLD after OLT. A retrospective analysis was performed on 68 OLT patients with donor liver biopsies and posttransplantation liver biopsies. Individual medical charts were reviewed for demographics, indication for OLT, serial histology reports, genotypes for hepatitis C, comorbid conditions, and medications. Liver biopsies were reviewed blindly and graded according to the Brunt Scoring System. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to study the risk factors for developing NAFLD. The interval time from OLT to subsequent follow‐up liver biopsy was 28 ± 18 months. A total of 12 patients (18%) developed de novo NAFLD, and 6 (9%) developed de novo NASH. The regression model indicated that the use of angiotensin‐converting enzyme inhibitors (ACE‐I) was associated with a reduced risk of developing NAFLD after OLT (odds ratio, 0.09; 95% confidence interval, 0.010‐0.92; P = 0.042). Increase in body mass index (BMI) of greater than 10% after OLT was associated with a higher risk of developing NAFLD (odds ratio, 19.38; 95% confidence interval, 3.50‐107.40; P = 0.001). In conclusion, de novo NAFLD is common in the post‐OLT setting, with a significant association with weight gain after transplant. The use of an ACE‐I may reduce the risk of developing post‐OLT NAFLD. Liver Transpl, 2006. © 2006 AASLD.


Children with autism experience difficulties in understanding social affective cues, and it has been suggested that such deficits will generalize to music. In order to investigate this proposal, typically developing individuals and children with autism and Down syndrome were compared on tasks measuring perception of affective and movement states in music. The results showed that discrimination performance on both experimental conditions depended on chronological or verbal mental age rather than diagnosis. The findings suggest that emotion-processing deficits in the social domain do not generalize to music, and that musical understanding is closely related to the level of language development.


Title of dissertation: PROCESSING OF EX-SITU ACQUIRED SIGNALS FROM MAGNETIC DISKS Patrick McAvoy, Doctor of Philosophy, 2008 Dissertation directed by: Professor I. D. Mayergoyz Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering The ubiquity and high performance of hard disk drives for nonvolatile digital data storage cannot be denied. As the magnetic recording industry continues to develop new techniques for increasing storage density and reducing cost per bit, diagnostic and forensic tools for characterizing and interpreting the magnetic patterns recorded onto disk drive media become increasingly important. Therefore, this dissertation presents developments to the uniquely suitable spin-stand-based method of imaging magnetization patterns on media extracted from commercial hard disk drives. The emphasis of the presented research is placed on the following three areas: microscopy enhancement techniques for longitudinal magnetic recording media, "drive-independent" characterization and reconstruction of disk data, and the exploration of spin-stand microscopy in the novel context of perpendicular magnetic recording. First, it is known that, while the spin-stand microscopy technique offers highspeed and massive scale imaging capabilities, the images obtained are corrupted by distortion due to the non-local sensing or finite spatial resolution of the imaging sensor. Two techniques for mitigating this distortion, one based on characterizing the head by means of its linear response function, and a new method based on spatial Hilbert transforms, are described and demonstrated. Furthermore, a twodimensional extension of the Hilbert transform in the context of magnetic recording is derived based on physical arguments and its application to spin-stand imaging is demonstrated. Second, although magnetic media imaging is interesting in its own right, an extension of this capability is the identification of commercial hard disk drive write channels and the subsequent reconstruction of the data written to the associated disks in a "drive-independent" manner on the spin-stand. For fundamental and practical reasons, a multilayered encoding process is performed on digital data before it is written to the disk; the presented work details the theoretical and experimental results obtained in characterizing and reversing these codes. Finally, because perpendicular recording technology has recently come on the market in consumer disk drives, the spin-stand microscopy technique is extended to imaging the media employing this new mode of recording. In particular, the novel aspects of perpendicular recording are discussed and their impact on spin-stand microscopy is demonstrated. PROCESSING OF EX-SITU ACQUIRED SIGNALS FROM MAGNETIC DISKS


This dissertation explores the nexus between sustainable tourism development and corporate social responsibility (CSR). It addresses the scope for CSR to promote sustainable tourism in an international development context. This objective was pursued by exploring three sub-questions: what tools have been used to stimulate social responsibility in tourism; how has ecotourism influenced social responsibility in tourism; and finally, how have various stakeholders approached CSR in tourism? These questions were investigated through case studies within three research cycles, and documented in six published, peer-reviewed articles. Using a qualitative and exploratory approach, the author finds tourism to be lagging behind other industries in assuming a responsibility to mitigate its environmental and social impacts. Existent voluntary performance schemes for tourism sustainability, as well as alternative forms of tourism (ecotourism) are reviewed in order to identify their contributions to developing CSR in tourism. A significant deficiency of existent tools is identified in their neglect to address social impacts, especially the ones emerging in the contemporary context of globalization and trade liberalization in tourism. (Less)


Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are usually built by stacking convolutional operations layer-by-layer. Although CNN has shown strong capability to extract semantics from raw pixels, its capacity to capture spatial relationships of pixels across rows and columns of an image is not fully explored. These relationships are important to learn semantic objects with strong shape priors but weak appearance coherences, such as traffic lanes, which are often occluded or not even painted on the road surface as shown in Fig. 1 (a). In this paper, we propose Spatial CNN (SCNN), which generalizes traditional deep layer-by-layer convolutions to slice-by-slice convolutions within feature maps, thus enabling message passings between pixels across rows and columns in a layer. Such SCNN is particular suitable for long continuous shape structure or large objects, with strong spatial relationship but less appearance clues, such as traffic lanes, poles, and wall. We apply SCNN on a newly released very challenging traffic lane detection dataset and Cityscapse dataset. The results show that SCNN could learn the spatial relationship for structure output and significantly improves the performance. We show that SCNN outperforms the recurrent neural network (RNN) based ReNet and MRF+CNN (MRFNet) in the lane detection dataset by 8.7% and 4.6% respectively. Moreover, our SCNN won the 1st place on the TuSimple Benchmark Lane Detection Challenge, with an accuracy of 96.53%.


Purpose To understand and quantify the logistics (ie, acquisition, utilization, storage, distribution, maintenance, repair) of intravenous patient-controlled analgesia (IV PCA) pumps and analgesics in the acute postoperative pain setting. Methods As part of a larger multicentered, observational study, 29 hospitals in the United States were surveyed to examine IV PCA logistics. Data were collected via interviews with hospital staff using a standardized hospital questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were calculated on all site characteristics and IV PCA logistics data. Results : Average beds per hospital and inpatient surgery volume per year were 455.5 beds and 6,483.2 patients. The majority of sites (75.9%) owned their pumps and, on average, reported 1.3 pump types and 2.3 different storage locations. Most hospitals utilized 3 of 4 different opioid agents (ie, morphine, fentanyl, hydromorphone, meperidine). Morphine is the most common prefilled reservoir (75.9%), while hydromorphone is the most common pharmacy staff-filled reservoir used (72.4%). A fentanyl staff-filled reservoir is available in 62.5% of the hospitals. Conclusions : The process of providing IV PCA from initial order to set-up is complex and variable. The process to IV PCA initiation involves the understanding of various types of pumps and analgesics, coordination of hospital staff, and substantial time to implement. Future postoperative care should explore improved technologies (or means of delivery) to reduce the complexity and steps involved with IV PCA while continuing to deliver on-demand pain relief.


The subject of 'population' is undergoing a renaissance in geography; this is seen, for example, in the voluminous studies addressing 'marginalized' populations, including but not limited to refugees, internally displaced persons, and children. In short, scholarship has focused on those lives rendered 'wasted', 'precarious', or 'superfluous'. Population geographers have made substantial contributions; however, more can be done. In this and the next two progress reports, I suggest that population geographers reflect more deeply on the spatiality and survivability of vulnerable populations. More specifically, population geographers should consider the politics of fertility, mortality, and mobility from the standpoint of a layered demographic question: within any given place, who lives, who dies, and who decides? In this first report, I resituate the concept 'surplus population' within the broader domain of population geography. In subsequent reports, I consider more closely population geography's association with related subject areas (i.e. biopolitics and necropolitics). I maintain that, by addressing vulnerability and survivability, we join others in geography and allied fields who are writing about 'populations' not as biological, pre-given entities, but instead as political subjects at risk of premature death.


