A new Roentgen stereophotogrammetric analysis system, using a biplane technique, has been developed to determine the migration and rotation of total hip replacement (THR) femoral components in three dimensions. Stainless steel marker balls were injected into the femur during the operation. The patients stood within a calibration frame during the X-ray. The two exposures were taken consecutively allowing radio-opaque shutters to be moved in front of the films to prevent fogging. Studies with a model demonstrated that the system was capable of measuring the position of an implant to better than 0.11 mm (2 SD)w. In vivo measurements demonstrated that the migration rate of the different parts of the femoral component could be determined with an accuracy of 0.25 to 0.50 mm/year. By considering the accuracy determined in different ways, methods for improving the system have been identified. The migration and rotation rate of 58 Hinek cemented femoral components was studied for four years. Migration was three to five times greater (p < 0.001) during the first year than subsequently. The prosthesis head moved the most during the first year (0.94 mm). A better understanding of the cause of implant failure could be obtained by studying the early migration of different types of prosthesis and comparing this with their clinical results and design features.


In somatic cells, checkpoint pathways trigger cell cycle arrest in response to unreplicated or damaged DNA by inhibiting the activity of cyclin-dependent kinases (Cdks). In the Xenopus laevis embryo, checkpoints are not operational until the midblastula transition (MBT). Studies in cell-free egg extracts indicate that a threshold concentration of nuclei, which approximates the MBT concentration, is required to elicit a checkpoint. The checkpoint response to unreplicated DNA in the extract prevents transition into mitosis by inhibiting Cdk1/cyclin B, causing an increase in the minimum amount of cyclin B necessary to enter mitosis, termed the cyclin threshold. Once the threshold of cyclin is maintained or exceeded, the system will proceed into mitosis after a lag time. We have investigated the relationship between nuclear concentration and cell cycle regulation in the extract. By precisely regulating the concentration of cyclin B and nuclear content in extract samples, we have found 1) the concentration of nuclei affects cyclin B thresholds and lag time of entry into mitosis, 2) elevated cyclin thresholds caused by DNA replication blocks are further increased by increasing the concentration of nuclei, and 3) double-stranded DNA breaks in the extract system do not affect cyclin thresholds or lag time of entry into mitosis within the range of nuclear concentrations that can be efficiently replicated. This data provides evidence of the importance of the nucleocytoplasmic ratio in normal cell cycle progression and its importance for checkpoint acquisition during early Xenopus laevis development.


Abstract The polygraph is an instrument that detects, monitors, and records physiological responses that are allegedly of psychological origin and attributed to deception. Hence the human mind and its complex psychology are the core of the detected physical responses. However, the polygraph industry has almost entirely overlooked psychological issues in its training and publishing. The industry focuses its attention and interest on various technical aspects of the test such as e.g. scoring, rather than concentrating on what is most important, i.e. the examinee's psychology, as it is responsible for almost the entire test result. The paper extensively explains the importance of examinee psychology and its influence on test outcome, points to the shortfalls in training and publication activity of the industry, and discusses the result and impact of the industry's approach.


Indian English, or rather, the forms of English used in India, have long been a topic of interest for laymen and scholars. For generations, the 'exotic' nature of the transplanted language was commented on, often ridiculed as a matter of unintentional comic. It was only from the 1960s onwards that the local forms of English were recognized for what they are — adaptations of the world language to local needs, and varying to an enormous degree, depending on the speakers' (and writers') education and the uses they make of the language. This acknowledgement came mainly from abroad (and still does); Indians are much less willing to admit to the variation and its communicative functions in the country. Therefore, standard English (if possible in its classical British form) is generally favoured, together with formal written uses often based on the stylistic models provided by English literature from Shakespeare to Dickens. R.R. Mehrotra was one of the first to see the need for a proper sociolinguistic description of the Indian situation, and the forms and functions of English in this complex set-up. He has for a long time collected and analysed the huge range of English around him, with the aim of publishing a collection of texts that reflects the variation within the country along various dimensions, historical, regional, ethnic, social and stylistic. The present collection of texts is typical in many ways, evoking in the content, style and grammatical forms the contexts in which English functions; notes help to put the excerpts into the proper frame to make them intelligible to outsiders.


Osmium extracted from unequilibrated bulk chondrites has isotope anomalies consistent with an insoluble s-process carrier, termed Os(i) here. Osmium from metamorphosed bulk chondrites does not have isotope anomalies, implying that the Os(i) carrier was destroyed by metamorphism. The isotopic homogeneity of metamorphosed bulk chondrites is consistent with extremely effective mixing of presolar grains from varied sources in the nebula. Osmium in the Os(i) carrier is likely from nucleosynthetic sites with a neutron density about two to four times as high as that of the average solar s-process Os.


