In citizens' debates about issues of public policy, we frequently encounter what this Article calls the divine accountability thesis - the controversial claim that the divine realm will punish a city, state, or nation unless it performs or proscribes certain forms of conduct. Many of us reject that claim, but its persistent usage in numerous societies over the past five thousand years teaches us a great deal about citizens' political self-conceptions. This Article begins by arguing that the divine accountability thesis illustrates human beings' deeply ingrained tendency to regard their political communities as discrete moral entities, individually deserving of punishment or reward. Drawing from the work of Ronald Dworkin and others, the Article then argues that the divine accountability thesis has an influential secular counterpart, consisting of two widely shared perceptions that, taken together, compose what this Article calls the integration thesis. The integration thesis holds that our individual identities are integrated with, and partially constructed by, the political communities to which we belong, and that each of our political communities is akin to a personified moral agent whose conduct reverberates in the individual lives of its integrated members. The integration thesis and the divine accountability thesis often push in precisely the same direction - namely, toward using the law as a means of stripping individuals of their freedom to make certain moral decisions for themselves. Hoping to draw advocates of these and other political viewpoints onto common ground, the Article proposes seven questions that all scholars and citizens ought to ask when assessing whether a given moral issue should be resolved collectively by a political community or should be left for each individual to resolve on his or her own.


The decade since 9/11 has seen a decline in liberal tolerance in the West as Muslims have endured increasing levels of repression. This book presents a series of case studies from Western Europe, Australia and North America demonstrating the transnational character of Islamophobia. The authors explore contemporary intercultural conflicts using the concept of moral panic, revitalised for the era of globalisation. Exploring various sites of conflict, Global Islamophobia considers the role played by 'moral entrepreneurs' in orchestrating popular xenophobia and in agitating for greater surveillance, policing and cultural regulation of those deemed a threat to the nation's security or imagined community.

This timely collection examines the interpenetration of the global and the local in the West's cultural politics towards Islam, highlighting parallels in the responses of governments and in the worrying reversion to a politics of coercion and assimilation. As such, it will be of interest to scholars of sociology and politics with interests in race and ethnicity; citizenship and assimilation; political communication, securitisation and The War on Terror; and moral panics.


Interest-rate spreads fluctuate widely across time and countries. We characterize their behavior using some 3,200 quarterly observations for 21 advanced and 17 emerging economies since the early 1990s. Before the financial crisis, spreads are 10 times more volatile in emerging economies than in advanced economies. Since 2008, the behavior of spreads has converged across country groups, largely because it has adjusted in advanced economies. We also provide evidence on the transmission of spread shocks and find it similar across sample periods and country groups. Spread shocks have become a more important source of output fluctuations in advanced economies after 2008.


The Swedish civil defence organizations have a long tradition of balancing their messages to the public through diverse media use. Over the course of the early Cold War, however, the political and technical circumstances of the civil defence organizations changed, rendering old methods from the 1930s obsolete. To keep their relevance, the narratives of the civil defence organizations had to be carefully remodelled in accordance with the current situation, obscuring some facts while stressing others more clearly. By operationalizing the concept of media system, this article examines how the Swedish civil defence organizations used the media, broadly defined, to deal with the two main narratives that their practical work was based upon: urban destruction as war unfolds, and the safety of air-raid shelters. The article shows how these narratives were constructed and connected between various media, but also their changing and dynamic character over time. Over the course of the 1940s and 1950s, the narrative of urban destruction changed from a concrete to an abstract mediation, while the narrative of sheltered salvation took an opposite direction.


Build robust and scalable iOS and Mac OS X game applications About This Book * Learn to use and implement the 23 Gang of Four design patterns using Swift 2 * Design and architect your code for Swift application development * Understand the role, generic UML design, and participants in the class diagram of the pattern by implementing them in a step-by-step approach Who This Book Is For This book is intended for competent Swift developers who want to apply enduring design patterns with Swift to structure and scale their application code. What You Will Learn * Choose the appropriate pattern depending on the problem to be solved * Understand the generic class diagram of each of the 23 GoF patterns and how each object participates in the pattern * Use Swift to implement these patterns even though the language doesn't provide all of the object-oriented programming concepts such as abstract class, interface, and so on * Architect your software to avoid the overuse of memory, time spent on calculations, or high network traffic * Find the best way to organize your code to make it more secure from the outside world * Prepare your code to make it more flexible when the consumer changes or the third-party component hidden code changes * Structure your code to change the algorithm to apply at runtime * Deliver Flyweight responsibility to your objects In Detail Swift is a multi-paradigm language. It has expressive features familiar to those used to work with modern functional languages, while also keeping the object-oriented features of Objective-C. It remains compatible with Apple's legacy codes and frameworks. A design pattern systematically names, motivates, and explains a general design that addresses a recurring design problem in object-oriented systems. It describes the problem, the solution, when to apply the solution, and its consequences. It also gives implementation hints and examples. Knowledge about design patterns is also one of the best ways to make you different compared to other low-level developers. This book shows you how to use Swift 2 to learn about 23 Gang of Four (GoF) design patterns, and is organized into three categories. The book will present you the five creational patterns, followed by the seven structural patterns, and finishing with the 11 behavioral patterns as defined by the GoF. Each chapter will introduce the pattern by defining its role, which common problems the pattern should be used for, its generic UML representation, how each objects presented in the class diagram participate in the pattern, and what the role of each of these objects is. The book then presents you with a concrete case as an illustration that will be used to implement the pattern using Swift. Style and approach A step-by-step tutorial completed with screenshots and code highlights wherever necessary. Each chapter discusses one or more patterns with its definitions and a simple-to-follow illustration case using a playground or XCText project to implement it with Swift.


Carbonaceous particles were generated during a "sooting burn" experiment to explore how heterogeneity in horizontal leaf area density (LAD) within the canopy impacts the ultrafine particle (UFP) collection efficiency at the branch-scale. To address this goal, wind tunnel experiments and a particle-size resolving model, which couples the turbulent flow field within the vegetated volume and the collection efficiency, were presented. Three scenarios were examined in a wind-tunnel packed with Juniperus chinensis branches: An LAD that was uniformly distributed, linearly increasing and linearly decreasing along the longitudinal or mean wind direction. The concentration measurements were conducted at multiple locations within the vegetated volume to evaluate the performance of the proposed model needed in discerning the role of LAD heterogeneity on UFP collection. Differences not exceeding 20% were found between modeled and measured concentration for all particle sizes across a wide range of wind speeds. The overall particle collection efficiency was found to be primarily governed by the spatially integrated LAD when differences in aerodynamic attributes (e.g., foliage drag) were accounted for. When combined with earlier studies, the results suggest that one parameter linking the laminar boundary layer conductance to the Schmidt number depends on particle size.


Abstract. Two circular permanent lakes of 150 and 250 m diameter and 6–8 m depth to an unconsolidated muddy bottom occur 250 m apart from each other in the agricultural fields SW of the town of Almiros (Thessaly, central Greece). The age of the lakes is assumed to be Late Pliocene to Early Holocene with a minimum age of approx. 7000 yr BP. The abundant polymict, quartz-rich carbonate breccia and clasts with a clay rich matrix in the shallow embankments of the lakes show weak stratification but no volcanic structures. The carbonate clasts and particles often display spheroidal shapes and consist of calcite aggregates with feathery, arborescent, variolitic to micro-sparitic textures and spheroidal fabrics, recrystallized and deformed glass-shaped fragments, calcite globules in quartz; thus indications of possible carbonate melting, quenching and devitrification. The carbonatic matrix includes small xenomorphic phases, such as chromspinel, zircon with blurred granular and skeletal textures, skeletal rutile and ilmenite, which are interpreted as relicts of partial melting and quenching under high temperatures of 1240–1800 °C. Only a few quartz fragments exhibit indistinct planar fractures. In several cases they include exotic Al-Si- and sulfur bearing Fe-phases, The modeled "Residual Gravity" profiles through the lakes indicate negative gravity anomalies of bowl-type structures down to 150 m for the eastern lake and down to 250 m for the larger western lake. Several hypotheses can be drawn upon to explain the origin of these enigmatic twin-lakes: (a) Maar-type volcanic craters; (b) hydrothermal or CO2/hydrocarbon gas explosion craters; (c) and (d) doline holes due to karstification; or (e) small meteorite impact craters, the latter being a plausible explanation due to geologic, petrologic, and geophysical evidence. The morphology and dimensions of the lakes as well as the density contrast tomography of the bedrock favor a meteorite impact hypothesis of a projectile, which may has split into two fragments before reaching the surface.


We consider the Kane-Mele-Hubbard model with a magnetic $\pi$ flux threading each honeycomb plaquette. The resulting model has remarkably rich physical properties. In each spin sector, the noninteracting band structure is characterized by a total Chern number $C=\pm 2$. Fine-tuning of the intrinsic spin-orbit coupling $\lambda$ leads to a quadratic band crossing point associated with a topological phase transition. At this point, quantum Monte Carlo simulations reveal a magnetically ordered phase which extends to weak coupling. Although the spinful model has two Kramers doublets at each edge and is explicitly shown to be a $Z_{2}$ trivial insulator, the helical edge states are protected at the single-particle level by translation symmetry. Drawing on the bosonized low-energy Hamiltonian, we predict a correlation-induced gap as a result of umklapp scattering for half-filled bands. For strong interactions, this prediction is confirmed by quantum Monte Carlo simulations.


This paper aims to provide a comprehensive survey o f the theory of international tax competition. Starting with the standard framework, it visits the non-cooperative equilibrium of tax competition, analyses aspects of partial and regional coordination, repeated interaction, stock-flow-effects, agglomeration effects and time consistency issues in dynamic models. We discuss profit shifting in the Keen-Kanbur model an d then survey frameworks to analyze countries' bidding for firms, tax rate differentiat ion and preferential tax regimes, the role of information exchange and recent work on tax havens. The paper also discusses approaches that replace the benevolent government assumption b y selfish (Leviathan) governments or by political processes that determine countries' decis ions on their tax policy in an international context.