The aim of this study is to analyse the role of metaphor in the dissemination ofspecialised knowledge through the discourse of newspaper articles. A bilingualEnglish and Spanish newspaper corpus of 100 science popularisation articleson cancer (The Guardian and El Pais) was used to analyse and examine themetaphorical expressions employed to describe cancer aetiology and threepathological cellular processes involved in the disease. Metaphors were identifiedaccording to the Metaphor Identification Procedure (Pragglejaz group,2007). The analysis showed that different source domains are required for therecontextualisation of cancer, with certain source domains being preferred. Theselection of source domains appears to depend on the cancer-related aspect(target) and, to some extent, on the language of the newspaper.


Purpose of reviewTo summarize recent findings and current concepts in the beneficial effects of berry consumption on brain function during aging. Recent findingsBerryfruit supplementation has continued to demonstrate efficacy in reversing age-related cognitive decline in animal studies. In terms of the mechanisms behind the effects of berries on the central nervous system, recent studies have demonstrated the bioavailability of berry polyphenols in several animal models. These studies have revealed that flavonoids and polyphenols from berries do accumulate in the brain following long-term consumption. Finally, several compelling studies have revealed that berries can influence cell-signaling cascades both in vivo and in cell culture systems. These studies underscore the developing theory that berries and antioxidant-rich foods may be acting as more than just oxygen radical neutralizers in the aging central nervous system. SummaryAntioxidant-rich berries consumed in the diet can positively impact learning and memory in the aged animal. This effect on cognition is thought to be due to the direct interaction of berry polyphenols with aging neurons, reducing the impact of stress-related cellular signals and increasing the capacity of neurons to maintain proper functioning during aging.


Photon-counting integral imaging has been introduced recently, and its applications in three-dimensional (3D) object sensing, visualization, recognition, and classification under photon-starved conditions have been demonstrated. This paper sheds light on the underlying information-theoretic foundation behind the ability of photon-counting integral imaging in performing complex tasks with far fewer photons than conventional imaging systems. A metric for photon-information content is formulated in the context of 3D photon-counting imaging, and its properties are investigated. It is shown that there is an inherent trade-off between imaging fidelity, measured by the entropy-normalized mutual information associated with a given imaging system, and the amount of information in each photon used in the imaging process, as represented by the photon-number-normalized mutual information. The dependence of this trade-off on photon statistics, correlation in the 3D image, and the signal-to-noise ratio of the photon-detection system is also investigated.


During the past two decades, revolutionary breakthroughs have occurred in the understanding of ferroelectric materials, both from the perspective of theory and experiment. First principles approaches, including the Berry phase formulation of ferroelectricity, now allow accurate, quantitative predictions of material properties, and single crystalline thin films are now available for fundamental studies of these materials. In addition, the need for high dielectric constant insulators and nonvolatile memories in semiconductor applications has motivated a renaissance in the investigation of these materials. This book addresses the paradigmatic shifts in understanding brought about by these breakthroughs, including the consideration of novel fabrication methods of single crystalline ferroelectric thin films and nanoscale applications of these materials, and new theoretical methods such as the effective Hamiltonian approach and density functional theory. A book for practicing scientists as well as graduate students.


The U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) is widely considered the strongest biodiversity conservation law in the world. Part of its strength comes from the mandate to use the best available science to make decisions under the law, including whether to list a species, setting the criteria for when a species can be considered recovered, and determining when those criteria have been met and a species can be delisted. Both biological status and threat factors are considered at each stage of the listing and delisting process. In most cases, conservation science would suggest that species at risk enough to be listed under the Act should be more abundant and secure at delisting than they were at listing. Surprisingly, we identified 130 ESA-listed species that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service could consider recovered with fewer populations or individuals than existed at the time of listing. We ask whether their ESA recovery plans present scientific data, rationale, or evidence to support a decline in abundance as part of recovery. We find that almost no plan clearly explains why a decline is allowed. Fewer than half of the plans provide scientific support for a decline in the form of literature references or modeling results. We recommend that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service create a decision support system to inform when species can decline in abundance and still recover, including guidance on (a) the need to explicitly address the declines and (b) the science used to support the decisions.


Abstract A major obstacle of bioethanol production is finding a renewable and cheap feedstock, which still needs to be addressed. This work focuses on comparing bioethanol production from buttonwood and date palm leaves. Furthermore, cellulase activities were compared from 4 newly isolated cellulase producing Bacillus spp. and optimal temperature, pH and metal ion supplementation conditions to enhance the cellulolytic activity were determined. Finally, the bioethanol yields were compared between a Clostridium aciditolerans sp. (hereafter referred to as AK-1) and Saccharomyces cerevisiae for maximum bioethanol yields. Cellulase activity as high as 372 and 192 U/g substrate were obtained using buttonwood and date palm leaves, respectively, under optimal conditions. Using newly isolated Bacillus strain MI-42 for saccharification, efficiencies of 77.8 and 72.5% were obtained from buttonwood and date palm leaves, respectively. Using AK-1, maximum bioethanol yields of 2.07 and 0.85 g/L were obtained from buttonwood and date palm leaves, respectively, while maximum yields using S. cerevisiae reached 2.12 and 0.9 g/L. However, AK-1 required 96 hours to reach maximum yield, while S. cerevisiae needed just 10 hours. Although buttonwood and date palm leaves could be suitable feedstock, further optimization of the fermentation process is still needed to improve bioethanol yields.


Roads play an indispensable role as part of the infrastructure of society. In recent years, society has witnessed the rapid development of laser mobile mapping systems (LMMS) which, at high measurement rates, acquire dense and accurate point cloud data. This paper presents a way to automatically estimate the required excavation volume when widening a road from point cloud data acquired by an LMMS. Firstly, the input point cloud is down-sampled to a uniform grid and outliers are removed. For each of the resulting grid points, both on and off the road, the local surface normal and 2D slope are estimated. Normals and slopes are consecutively used to separate road from off-road points which enables the estimation of the road centerline and road boundaries. In the final step, the left and right side of the road points are sliced in 1-m slices up to a distance of 4 m, perpendicular to the roadside. Determining and summing each sliced volume enables the estimation of the required excavation for a widening of the road on the left or on the right side. The procedure, including a quality analysis, is demonstrated on a stretch of a mountain road that is approximately 132 m long as sampled by a Lynx LMMS. The results in this particular case show that the required excavation volume on the left side is 8% more than that on the right side. In addition, the error in the results is assessed in two ways. First, by adding up estimated local errors, and second, by comparing results from two different datasets sampling the same piece of road both acquired by the Lynx LMMS. Results of both approaches indicate that the error in the estimated volume is below 4%. The proposed method is relatively easy to implement and runs smoothly on a desktop PC. The whole workflow of the LMMS data acquisition and subsequent volume computation can be completed in one or two days and provides road engineers with much more detail than traditional single-point surveying methods such as Total Station or GPS profiling. A drawback is that an LMMS system can only sample what is within the view of the system from the road.


ABSTRACT The benefits of biofuels depend on the feedstock, conversion pathway and local context. This paper assesses biofuels technology readiness and developments to provide foresight to biofuels development in Southern Africa. Efficient conversion pathways, coupled with biomass from waste or high-yielding energy crops, will reduce both the costs of biofuels production, and the environmental impacts. Compared to petroleum fuels, the current commercial biofuels (ethanol, biogas and biodiesel) typically offer carbon emission reductions of 30–50% but are marginally more expensive. The extent of biofuels market penetration will therefore be influenced by mandates (blending targets) and subsidies (green premium). Advanced biofuels promise greater efficiencies and carbon emission reductions at reduced cost but will require further research and development to reach commercialisation. If developed appropriately, biofuels can reduce carbon emissions and improve energy security, while enabling sustainable agriculture and improved natural resources management.