This study undertook to derive share repurchase trends from a small sample of JSE-listed companies over the nine years, 1999 – 2008. The study also draws attention to the particular obstacles to be overcome when conducting research into the unique South African share repurchases environment. The study finds that 33 companies made 71 repurchase announcements (47 general and 24 specific) via the Securities Exchange News Service (SENS) over the period July 1999 until financial year-end in 2008. On average, 59,0% of the total number of shares (and 49,3% of the total value) repurchased under a general authority is not included in the 3% SENS announcements. General share repurchases represent 47,9% of total repurchases in volume (and 60,5% in terms of value). The total number of shares repurchased (excluding share trust purchases) by the 33 companies shows that 56,8% were repurchased by subsidiaries and 17,1% were subsequent repurchases by companies from subsidiaries. (In value, these repurchases represent 53,7% and 17,2%, respectively.) This study therefore concludes that research based on only the 3% SENS announcements of general share buy-backs results in significant understating of actual total share buy-back activities, and that the South African share repurchase environment presents unique challenges. The main obstacle for future South African research in this field however is the lack of comprehensive and accurate share repurchase data as supplied by South African financial data sources. This material is based upon work supported financially by the National Research Foundation. Any opinion, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and therefore the NRF does not accept any liability in regard thereto.


Prostate and colorectal cancers are among the most common cancers in Norway and are also leading causes of cancer related deaths. In prostate cancer there are currently no accurate clinical methods to discriminate patients in immediate need of treatment from patients with clinically insignificant cancers that can postpone curative treatment. This leads to substantial overtreatment and potentially side-effects for this group of patients. In colon cancer, highthroughput methods to classify tumours according to known prognostic markers (e.g. MSI status) and a better understanding of tumour biology is important for optimized personalized treatment. There is therefore a need for additional diagnostic and prognostic tools to increase survival and secure good quality of life. The main objective of this thesis was to test the feasibility and accuracy of different MR methods in the diagnostics of prostate and colon cancer.With a multiparametric MR examination of the prostate, combining T2-weighted imaging, diffusion weighted imaging, dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI, and/or MR spectroscopic imaging the entire gland can be examined non-invasively for metabolic, cellular, morphological and vascular changes associated with the disease. In this thesis, a multiparametric MR examination was performed on a 3 T system without an endorectal coil and a significant difference in mean values between cancer and non-cancer areas were observed for all MR parameters analyzed. Further, any combination of MR parameters was better than T2WI alone in separating cancer and non-cancer areas. These findings show that a multiparametric MR examination without an endorectal coil is feasible and accurate and can contribute to improve the diagnostic pathway of prostate cancer patients, avoiding patient discomfort and high cost.High resolution magic angle spinning (HR MAS) MR spectroscopy is an ex vivo method providing detailed metabolic information (metabolite profiles) of intact tissue samples. With sophisticated multivariate analysis, these metabolite profiles can be used to discriminate between cancer and non-cancer tissue and to discriminate between tissue samples of different classes such as aggressiveness (Gleason score) in prostate cancer and MSI status in colon cancer. In this thesis, discrimination between cancer and non-cancer tissue samples based on the metabolic profile has been demonstrated both for colon and prostate cancer. Further, classification of MSI status of samples from colon cancer patients and of aggressiveness of samples from prostate cancer patients was shown to have high accuracy.Magnetic resonance spectroscopy can be performed both on tissue samples ex vivo and on patients in vivo during a clinical MR examination and as a part of this thesis the hypothesis that metabolic ratios measured in vivo correlate with profiles measured ex vivo from the same locations was tested. Indeed, a strong correlation between in vivo and ex vivo prostate spectroscopy measurements was observed. This indicates that HR MAS can adequately represent the in vivo metabolic profile of the cancer and that diagnostic and prognostic biomarker findings from ex vivo studies of tissue samples can be translated to in vivo patient examinations.In conclusion, the work presented in this thesis show that MRI and MRS are useful methods in diagnostics of colon and prostate cancer with the ability to discriminate between cancer and non-cancer, and that the methods also have a potential in prognostics by MSI and Gleason score classification.


Generative adversarial networks (GANs) form a generative modeling approach known for producing appealing samples, but they are notably difficult to train. One common way to tackle this issue has been to propose new formulations of the GAN objective. Yet, surprisingly few studies have looked at optimization methods designed for this adversarial training. In this work, we cast GAN optimization problems in the general variational inequality framework. Tapping into the mathematical programming literature, we counter some common misconceptions about the difficulties of saddle point optimization and propose to extend techniques designed for variational inequalities to the training of GANs. We apply averaging, extrapolation and a computationally cheaper variant that we call extrapolation from the past to the stochastic gradient method (SGD) and Adam.