Upland rice is important for sustainable crop production to meet future food demands. Increase in area planted with low land rice genotypes is constraints because of water shortage due to climate change. Thirteen upland rice genotypes were evaluated in a randomized complete block design with three replications in two years to study the genetic variation and diversity of some agronomic traits and nutritional qualities of the selected upland rice genotypes. Data were subjected to analysis of variance, principal component analysis and cluster analysis. Significant variations were expressed by genotypes for all traits studied. Interaction between genotypes and year exhibited significant differences for all the traits with exception of Panicle Weight (PW) and Tiller Number (TN) where no significant difference was expressed. The highest phenotypic and genotypic coefficient of variation was recorded for grain yield across years. All traits under study exhibited high heritability with exception of Tiller Number (TN) in both years and in year 2 of number days to 50% flowering number of leaves at 2 weeks after planting and 8 weeks after planting respectively. Cluster analysis based on 15 traits grouped the 13 rice genotypes into five clusters. Cluster III was the largest and consisted of 4 genotypes mostly belonging to NERICA family. The first four principal components of the 15 principal components accounted for about 96.67% of the total variation and revealed a wide variation among the genotypes. The best traits, which showed high heritability and high genetic advance, could be used as a selection criterion for hybridization programmers in future breeding.


Objective: Evaluation of effect of interval between surgery to adjuvant radiotherapy (Sx-ART) start and its early tolerance in glioma patients. Method: A retrospective study of 155 adult glioma patients (WHO Grade II-IV) who underwent adjuvant radiotherapy (ART) post-surgery with confirmed histopathology was done in our institution from Sept, 2012 to May,2017. Results were analysed in 3 parts: Sx-ART interval, ART schedule, ART course tolerance. Results: Sx-ART interval ranged from 1-8wks. Seventy-eight percent (121/155) patients started ART within 4wks of surgery, 30/155(19.4%) started within 2wks and 89/155 (57.4%) within 3wks of surgery. ART schedule was conventional fractionation (CF) in 121 (78%) while 34/155 (22%) patients received hypofractionated (HF) course. CF schedules varied between 54Gy-61Gy in 28-33 fractions and HF ranged 50Gy-55Gy in 20-25 fractions. Duration of ART ranged 24-50 days (median 41days). Sixty-five percent (101/155) patients completed ART <6wks and 147/155 (95%) <7wks. Seventy-eight percent (121/155) patients had concurrent Temozolomide (TMZ) including 28/34 (82%) HF patients. ART course interruption was recorded in 11/155 (7%) patients. Interruptions for Sx-ART interval <3wks & >3wks was 3 & 8 patients respectively. None had Grade 3/4 skin reactions or post-treatment scar infection/gaping at ART conclusion. Conclusion: Early start of ART in this analysis showed no difference in tolerance to radiotherapy, including patients receiving HF radiotherapy or concomitant temozolomide. Decrease in time interval from surgery to start of radiotherapy may improve compliance to radiotherapy and reduce overall duration of treatment time (ODT). Long term data of such approaches to reduce ODT and its effect on disease free and overall survival require future studies.


This article looks at well documented processes of urban regeneration and community displacement in the inner-city through an innovative anthropological perspective focused on concepts of waste and value. Using the notion of symbolic devaluation of the working classes developed by Skeggs (1997; 2004), it traces their exclusion from recycling practices while at the same time the estates they live on are being regenerated. Raising questions about the parallels and contradictions between regeneration and recycling, it shows how symbolic devaluation of speci�耀c areas and their inhabitants are necessary precursors of the physical demolition and removal that characterize regeneration processes. Through an ethnographic approach, the deep connections between people and their waste, and people as waste, are exposed and questioned, showing how valuable middle class selves are produced through appropriate waste management procedures, i.e. individualized recycling, while inner-city, estate dwellers are remade into uncaring, unworthy citizens who cannot take part in this value-producing circuit.


The mechanism of photoinduced anisotropy through photoisomerization has been studied by measuring photoinduced dichroism and birefringence in solgel silica-based glasses containing an azo dye (Disperse Red 1) and a plasticizer (carbazole). The equations commonly adopted to describe the molecular orientation (Sekkat's theory) have been solved numerically and analytically within two different approximations. The results have been applied to photoinduced birefringence measured with expanded beams, and the dominant mechanisms driving the azo-dye molecular orientation in the investigated materials during both illumination and relaxation have been inferred. The experiments of photoinduced dichroism, performed with nonexpanded beams, suggest that the distribution of times describing the kinetics of the anisotropy formation, usually attributed to inhomogeneities in the chromophore environment, may be ascribed instead to the nonuniform profile of the beams.


ABSTRACT Computer modeling, a new form of knowledge production implying new theoretical and experimental practices, has since the 1950s become an important tool in scientific investigation. This paper analyzes computer simulation in two cases of atmospheric transport modeling. First, it investigates pioneering efforts by the meteorologist Heinz Fortak in the 1960s to construct Gaussian models of local and regional air pollution transport. Second, it deals with the much more complex simulation efforts by a Norwegian group around Anton Eliassen in the 1970s and 1980s to model long distance transport and transformation of pollutants. In both cases, the simulation of air pollution phenomena implied a set of specific practices. The use of the computer as a tool required drastic simplifications; the collection and preparation of an enormous amount of input data; the adoption of control procedures to validate the models; and the execution of ""computer experiments"" in sensitivity studies. Because of uncertainty and ignorance, scientists enjoyed a large freedom of choice in the construction of models and simulation runs, and great interpretative flexibility of their outcome. Nevertheless, by relying on tacit expert knowledge and intuition, scientists were ultimately able to approach coherence and stability.


What is the record of right-wing terrorism and violence (RTV) in Western Europe post-1990? To date, RTV incident data suitable for temporal and cross-national comparisons have been lacking. Consequently, few comparative studies of RTV exist, and we generally have limited knowledge about the most recent evolution of RTV in Western Europe. To help fill these gaps, this article introduces a new dataset covering RTV incidents in Western Europe between 1990 and 2015. Including the most severe types of incidents only, the dataset comprises 578 incidents, including 190 deadly incidents causing 303 deaths. Each incident has been manually researched by the same person and coded on a range of variables, including time and location, perpetrator and victim characteristics, organizational affiliations, weapon types, and number of casualties. The article also proposes six hypotheses aiming to explain the perhaps most puzzling finding emerging from the RTV dataset: that the number of deadly incidents has declined considerably under conditions commonly assumed to stimulate RTV. These conditions include increased immigration, enhanced support to radical right parties, Islamist terrorism, and booming youth unemployment rates.


The sensational Tommaso Sgricci (1789-1836), the most famous improvvisatore of his day, was known for theatrical performances in which he extemporized lyric poems as well as entire Classical dramas. His fame spread throughout Europe through periodical articles and reviews, and through the first-hand reports of English travellers who witnessed his performances in Italy. The Shelleys' intense engagement with Sgricci during the winter of 1820-21 leaves its mark on important texts written during those years, including Mary's Valperga and Percy's Defence of Poetry. Byron encountered Sgricci both personally and professionally between 1816 and 1820; resonances between Sgricci's distinctive performance genre and Byron's later poetry are less direct, but more profound. The embodied responses to history in Canto IV of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage bear comparison with Sgricci's spontaneous dramas on Classical and historical themes, as does the "mobility" exemplified by the performer Lady Adeline Amundeville in the later cantos of Don Juan. Byron's ability to "revivify" the past in these works may be illuminated by setting them alongside the practice of the improvvisatore, a figure who stands for the real-time, responsive, public process of crafting poetry out of contingent subject-matter, habitual sound-patterns, fragments of memory, and lively imagination.


Since 1915, when Yamagiwa and Ichikawa succeeded in producing tar cancer experimentally, considerable progress has been made towards the elucidation of the chemical nature of substances capable of inciting malignant changes in cells. Outstanding contributions since then have been those of Bloch and Dreifuss (1921) and of Kennaway and his colleagues. From the work of Bloch and Dreifuss it appeared that the carcinogenic material in tar was present in the neutral, nitrogen-free, high-boiling fraction. Kennaway (1924, 1925, 1930) produced carcinogenic substances from acetylene and from other compounds under conditions which indicated that the active substances were hydrocarbons. Following the application of the fluorescence spectrum to this problem by Mayneord in 1927, Hieger (1930) noted that many cancer-producing materials showed similar fluorescence spectra. Thereupon a number of compounds which were found by the English investigators to have spectra similar to those of the cancer-producing tars were tested on animals. This led to the observation that 1:2:5:6–dibenzanthracene was capable of producing cancer in experimental animals. A large number of compounds 1 of this type were then synthesized by Cook and his collaborators; animal assays showed that certain of these compounds were highly active. In the earlier experiments of this group of English workers carcinomas were produced by applying solutions of the compounds to the skin of the experimental animals. Burrows, Hieger and Kennaway (1932) then made the significant finding that 1:2:5:6–dibenzanthracene could also produce tumors of connective tissue. Thereupon, experimental work with dibenzanthracene was undertaken in this laboratory.


Invasive SpeciesAs cargo ships pump millions of liters of ballast in and out of their hulls, they also help spread sometimes microscopic stowaways, including invasive shellfish and algae that have damaged marine ecosystems and local economies worldwide. Blocking these invasions is the goal of a science barge called the Mobile Ballast Water Treatment Test Platform . Recently, researchers began using it to test ship-based technologies capable of removing most organisms from ballast water. The experiments are part of a larger international effort to prevent ship-borne invasions. It's not clear, however, which technologies will meet the new standards—or how researchers can validate the effectiveness of various devices. That's where the barge, and several other floating laboratories like it, come in: to provide unbiased, independent data to regulators and shipbuilders.