The market of the economy. The market is expounded by different scientific disciplines, judged by different normative positions, and experienced by different actors. Despite this omnipresence, there is no discernible consensus that answers the question what a market per se is. In contention with theoretical arguments about the market and with the help of systems theory, this article seeks to develop a robust notion of the market. Market can thus be understood as the internal environment of the economic system. Market happens, if both the communication of exchange and the observation of competitors blend into each other, and if these processes focus on and crystallize in prices.


Our study aimed to determine the neural correlates of speech planning and execution in adults who stutter (AWS). Fifteen AWS and 15 controls (CON) completed two tasks that either manipulated speech planning or execution processing loads. Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) was used to measure changes in blood flow concentrations during each task, thus providing an indirect measure of neural activity. An image-based reconstruction technique was used to analyze the results and facilitate their interpretation in the context of previous functional neuroimaging studies of AWS that used positron emission tomography (PET) or functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). For planning, we compared neural activity associated with high versus low planning load in AWS and CON. For execution, we compared the neural activity associated with overt versus covert naming in AWS and CON. Broadly, group level effects corroborate previous PET/fMRI findings including under-activation in left-hemisphere perisylvian speech-language networks and over-activation in right-hemisphere homologues. Increased planning load revealed atypical left-hemisphere activation in AWS, whereas increased execution load yielded atypical right fronto-temporo-parietal and bilateral motor activation in AWS. Our results add to the limited literature differentiating speech planning versus execution processes in AWS.


While research on youth media offers persuasive arguments about what young people are doing with information and communication technologies (ICTs), a significant absence from the literature pertains to the general neglect of Palestinian youth engagements with inexpensive ICTs and digital media forms. Despite a few perceptive analyses, several studies ignore the role of popular culture in Palestinian refugee life-worlds. This article explores how Palestinian youth living in a refugee camp in the West Bank appropriate old and new media to create personal and social narratives. Drawing insights from Paul Ricoeur's work, non-representational theory, feminist, media, and cultural studies, the article probes the issues through a set of interrelated questions: What are the salient features of the Palestinian youth media initiative? What kinds of media narratives are produced and how do these relate to young people's notions of identity and selfhood? How do young people refashion the notion of the political?


There is an intractable paradox in the relation between rights and criminal punishment. Criminal punishment frequently conflicts with rights; people typically have identical rights within a legal system, yet the punished are unable to exercise the rights to the same extent as other people. But criminal punishment, in conjunction with criminal laws, also operates to protect rights. To clarify the tension between rights and punishment, I start by analyzing the content and purpose of rights. Next I discuss the nature of rules and the particular types of rules that make up a typical "systems of rules." I then argue that legal systems are a form of a system of rules, and consider how rights and the laws of criminal punishment belong to different categories of rules. Normally these categories of rules complement one another; while this holds true in the case of rights and punishments, they have attributes that inevitably bring them into conflict. I take some time to examine the theory of right forfeiture because it purports to explain away the discrepancy between rights and punishment, but I conclude that the theory essentially misunderstands rights. Finally, I put forward some broad guidelines for reducing the collision between punishment and rights, while acknowledging that these two kinds of laws will never be entirely compatible. * Benjamin L. Apt currently works in the field of asylum law. Mr. Apt received his JD as well as his MA in International Relations from Boston University, an MTS from Harvard Divinity School and a BA in Religion from Amherst College. He thanks his constant reader, Alexandra M. Lord, for her patient reading and re-reading of the manuscript for this article. Washington University Open Scholarship 68 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY JURISPRUDENCE REVIEW [VOL. 11:1


Eighty-five percent of Spanish table grapes are produced near the Mediterranean Sea, in very arid regions. The irrigation-water availability influences the cropping plans adopted on farms and, on the medium-term, it will also influence viability and competitiveness. This work is aimed at analysing the effects of the main technological improvements introduced on farms and determining the economic consequences, derived from other production scenarios characterized by variability in irrigation-water supply and price. Mathematical programming has been applied to models established for representative farms in Murcia and Alicante. After obtaining the most direct results of investment in technology, the modelization shows that the on-farm water availability exerts a greater effect than the water price, and that only technologically equipped farms can face increases in the price of this resource, keeping their economic sustainability constant.


Cooperatives have been playing important roles in the socio-economic lives of communities for a long time during which they have also encountered challenges and weaknesses. These have made countries to have their own distinct histories of the development of cooperatives and of course sometimes having similarities. Based on a critical review of literature and analysis of secondary data, this article presents a brief history of the development of the Ethiopian cooperatives with a focus on agricultural cooperatives. It indicates that although modern cooperatives have rapidly increased and positively contributed to community development, several weaknesses and challenges still remain being rooted in the economic, social, institutional, political and environmental settings. Due to the importance given to agricultural cooperatives in today's Ethiopia, sustaining the contributions of cooperatives to members and the larger community becomes vital that deserves policymakers' attention. Towards that end and based on the key findings, the article proposes a framework that can help integrate sustainability principles into a cooperative structure right from the setup stage, as a future trajectory in the development of cooperatives in Ethiopia. Keywords : agricultural cooperatives, collective action, developing country, Ethiopia, sustainable development, framework


To explore the potential effects of the toothfish fishery on the population dynamics of Antarctic toothfish and its main prey, grenadiers (Macrouridae) and icefish (Channichthyidae), we develop a spatially explicit model using a predator-prey suitability model for the Ross Sea Region. We model the age-based population dynamics of toothfish, grenadier, and icefish, and include natural mortality (M1) and predation mortality (M2), in addition to fishing mortality (F) on all three species. The model suggests that the predation release caused by the fishery effect on toothfish abundance is greater than the direct fishing mortality on both prey species and that icefish is expected to show a larger increase in biomass through time than grenadiers. It also suggests that a prey-suitability function is more likely than a Holling type II function to describe the predatory relationships in the model. We use the model to compare the predicted population changes with available abundance data for each species to develop hypotheses of the nature of the interaction. Whilst this model is in a development stage, it provides a useful tool for evaluating potential impacts of the fishery on key prey species, and for assessing and designing monitoring tools for fish species associated with the toothfish fishery. We recommend targeted sampling of toothfish for diet analysis, and the monitoring of icefish and grenadier populations in SSRUs 88.1H and 88.1K through the development of age frequencies (length measurements and aging).


The present work articulates few case empirical studies on decision making in industrial
context. Development of variety of Decision Support System (DSS) under uncertainty and
vague information is attempted herein. The study emphases on five important decision making
domains where effective decision making may surely enhance overall performance of the
organization. The focused territories of this work are i) robot selection, ii) g-resilient supplier
selection, iii) third party logistics (3PL) service provider selection, iv) assessment of supply
chain's g-resilient index and v) risk assessment in e-commerce exercises.
Firstly, decision support systems in relation to robot selection are conceptualized through
adaptation to fuzzy set theory in integration with TODIM and PROMETHEE approach, Grey
set theory is also found useful in this regard; and is combined with TODIM approach to
identify the best robot alternative. In this work, an attempt is also made to tackle subjective
(qualitative) and objective (quantitative) evaluation information simultaneously, towards
effective decision making.
Supplier selection is a key strategic concern for the large-scale organizations. In view of this, a
novel decision support framework is proposed to address g-resilient (green and resilient)
supplier selection issues. Green capability of suppliers' ensures the pollution free operation;
while, resiliency deals with unexpected system disruptions. A comparative analysis of the
results is also carried out by applying well-known decision making approaches like Fuzzy-
TOPSIS and Fuzzy-VIKOR.
In relation to 3PL service provider selection, this dissertation proposes a novel 'Dominance-
Based' model in combination with grey set theory to deal with 3PL provider selection,
considering linguistic preferences of the Decision-Makers (DMs). An empirical case study is
articulated to demonstrate application potential of the proposed model. The results, obtained
thereof, have been compared to that of grey-TOPSIS approach.
Another part of this dissertation is to provide an integrated framework in order to assess gresilient
(ecosilient) performance of the supply chain of a case automotive company. The
overall g-resilient supply chain performance is determined by computing a unique ecosilient
(g-resilient) index. The concepts of Fuzzy Performance Importance Index (FPII) along with
Degree of Similarity (DOS) (obtained from fuzzy set theory) are applied to rank different gresilient
criteria in accordance to their current status of performance.
The study is further extended to analyze, and thereby, to mitigate various risk factors (risk
sources) involved in e-commerce exercises. A total forty eight major e-commerce risks are
recognized and evaluated in a decision making perspective by utilizing the knowledge
acquired from the fuzzy set theory. Risk is evaluated as a product of two risk quantifying
parameters viz. (i) Likelihood of occurrence and, (ii) Impact. Aforesaid two risk quantifying
parameters are assessed in a subjective manner (linguistic human judgment), rather than
exploring probabilistic approach of risk analysis. The 'crisp risk extent' corresponding to
various risk factors are figured out through the proposed fuzzy risk analysis approach. The risk
factor possessing high 'crisp risk extent' score is said be more critical for the current problem
context (toward e-commerce success). Risks are now categorized into different levels of
severity (adverse consequences) (i.e. negligible, minor, marginal, critical and catastrophic).
Amongst forty eight risk sources, top five risk sources which are supposed to adversely affect
the company's e-commerce performance are recognized through such categorization. The
overall risk extent is determined by aggregating individual risks (under 'critical' level of
severity) using Fuzzy Inference System (FIS). Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) is then
used to obtain structural relationship amongst aforementioned five risk sources. An
appropriate action requirement plan is also suggested, to control and minimize risks associated
with e-commerce exercises.