Crop fertilization
 and reduced tillage practices simultaneously improve soil properties
 and crop yield. The objectives of the research were to evaluate urea
 (FN) and organic N under different tillage system in a 2-year field
 experiments for soil physiochemical properties, crop yield and N
 dynamics. The experiments were carried out at Agricultural Research
 Farm of NWFP Agricultural University Peshawar Pakistan. Tillage
 system included deep (DT), conventional (CT) and minimum (MT)
 tillage. The N treatments were 60, 120 kg FN ha-1, 10, 20 tons
 farmyard manure (FYM) ha-1 and 10 tons soybean residue (SR) ha-1.
 Farmyard manure and SR were applied solely and in combination with
 half of FN. A control treatment having no FN, FYM or SR was also
 included. The experimental design was RCB with split plot
 arrangement having three replications. Tillage were allotted to main
 plots, whereas N treatment to subplots. Minimum tillage had higher
 soil moisture, total N, mineral N and organic C as well as lower
 soil bulk density than DT. Higher straw, grain and total N uptakes
 as well as N uptake efficiency was observed in MT than DT. Deeply
 ploughed plots had higher N utilization efficiency, apparent N
 re-translocation and its efficiency, N harvest index and
 physiological efficiency of added N compared to MT. Minimum tillage
 enhanced emergence, booting, anthesis, milking, maturity and plant
 tallness compared to DT. Minimum ploughed plots had improved yield
 components, biological and grain yield. Similarly, MT imposed
 greater partition of dry matter to leaf, stem and maturity at
 different growth stages than DT. Emergence was higher in DT, whereas
 tillers m-2 and weeds m-2 in MT. Supplementing 20 tons FYM ha-1 with
 60 kg FN ha-1 had increased soil moisture, mineral N and soil
 organic C but decreased soil bulk density. Soil C/N ratio was higher
 in plots receiving FYM solely. Urea N had increased soil pH, whereas
 soil total N was increased with 10 tons SR + 60 kg FN ha-1. Greater
 leaf N at boot, anthesis and maturity stages were measured in plots
 having 20 tons FYM + 30 kg FN ha-1, 10 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1 and
 120 kg FN ha-1, respectively compared to other treatments. Higher
 levels of FYM along with FN had increased stem N at earlier growth
 stage i.e. boot and anthesis compared to lower levels of FYM + 60 kg
 FN ha-1. Plots having 20 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1 had greater stem N
 at boot and anthesis stage, but 10 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1
 application had higher stem N at maturity. Higher levels of FYM and
 FN jointly used had improved spike N at anthesis and maturity stage
 as well as straw, grain, total N uptakes and protein content
 compared to other treatments. Control and lower levels of N had
 greater nitrogen use, N utilization, apparent N re-translocation
 efficiencies and N harvest index than fertilized plots. In the same
 way, greater recovery and agronomic efficiencies of N were observed
 in 60 kg FN ha-1 plots compared to other fertilized plots. Uptake
 efficiency of N was higher in plots having 120 kg FN ha-1, whereas
 physiological efficiency of N was greater in plots having 10 tons SR
 + 30 kg FN ha-1. Fertilization had enhanced emergence and plant
 height, but control or 60 kg FN ha-1 enhanced vegetative and
 reproductive cycles. Spike m-2, grains per spike, thousand grains
 weight, biological and grain yield was higher in 20 tons FYM + 60 kg
 FN ha-1 compared to other treatments. Relative yield over control
 was higher in plots having FYM + FN used jointly. Increasing N had
 increased harvest index in all tillage practices, being higher in CT
 and in organic N +FN. Fertilization of 20 tons FYM with 60 kg FN
 ha-1 had increased average leaf area, leaf area index and specific
 leaf weight, but control had greater specific leaf weight. Leaf,
 stem and spike dry weight at boot, anthesis and maturity stages were
 higher in plots incorporated with 20 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1.
 Incorporation of 10 tons FYM ha-1 had increased crop growth rate and
 net assimilation rate before anthesis. However, post anthesis crop
 growth rate and net assimilation rate were greater in plots having
 20 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1 and 10 tons FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1,
 respectively. Incorporation of FYM with N used jointly had greater
 emergence, tillers and weeds m-2 compared to other treatments. Value
 cost ratio (VCR) and relative increase in income (RII) were higher
 for FYM used as solely or combined with FN. Application of 20 tons
 FYM + 60 kg FN ha-1 had higher gross income ($505.2), net income
 ($455.0) over control, having VCR (9.1) and RII (75.8%) compared to
 other treatments. Integrated use of 20 tons FYM ha-1 with either 30
 or 60 kg FN ha-1 under MT had improved crop productivity and soil
 fertility beside the monetary benefits and thus recommended for
 wheat sowing in agro-climatic condition of Peshawar, Pakistan.


A brief history of ancient water supply techniques for urban areas from the earliest civilizations through the Roman times is presented. Throughout the history of urban centers, a sufficient water supply has been the backbone of each city. All sources of water, rivers, lakes, springs, underground sources, and rainwater collection, were exploited for urban supply starting from the earliest civilizations. The specific choice was dependent upon the civilization, the geomorphology, the topography, and the local climatic and hydrological conditions. No large-scale lifting techniques were available; thus, water was transferred from the source by aqueducts from a higher altitude. Cisterns used for collection of rain water and wells for drawing groundwater were very well developed since the Bronze Age. During historical times, Greeks and later Romans reached a high level of water supply technologies that greatly influenced modern achievements in water engineering and management.


Financialization is the increased influence of financial actors and logics on social and economic life, and is one of the key drivers transforming food systems and rural economies around the world. The premise of this book is that the actions of financial actors, and their financial logics, are transforming agri-food systems in profound ways. It is shown that although financialization is a powerful dynamic, some recent developments suggest that the rollout of financialization is contradictory and uneven in different spaces and markets. The book examines cases in which state regulation or re-regulation and social movement resistance are setting roadblocks or speed bumps in the path of financialization, resulting in a 'cooling off' of investment, as well as the other side of the argument where there is evidence of a 'heating up'. The authors address not only the limits to financialization, but also the mechanisms through which financial entities are able to penetrate and re-shape agri-food industries. This book provides both a comparative analysis of financialization blending, and empirical findings with conceptual insights. It explores the connection between financialization, food systems, and rural transformation by critically examining: the concept of financialization and how food and farming are being financialized; the impacts of financialization in the food industry; and financialization in farming and forestry – along with the impacts this has on rural people and communities. This is a timely book, bringing together concrete case studies, from around the globe, to reveal the operations and impacts of finance capital in the 'space' of agri-food.