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Since the introduction of the ZIRLO™ alloy for use in commercial nuclear light water reactors (LWRs) in the early nineties, work has continued on identifying chemistry and process changes to improve further the in-reactor corrosion performance of the alloy. Relative to the reference ZIRLO chemistry of Zr-1%Nb-1%Sn-0.1%Fe, a series of Zr-xNb-ySn-zFe alloys was fabricated to strip material and autoclave tested. The goal was to identify Zr-Nb-Sn-Fe compositions that would result in lower uniform corrosion rates in pure water and steam environments, while retaining resistance to accelerated corrosion in abnormal chemistry conditions, such as elevated lithium levels. The results of the study identified a reduction in tin content as having the greatest impact on improving the uniform corrosion performance. However, a minimum tin content was required to avoid accelerated corrosion in water containing 70-ppm Li. In the processing area, an extensive study was conducted to evaluate the relationship between thermal-mechanical processing, alloy microstructure (e.g., second phase particles), and corrosion performance. Processing variables following β-phase heat treatments included cold work, annealing temperature, and annealing time. Long-term autoclave tests performed in 633°K water containing 70-ppm lithium showed the uniform corrosion rate of the alloy is essentially optimized in cold-worked material after only 1 h of anneal at temperatures higher than 823°K. The autoclave results also showed a lower corrosion rate with decreasing processing temperatures. A low tin version of the ZIRLO alloy, with approximately 0.75 % tin content, was fabricated into fuel cladding and inserted as fuel rods in a commercial pressurized water reactor. After two 18-month cycles at high fuel duty and average burnups greater than 52 GWD/MTU, the peak oxide thickness in the low tin ZIRLO was significantly lower than reference ZIRLO.


We examined the impacts of possible future land development patterns on the biodiversity of a landscape. Our landscape data included a remote sensing derived map of the current habitat of the study area and six maps of future habitat distributions resulting from different land development scenarios. Our species data included lists of all bird, mammal, reptile, and amphibian species in the study area, their habitat associations, and area requirements for each. We estimated the area requirements using home ranges, sampled population densities, or genetic area requirements that incorporate dispersal distances. Our measures of biodiversity were species richness and habitat abundance. We calculated habitat abundance in two ways. First, we computed the total habitat area for each species in each landscape. Second, we calculated the number of habitat units for each species in each landscape by dividing the size of each habitat patch in the landscape by the area requirement and summing over all patches. Species richness was based on presence of habitat. Species became extinct in the landscape if they had no habitat area or no habitat units, respectively. We then computed ratios of habitat abundance in each future landscape to habitat abundance in the present for each species. We also computed the ratio of future to present species richness. We then calculated summary statistics across all species. Species richness changed little from present to future. There were distinctly greater risks to habitat abundance in landscapes that extrapolated from present trends or zoning patterns, however, as opposed to landscapes in which land development activities followed more constrained patterns. These results were stable when tested using Monte Carlo simulations and sensitivity tests on the area requirements. We conclude that this methodology can begin to discriminate the effects of potential changes in land development on vertebrate biodiversity.


A model is presented that uses the electrical conductivity tensor of a multi-species plasma to estimate the efficiency Q of plasma heating by Pedersen current dissipation as a function of height from the photosphere to the lower corona. The particle densities and temperature are given by FAL model CM. Q is the efficiency with which the electric field generates thermal energy by transferring energy to the current density J⊥ perpendicular to the magnetic field. The energy is then thermalized by collisions. The projection of J ⊥ on the driving electric field is the Pedersen current density. Q is the ratio of the actual heating rate due to Pedersen current dissipation to the heating rate when J⊥ is entirely a Pedersen current, which is the maximum possible heating rate for given J⊥. It is found that Pedersen current dissipation is highly efficient throughout the chromosphere, but is highly inefficient in the transition region and corona on the spatial scales of FAL CM. In the photosphere, the electron magnetization, which is the product of the cyclotron frequency and the collision time is so small compared to unity that the conductivity tensor is almost isotropic, implying there is no essential difference between Pedersen current dissipation and magnetic field aligned current dissipation. It is the rapid increase with height of the magnetizations of electrons, protons and metallic ions from 1t o� 1 beginning near the height of the FAL CM temperature minimum that causes Pedersen current dissipation to become essentially different from magnetic field aligned current dissipation, and that causes Q to rapidly increase from minimum values ∼0.1 near the temperature minimum to ∼1 in the lower chromosphere. Q remains ∼1 up to the transition region in which it precipitously decreases with height to values 10 −10 in the corona. It is proposed that the rapidly increasing magnetization triggers the onset of heating by Pedersen current dissipation that causes the chromospheric temperature inversion and heats the entire non-flaring chromosphere. The energy channeled by any mechanism into the generation of a center of mass (CM) electric field that drives current perpendicular to the magnetic field is thermalized by Pedersen current dissipation at the maximum possible rate throughout the chromosphere. The mechanism is damped in the chromosphere to the degree to which its energy is channeled into the creation of the CM electric field. The results of the model are consistent with previous predictions that slow magnetoacoustic waves heat network regions of the chromosphere through dissipation of Pedersen currents driven by a wave generated convection electric field, and that electric current dissipation on the spatial scales of the FAL models is insignificant for heating the transition region.


Background. Calcineurin-inhibitor (CNI) nephrotoxicity is a major cause of morbidity and mortality after cardiac transplantation. The aim of this study was to assess over 2 years the safety and effect on renal function of withdrawal of CNI immunosuppression and replacement with sirolimus (SRL) in stable cardiac transplant recipients. Methods. CNI was substituted with SRL in 78 cardiac transplant recipients (SRL group) of whom 58 (group A) had CNI-induced renal impairment (glomerular filtration rate [GFR] <50 mL/min) and 20 (group B) had preserved renal function (GFR >50 mL/min). Fifty-one patients (CNI group) with renal impairment (GFR ≤50 mL/min) maintained on CNI served as controls. Secondary immunosuppressants were unchanged. Results. In the SRL group, GFR increased from 47.0±18.0 to 61.2±22.2 ml/min (P=0.0001) 24 months after SRL initiation. In Group A, GFR increased from 40.5±12.7 to 53.9±19.8 mL/min (P<0.0001). In Group B, GFR increased marginally from 67.2±15.8 to 83.5±27.8 mL/min (P=0.10). In the CNI group, GFR declined from 40.5±14.0 mL/min to 36.4±12.5 mL/min (P=0.23) after 24 months of follow up. There was no significant difference in cardiac rejection or cardiac allograft function. In SRL group, proteinuria increased from 299±622 mg/day to 517±795 mg/day (P=0.0002) 12 months after SRL initiation and then stabilized; it did not differ from CNI group at 24 months (637±806 vs. 514±744 mg/day, P=0.39). Uric acid decreased from 7.6±2.4 to 6.2±1.9 mg/dL (P=0.0007) in the SRL group. Conclusions. Graduated substitution of CNI with SRL in cardiac transplant recipients is safe and improves renal function, without cardiac compromise.


A petrographic and mineral chemical study was conducted on pyrite from non-conglomeratic sedimentary rocks of the 3.0 to 2.8 Ga Witwatersrand Supergroup. Detailed petrographic analyses revealed the presence of three paragenetic associations, namely detrital, diagenetic and epigenetic pyrite. Detrital pyrite is commonly observed in sandstone and diamictite from proximal shelf deposits. The mineral chemistry of large (0.1 to 0.5 mm in size) and small (<0.05 mm in size) detrital pyrite grains, based on Co, Ni and As contents, suggests a metamorphic and diagenetic origin, respectively. Significantly, a variety of early diagenetic pyrite forms has survived greenschist facies metamorphism; these occur exclusively in carbonaceous mudstones intercalated with fluvial inner shelf sandstones. The high Ni content of early diagenetic pyrite and the occurrence of early diagenetic Cu-Pb sulfides highlight the importance of organic matter and host rock composition. However, in distal to starved outer shelf depositional settings, detrital pyrite is absent and diagenetic pyrite is scarce. Nevertheless, the composition of diagenetic pyrite in distal magnetite-rich lithologies is similarly affected by host rock composition and possibly Fe-Mn reduction (elevated Co and As concentrations). Epigenetic pyrite, pyrrhotite and base-metal sulfides are prevalent in sandstone intercalations near diabase sills and fault zones. The composition of epigenetic pyrite is influenced by the temperature of the fluids and the interaction of the fluids with the host rock, as well as with precursor and associated iron sulfides.

This study finds that local depositional and tectonic settings are instrumental in dictating the distribution, morphology and composition of diagenetic pyrite. In this regard, the formation of metal-rich early diagenetic pyrite is favored in carbonaceous mudstones associated with fluvial regimes in the upper Hospital Hill, Government, Jeppestown, Johannesburg and Turffontein Subgroups, where continental runoff would have supplied nutrients and sulfur species to the shallow water environment. In contrast, the scarcity of diagenetic pyrite in marine-dominated environments of the lower Hospital Hill Subgroup (of which some are carbonaceous) and distal portions of the Government and Jeppestown Subgroups, is consistent with a lack of sulfate in the Archean ocean.