The concrete pavements that were originally constructed in Washington State as part of the interstate construction program have performed remarkably well considering the dramatic increase in the anticipated traffic loads. To date, the primary distress on the concrete pavements in Washington State has been in the form of joint faulting (due to lack of dowel bars and underlying base/subgrade conditions), longitudinal cracking (which is believed to have occurred 3 to 5 years after construction) and wear due to studded tires. A number of factors have contributed to the long-life of these concrete pavements, such as, short joint spacing (usually 15 ft – 4.6 m), thickness (8-9 in., 200-225 mm) and aggregate quality. However, a number of design modifications have evolved over time to improve pavement performance. These include the use of dowel bars, dowel bar type, mix design, hot mix asphalt base, joint design and joint spacing. This research documents the design and performance of the concrete pavements built in the 1960's, summarizes the design modifications and resulting pavement performance that has taken place over the last 40 years, summarizes the current construction practices and discusses future challenges and risks for the long-life concrete pavements built in Washington State.


- IN this paper, a new approach to face recognition is presented in which not only a classifier but also a feature space is learned incrementally to adapt to a chunk of training samples. Human face recognition plays a significant role in security applications for access control and real time video surveillance systems, and robotics. Popular approaches for face recognition, such as principal components analysis (PCA), rely on static datasets where training is carried in a batch-mode on a pre-available image set. Real world applications require that the training set be dynamic of evolving nature where within the framework of continuous learning new training images are continuously added to the original set; this would trigger a costly frequent re-computation of the eigen space representation via repeating an entire batch-based training that includes the new images. Incremental PCA methods allow adding new images and updating the PCA representation, and offer the advantage of dispensing with the recently added images after model update. A benefit of this type of incremental learning is that the search for useful features and the learning of an optimal decision boundary are carried out in an online fashion. To implement this idea, chunk incremental principal component analysis (IPCA) and resource allocating network with long-term memory are effectively combined. In this paper, various incremental PCA (IPCA) training and relearning strategies are proposed and applied to the candid covariance-free incremental principal component algorithm. The effect of the number of increments and size of the eigen vectors on the correct rate of recognition is studied.


As the first complete narrative in English of the Haitian Revolution, Marcus Rainsford's An Historical Account of the Black Empire of Hayti was highly influential in establishing nineteenth-century world opinion of this momentous event. This new edition is the first to appear since the original publication in 1805. Rainsford, a career officer in the British army, went to Haiti to recruit black soldiers for the British. By publishing his observations of the prowess of black troops, and recounting his meetings with Toussaint Louverture, Rainsford offered eyewitness testimonial that acknowledged the intelligence and effectiveness of the Haitian rebels. Although not an abolitionist, Rainsford nonetheless was supportive of the independent state of Haiti, which he argued posed no threat to British colonial interests in the West Indies, an extremely unusual stance at the time. Rainsford's account made an immediate impact upon publication; it was widely reviewed, and translated twice in its first year. Paul Youngquist's and Gregory Pierrot's critical introduction to this new edition provides contextual and historical details, as well as new biographical information about Rainsford. Of particular interest is a newly discovered miniature painting of Louverture attributed to Rainsford, which is reproduced along with the twelve engravings that accompanied his original account.


Today, we are seeing an ever-increasing number of clinical notes that contain clinical results, images, and textual descriptions of patient's health state. All these data can be analyzed and employed to cater novel services that can help people and domain experts with their common healthcare tasks. However, many technologies such as Deep Learning and tools like Word Embeddings have started to be investigated only recently, and many challenges remain open when it comes to healthcare domain applications. To address these challenges, we propose the use of Deep Learning and Word Embeddings for identifying sixteen morbidity types within textual descriptions of clinical records. For this purpose, we have used a Deep Learning model based on Bidirectional Long-Short Term Memory (LSTM) layers which can exploit state-of-the-art vector representations of data such as Word Embeddings. We have employed pre-trained Word Embeddings namely GloVe and Word2Vec, and our own Word Embeddings trained on the target domain. Furthermore, we have compared the performances of the deep learning approaches against the traditional tf-idf using Support Vector Machine and Multilayer perceptron (our baselines). From the obtained results it seems that the latter outperforms the combination of Deep Learning approaches using any word embeddings. Our preliminary results indicate that there are specific features that make the dataset biased in favour of traditional machine learning approaches.


Cardiovascular performance was studied in 18 alpha-chloralose anaesthetized pigs when arterial potassium ([K+]a) was raised to levels observed in heavy exercise. The effects of hyperkalaemia were then studied during cardiac sympathetic nerve stimulation or during an infusion of noradrenaline. Elevation of [K+]a up to ca. 10 mM caused a progressive decline in cardiovascular performance. However, right cardiac sympathetic nerve stimulation elevated all cardiovascular parameters in the presence of raised [K+]a and offset the negative cardiac effects of hyperkalaemia. Electrical pacing of the right atrium to heart rates (HRs) equivalent to those observed during right cardiac sympathetic nerve stimulation did not offset the depressive effects of hyperkalaemia and, indeed, hastened the decline in cardiovascular performance. Infusion of noradrenaline (1 microgram kg min-1 i.v.) during hyperkalaemia caused an increase in all cardiovascular parameters similar to that seen during sympathetic nerve stimulation. After propranolol (0.5 mg kg-1 i.v.), sympathetic nerve stimulation slightly increased HR, systolic blood pressure (SBP) and dP/dtmax. Elevation of [K+]a occurred more rapidly after propranolol, but the heart was still protected from hyperkalaemia during cardiac sympathetic stimulation. Infusion of noradrenaline elicited arrhythmias in six pigs. Infusion of KCl reduced the incidence of arrhythmias and in some cases abolished them. These findings may be related to how the heart is protected from exercise-induced changes in potassium and catecholamines.