Driver violations of traffic signals are a major cause of intersection vehicle crashes. The duration of yellow intervals is highly associated with driver yellow/red time stopping behavior. Rainy weather and wet pavement surface conditions may result in changes in both driver behavior and vehicle performance. The research presented in this thesis quantifies the impact of wet pavement surface and rainy weather conditions on driver perception-reaction times (PRTs) and deceleration levels, which are used in statistical models for the design of yellow intervals. A new dataset with a total of 648 stop-run records were collected as part of the research effort during rainy weather and wet pavement surface conditions at the Virginia Department of Transportation's Smart Road facility. This experiment was conducted at a 72.4 km/h (45 mi/h) approach speed where participant drivers encountered a yellow indication initiation. The participant drivers were randomly selected in different age groups (under 40 years old, 40 to 59 years old, and 60 years of age or older) and genders (female and male). Combined with an existing dataset that was collected by the same research group under clear weather conditions during the summer of 2008, statistical models for driver PRT and deceleration levels are developed, considering roadway surface and environmental parameters, driver attributes (age and gender), roadway grade, and time to the intersection at the onset of yellow. Using the state-of-thepractice procedures with the modeled PRT and deceleration levels, inclement weather yellow timings are then developed as a function of different factors (e.g., driver age/gender, roadway grade, speed limits, and precipitation levels). The results indicate that an increase in the duration of change interval is required for wet roadway surface and rainy weather conditions. Lookup tables are developed with different reliability levels to provide practical guidelines for the design of yellow signal timings in wet and rainy weather conditions. These recommended change durations can be integrated within the Vehicle Infrastructure Integration (VII) initiative to provide customizable driver warnings prior to a transition to a red indication.


The Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) is an ambitious collaborative effort between government agencies and industry to increase the capabilities of the current air traffic system. Under NextGen, tools are being developed to support air traffic controllers in many aspects of their jobs. However, budgetary constraints, unanticipated technological hurdles and other challenges to implementation make it unlikely that every NextGen tool in development will find its way into future air traffic control facilities. Information is needed to prioritize NextGen tool development to ensure that the tools that will provide the most benefit can be implemented in the appropriate facilities. Toward this end, a web-based survey was conducted of 174 air traffic control tower controllers to identify the perceived usefulness of 10 planned NextGen tower capabilities designed to provide or support: departure metering at the ramp, taxi routing, departure runway assignments, departure flow management, runway scheduling, runway configuration management, integrated arrival/departure scheduling, enhanced surveillance, electronic flight data, and tower data communications. Along with brief descriptions of each of the planned capabilities, surveyed tower controllers were asked to indicate the extent to which each capability would help them in their job and affect capacity, efficiency, flexibility, predictability and safety at their airport. Results indicated that different NextGen capabilities were perceived as useful across different tower facilities. Implications for the prioritization of NextGen tool development are discussed.


The aim of this article is to introduce a novel sparse controller design for the temperature control of an experimental walking beam furnace in steel industry. Adequate tracking of temperature references is essential for the quality of the heated slabs. However, the design of the temperature control is hindered by the multivariable (non-square) dynamic behavior of the furnace. These dynamics include significant loop interactions and time delays. Furthermore, a novel datadriven model, based on real life experimental data that relies on a subspace state representation in a closed loop approach is introduced. In the sequel, the derived model is utilized to investigate the controller's structure. By applying the relative gain array approach a decentralized feedback controller is designed. However, in spite of the optimal and sparse design of the controller, there exists interaction between loops. By analyzing the interaction between the inputs-outputs with the σ2 Gramian-based interaction methodology, a decoupled multi-variable controller is implied. The simulation result, based on the experimental modeling of the furnace, shows that the controller can successfully decrease the interaction between the loops and track the reference temperature set-points.


Precipitation zone systems exist for Mexico based on seasonality, quantity of precipitation, climates and geographical divisions, but none are convenient for the study of the relation of precipitation with phenomena such as El Nino. An empirical set of seven exclusively Mexican and six shared zones was derived from three series of Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) images, from 1940 through 1989: a whole-year series (SPI-12) of 582 monthly images, a six month series (SPI-6) of 50 images for winter months (November through April), and a six-month series (SPI-6) of 50 images for summer months (May through October). By examination of principal component and unsupervised classification images, it was found that all three series had similar zones. A set of basic training fields chosen from the principal component images was used to classify all three series. The resulting thirteen zones, presented in this article, were found to be approximately similar, varying principally at zone edges. A set of simple zones defined by just a few vertices can be used for practical operations. In general the SPI zones are homogeneous, with almost no mixture of zones and few outliers of one zone in the area of others. They are compared with a previously published map of climatic regions. Potential applications for SPI zones are discussed.