The goal of this research is to develop algorithms for reconstruction and manipulation of gradient fields for scene analysis, from intensity images captured under variable illumination. These methods utilize gradients or differential measurements of intensity and depth for analyzing a scene, such as estimating shape and intrinsic images, and edge suppression under variable illumination. The differential measurements lead to robust reconstruction from gradient fields in the presence of outliers and avoid hard thresholds and smoothness assumptions in manipulating image gradient fields.
Reconstruction from gradient fields is important in several applications including shape extraction using Photometric Stereo and Shape from Shading, image editing and matting, retinex, mesh smoothing and phase unwrapping. In these applications, a non-integrable gradient field is available, which needs to be integrated to obtain the final image or surface. Previous approaches for enforcing integrability have focused on least square solutions which do not work well in the presence of outliers and do not locally confine errors during reconstruction. I present a generalized equation to represent a continuum of surface reconstructions of a given non-integrable gradient field. This equation is used to derive new types of feature preserving surface reconstructions in the presence of noise and outliers. The range of solutions is related to the degree of anisotropy of the weights applied to the gradients in the integration process.
Traditionally, image gradient fields have been manipulated using hard thresholds for recovering reflectance/illumination maps or to remove illumination effects such as shadows. Smoothness of reflectance/illumination maps is often assumed in such scenarios. By analyzing the direction of intensity gradient vectors in images captured under different illumination conditions, I present a framework for edge suppression which avoids hard thresholds and smoothness assumptions. This framework can be used to manipulate image gradient fields to synthesize computationally useful and visually pleasing images, and is based on two approaches: (a) gradient projection and (b) affine transformation of gradient fields using cross-projection tensors. These approaches are demonstrated in the context of several applications such as removing shadows and glass reflections, and recovering reflectance/illumination maps and foreground layers under varying illumination.


The critical remarks by Clifford D. Ferris of the chapter "Parnassius" in William H. Howe's treatise of the butterflies of North America stimulated me to write the review following below and send it in for publication to the Journal of the Lepidoρterists' Society. Through this I hoped to open a discussion on and come to a classification of the Parnassius subspecies of North-America. Earlier attempts were never followed by any reaction. Since George L. Godfrey, Editor-in-chief of the said journal, to my regret informed me that the Editors had decided not to allow any space to discussions on Howe's book, I submitted my remarks for publication in the Zoologische Mededelingen of the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie at Leiden. The chapter on Parnassius has been dealt with by John H. Shepard and Sigrid S. Shepard. For years I have cooperated with Mr. Shepard, to whom I am indebted for many a series of well-labelled North American Parnassius. Meeting in San Francisco in 1968, we discussed at length the distribution of Parnassius in North America and came to agreement, as prove Mr. Shepard's drawings, which I still have before me. As to P. eversmanni thor W. H. Edwards I have no comments. Regarding P. clodius Menetries the subspecies hel (mihi) is missing. It comes from Stevens Pass in the Cascade Mountains, Washington (at 4500 ft). It is a high altitude subspecies and in my collection there is no other series of Parnassius clodius so richly designed as the types depicted by me (1956, Parnassiana Nova 10: 243-244, pl. 3 figs. 1-6). As to the subspecies pseudogallatinus Bryk, I still doubt whether specimens from the eastern part of the Vancouver territory still belong to it, whereas in most characters they come very close to ssp. hel Eisner. Most specimens


In this paper, we study large-scale convex optimization algorithms based on the Newton method applied to regularized generalized self-concordant losses, which include logistic regression and softmax regression. We first prove that our new simple scheme based on a sequence of problems with decreasing regularization parameters is provably globally convergent, that this convergence is linear with a constant factor which scales only logarithmically with the condition number. In the parametric setting, we obtain an algorithm with the same scaling than regular first-order methods but with an improved behavior, in particular in ill-conditioned problems. Second, in the non parametric machine learning setting, we provide an explicit algorithm combining the previous scheme with Nystr{o}m projection techniques, and prove that it achieves optimal generalization bounds with a time complexity of order O(ndf $\lambda$), a memory complexity of order O(df 2 $\lambda$) and no dependence on the condition number, generalizing the results known for least-squares regression. Here n is the number of observations and df $\lambda$ is the associated degrees of freedom. In particular, this is the first large-scale algorithm to solve logistic and softmax regressions in the non-parametric setting with large condition numbers and theoretical guarantees.


Countries in the Global South are producing the most important educational needs of the 21st century. Fast-growing cities can provide the most striking examples of these current tendencies. Just over a decade after the start of the new millennium, the needs for quality-education and appropriate learning space are huge. Yet they are still largely underestimated in many countries of the Global South. With high-level demographical growth and fast-expanding urban boundaries, the developing metropolis provides a fascinating place to analyze societal mutations. School – as one of the fundamental institutions in modern society – deserves timely observation and careful analysis. The research work is dedicated to the study of educational architecture in two African cities Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) and Cape Town (South Africa) and one Chinese city: Hangzhou. Because of the fundamental relationship between school and society, learning places need to make statement of their urban positions. The hypothesis proposes to question the concept of sustainability in the framework of cultural-environmental qualities between school and city, between users and space. Conducted by an architect, this thesis is the synthesis of a research process together with the professional practice. It is benchmarked by a path of three steps: critical analysis of literature, in situ case-study and cross-cultural comparison with proposal of an assessment method that opens up for future perspectives. The thesis argues that the current time is crucial for our society to reconsider the place of educational architecture in the city. A truly sustainable architecture is transformable in the time-span of its usage and transformative in the changing urban environment. With a discursive comparative view between built cases located in these three cities, this work attempts to provide new insights on the design of the learning space in the urban future. The synthesis provides a panel of cultural-environmental quality profiles as guidelines to future design innovation opportunities.


Due to the increasing use of service level agreements for the provisioning of IT services, providers have to ensure that the guarantees for the quality of their offered services, expressed by quality of service parameters, are met. These guarantees are endangered by resource malfunctions in the provider's infrastructure or quality degradations of services which are supplied by subproviders. To optimize the resolution of customer reports about service quality degradations affecting the quality guarantees we propose to apply event correlation techniques. In this paper we present a framework for this new kind of event correlation which is called service-oriented event correlation. The framework bridges the gap between the management of the infrastructure and the offer of services for the customers with respect to the service fault diagnosis. The application of event correlation approaches in the framework is examined in detail.


Throughout the Sahelian region of Africa, vegetation growth displays substantial inter-annual variation, causing widespread concern in the region as rain-fed agriculture and pastoralism are a means of sustenance for the predominantly rural population. Previously proposed factors behind variations include changes in total yearly rainfall, land-use change and migration. But these factors are not fully explanatory. This study addresses other possible factors for variation in vegetation patterns through the analysis of the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) produced by satellite sensors. We focus on precipitation, but instead of looking at the total yearly amount of rainfall, the intra-annual variation is examined. Here we show that plant growth is strongly correlated with the number and frequency of days within the rainy season upon which there is no rainfall. Furthermore, we find that if the start of the growing season, or the period in which the peak growth of vegetation occurs, is especially dry then plant growth may be stunted throughout the remainder of the season. These results enable better understanding of climate dynamics in the Sahel and allow more accurate forecasting of crop yields, carbon storage and landscape changes without the need to resort to rainfall estimates that are sometimes of low accuracy. In addition, it may be possible to apply the results to other dry land regions worldwide.


Identifying large repeat expansions such as those that cause amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Fragile X syndrome is challenging for short-read (100-150 bp) whole genome sequencing (WGS) data. A solution to this problem is an important step towards integrating WGS into precision medicine. We have developed a software tool called ExpansionHunter that, using PCR-free WGS short-read data, can genotype repeats at the locus of interest, even if the expanded repeat is larger than the read length. We applied our algorithm to WGS data from 3,001 ALS patients who have been tested for the presence of the C9orf72 repeat expansion with repeat-primed PCR (RP-PCR). Taking the RP-PCR calls as the ground truth, our WGS-based method identified pathogenic repeat expansions with 98.1% sensitivity and 99.7% specificity. Further inspection identified that all 11 conflicts were resolved as errors in the original RP-PCR results. Compared against this updated result, ExpansionHunter correctly classified all (212/212) of the expanded samples as either expansions (208) or potential expansions (4). Additionally, 99.9% (2,786/2,789) of the wild type samples were correctly classified as wild type by this method with the remaining two identified as possible expansions. We further applied our algorithm to a set of 144 samples where every sample had one of eight different pathogenic repeat expansions including examples associated with fragile X syndrome, Friedreich's ataxia and Huntington's disease and correctly flagged all of the known repeat expansions. Finally, we tested the accuracy of our method for short repeats by comparing our genotypes with results from 860 samples sized using fragment length analysis and determined that our calls were >95% accurate. ExpansionHunter can be used to accurately detect known pathogenic repeat expansions and provides researchers with a tool that can be used to identify new pathogenic repeat expansions.