A comparison of Chicago public school students' standardized test scores in 2009-2014 with those of public students across the U.S. reveals two striking patterns. First, Chicago students' scores improved dramatically more, on average, between third and eighth grade than those of the average student in the U.S. This is true for students of all racial/ethnic groups. The average Chicago student's test scores improved by roughly 6 grade-level equivalents in the 5 years from third to eighth grade. Second, at each grade level in grades three through eight, Chicago students' scores improved more from 2009 to 2014 than did the average scores of all students in the U.S. Test scores rose in Chicago by roughly two-thirds of a grade level from 2009 to 2014, compared to an increase of one-sixth of a grade level nationally. Again, this was equally true for black, Hispanic, and white students. These patterns do not appear to result from increasingly test-aligned instruction or from changing city demographics and enrollment patterns. Executive Summary AUTHORS


The primary role of nests as structural support for eggs, nestlings, and incubating parents is well established, but our understanding of their secondary roles and their adaptive features is still limited. Nests can serve a particularly important role in protecting or buffering birds from weather. In hot, arid environments, maximum daily temperatures can exceed a species' upper critical temperature threshold and during the non-breeding season temperatures may also drop below freezing. Nest structures that help buffer against extreme temperatures may play a crucial role in managing the costs of thermoregulation, especially those nests that are used and maintained year-round. We use extensive year-round data to investigate the thermal benefits of massive colonial structures built by sociable weavers in the arid savannahs of the Kalahari, South Africa. These colonies consist of multiple nesting chambers and are used as roosts when birds are not breeding. We explored whether these structures provide thermal buffering throughout the year and how individual chamber placement within the colony and features of the chambers influenced their thermal buffering capacity. We also investigated whether nest chambers occupied and modified by an obligate nest parasite, the African pygmy falcon provided additional thermal buffering. Our results show that sociable weaver colonies provide thermal benefits throughout the year, buffering both hot and cold ambient extremes. Chambers with longer entrance tunnels provided better insulation than chambers with shorter entrance tunnels, and chambers located toward the center of a colony provided greater insulation than chambers at the edge. Chambers occupied by falcons did not display additional thermal benefits, which may be due to falcons choosing chambers with shorter entrance tunnels. Because falcons are larger than weavers, they may find it harder to enter chambers with longer entrance tunnels, and/or because weavers cease maintenance of those chambers. In conclusion, the communal nests of sociable weaver provide thermal benefits to weavers and heterospecifics alike, creating a more optimal environment for breeding, roosting and reducing thermal stress. In a landscape that is becoming increasingly harsh under climate change, the importance of these structures to the local animal communities may also increase.


Objective: Helicobacter pylori , which has been designated by the WHO as type I carcinogen, has a global prevalence of over 50%. The aim of this study was to determine the association between this bacterium and upper gastrointestinal problems in an endoscopy unit in Ouagadougou, using a molecular diagnostic method. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of 111 patients who underwent upper gastrointestinal diagnostic endoscopy between April and June 2013. Each patient had four gastric biopsies taken. Helicobacter pylori was detected by real-time PCR at the Biomolecular Research Centre, CERBA/LABIOGENE. Results: The prevalence of Helicobacter pylori in patients with various upper gastrointestinal problems was 84.7%. The use of medication that can reduce the H. pylori density was common among the infected patients, as history of antibiotics use, acid suppressant use and medications for eradication treatment were obtained in 43.6%, 26.6% and 18% respectively. Abdominal pain was the indication for the examination in 97.88%. The prevalence rate of H. Pylori was 87.21% among those who presented with signs of gastroesophageal reflux diseases (GERD) and 76% in those without signs. The endoscopy was normal in 55.85%. In all cases of ulcers (8.51%), the PCR was positive for H. pylori . There were no cases of gastric or duodenal cancers. Conclusion: This study confirms the high prevalence of Helicobacter pylori infection in our cohort of patients when PCR method was used, but showed a direct relationship between presence of symptoms of gastroesophageal reflux disease and prevalence of Helicobacter pylori infection. Keywords: Helicobacter pylori , Real-time PCR, Endoscopy, Prevalence


Researchers believe there is a link between diabetes and depression. Some drugs used to treat type II diabetes and its associated inflammatory symptoms have been found to improve depression as well. These include metformin, rosiglitazone, and pioglitazone. A recent study by Natalie Rasgon and colleagues explored the effects of pioglitazone treatment on people with insulin resistance, insulin sensitivity and/or pre-diabetes and ongoing depression. The researchers hoped to find that adding pioglitazone to the patients' regular antidepressant regimen might improve depression by reducing inflammation. The study also touched on the role of telomere length in mental and metabolic disorders. Telomeres are repeated DNA sequences that sit at the end of chromosomes and protect them during cell replication. Telomeres get shorter with aging and with psychiatric illnesses. In the study, telomere length was used to predict whether patients' depression would improve. Rasgon and colleagues found that in those patients taking both pioglitazone and antidepressant treatments (compared to those who received a placebo in addition to their antidepressants), longer telomeres predicted better antidepressant response. This suggests that telomere length could be used as a biomarker—that is, measuring a patient's telomere length could reveal whether that patient's depression is likely to respond to an anti-inflammatory treatment such as pioglitazone. The research was presented at a 2015 scientific meeting. Intranasal Ketamine Has Long-Lasting Antidepressant Effects


This manual provides guidance to those involved with all aspects of covered bridges, from initial inspection and evaluation, through the engineering of rehabilitation, to construction issues. Broadly speaking, this manual covers general terminology and historic development of covered bridges. The manual also addresses loads, structural analysis, connections, and design issues. The last five chapters contain discussions of evaluation, maintenance, strengthening, and preservation of existing covered bridges; historic considerations of existing structures; and a state-of-the-art guide on wood preservatives for covered bridges. Historic preservation requirements as they relate to the U.S. Department of Interior standards for these important and unusual structures also are provided. The appendices include an extensive series of case studies. The manual focuses on the nuances of the engineering aspects of covered bridges, including some issues not addressed currently by national bridge specifications. The chapter on timber connections provides a comprehensive discussion of covered bridge joinery and represents an important contribution to covered bridge engineering.


This study examines sand transport and wind speed across a beach at Magilligan Strand, Northern Ireland, under offshore wind conditions. Traditionally the offshore component of local wind regimes has been ignored when quantifying beach-dune sediment budgets, with the sheltering effect of the foredune assumed to prohibit grain entrainment on the adjoining beach. Recent investigations of secondary airflow patterns over coastal dunes have suggested this may not be the case, that the turbulent nature of the airflow in these zones enhances sediment transport potential. Beach sediment may be delivered to the dune toe by re-circulating eddies under offshore winds in coastal areas, which may explain much of the dynamics of aeolian dunes on coasts where the dominant wind direction is offshore.
The present study investigated aeolian sediment transport patterns under an offshore wind event. Empirical data were collected using load cell traps, for aeolian sediment transport, co-located with 3-D ultrasonic anemometers. The instrument positioning on the sub-aerial beach was informed by prior analysis of the airflow patterns using computational fluid dynamics. The array covered a total beach area of 90 m alongshore by 65 m cross-shore from the dune crest. Results confirm that sediment transport occurred in the 'sheltered' area under offshore winds. Over short time and space scales the nature of the transport is highly complex; however, preferential zones for sand entrainment may be identified. Alongshore spatial heterogeneity of sediment transport seems to show a relationship to undulations in the dune crest, while temporal and spatial variations may also be related to the position of the airflow reattachment zone. These results highlight the important feedbacks between flow characteristics and transport in a complex three dimensional surface.


This paper examines whether external auditors play a unique governance role distinct from other mechanisms of corporate governance. We exploit the staggered adoptions of the Universal Demand (UD) laws by U.S states, which have been shown to result in the decline of various corporate governance mechanisms. We examine whether auditors step up their monitoring when outside shareholders place a greater demand on external monitoring, yet other governance mechanisms decline. We find that external auditors are more likely to issue going-concern opinions to financially distressed firms after their incorporation states have adopted the UD laws. Further, the increased propensity to issue going-concern opinions is driven by auditors' reputation and litigation concerns. The effect is stronger when alternative governance mechanisms are weak, and it is not attenuated by auditors' financial ties to clients. We also find evidence of greater auditor monitoring after the passage of UD laws using two alternative outcomes, i.e., the reporting of internal control weakness and the length of audit reporting lag. Overall, our findings suggest the unique monitoring role of external auditors as they step up their oversight of the audited firms in the lapse of other monitors.


Discussions about state-sponsored communication with foreign publics are increasingly framed in the language of "information war" rather than "public diplomacy," particularly in Eastern Europe. For example, media projects supported by Western governments to engage Ukrainian audiences, and Ukrainian government efforts to engage international audiences via the media, are considered necessary responses in the information war with Russia. This article highlights several potentially problematic assumptions about communicative influence that are embedded in the language of information war. First is the assumption that communication can be targeted like a weapon to achieve a predictable impact. Second is the assumption that audiences engage with communication from an adversary because they are "vulnerable." Third is the assumption that "winning" in an information war means getting citizens to believe particular facts. Although these assumptions may hold to some degree, this article argues that adopting them uncritically can have detrimental consequences in policymaking.