Abstract.
 The partial skull of a lion from Natodomeri, northwest Kenya is described. The Natodomeri sites are correlated with Member I of the Kibish Formation, dated to between 195 ka and ca. 205 ka. The skull is remarkable for its very great size, equivalent to the largest cave lions (Panthera spelaea [Goldfuss, 1810]) of Pleistocene Eurasia and much larger than any previously known lion from Africa, living or fossil. We hypothesize that this individual represents a previously unknown population or subspecies of lion present in the late Middle and Late Pleistocene of eastern Africa rather than being an indication of climate-driven size increase in lions of that time. This raises questions regarding the extent of our understanding of the pattern and causes of lion evolution in the Late Pleistocene.


We report work on the first component of a two-stage speech recognition architecture based onphonological features rather than phones. This paper reports experiments on three phonological feature systems: (1) the Sound Pattern of English (SPE) system which uses binary features, (2) amulti-valued (MV) feature system which uses traditional phonetic categories such as manner, place, etc., and (3)Government Phonology (GP) which uses a set of structured primes. All experiments used recurrent neural networks to perform feature detection. In these networks the input layer is a standard framewise cepstral representation, and the output layer represents the values of the features. The system effectively produces a representation of the most likely phonological features for each input frame. All experiments were carried out on the TIMIT speaker-independent database. The networks performed well in all cases, with the average accuracy for a single feature ranging from 86% and 93%. We describe these experiments in detail, and discuss the justification and potential advantages of using phonological features rather than phones for the basis of speech recognition.


In the article the model of the welfare state in Lithuania, its development and perspectives are overviewed and also Swedish welfare state and its present situation is considered. In the beginning of creating Lithuanian social security system, there was a turn to corporate welfare state model direction, but later direction has changed to a liberal one. In the article various reasons of this turn are analyzed. Lithuanian political parties, media and even society are not interested much in creation of institutional, Swedish welfare state model. At the moment Lithuania is missing a lot of elements of main socialdemocratic welfare state creation. Recently in Sweden liberal direction as a consequence of globalization and tough economical competition can be noticed. Economical difficulties promoted cuts in the expenses of state social security and application of new public management practice. These new circumstances can shift Sweden from the traditional objectives of socialdemocratic welfare state and the question of implementing of some of its elements in Lithuania may totally disappear from economical, social and political agenda.


The hypertrophic response to overload in fast-twitch skeletal muscle is impaired in aged humans and rats and upregulation of protein degradation pathways are hypothesized to be a contributing factor. Muscle growth occurs when protein synthesis is greater than protein degradation. Dietary supplementation of the essential amino acid leucine has been shown to reduce protein degradation in both young and aged skeletal muscle. Specifically leucine acts in part by attenuating 5'-AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) activation as well as the translocation of the forkhead box transcription factor 3A (FoxO3 known to promote transcription of mRNAs encoding degradation pathway proteins) to the nucleus. Akt (a promoter of muscle growth) prevents translocation of FoxO3 into the nucleus by phosphorylating FoxO3 phosphorylation at Ser[superscript]318/321. However AMPK inhibits Akt's phosphorylation of FoxO3 allowing it to enter the nucleus and increase transcription of protein degradation pathway genes encoding ubiquitin ligase proteins such as muscle RING finger 1 (MuRF1) and muscle atrophy F-box (MAFbx or Atrogin-1). During the aging process AMPK Thr[superscript]172 phosphorylation (and thus its activation) is increased purportedly inhibiting gains in muscle mass and strength. Although dietary leucine supplementation has been shown to enhance muscle hypertrophy in response to resistance training in young humans the potential for leucine supplementation to enhance overload-induced muscle hypertrophy in aged humans or animal models has not been examined. Thus the aim of this study was to determine whether dietary leucine supplementation can attenuate markers of protein degradation and rescue hypertrophy during overload in the fast-twitch skeletal muscles of aged rats to levels comparable to their younger counterparts. It was hypothesized that dietary leucine supplementation during 7 days of fast-twitch plantaris muscle overload would enhance plantaris muscle hypertrophy in aged rats to levels observed in young adult rats not receiving leucine. It was also hypothesized that dietary leucine supplementation during the overload period would alter markers of protein degradation (enhance FoxO3 phosphorylation and reduce the levels of AMPK phosphorylation Atrogin-1 protein content and MuRF1 protein content) in the overloaded fast-twitch plantaris muscles of the aged rats to levels observed in young adult rats not receiving leucine. Young adult (8 mo.) and old (33 mo.) male Fisher 344 x Brown Norway F1 Hybrid (FBN) rats underwent a 1-week unilateral overload of the fast-twitch plantaris muscles via tenotomy of the synergistic gastrocnemius muscle. Within each age group animals were matched for body weight and separated into either a dietary leucine supplementation group (normal rat chow supplemented by an additional 5% leucine content in place of 5% of the carbohydrate content; n = 7/age group) or placebo group (normal rat chow; n = 6/age group). The leucine groups started the leucine-enriched diet 2 days prior to and throughout the overload intervention. All animals had ad libitum access to water and chow during the entire experiment; no differences in daily calorie consumption were observed between the placebo vs. leucine groups within each age group. At the end of the overload period sham-operated and overloaded plantaris muscles were harvested and analyzed via western blotting for the phosphorylations of AMPK and FoxO3 as well as total levels of Atrogin-1 and MuRF1. Dietary leucine enrichment significantly (p [equal to or less than] 0.05) enhanced overload-induced plantaris muscle hypertrophy in old but not in young adult animals. Sham and overloaded plantaris muscle AMPK phosphorylation was significantly higher in aged animals receiving normal chow compared to young adult animals; however leucine supplementation in old animals reduced this AMPK phosphorylation to levels similar to young adult animals. Compared to placebo leucine also non-significantly (p = 0.07) enhanced FoxO3 phosphorylation in the overloaded muscles of both young adult and old animals (thus theoretically reducing FoxO3 translocation to the nucleus). Accordingly leucine also non-significantly (p = 0.07) reversed the overload-induced increase (from a 22.8% increase to a 17.0% decrease) in Atrogin-1 content in aged muscles and non-significantly (p = 0.14) enhanced the overload-induced decrease in MuRF1 content in the muscles of both age groups. These findings indicate that a leucine-enriched diet may potentially enhance overload-induced growth of aged fast-twitch muscle in part by suppressing pathways known to stimulate protein degradation.