Review: Radioactive Waste Disposal at Sea By Lasse Ringius Reviewed by Umar Karim Mirza Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Pakistan Lasse Ringius. Radioactive Waste Disposal at Sea. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001. 261 pp. ISBN 0-262-68118-8 (paperback). US$23.95. Acid-free paper. Most studies of environmental regimes focus on the use of power, the pursuit of rational self-interest, and the influence of scientific knowledge. This book focuses instead on the influence of public ideas and policy entrepreneurs, and makes a significant contribution by showing that, under certain circumstances, regimes can be created and changed by a combination of powerful but highly oversimplified public ideas and transnational political entrepreneurs. The careful analysis of the creation of the global ocean dumping regime in 1972 and its transformation in 1993 to include a ban on the disposal at sea of radioactive waste, persuasively demonstrates the importance of public ideas, transnational coalitions of policy entrepreneurs, and environmental non-governmental organizations. The analysis contains important insights for international environmental policy. Ringius shows how transnational coalitions of policy entrepreneurs can build environmental regimes, and how global non-governmental organizations can act as catalysts for regime change. In this first book-length empirical study of the formation of the global ocean dumping regime in 1972 and its subsequent development, Ringius describes the structure within which global ocean dumping policy, particularly with regard to the disposal of radioactive waste, is embedded. He also examines the political construction of ocean dumping as a global environmental problem, the role of persuasion and communication in an international setting, and the formation of international public opinion. He argues not that the influence of ideas alone explains how regimes develop, but rather that it is necessary to understand how actors, interests, and ideas together influence regimes and international environmental policy. In telling the story of how an environmental organization initiated a regime for regulating radioactive waste disposal that went against both scientific consensus and the interests of powerful states and yet ultimately triumphed, this book challenges important conventional wisdom about how international environmental regulation happens. Ringius shows the power of public ideas and policy entrepreneurs in international negotiations in a way that has implications far beyond this particular case. Forceful ideas and committed


the skill of absolute pitch (ap) has been proposed as an ideal paradigm for investigating the complex relationships that exist between the genome and its expression at a cognitive and behavioral level (the phenotype). Yet despite this, we still have limited understanding of the early conditions that might be necessary or sufficient for development of this skill, and the influence of the current music environment has not been explored. To investigate these issues we undertook a detailed characterization of the early and current music environment of 160 musicians, and then identified factors predictive of varying extent of AP ability. The results demonstrate a similar contribution of past and present environmental influences, with a combination of factors (rather than any given factor) most salient in AP musicians. The novel finding for the role of the current environment suggests that auditory processing models emphasizing plasticity effects are relevant to AP ability.


Protein drugs are typically administered intravenously, but this practice has clear disadvantages such as widespread circulation and swift clearance from the body. Orally delivered protein drugs are not yet available but potentially offer improved distribution, retention, and activity by use of protective matrices and cell-specific targeting. Much work has been done on delayed release formulations for the upper intestine, but there has not been overwhelming evidence of protection of peptides from gastric conditions. In many instances the large intestine may be a better release target due to lower proteolytic activity. Afflictions of the colon such as Inflammatory Bowel Disease and colon cancer would benefit most directly from colon targeted drug release. Orally delivered colon-targeted protein drugs need protection and a release mechanism to withstand the upper GI and be dispersed along the inflamed areas of the lower intestine. This sort of delayed release has been proven with low molecular weight drugs, but has yet to be shown with peptides which also need protection from the acidic and proteolytic conditions of digestion. This work aims to distribute protein drugs throughout the colon while retaining protein activity. Pellets containing active peptides are synthesized from dextran modified with methacrylate. Dextranase, formed by bacteria and found in increasing amount in the lower intestines, gradually degrades these pellets allowing steady transport of drug from the pellet. These pellets are further coated in an acrylic copolymer (supplied by Evonik) designed to protect from acidic pH of the stomach and degrade within the upper intestines. Polylactide nanoparticles loaded in these constructs were found to release steadily under conditions simulating the colon over 25-40 hours. Lysozyme was incorporated into pellets as a model protein drug and showed an estimated 10% activity after a complete digestion simulation. α-MUC1 was utilized similarly and imaged on epithelial cells, demonstrating feasibility of delivering antibody drugs orally. As many cancers overexpress MUC1 and inflamed cells are believed to as well, MUC1 is a potential drug target for CD and colitis. In vivo data using a mice colitis model showed mitigation of symptoms when administered with antacids. Overall this drug delivery platform has demonstrated colon targeting and potential efficacy of orally delivered enzyme, antibody, and other complex peptide drugs.


Suicidal behavior in children and youth continues to be a major public health problem in the United States. School personnel have a legal and ethical obligation to recognize and respond to the mental health needs of their students and to take steps to ensure their safety. In this exploratory study, suicide risk assessment practices of three large school districts were examined. More than 3,400 suicide risk assessments were conducted in these districts during the 3 years considered. The results indicate that all three districts have implemented suicide prevention programs that include risk-assessment practices in an effort to reduce suicidality. Suicides risk assessments were conducted with at least one child in each grade from kindergarten through 12th in each district, occurring most frequently at the middle school level. Differences by gender were noted in terms of level of risk and hospitalizations, but no significant differences were observed based on race/ethnicity. These risk assessment efforts of these three districts appear to be promising in preventing suicides: none of the students who were assessed went on to commit suicide. Implications for school-based practices and training are discussed.


Flu vaccine candidate STEMs the tide Every year we need a new flu vaccine, because influenza virus constantly mutates the major target of antibodies to flu: the "head" region of the viral hemagglutinin (HA) protein. Avoiding the problem of mutation requires a vaccine that elicits antibodies against the more conserved "stem" region of HA. During infection, antibodies are occasionally produced that recognize the stem and that neutralize a broad range of influenza virus strains. Impagliazzo et al. engineered an HA stem–only vaccine candidate that elicited broadly neutralizing antibodies in mice and nonhuman primates and that protected mice against multiple influenza strains. Science, this issue p. 1301 An engineered stem-only hemagglutinin vaccine candidate provides broad protection in an animal model of influenza infection. The identification of human broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) targeting the hemagglutinin (HA) stem revitalized hopes of developing a universal influenza vaccine. Using a rational design and library approach, we engineered stable HA stem antigens ("mini-HAs") based on an H1 subtype sequence. Our most advanced candidate exhibits structural and bnAb binding properties comparable to those of full-length HA, completely protects mice in lethal heterologous and heterosubtypic challenge models, and reduces fever after sublethal challenge in cynomolgus monkeys. Antibodies elicited by this mini-HA in mice and nonhuman primates bound a wide range of HAs, competed with human bnAbs for HA stem binding, neutralized H5N1 viruses, and mediated antibody-dependent effector activity. These results represent a proof of concept for the design of HA stem mimics that elicit bnAbs against influenza A group 1 viruses.


The Swedish word folk ('people') is normally considered an ordinary noun. This classification is, however, not completely unproblematic, since it is sometimes claimed that folk is actually undergoing a word-class change, becoming more and more pronoun-like. Similar changes from noun to generic pronoun are also attested for words with the meaning 'people' in other languages, making this a possible grammaticalization path for such nouns. This article investigates the claim that folk is becoming a generic pronoun. Is this claim true, and, if it is, when did this development start? Occurrences of folk in texts and corpora from the period 1300–2013 are analysed with respect to both syntactic and semantic characteristics. The analysis shows that folk in the studied material is used more and more often without premodifiers, in a way similar to that of a pronoun. It is also apparent that almost all occurrences of folk today has a general, abstract meaning, compared to before ca. 1900, when the word was used with many different, more specific senses. This is typical for a grammaticalization process as it can be understood as a case of semantic bleaching, and it is argued that the development of folk is actually a case of grammaticalization taking place in the present.


Silver has been known for centuries to be a powerful disinfectant, with no known harmful effects to humans if applied in adequate doses. Although its use was partially discontinued with the advent of chlorination and modern antibiotics, the discovery of bacterial resistance and disinfection by-products has enabled its re-emergence as a viable water purification option. On the other hand, implementation in small-scale rainwater harvesting (RWH) systems has received little attention, possibly due to a general perception that it is a complex and/or expensive technology. This can be overcome by efficient designs that dose silver ions into the water at a minimal cost. The authors evaluated a dozen RWH systems equipped with silver releasing devices, which have been providing drinking water to schools and clinics in a rural area of Mexico. This paper represents a follow-up to a previously published study on an evaluation performed in the same region. A number of water quality parameters have been analysed, examining the long-term efficiency of the projects. Our observations show that the silver ion devices act as an effective disinfection mechanism, as long as adequate maintenance is provided. The combination with conventional settling tanks and filtration units seems to greatly enhance the overall performance of the system.


Tissue engineering utilizes scaffolds containing chondrogenic cells to promote cartilage development at a clinically relevant scale, yet there remains a limited understanding of the optimal conditions for inducing differentiation and matrix production. We investigated how cell density and temporal exposure to chondrogenic factors impacted chondrogenesis of human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) encapsulated in poly(ethylene glycol) diacrylate hydrogels. We found maximal proteoglycan and collagen production in constructs seeded between 10 and 25 × 10(6) cells/mL. Matrix deposition was significantly less per cell in constructs seeded at either higher or lower densities, indicating that paracrine communications may remain important despite loss of direct cell-cell contact. In vitro chondrogenesis of hMSCs was first accomplished using pellet cultures and a defined medium containing transforming growth factor (TGF)-β1 and dexamethasone. The differentiation of hMSCs in hydrogels also required initial exposure to TGF-β1, with no chondrogenic matrix produced in its absence. If TGF-β1 was initially included for at least 7 days, its removal impacted collagen production per cell but also lead to an increase in cell number, such that total collagen deposition was equivalent to controls when TGF-β1 was included for at least 3 weeks. Further, proteoglycan content per construct was higher at 6 weeks after removal of TGF-β1 at any time. In contrast to TGF-β1, dexamethasone was not required for chondrogenesis of hMSCs in hydrogels: there was no difference in matrix deposition between hydrogels cultured with or without dexamethasone. Further, without dexamethasone, SOX9 gene expression was higher during early chondrogenesis and there was a significant reduction in collagen I deposition, suggesting that a more hyaline cartilage phenotype is achieved without dexamethasone. Collagen content at 6 weeks was lower if dexamethasone was excluded after the first 7 days, but was equivalent to control if dexamethasone was included for 2 weeks or longer. Proteoglycan deposition was unaffected by dexamethasone exclusion. These results indicate that modulating exposure to TGF-β1 is beneficial for cell survival/proliferation and matrix production from hMSCs in hydrogels, and that not only is dexamethasone dispensable but also its exclusion may be advantageous for forming hyaline cartilage.