The aim of this study is to answer the question: "do board characteristics affect firm performance?" There are six board of directors' characteristics being studied, including managerial ownership, board size, board independence, CEO duality, gender diversity and ethnic diversity. Return on Equity (ROE) is used as a measurement for firm financial performance. There are 300 Malaysian public listed companies being randomly selected from each sector. The results show that board size and ethnic diversity have positive relationship with ROE while board independence has negative relationship. There is no significant relationship between managerial ownership, CEO duality and gender diversity on firm performance. The findings may provide some implications for future research regarding the effectiveness of board of directors towards firm performance.


Cell fate is determined by cell-specific activation of transcription factor σF after asymmetric division during sporulation by Bacillus subtilis. The activity of σF is governed by SpoIIAA, SpoIIAB, and SpoIIE, a membrane protein localized at the polar septum. SpoIIAB binds to and inhibits σF, and SpoIIAA inhibits SpoIIAB, which prevents SpoIIAB from binding to σF. SpoIIAB is also a serine kinase that inactivates SpoIIAA. Here, it is demonstrated that SpoIIE dephosphorylates SpoIIAA-P and overcomes SpoIIAB-mediated inhibition of σF. The finding that SpoIIE is a serine phosphatase links asymmetric division to the pathway governing cell-specific gene transcription.


Despite a general agreement about the importance of very early design decisions (various sources estimate that between 60% to 80% of the total project costs are determined during this stage), the very early design stage of building and civil engineering projects is not yet adequately supported by IT.
 The paper focusses on the problems that are causing the lack of IT support and reports on a possible solution based on the application of Product Data Technology (PDT) and Knowledge Engineering. The paper will show some initial experience with the development and application of an Inception Modeller that implements ideas from the General AEC Reference Model (GARM) as proposed by Wim Gieling in 1988. The development takes place in co-operation with the Brite-Euram CONCUR-project. The system concentrates on the inception and very early design of technical buildings, i.e. buildings in which equipment plays a major role, like power plant buildings, hospitals, factories, etc.
 The basic idea is to support the choice and elaboration of Technical Solutions that fulfil the requirements of Functional Units. The knowledge base is structured according to a FU-TS decomposition, or Hamburger model, of the building. A knowledge acquisition tool based on the same Hamburger model is under development and will be explained in some detail in the final paper. The system is implemented in Java, using Clips as the knowledge engine and VRML for the visualization.
 Though it is probably still too early to draw any definitive conclusions, it looks as if the structure provided by the FU-TS decomposition is ideal for very early design support. It provides a means to capture and re-use knowledge of successful earlier designs, thus providing a mechanism still missing in the building and construction industry.


Real data are usually complex and contain various components. For example, face images have expressions and genders. Each component mainly reflects one aspect of data and provides information others do not have. Therefore, exploring the semantic information of multiple components as well as the diversity among them is of great benefit to understand data comprehensively and in-depth. However, this cannot be achieved by current nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF)-based methods, despite that NMF has shown remarkable competitiveness in learning parts-based representation of data. To overcome this limitation, we propose a novel multi-component nonnegative matrix factorization (MCNMF). Instead of seeking for only one representation of data, MCNMF learns multiple representations simultaneously, with the help of the Hilbert Schmidt Independence Criterion (HSIC) as a diversity term. HSIC explores the diverse information among the representations, where each representation corresponds to a component. By integrating the multiple representations, a more comprehensive representation is then established. Extensive experimental results on real-world datasets have shown that MCNMF not only achieves more accurate performance over the state-of-the-arts using the aggregated representation, but also interprets data from different aspects with the multiple representations, which is beyond what current NMFs can offer.


This paper focuses on two commonly used path assignment policies for agents traversing a congested network: self-interested routing, and system-optimum routing. In the self-interested routing policy each agent selects a path that optimizes its own utility, while in the system-optimum routing, agents are assigned paths with the goal of maximizing system performance. This paper considers a scenario where a centralized network manager wishes to optimize utilities over all agents, i.e., implement a system-optimum routing policy. In many real-life scenarios, however, the system manager is unable to influence the route assignment of all agents due to limited influence on route choice decisions. Motivated by such scenarios, a computationally tractable method is presented that computes the minimal amount of agents that the system manager needs to influence (compliant agents) in order to achieve system optimal performance. Moreover, this methodology can also determine whether a given set of compliant agents is sufficient to achieve system optimum and compute the optimal route assignment for the compliant agents to do so. Experimental results are presented showing that in several large-scale, realistic traffic networks optimal flow can be achieved with as low as 13% of the agent being compliant and up to 54%.


Ambulatory monitoring of the electrocardiogram (ECG) is a highly relevant topic in personal healthcare. A key technical challenge is overcoming artifacts from motion in order to produce ECG signals capable of being used in clinical diagnosis by a cardiologist. An electrode-tissue impedance is a signal of significant interest in reducing the motion artifact in ECG recordings on the go. A wireless system containing an ultralow-power analog front-end ECG signal acquisition, as well as the electrode-tissue impedance, is used in a validation study on multiple subjects. The goal of this paper is to study the correlation between motion artifacts and skin electrode impedance for a variety of motion types and electrodes. We have found that the correlation of the electrode-tissue impedance with the motion artifact is highly dependent on the electrode design the impedance signal (real, imaginary, absolute impedance), and artifact types (e.g., push or pull electrodes). With the chosen electrodes, we found that the highest correlation was obtained for local electrode artifacts (push, pull, electrode) followed by local skin (stretch, twist, skin) and global artifacts (walk, jog, jump). The results show that the electrode-tissue impedance can correlate with the motion artifacts for local disturbance of the electrodes and that the impedance signals can be used in motion artifact removal techniques such as adaptive filtering.


At the 54 th session of the Senate of the National Open University of Nigeria, the Senate approved the commencement of e-examination as from 2009/2010 academic session for all students of the University. Consequently, the students took their examination during that session electronically.  This paper examines the perception of these students about e-examination. This is of special interest because it was the first time they were being examined electronically. The objectives of the study were to determine i) user familiarity with e-examinations; ii) students e-examination experience; iii) students satisfaction with the e-examination; and iv) students' perception of the quality of the e-examination. Survey design was used for the study and a total of one hundred and two students in their second, third and fourth years of study participated and served as samples of the study. The convenience sampling technique was used for the study and data was collected through the use of a questionnaire.  Descriptive (frequencies, mean and standard deviation) and (chi-square) statistics were used for data analysis using Microsoft Excel (2007 Edition) and Smith's Statistical Package (SSP). The findings of the study revealed that students of NOUN Maiduguri study centre perceived low computer user familiarity which retarded their performance in the e-examination. They agreed to have an encouraging experience with the e-examination. Even though, the students were greatly satisfied with the e-examination, they still preferred the pen and paper examination. Furthermore, they perceived that the questions were well displayed and valid, however, they expressed dissatisfaction with the quality of e-examination questions. Based on the findings, recommendations were proffered for the students and the University Management. Amongst which are that the National Open University of Nigeria should introduce a mandatory general studies course on Introduction to Computer Studies and practice exercises for e-examinations as part of the course contents which students should be exposed to. Keywords: e-examinations, Maiduguri Study Centre, National Open University of Nigeria, perception, Students.