The aim of the present investigation was to determine whether
bromine has a physiological role in the mammalian body.
For this purpose the following investigations were carried out:
(1) Bromide levels and its possible binding to protein in the sera of
human subjects and guinea pigs were examined. No protein bound bromine
was found in either. The bromide ratios of red blood cells to serum and
of the serum to C.S.F. were determined. The concentration varies
between cells and serum in blood, but only to a limited extent, and is
higher than in C.S.F. The blood concentration is influenced by diet.
The bromide/chloride ratio in both serum and C.S.F. were also measured
and was found to be different. The serum bromide levels in a group of schizophrenic patients
fell within the lower half of the normal range. This was shown to be
due to the dietary factor.
(2) The bromide content in various tissues of man (including various
regions of one human brain), of guinea pigs, of rabbits and of rats were
examined by a chemical method. A radio-isotope method was also used
but only in guinea pigs. The results showed that no tissue concentrates
bromide preferentially, with the exception of the stomach (measured only
in guinea pigs). No protein bound bromine was found in the pituitary.
The prolonged administration of varying amounts of bromide to
guinea pigs showed that there was a progressive accumulation of bromide
in all organs studied, the highest being in the serum.
The addition of fluoride to the drinking water of guinea pigs
significantly decreased the bromide level in all tissues studied. This suggests that fluoride can displace bromide in tissues.
(3) The effect of bromide and fluoride on thyroid. function was
investigated, and the results suggest that bromide may stimulate and
fluoride depress the production of thyroid hormone.
(4-) The rate of bromide excretion in humans was investigated using both
radioisotopic and chemical techniques; the results showed that there was
very little excretion during the first 24 hours (approximately 2 percent) and
that the average biological half-life of bromide is approximately 6 days.
Studies also indicated that chloride is excreted. preferentially to
bromide by the kidney. It was found that bromide is excreted. at a
reduced rate during the night. This diurnal rhythm of bromide
excretion follows very closely that of chloride and sodium. There was
no definite relationship between urinary volume and bromide excretion.
(5) Prolonged administration of bromide and. fluoride to guinea pigs
showed no significant effect on blood components, such as sodium,
potassium, acetyl cholinesterase and alanine amino transferase (G.P.T).


FACTORS INFLUENCING NEWCASTLE DISEASE VACCINE BIOTECHNOLOGY ADOPTION BY THE SMALL-HOLDER POULTRY FARMERS IN KATHIANI AND CENTRAL DIVISION OF MACHAKOS DISTRICT, KENYA. Agricultural biotechnology, of which poultry vaccine production is an integral component, is believed to hold great potential for contributing significantly to household food security particularly among the small-holder farmers in developing countries such as Kenya. In view of this, developing countries are adopting agricultural biotechnology and Kenya has so far embraced various aspects of this technology including tissue culture planting materials and use of vaccines against livestock/poultry diseases. This descriptive cross-sectional study therefore sought to investigate the factors influencing adoption of the Newcastle disease vaccine, a product of agricultural biotechnology, in Kathiani and Central Divisions of Machakos district where the vaccine was introduced by the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARl) in 1998. A sample size of 150 poultry farmers, most of them small-holder farmers, was determined. The two study areas of Kathiani and Central divisions of Machakos District were selected purposively because KARl, the sponsor of this study, needed data from these divisions for future biotechnology programming. Systematic sampling methodology was then used to identify households in each of the five locations of the two divisions from which respondents were selected and interviewed through interviewer-administered questionnaire. The study established that Newcastle disease (NCD) vaccine adoption was poor since the majority (147; 98%) of small-holder farmers interviewed could not afford it each time they wanted to vaccinate their birds. Similarly, due to limited awareness regarding the importance of vaccine use, many (123; 82%) small-holder farmers interviewed did not know of its availability in the study areas. This, in turn, resulted in the vaccine's poor adoption rates by the said farmers. The difference between the levels of awareness and unawareness of the vaccine among respondents was significant (l d f 1 = 61.440; P< 0.001). Only 3 (2 %) of the respondents who knew about the vaccine used it. The difference between these respondents and those who did not use it (147; 98%) was also statistically significant (l d f 1=138.240; P < 0.001). The study established that there were no distribution arrangements of the vaccine in the study area to specifically address the needs of the small-holder poultry farmers. This too, contributed to poor adoption of the vaccine by the farmers. In conclusion, unaffordability, low awareness levels as well as lack of distribution strategies for NCD vaccine contributed to its poor adoption levels in the study area. Therefore, the biotechnology intervention (NCD vaccine) may not have contributed to significant increase in household poultry production in the area. There is need to address the reported factors such as low awareness, unaffordability and lack of distribution strategies of NCDV that are constraining NCD vaccine biotechnology adoption by small-holder poultry farmers in order for the technology to contribute to household poultry production in the study area. A rise in poultry production would in turn contribute to household food security through increased consumption of chickens as well as proceeds from the sale of birds, thus increasing family incomes.