When compared with exposure to darkness, exposing Hibiscus rosa-sinensis L. 'Nairobi' plants to red light (635 to 685 nm, 2.9 μmol·m -2 ·s -1 ) delayed flower bud abscission, while exposure to far-red light (705 to 755 nm, 1.7 μmol·m -2 ·s -1 ) accelerated this process. Flower bud abscission in response to light quality appears to be controlled partly by the presence of leaves. The delay of bud abscission was positively correlated to the number of leaves being exposed to red light. Excluding the flower buds from exposure to red or far-red light, while exposing the remaining parts of the plants to these light conditions, did not influence the effects of the light exposure on bud abscission. Exposing only the buds to red light by the use of red light-emitting diodes (0.8 μmol·m -2 ·s -1 ) did not prevent dark-induced flower bud abscission. Exposing the whole plants, darkness or far-red light could only induce flower bud abscission when leaves were present; bud abscission was totally absent when all leaves were removed. To prevent flower bud abscission, leaves had to be removed before, or at the start of, the far-red light treatment. These results suggest that in darkness or far-red light, a flower bud abscission-promoting signal from the leaves may be involved.


Gravity models computed for a profile across the long-wavelength paired negative-positive Bouguer anomalies of the southern Appalachian Mountains show that the large negative anomaly can be explained by a crustal root zone, whereas the steep gradient and positive anomaly east of the root may be explained equally well by three different geometries: a suture zone, a mantle upwarp, or a shallow body. Seismic data support the existence of a mountain root but are inadequate to resolve differences among the three possible geometries for the positive anomaly. The presence of outcropping mafic and ultramafic rocks in the southern Appalachians and the inferred tectonic history of the Appalachian orogen are most consistent with the suture-zone model. Crust similar to continental crust probably exists beneath the Coastal Plain and inner continental shelf where the gravity anomalies return to near-zero values.


An e-beam lithographic technique is described that produces multiple discrete phase levels as a surface-relief structure directly in positive e-beam resist. Processing techniques are presented for two positive e-beam resists: EBR-9 and polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA). This fabrication technology is experimentally applied to produce sawtooth (blazed) gratings and multiphase-level numeric-type computer-generated holograms (i.e., kinoforms).


A study has been conducted to evaluate a spreadsheet-based conceptual Thornthwaite monthly water balance model and the process-based DRAINMOD model for their reliability in predicting monthly water budgets of a poorly drained, first order forested watershed at the Santee Experimental Forest located along the Lower Coastal Plain of South Carolina. Measured precipitation, weather, stream flow and soil hydraulic data from a 160 ha low-gradient, naturally drained watershed on a mixed pine hardwood forest (WS80) were used in the testing of the models. The Penman-Monteith and Thornthwaite based potential evapotranspiration (PET) methods were used in both models. While rooting depth and field capacity of the soil were the only parameters needed for the Thornthwaite model, complete data on soil water retention and saturated hydraulic conductivity by layers, root depths, surface storage, and drainage design parameters were needed for DRAINMOD to simulate monthly and annual hydrology. As expected, results using two and a half years (January 2003 – June 2005) of data showed that DRAINMOD was a better predictor (Nash-Sutcliffe E = 0.92 and absolute average monthly deviation, Eaamd = 11.0 mm) of monthly outflows compared to the Thornthwaite model (E = 0.83 and Eaamd = 16.8 mm). Although DRAINMOD can also be used to analyze the daily water table dynamics in contrast to the Thornthwaite model, it was not considered in this study. A DRAINMOD simulation was later conducted with a 46-year (1956-2002) weather dataset to evaluate the long-term hydrology of the watershed, specifically to describe the variability in predicted outflows as affected by the year-to-year climatic variations. Despite the limitations of these models, they can be useful tools for land managers and planners to estimate water tables, quantify monthly and seasonal water budgets as well as estimate nutrient and sediment loadings from poorly drained coastal forests.


Blood flow rates may be determined by nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation time measurements. A set of experiments carried out on the flow of blood in mice tails has demonstrated the feasibility of the scheme. Two simple measurement methods are described, and the pertinent equations are given. In addition, some procedures for using nuclear magnetic resonance and electron paramagnetic resonance for tracing the flow of specific materials in the body are outlined.


The capabilities of a novel deformable mirror to correct ocular aberrations are analyzed. The deformable mirror, (MIRAO52 Imagine Eyes) is incorporated within a complex retinal imaging system able to produce simultaneous en-face optical coherence tomography (OCT) and scanning laser ophthalmoscopy (SLO) images of the retina. The performances of the deformable mirror have been examined by evaluating the amount of aberrations which the deformable mirror is able to correct for, the improvement in the signal-to-noise ratio and transversal resolution in both OCT and SLO images obtained from an artificial eye. Pairs of C-scan images were obtained at a frame rate of 2 Hz, with and without wave-front correction. The correction of aberrations increased the signal-to-noise ratio in images obtained from artificial eyes by up to 6 dB in the OCT channel and up to 31 dB in the SLO channel. Also, we demonstrated the high capability of the MIRAO52 deformable mirror to correct for high amounts of wave-front aberrations.


It is perhaps the critical issue of our time: how can we, as human beings, find ethical and sustainable ways to live with one another and with other living beings on this planet? Inviting us into the world of green sisters, this book provides compelling answers from a variety of religious communities. Green sisters are environmentally active Catholic nuns who are working to heal the earth as they cultivate new forms of religious culture. Sarah Taylor approaches this world as an "intimate outsider". Neither Roman Catholic nor member of a religious order, she is a scholar well versed in both ethnography and American religious history who has also spent time shucking garlic and digging vegetable beds with the sisters. With her we encounter sisters in North America who are tearing up the manicured lawns around their mother houses to create community-supported organic gardens; building alternative housing structures and hermitages from renewable materials; adopting the "green" technology of composting toilets, solar panels, fluorescent lighting, and hybrid vehicles; and turning their community properties into land trusts with wildlife sanctuaries. "Green Sisters" gives us a firsthand understanding of the practice and experience of women whose lives bring together Catholicism and ecology, orthodoxy and activism, traditional theology and a passionate mission to save the planet. As green sisters explore ways of living a meaningful religious life in the face of increased cultural diversity and ecological crisis, their story offers hope for the future - and for a deeper understanding of the connections between women, religion, ecology, and culture.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Oxytocin for labor augmentation is widely used in obstetric care in Western countries. Two recent, smaller studies found opposing results regarding the association between prenatal exposure to oxytocin for labor augmentation and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). In Denmark, oxytocin is the medication used for nearly all medical augmentations of labor, and we examined the association between medical augmentation of labor and ADHD in a large cohort study based on national register data. METHODS: All singletons born after spontaneous onset of labor in Denmark between 2000 and 2008 (N = 546 146) were included in the study. Data from the Danish Medical Birth Registry on medical augmentation of labor (yes/no) were used to identify exposed children. ADHD was defined based on the diagnostic codes of International Classification of Diseases, 10th Revision, for hyperkinetic disorder and information on dispensed ADHD medication. A multivariate proportional hazards regression model was used to test the association. RESULTS: Among 546 146 deliveries, 26% included medical augmentation of labor, and 0.9% of the children were identified as having ADHD (n = 4617). We found no association between augmentation of labor and ADHD in the offspring (hazard ratio: 1.05 [95% confidence interval: 0.98–1.13]). CONCLUSIONS: Our study does not support an association between medical augmentation of labor and ADHD in the child.


Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) is currently the only established cure for sickle cell disease (SCD). Replacement of the stem cell that has the defective beta globin allele with the normal gene decreases hemoglobin S and the risk of complications of SCD. The first case reported was a girl with acute myeloid leukemia and SCD who received HSCT and achieved long-term SCD and leukemia-free survival. Given the favorable outcomes of HSCT with thalassemia major using myeloablative preparative regimens, this approach became widely used in the initial studies of HSCT in SCD. The current standard of care is to use a myeloablative stem cell transplantation in patients with severe disease who have human leukocyte antigen–identical sibling. HSCT improves organ function, quality of life, and overall and disease-free survival. However, this is associated with high risk of gonadal dysfunction and graft versus host disease in addition to the mortality associated with the myeloablative HSCT. Reduced-intensity HSCT has also been reported with high rates of engraftment and favorable outcomes. This has been introduced to lower the gonadal dysfunction, mortality, and graft versus host disease associated with myeloablative approaches. Other approaches include HSCT using matched unrelated donors, cord blood units, and human leukocyte antigen haploidentical donors. Unfortunately, graft rejection is a common complication with these approaches. In this chapter, we review the indications of HSCT for SCD and outcomes of different transplant strategies including alternative donor transplant, graft rejection, and infertility after transplantation.


A short-cut review was carried out to establish whether the traditional three-sided dressing is better than a one-way chest seal at preventing the respiratory complications from penetrating chest trauma. Only one animal study, two guidelines and two case reports provided published evidence relevant to the question. The author, date and country of publication, patient group studied, study type, relevant outcomes, results and study weaknesses of these papers are tabulated. The clinical bottom line is that there is very little evidence, but that the one-way seals may have practical advantages, particularly in the out-of-hospital setting.


Unbound Voices brings together the voices of Chinese American women in a fascinating, intimate collection of documents--letters, essays, poems, autobiographies, speeches, testimonials, and oral histories--detailing half a century of their lives in America. Together, these sources provide a captivating mosaic of Chinese women's experiences in their own words, as they tell of making a home for themselves and their families in San Francisco from the Gold Rush years through World War II. The personal nature of these documents makes for compelling reading. We hear the voices of prostitutes and domestic slavegirls, immigrant wives of merchants, Christians and pagans, homemakers, and social activists alike. We read the stories of daughters who confronted cultural conflicts and racial discrimination; the myriad ways women coped with the Great Depression; and personal contributions to the causes of women's emancipation, Chinese nationalism, workers' rights, and World War II. The symphony of voices presented here lends immediacy and authenticity to our understanding of the Chinese American women's lives. This rich collection of women's stories also serves to demonstrate collective change over time as well as to highlight individual struggles for survival and advancement in both private and public spheres. An educational tool on researching and reclaiming women's history, Unbound Voices offers us a valuable lesson on how one group of women overcame the legacy of bound feet and bound lives in America. The selections are accompanied by photographs, with extensive introductions and annotation by Judy Yung, a noted authority on primary resources relating to the history of Chinese American women.