Public-I4-A4 Note: This guideline provides advice of a general nature. This statewide guideline has been prepared to promote and facilitate standardisation and consistency of practice, using a multidisciplinary approach. The guideline is based on a review of published evidence and expert opinion. Information in this statewide guideline is current at the time of publication. SA Health does not accept responsibility for the quality or accuracy of material on websites linked from this site and does not sponsor, approve or endorse materials on such links. Health practitioners in the South Australian public health sector are expected to review specific details of each patient and professionally assess the applicability of the relevant guideline to that clinical situation. If for good clinical reasons, a decision is made to depart from the guideline, the responsible clinician must document in the patient's medical record, the decision made, by whom, and detailed reasons for the departure from the guideline. This statewide guideline does not address all the elements of clinical practice and assumes that the individual clinicians are responsible for discussing care with consumers in an environment that is culturally appropriate and which enables respectful confidential discussion. This includes: • The use of interpreter services where necessary, • Advising consumers of their choice and ensuring informed consent is obtained, • Providing care within scope of practice, meeting all legislative requirements and maintaining standards of professional conduct, and • Documenting all care in accordance with mandatory and local requirements


Communication cost and local computation complexity are two main bottlenecks of the distributed statistical learning. In this paper, we consider the distributed M-estimation problem in both regular and sparse case and propose a novel one-round communication efficient algorithm. For regular distributed M-estimator, the asymptotic normality is provided to conduct statistical inference. For sparse distributed M-estimator, we only require solving a quadratic Lasso problem in the master machine using the same local information as the regular distributed M-estimator. Consequently, the computation complexity of the local machine is sufficiently reduced compared with the existing debiased sparse estimator. Under mild conditions, the theoretical results guarantee that our proposed distributed estimators achieve (near)optimal statistical convergence rate. The effectiveness of our proposed algorithm is verified through experiments across different M-estimation problems using both synthetic and real benchmark datasets.


The problem of municipal solid waste (MSW) management has been an issue of global concern in recent times and has engaged governments and local authorities in their quest to manage solid waste in a sustained manner. One proposition which has the potential of solving three problems at the same time is the use of the biodegradable component of MSW as a source of energy to augment energy supply. This research therefore assessed the use of the organic fraction of MSW as an eco-efficient energy source in Ghana. A study of Ghana's solid waste profile was undertaken and the fraction of biodegradable component was found to be approximately 60%, with a heating value of 17 MJ/kg and a moisture content of 50%. Moreover, it was established that 0.5 kg of solid waste is generated daily by each Ghanaian, meaning that about 5610 tons of the organic fraction could be made available every day to generate energy to the national grid. It was also established that waste disposal in Ghana is largely by way of open dumping as primary collection of waste from households in Ghana is limited to high-income communities which represent only 11% of the population, whereas secondary collection from transfer points to the disposal facilities is inefficient. With representative power output of 1.66 MWh/tonne a total of 3320 GWh of energy can be produced annually from the 4 proposed plants, generating net revenue of about $111,600,000. As an optimizing step, a waste incineration scheme was suggested in which the off-gases produced from organic waste combustion could be used to produce electrical power with steam in a multi-stage heat exchanger-steam turbine configuration, and the off gases again used for pre-drying of the organic waste in a cycle. A state-of-the art waste incineration technology was used as a model and adapted to suit Ghana's tropical conditions. MSW combustion releases less CO2 for the same power output (837 Ib/MWh) than any of the other conventional fuels do, and is therefore a good fuel for the fight against climate change.


In the last decade, new molecular techniques were introduced into pathology laboratories. Cytology also benefited from the innovations emerging from this new era. Molecular cytopathology (MCP) can be defined as molecular studies applied on all types of cytological specimens, namely gynaecology cytology, exfoliative non- gynaecology cytology and fine needle aspirates. The development of many new ancillary techniques has paralleled the emergence of clinical cytology as a major diagnostic specialty. Clinical applications of these techniques have been growing in the last decade. The widespread acceptance of liquid-based systems in gynaecological cytology emphasises the relation between cells and molecules. The increased use of morphology and molecular biology in human papillomavirus-induced lesions for example, showed the potential to optimise, in one single brushed sample, diagnosis and research. Cytology samples from serous effusions, the pulmonary tree, urine, and aspirations, among others, are now likely to be studied by different molecular techniques for diagnosis, prognosis, or even assessment of therapeutic targets. In this review, the main published results concerning the application of molecular techniques in different fields of cytopathology are highlighted, and their applications discussed.


A wide range of psychiatric and medical disorders have been hypothesized to be related to obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and thus, together, to form a family of disorders known as obsessive compulsive (or OCD) spectrum disorder. The grouping of these conditions is based on their phenomenological similarities with OCD (i.e., obsessive thinking and/or compulsive behaviors), as well as their having courses of illness, comorbidity and family history patterns, biological abnormalities, and treatment responses similar to OCD. Proposed OCD spectrum disorders have included body dysmorphic disorder, hypochondriasis, anorexia nervosa, trichotillomania, and some forms of delusional disorder, among others. However, conditions with impulsive features have also been hypothesized to belong to this family, including impulse control disorders in general, paraphilias and nonparaphilic sexual addictions, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder, and Tourette's disorder. We review the evidence supporting the grouping of these conditions into an OCD spectrum disorder family. We conclude that these disorders are different in some ways from OCD, but that they also have many similarities with OCD, and may therefore be related to one another and to OCD. In addition, we hypothesize that some of the differences among them may be explained in part by variation along a dimension of compulsivity versus impulsivity. Finally, because most of these conditions appear to be related to mood disorder, we hypothesize that the OCD spectrum disorder family may belong to the larger family of affective spectrum disorder.


War, Media, and Propaganda: A Global Perspective. Yahya R. Kamalipour and Nancy Snow, eds. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2004. 280 pp. $75.00 hbk. $27.95 pbk. After America's hot war in Iraq in spring 2003, a stream of books recounting the reporting of the war hit the presses, some memoirs of journalists embedded with the soldiers and others more critical reviews of the successes and failures of the media in reporting war to its citizens. War, Media, and Propaganda, which falls into the latter category, brings together an eclectic group of scholars and journalists to address the media's failures in reporting the war from a range of perspectives. Twenty-six authors write twenty-four chapters diverse in approach and style. In the book's forward, Ben Bagdikian writes that the "painful message of the book" is the "unholy trinity of 'war, media and propaganda.'" In the Iraq War, the major media failed citizens because they were so wedded to relationships with high-placed official sources and to the protection of corporate media profits. Caught up in a dubious patriotism in time of war, the news media did not report what they knew about the Bush administration's false claims of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. The first group of chapters offers theoretical analysis of war reporting and related issues, including a critique of Western, free market economies as well as a background piece on Islam. Next a section of chapters provides various regional and national perspectives on the Iraq War and its reporting, among them Canadian, South African, Chinese, Middle Eastern, and Latin American. The book concludes with articles recommending solutions to the problems posed in earlier chapters. R. S. Zaharna advances that the United States should stop confusing manipulative propaganda with public diplomacy, and Majid Tehranian concludes the book with ten commandments for peace journalism. In the first chapter David Miller sets the tone for the book by marshalling evidence from military planning documents that government and military officials in the United States and the United Kingdom had established as their strategy total propaganda control. "It is evident that the United States and its ally, the United Kingdom, are intent on ruling the world and that information control has become central to that effort." Australian Naren Chitty considers attacks by extremist Islamists and terrorists as efforts to counter Western liberalism's forces of globalization. UCLA professor Douglas Kellner describes the Iraq War as the "Oedipus Tex drama ... George W. Bush's desires to conclude his father's unfinished business and simultaneously defeat Evil to constitute himself Good. …


Featuring over sixty artists, both national and international, this group exhibition traces a journey through the influence of punk in contemporary art and echoes the importance of its presence as an attitude and as a referent for many creators. It includes installations, documentary excerpts, multiples, photographs, videos and paintings, together with a section documenting the origins of punk and its vestiges in the present day. Some of the themes addressed include noise, denial, violence, nihilism and sexuality. Dissatisfaction, nonconformity, the loss of faith in progress and a fierce criticism of the icons of the economic and social system appear in the work of these creators. Punk was born in London and New York between 1976 and 1978 as an explosion of discontent and dissatisfaction towards a situation without a future, which immediately caught on and spread geographically. A rage that still resonates today. The journalist and music critic Greil Marcus outlined this for the first time in 1989, in Lipstick Traces. A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, a journey through the history of the antecedents of the movement, going back to Dada and Situationism. The exhibition draws on this book and performs the same exercise in reverse: a prospective exercise that looks for vestiges of punk in the artists of today. In this exhibition, punk appears as an explicit reference in many artists; in the use of elements such as noise, cut-out typography, anti-design and the aesthetics of the ugly; or in the inclusion of explicit references to musical bands. But it also shows traces of punk as an attitude: denial, opposition and destruction; the do it yourself; the reference to fear and horror in a society that alienates individuals; the same alienation that provokes psychotic states; the fondness for anything outside the norm; nihilism; criticism of the economic system and anarchy; or the demand for sexual freedom itself, the body as a place of battle. The exhibition was curated by David G. Torres.