Seventeen ambulatory patients with extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer received one or two courses of high-dose induction chemotherapy consisting of cyclophosphamide (100 mg/kg) plus etopside (1,200 mg/m2) followed by four or five cycles of conventional-dose cyclophosphamide (1,000 mg/m2), doxorubicin (40 mg/m2), and vincristine (1.4 mg/m2) (CAV) given every 21 days. No additional chemotherapy was given until relapse or progression was documented. Response was assessed initially after high-dose induction therapy and again after completion of all chemotherapy. After induction therapy, 16/17 (94%) patients had achieved an objective response, including five (29%) complete responses and 11 (65%) partial responses. Two partially responding patients improved to a complete response after CAV, while one partial responder progressed and one patient died of an intercurrent illness while receiving CAV. Thus, the overall response after completing all chemotherapy was 15/16 (94%), including seven (44%) complete responses and eight (50%) partial responses. Median response duration was six months (range, 3 to 11 months), and overall median survival was ten months (range, 2 to 17 months). All 31 courses of induction therapy were associated with leukopenia (less than 1,000/microL), 81% with thrombocytopenia (less than 20,000/microL), and 77% with fever (greater than 38.5 degrees C). Seven episodes of bacteremia and one axillary abscess were documented, and there was one treatment-related death (6%). These toxicities are similar to that produced by high-dose etoposide alone. High-dose cyclophosphamide combined with high-dose etoposide can be administered to ambulatory patients with extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer without requiring bone marrow transplantation to reestablish hematopoiesis. Complete response and median survival rates, however, are similar to those obtained with less intensive therapy.


Traditionally, using "Nnoboa", a mutual-aid, for small number of people has worked miracles to improve standard of living and quality of life of rural dwellers. Dadson [3] points out that the concept has been developed into a multi-purpose network-based theory of raising social capital. The need to use it nationwide has not been tested. With the technology such social networking, future educational investment could be implemented to help the poor to work together to achieve synergy that uplifts the quality of life. We propose a conceptual model that shows how to accelerate individual and institutional development of society through careful implementation of the "Nnoboa" or mutual-aid concept.


This thesis evaluates why the implementation of a tree plantation project in Chiapas, Mexico, called Scolel Te failed in its attempt to participate in the CDMs scheme. The Scolel Te project brings together farmers and local organisations into a network of exchange of resources that aims at producing an outcome that is only possible through the co-ordination and co-operation of all participants: the emission of carbon certificates. This thesis studies the co-ordination problems that local actors face at the moment of establishing the carbon projects by identifying how formal and informal mechanisms such as contracts, economic incentives, trust, and reputation, create or solve co-ordination problems in the Scolel Te network. The thesis also describes how changes in the distribution of power among actors affect the functioning of the network and how individual's interests and strategic alliances have the potential of derailing the aims of the environmental project. For such purposes, this thesis analyses the exchange relationships among actors at the micro level and identifies how exchange relationships evolve over time. Then an overall picture of the exchange relationships is presented (macro level) with focus in understanding how and why power in the network is exerted. Findings suggest that relying on economic incentives as the main mechanism to generate commitment among communities has failed to create stable exchange relationships in the long term. Trust and reputation are stronger mechanisms to achieve commitment. Moreover, we find that the ability to generate commitment depends highly on the generation of interdependencies between tree plantation projects and the main economic activities of local actors. However, type of land tenure, main economic activity, and pre-existing power relationships embedded at local level are also the principal factors that determine the dynamism of the social exchange relationships and commitment in the long-run. This thesis considers that co-ordination failure occurs because a lack of knowledge about the real dependencies between local actors and their natural resources in the design of CDMs. At macro level, this thesis found that the lack of accountability of the unregulated local carbon market at local level has created unintended incentives for actors to adopt less environmentally responsible strategies and disincentive participation in the CDMs.


Robust reinforcement learning (RL) is to find a policy that optimizes the worst-case performance over an uncertainty set of MDPs. In this paper, we focus on model-free robust RL, where the uncertainty set is defined to be centering at a misspecified MDP that generates a single sample trajectory sequentially and is assumed to be unknown. We develop a sample-based approach to estimate the unknown uncertainty set and design a robust Q-learning algorithm (tabular case) and robust TDC algorithm (function approximation setting), which can be implemented in an online and incremental fashion. For the robust Q-learning algorithm, we prove that it converges to the optimal robust Q function, and for the robust TDC algorithm, we prove that it converges asymptotically to some stationary points. Unlike the results in [Roy et al., 2017], our algorithms do not need any additional conditions on the discount factor to guarantee the convergence. We further characterize the finite-time error bounds of the two algorithms and show that both the robust Q-learning and robust TDC algorithms converge as fast as their vanilla counterparts(within a constant factor). Our numerical experiments further demonstrate the robustness of our algorithms. Our approach can be readily extended to robustify many other algorithms, e.g., TD, SARSA, and other GTD algorithms.