* Licensed from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration under U.S. Patent No. 5,241,315. Accurate, reliable, and easy to use Established in 1998, Sigma Space Corporation provides its customers with pioneering aerospace technology solutions. We produce next-generation lidar, laser ranging, attitude determination, spectroscopy, and radiometry instrumentation for remote sensing and defense applications. From research and operational forecasts to national security, our instruments consistently demonstrate unparalleled performance. Sigma Space also offers advanced science and engineering services to private and government clients, including NASA and DOD. Supporting these efforts is our world-class staff of engineers, technicians, and scientists. SIGMA SPACE CORPORATION – Excellence in Aerospace Technology


Several members of a repetitive DNA family in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans have been shown to express ARS and centromeric function in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The repetitive family, denoted CeRep3, consists of dispersed repeated elements about 1 kilobase in length, present 50 to 100 times in the nematode genome. Three elements were sequenced and found to contain DNA sequences homologous to yeast ARS and CEN consensus sequences. Nematode DNA segments containing these repeats were tested for ARS and CEN (or SEG) function after ligation to shuttle vectors and introduction into yeast cells. Such nematode segments conferred ARS function to the plasmid, as judged by an increased frequency of transformation compared with control plasmids without ARS function. Some, but not all, also conferred to the plasmid increased mitotic stability, increased frequency of 2+:2- segregation in meiosis, and decreased plasmid copy number. These effects are similar to those of yeast centromeric DNA. In view of these results, we suggest that the CeRep3 repetitive family may have replication and centromeric functions in C. elegans.


Query rewriting (QR), which aims to improve the shopping experience by reformulating ambiguous customer input queries into well-formed queries, is a critical component of modern e-commerce search engines. In this work, we present a practical deep learning solution, named as Query Understanding EnhancEd mechaNism (QUEEN), to the large-scale query rewriting problem in e-commerce search engines. QUEEN incorporates query annotations, the byproduct of query processing pipelines in most e-commerce search engines, to model ambiguous product search queries. The empirical study is based on 38.5 million anonymous product search queries. Compared to other SOTA baselines, QUEEN improves the sentencelevel recall by 6% (relatively).


ABSTRACT The concept of student partnership has attracted increased attention during the last decade, often due to an assumption that it can mitigate neo-liberal agendas and practices in teaching and learning. A review of definitions and understandings of student partnership models shows that most of the research conducted on this topic has been based on normative assumptions, with less focus on how partnership practices play out in different contexts. In this article an analytical framework for analysing student partnership is introduced and tested through an empirical analysis of collaborative practices in centres for teaching excellence in Norwegian higher education. The key findings are that the diversity and dynamics of student partnership depend on the context in which they operate, but more importantly how different practices of partnership play out in parallel in those educational contexts. The result is often a mix of hybrid practices related to different conceptualizations of student partnership.


BACKGROUND
Researchers have suggested that omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids from oily fish (long-chain omega-3 (LCn3), including eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA)), as well as from plants (alpha-linolenic acid (ALA)) benefit cardiovascular health. Guidelines recommend increasing omega-3-rich foods, and sometimes supplementation, but recent trials have not confirmed this.

OBJECTIVES
To assess effects of increased intake of fish- and plant-based omega-3 for all-cause mortality, cardiovascular (CVD) events, adiposity and lipids.

SEARCH METHODS
We searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE and Embase to April 2017, plus ClinicalTrials.gov and World Health Organization International Clinical Trials Registry to September 2016, with no language restrictions. We handsearched systematic review references and bibliographies and contacted authors.

SELECTION CRITERIA
We included randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that lasted at least 12 months and compared supplementation and/or advice to increase LCn3 or ALA intake versus usual or lower intake.

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
Two review authors independently assessed studies for inclusion, extracted data and assessed validity. We performed separate random-effects meta-analysis for ALA and LCn3 interventions, and assessed dose-response relationships through meta-regression.

MAIN RESULTS
We included 79 RCTs (112,059 participants) in this review update and found that 25 were at low summary risk of bias. Trials were of 12 to 72 months' duration and included adults at varying cardiovascular risk, mainly in high-income countries. Most studies assessed LCn3 supplementation with capsules, but some used LCn3- or ALA-rich or enriched foods or dietary advice compared to placebo or usual diet. LCn3 doses ranged from 0.5g/d LCn3 to > 5 g/d (16 RCTs gave at least 3g/d LCn3).Meta-analysis and sensitivity analyses suggested little or no effect of increasing LCn3 on all-cause mortality (RR 0.98, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.03, 92,653 participants; 8189 deaths in 39 trials, high-quality evidence), cardiovascular mortality (RR 0.95, 95% CI 0.87 to 1.03, 67,772 participants; 4544 CVD deaths in 25 RCTs), cardiovascular events (RR 0.99, 95% CI 0.94 to 1.04, 90,378 participants; 14,737 people experienced events in 38 trials, high-quality evidence), coronary heart disease (CHD) mortality (RR 0.93, 95% CI 0.79 to 1.09, 73,491 participants; 1596 CHD deaths in 21 RCTs), stroke (RR 1.06, 95% CI 0.96 to 1.16, 89,358 participants; 1822 strokes in 28 trials) or arrhythmia (RR 0.97, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.05, 53,796 participants; 3788 people experienced arrhythmia in 28 RCTs). There was a suggestion that LCn3 reduced CHD events (RR 0.93, 95% CI 0.88 to 0.97, 84,301 participants; 5469 people experienced CHD events in 28 RCTs); however, this was not maintained in sensitivity analyses - LCn3 probably makes little or no difference to CHD event risk. All evidence was of moderate GRADE quality, except as noted.Increasing ALA intake probably makes little or no difference to all-cause mortality (RR 1.01, 95% CI 0.84 to 1.20, 19,327 participants; 459 deaths, 5 RCTs),cardiovascular mortality (RR 0.96, 95% CI 0.74 to 1.25, 18,619 participants; 219 cardiovascular deaths, 4 RCTs), and CHD mortality (1.1% to 1.0%, RR 0.95, 95% CI 0.72 to 1.26, 18,353 participants; 193 CHD deaths, 3 RCTs) and ALA may make little or no difference to CHD events (RR 1.00, 95% CI 0.80 to 1.22, 19,061 participants, 397 CHD events, 4 RCTs, low-quality evidence). However, increased ALA may slightly reduce risk of cardiovascular events (from 4.8% to 4.7%, RR 0.95, 95% CI 0.83 to 1.07, 19,327 participants; 884 CVD events, 5 RCTs, low-quality evidence with greater effects in trials at low summary risk of bias), and probably reduces risk of arrhythmia (3.3% to 2.6%, RR 0.79, 95% CI 0.57 to 1.10, 4,837 participants; 141 events, 1 RCT). Effects on stroke are unclear.Sensitivity analysis retaining only trials at low summary risk of bias moved effect sizes towards the null (RR 1.0) for all LCn3 primary outcomes except arrhythmias, but for most ALA outcomes, effect sizes moved to suggest protection. LCn3 funnel plots suggested that adding in missing studies/results would move effect sizes towards null for most primary outcomes. There were no dose or duration effects in subgrouping or meta-regression.There was no evidence that increasing LCn3 or ALA altered serious adverse events, adiposity or lipids, except LCn3 reduced triglycerides by ˜15% in a dose-dependant way (high-quality evidence).

AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS
This is the most extensive systematic assessment of effects of omega-3 fats on cardiovascular health to date. Moderate- and high-quality evidence suggests that increasing EPA and DHA has little or no effect on mortality or cardiovascular health (evidence mainly from supplement trials). Previous suggestions of benefits from EPA and DHA supplements appear to spring from trials with higher risk of bias. Low-quality evidence suggests ALA may slightly reduce CVD event and arrhythmia risk.


For short-term scheduling of crude oil operations in refinery, often crude oil residency time constraint and charging-tank-switch-overlap constraint are ignored by mathematical programming models to make the problem solvable. Thus, a schedule obtained by such mathematical programming models is infeasible and cannot be deployed. To solve this problem, this work studies the short-term scheduling problem of crude oil operations in a control theory perspective. The system is modeled by a hybrid Petri net and a short-term schedule is seen as a series of control commands. With this model, schedulability analysis is carried out and schedulability conditions are presented. These conditions can be used as constraints for finding a realizable and optimal refining schedule. Moreover, based on the proposed approach, a detailed schedule can be easily obtained given a realizable refining schedule. In this way, the complexity for the short-term scheduling problem of crude oil operations in refinery is greatly reduced and effective techniques and tools for practical applications can be obtained.


Crude oil contamination of soil is a major concern for tea industry in Assam, India. Crude oil is a persistent organic contaminant which alters soil physical and biochemical characteristics and makes tea plants more susceptible against crude oil contamination. Therefore, two native bacterial strains designated as AS 03 and NA 108 having crude oil degradation ability was isolated from crude oil contaminated soil. Isolates were evaluated for reduction of crude oil phytotoxicity and soil bioremediation. Biochemical and 16s ribosomal ribonucleic acid (rRNA) analysis confirmed that the bacterial strains belong to Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Under in vitro evaluation, it was found that both the strain could tolerate crude oil up to 40% (v/v). However, structural changes including morphology, difference in number of colonies were found in the presence of hydrocarbon in both AS 03 and NA 108. Also, an improvement in growth of bacterized tea plants was observed compared to non-bacterized plants grown in crude oil contaminated soil. The cumulative increment in height was 5 to 42%, compared to non-bacterized plants and with significantly higher root and shoot dry biomass accumulation. Soil treatment with both AS 03 and NA 108 improved soil quality including organic carbon, conductivity, pH and degradation of total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH) of the contaminated soil. These findings suggest that the tested bacteria can be exploited for bioremediation of crude oil contaminated soil in the geographical region of Assam.