For the exhibition in Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), Bill Balaskas was commissioned to produce a new installation titled 'Anarchy Near the UK'.


Advance Gold (AG) is a new agricultural compounds & veterinary medicines (ACVM)-registered budbreak enhancer for Gold3 kiwifruit. It contains salicylic acid as the active ingredient, and is used in conjunction with nitrogen and calcium salts. Gold3 kiwifruit blocks in the Bay of Plenty up to 1 ha in area were sprayed using convention air blast sprayers fitted with air inclusion nozzles in August of 2015 and 2016, and monitored for budbreak, flowering and components of yield. Following good winter chill in 2015, a block at near sea level produced about 2 king flowers per winter bud (KF/WB) without AG treatment and about 3 KF/WB following AG treatment. A site at 93 m above sea level produced a larger number of flowers unassisted and a modest increase following AG treatment. Minimal winter chill in 2016 resulted in very low flower numbers in untreated canes at both sites, with AG treatment producing an increase of approximately 1 KF/WB. The current budbreaker used by the kiwifruit industry, hydrogen cyanamide, produced comparable increases in flower numbers to AG in the four trials but gave a larger proportion of "star triples", tightly clustered triple flowers. Components of yield are presented.


Public health is the health status of a population and uses different approaches to maintain the health of the population. Emergency departments play a key role in public health. They are complex and difficult due to many different factors. ABC Memorial Hospital had an emergency department that was inefficient and consistently failed to meet the time requirements they had set for themselves. The author was given opportunity to observe ABC Memorial's ED and present the findings to the hospital's Nurse Executive Forum. The purpose of this essay is to explore the overall importance of patient flow and patient satisfaction in the emergency department of a hospital. Throughout the essay the author will research and explore best practices, how to improve patient flow and satisfaction, and technology that helps improve the emergency department. The author will also provide the observations and recommendations given to ABC Memorial Hospital.


Reflection seismics has traditionally played an important part in glaciology since the 1920s. Mostly, explosive seismic source were utilized. One disadvantage is that they have to be deployed in boreholes, which cannot used repeatedly because of destruction by the charge. Moreover, the source signal is very variable and cannot be retrieved for processing purposes. Application of active reflection seismics in Antarctica and on the cold, firn-covered Alpine saddle Colle Gnifetti using seismic vibrators as sources indicate that the vibroseismic technique has several advantages to overcome current shortcomings of explosive seismic sources. Most noteworthy advantages of vibrators are their operation from the surface and the basically destruction-free application, allowing for numerous repeated shots at the same position without signal degradation.The results presented here show that the application of vibroseis in glaciology enables us to detect internal layers, likely caused by changing crystal orientation fabric, determine properties of the ice-bed interface, and image the rock and sediments underneath an ice mass. Our utilized vibrators basically represent the end-members of available devices, from an industrial standard with a peak force of 120 kN in a frequency range of 10-100 Hz to microvibrators with only some 100 N, with a pressure- (30-180 Hz) and a shear-wave (60-360 Hz) version. Comparison of microvibrator data acquired on the firn-covered Alpine saddle Colle Gnifetti with those from non-ice covered surfaces as well as small explosive sources indicate that the data are of very high quality. This is not only attributed to the small employed forces, which keep the structure of the surface firn intact, but to the complete transmission path, yielding a total p-wave penetration depth of some 150 m into bedrock underneath the 60 m thick glacier.


This wide-ranging, original account of the politics and economics of the giant military supply project in the North reconstructs an important but little-known part of Civil War history. Drawing on new and extensive research in army and business archives, Mark R. Wilson offers a fresh view of the wartime North and the ways in which its economy worked when the Lincoln administration, with unprecedented military effort, moved to suppress the rebellion. This task of equipping and sustaining Union forces fell to career army procurement officers. Largely free from political partisanship or any formal free-market ideology, they created a mixed military economy with a complex contracting system that they pieced together to meet the experience of civil war. Wilson argues that the North owed its victory to these professional military men and their finely tuned relationships with contractors, public officials, and war workers. Wilson also examines the obstacles military bureaucrats faced, many of which illuminated basic problems of modern political economy: the balance between efficiency and equity, the promotion of competition, and the protection of workers' welfare. The struggle over these problems determined the flow of hundreds of millions of dollars; it also redirected American political and economic development by forcing citizens to grapple with difficult questions about the proper relationships among government, business, and labor. Students of the American Civil War will welcome this fresh study of military-industrial production and procurement on the home front-long an obscure topic.


This Article discusses the development of environmental regulation and preservation in Taiwan in light of United States environmental law. The Article begins with a discussion of how few measures have been enacted to protect the Taiwanese environment. It then illuminates some of the problems with the Taiwanese environmental regulations that do exist. According to the author, some of these problems include: ambiguous and conflicting goals enunciated in the legislation; political pressures on the authorities influencing environmental policies; poor enforcement mechanisms; a legislative bias in favor of regulating new sources of pollution and against enforcing regulations in the case of old sources; and little or no litigation over environmental laws. The author next points out the weaknesses in Taiwan's policy of selective enforcement and its ineffective use of economic instruments to control pollution. The author concludes this Article with some suggestions of how Taiwan could improve its environmental regulation efforts.


Utilizing a critical race theory lens, this qualitative study employs a semi-structured interview and focus group interview design to explore the perspectives of individuals who interact with human resources structures, policies, or procedures in a formal or informal way in the context of an urban school district. To provide a foundational perspective, this study first reviews relevant literature related to human capital, teacher quality, and performance management. The overarching purpose of this research study is to explore ways that research participants perceive the effective management of human capital and ultimately, how the management of human capital impacts the educational experiences for children of color. Using a Critical Race Theory lens and grounded theory data analysis strategies, this research study synthesizes the participants' expressed experiences and perspectives regarding human capital and how it is significant in the context of an urban school district. Finally, as it relates to the education of children of color and overall performance management of the individuals that serve children of color, this research outlines the possible implications and considerations that emerged from the findings. This research study's findings indicate statutory requirements impact the effective management of human capital in the context of an urban school district, race and equity play a role in the implementation of an effective performance management system, and the quality of the classroom teacher is significant in predicting educational outcomes for children of color. Perhaps the most salient implication of this research is that it can inform the implementation of performance management systems that lead to increased student achievement for children of color.


We commonly think of the American Revolution as simply the war for independence from British colonial rule. But that independence applied to only a portion of the American population-African Americans would still be bound in slavery for nearly another century. In "Black Patriots and Loyalists", Alan Gilbert asks us to rethink what we know about the Revolutionary War, to realize that while white Americans were fighting for their freedom, black Americans were joining the British imperial forces to gain theirs. There were two wars being waged at once: a political revolution for independence from Britain and a social revolution for emancipation and equality. Drawing upon recently discovered archival material, Gilbert traces the imperial and patriot rivalry over recruitment and emancipation that led both sides to depend on blacks. As well, he presents persuasive evidence that slavery could have been abolished during the Revolution itself if either side had fully pursued the military advantage of freeing slaves and pressing them into combat-as when Washington formed the all-black and Native American First Rhode Island Regiment and Lord Dunmore freed slaves and indentured servants to fight for the British. "Black Patriots and Loyalists" contends that the struggle for emancipation was not only basic to the Revolution itself, but was a rousing force that would inspire freedom movements that followed in its wake, including the black loyalist pilgrimages for freedom in places such as Nova Scotia and Sierra Leone. In this thought-provoking history, Gilbert illuminates how the fight for abolition and equality-not just for the independence of the few but for the freedom and self-government of the many-has been central to the American story from its inception.