Amr A. Mohamed Mohamed Hassan Numerical Simulation for Viscous Flow past a Designed AUV Model. The flow pattern around a designed autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) model has been numerically predicted. The finite volume based code "Fluent" [1] was used for simulating the flow around the model at three speeds. The grid generator of the solver has been used for meshing the AUV hull and its computational domain with the structured hexahedral grid. Complete information about the numerical simulations process will be found in the different sections in this paper. The work represents the first stage in studying the performance and flow field over an AUV model. The second stage is to experimentally assess the performance and the associated flow field characteristics.


Development of the vascular disease pulmonary hypertension (PH) involves disparate molecular pathways that span multiple cell types. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) may coordinately regulate PH progression, but the integrative functions of miRNAs in this process have been challenging to define with conventional approaches. Here, analysis of the molecular network architecture specific to PH predicted that the miR-130/301 family is a master regulator of cellular proliferation in PH via regulation of subordinate miRNA pathways with unexpected connections to one another. In validation of this model, diseased pulmonary vessels and plasma from mammalian models and human PH subjects exhibited upregulation of miR-130/301 expression. Evaluation of pulmonary arterial endothelial cells and smooth muscle cells revealed that miR-130/301 targeted PPARγ with distinct consequences. In endothelial cells, miR-130/301 modulated apelin-miR-424/503-FGF2 signaling, while in smooth muscle cells, miR-130/301 modulated STAT3-miR-204 signaling to promote PH-associated phenotypes. In murine models, induction of miR-130/301 promoted pathogenic PH-associated effects, while miR-130/301 inhibition prevented PH pathogenesis. Together, these results provide insight into the systems-level regulation of miRNA-disease gene networks in PH with broad implications for miRNA-based therapeutics in this disease. Furthermore, these findings provide critical validation for the evolving application of network theory to the discovery of the miRNA-based origins of PH and other diseases.


This work concentrates on tracking control of dynamically positioned surface vessels with asymmetric added mass terms affecting the system model at the acceleration level. Specifically, we propose a novel continuous robust controller for surface vessels that, in addition to asymmetric added mass in its inertia matrix, contains unstructured uncertainties in all its system matrices. The proposed controller compensates the overall system uncertainties and ensures asymptotic tracking, while requiring only the knowledge of the sign of the leading principle minors of the input gain matrix. Lyapunov based approaches are applied in order to prove the stability of the closed-loop system and asymptotic convergence of the tracking error signal.


Acoustic Doppler current profiler and CTD data were collected in the equatorial Pacific, from 95W to 165E, during the ALIZE2 cruise, in January–March 1991. These data provide a quasi-synoptic picture of both currents and hydrology of this region. The Equatorial zonal and meridional current structures and associated density distribution are presented and compared with previous measurements. The Equatorial Undercurrent appears stronger and shallower than climatology in the eastern Pacific, but close to average in the west. Intense 20–30 day period oscillations are noticeable east of 140W. Wind measurements and dynamic height computations are used to estimate some terms of the zonal momentum balance along the Equator.


The aim of this study is to determine and analyze the contribution of technological factor, accessibility factor, credibility factor, and programs factor of zakat institutions to the zakat funds revenue received by zakat institutions in Surabaya. This study used a qualitative approach with case study strategy. Data collected through interviews with informants and direct observation to the object of the research. The result of this study is there are several factors that have important contribution to zakat revenue at zakat institution in Surabaya. The researcher found accessibility, credibility and zakat collection program during Ramadhan have important contribution to the revenue of zakat funds, while technology has not been widely used by muzakki to make payment of zakat.


This paper deals with the recruitment strategies of employers in the low-skilled segment of the labour market. We focus on low-skilled workers because they are overrepresented among jobless people and constitute the bulk of the clientele included in various activation and labour market programmes. A better understanding of the constraints and opportunities of interventions in this labour market segment may help improve their quality and effectiveness. On the basis of qualitative interviews with 41 employers in six European countries, we find that the traditional signals known to be used as statistical discrimination devices (old age, immigrant status and unemployment) play a somewhat reduced role, since these profiles are overrepresented among applicants for low skill positions. On the other hand, we find that other signals, mostly considered to be indicators of motivation, have a bigger impact in the selection process. These tend to concern the channel through which the contact with a prospective candidate is made. Unsolicited applications and recommendations from already employed workersemit a positive signal, whereas the fact of being referred by the public employment office is associated with the likelihood of lower motivation.


Eye movements consist of spherical rotations, with orientation generally constrained by Listing's law. Our main result is a complete explicit formulation of ballistic eye movement under the Listing constraint. We present a conceptual framework for eye movement bas-ing the dynamics of Listing motion on the equator of the sphere of unit quaternions, which we call the Listing sphere. Analytical dynamics shows that ballistic Listing motion corre-sponds to free particle motion on the Listing sphere. Thus, ballistic Listing movement is greatly simplified by transposition to the Listing sphere, where it consists of shortest dis-tance trajectories. This proves that ballistic eye motion consists of constant speed rotation along circles passing through the occipital point. The relevance of the occipital point in eye movement was already noted by Helmholtz, which we explain by the fact that it cor-responds to the equator of the Listing sphere. We designed a physical mechanism produc-ing the correspondence between eye movement and particle motion on the Listing sphere. Our straightforward description of ballistic eye motion under the pure Listing kinematic constraint serves as a useful idealized benchmark in the study of actual physiological eye movements, whose orientations are known to deviate slightly from the Listing constraint.


The influence of pepsin (EC 220.127.116.11) and trypsin (EC 22.214.171.124) action on the chemical composition of legume flours was the aim of this study. The level of proteins and lipids in hydrolysed flours was changed significantly. In comparison to the raw flours also fatty acid composition in treated flours was altered. In the lentil flours both trypsin and pepsin digestion conditions have decreased the level of unsaturated fatty acid. It is noteworthy that in all investigated, hydrolysed flours ratio linoleic: oleic fatty acid was significantly decreased in comparison to unhydrolysed flours (about 40%-pea; 60%- -lentil). Our investigations were also focused on the potential implementations of IMAC method in the separation and purification of peptides. Generally, peptides separation pro- files, performed on immobilized Zn (II), were dependent on the kind of flour and enzyme used in the hydrolysis process. In the lights of our results is clearly visible that investi- gated peptides had a weak affinity to the chelated metal ions. It is noteworthy, that in some cases the influences of chelating factor on separation profiles were noticeable.


The paper discusses mobile robot localization by means of geometric features from a laser range finder and a CCD camera. The features are line segments from the laser scanner and vertical edges from the camera. Emphasis is put on sensor models with a strong physical basis. For both sensors, uncertainties in the calibration and measurement process are adequately modeled and propagated through the feature extractors. This yields observations with their first order covariance estimates which are passed to an extended Kalman filter for fusion and position estimation. Experiments on a real platform show that, opposed to the use of the laser range finder only, the multisensor setup allows the uncertainty to stay bounded in difficult localization situations like long corridors, and contributes to an important reduction of uncertainty, particularly in the orientation. The experiments further demonstrate the applicability of such a multisensor localization system in real time on a fully autonomous robot.


Not Necessarily in the Right Order is an audio-video installation that responds to Nottingham's diverse multi-cultural demographic, exploring the social significance of 'carnival' and 'festival' as one of the few public opportunities to celebrate cultural diversity. Using these observations as a starting point, the work has evolved to become an exploration of what it means to be British in the 21st century.
The work, a commission by New Art Exchange (NAE) by artist collective Common Culture - David Campbell, Mark Durden and Ian Brown - is the result of more than a year's research into the diverse communities and vibrant festivals taking place in NAE's local area, Hyson Green, home to the largest ethnic minority population in the county and vibrant diaspora communities from Pakistan, India, Africa, Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and the Middle East.

Common Culture artist David Campbell said that during research for the piece - which brings together a number of locally based folk musicians, singers and dancers, suggesting the rehearsal for an enigmatic festival of the future - it became evident that place was inextricably linked to the issue of identity.
"It seemed to us that what underpins all of the manifestation of Carnival, Mela or Goose Fair is a desire to reiterate a sense of place, belonging, social and cultural binding through displays of identification," he said.

Conscious of their own lack of intimacy with the local area, Common Culture made the strategic decision to find ways of engaging with Nottingham's traditions of carnival by working with local musicians and performers to explore the wider meaning and function of carnival in contemporary Britain. To this end the work explores the relationship between identity and a sense of place, borrowing conventions from science-fiction (and science-fiction based musical alter-egos) to foreground issues of belonging and exclusion. The work plays with different narrative voices, musical styles and subject positions in order to disrupt familiar assumptions of identification. For example, the piece features a young actor who adopts different voices and subject positions to forge identifications with the viewer in a series of monologues that build up to an argument orchestrated between the same actor, but delivered through three distinct characters and accents.
The work is an important and poignant reflection on the area and its diverse festivals that include: Caribbean Carnival, The Goose Fair, Nottingham Pride, Nottingham Mela and Ishraqah (a festival of Middle Eastern culture). These are all important events, according to Director of Programme's at NAE Melanie Kidd, to preserve cultural identity. "Festivals are also equally powerful as a platform to influence and therefore diversify broader communities. Brutishness, like all cultures, has always been hybrid and out identity will continue to shift," she said.