Outsourcing. Downsizing. Eliminating redundancy. The mass layoff is a phenomenon susceptible to endless labeling and relabeling, be it by epithet or euphemism, but under any name it represents a massive trauma for workers. Legislators are by no means insensitive to the economic-and political-dimensions of this trauma. In 1988, back when the bogeyman was not China but Japan, Congress tackled the issue with the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act' (WARN Act), which requires firms above a certain size to provide notice before either a plant closing or a mass layoff.' To encourage compliance, the Act allows for civil actions against employers who fail to give notice, with liability of up to sixty days' backpay and lost benefits Unfortunately, when Congress passed the WARN Act, it neglected to specify the appropriate finder of fact for these lawsuits. In the absence of any express direction, the federal courts have been forced to grapple with whether a plaintiff bringing a civil action under the WARN Act has a Seventh Amendment right to demand a trial by jury.' A convincing answer has yet to rise from the scrum-at present litigants are faced with a division of authority. This Comment seeks to resolve that division by using existing interpretations of the Act's remedies to inform the Seventh Amendment analysis. On the basis of this analysis, the Comment concludes that WARN Act plaintiffs have a constitutional right to a jury trial. Part I describes two seemingly unrelated areas of law: the Supreme Court's prevailing analysis of the Seventh Amendment and its


The ferroelectric-photovoltaic (FE-PV) device, in which a homogeneous ferroelectric material is used as a light absorbing layer, has been investigated during the past several decades with numerous ferroelectric oxides. The FE-PV effect is distinctly different from the typical photovoltaic (PV) effect in semiconductor p–n junctions in that the polarization electric field is the driving force for the photocurrent in FE-PV devices. In addition, the anomalous photovoltaic effect, in which the voltage output along the polarization direction can be significantly larger than the bandgap of the ferroelectric materials, has been frequently observed in FE-PV devices. However, a big challenge faced by the FE-PV devices is the very low photocurrent output. The research interest in FE-PV devices has been re-spurred by the recent discovery of above-bandgap photovoltage in materials with ferroelectric domain walls, electric switchable diodes and photovoltaic effects, tip-enhanced photovoltaic effects at the nanoscale, and new low-bandgap ferroelectric materials and device design. In this feature article, we reviewed the advance in understanding the mechanisms of the ferroelectric photovoltaic effects and recent progress in improving the photovoltaic device performance, including the emerging approaches of integrating the ferroelectric materials into organic heterojunction photovoltaic devices for very high efficiency PV devices.


We present a real-time algorithm to estimate the 3D pose of a previously unseen face from a single range image. Based on a novel shape signature to identify noses in range images, we generate candidates for their positions, and then generate and evaluate many pose hypotheses in parallel using modern graphics processing units (GPUs). We developed a novel error function that compares the input range image to precomputed pose images of an average face model. The algorithm is robust to large pose variations of plusmn90deg yaw, plusmn45deg pitch and plusmn30deg roll rotation, facial expression, partial occlusion, and works for multiple faces in the field of view. It correctly estimates 97.8% of the poses within yaw and pitch error of 15deg at 55.8 fps. To evaluate the algorithm, we built a database of range images with large pose variations and developed a method for automatic ground truth annotation.


Abstract Objectives: The aim of the present study was to determine the current nutrition staffing profile of the Integrated Nutrition Programme (INP) in Department of Health in the Western Cape, and establish whether it is adequate to meet the objectives of the INP. Method: Self-administered questionnaires compiled in English were used as the main data collection instrument for nutrition staff in districts and at hospitals (n = 647). Eight individual questionnaires, one per staff category, were developed and utilised in the study. Results: Foodservice workers were the largest group of nutrition personnel (n = 509; 79%), followed by dietitians (n = 64; 10%), managers (n = 31; 5%), auxiliary workers (n = 28; 4%), and administrative workers (n = 15; 2%). Sixty-two per cent of the nutrition workforce was located in urban areas and 38% in rural districts. Hospital and district dietitians experienced common problems, as well as specific differences. Regarding problems, both categories referred to limited resources, inadequate number of available posts, and lack of acknowledgement and support from administrative and supply chain management. District dietitians were also hampered by lack of space for consultations, poor referrals from doctors, insufficient posts for nutrition advisers, and difficulty in communicating with Xhosa-speaking patients. Hospital dietitians were hampered by insufficient interaction with district dietitians and lack of dietitians for specialised units. They also mentioned that poor salaries were affecting morale. Conclusion: Recommendations such as additional posts for dietitians, improved conditions of service and salaries, increased advocacy for nutrition, and a number of human resources recommendations were made, and should be considered if the INP objectives are to be met.


Colloque international - Les religions face aux theories et aux politiques de la «race» (XVe-XXIe siecle) Contingent Hermeneutics. Collective Identities and Slavery in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam Intervenant : Benjamin Braude, Boston College) One of the colloquium's underlying challenges is that race and racism are terms that are defined by the context in which they are used and abused. Race in the US has conventionally been defined by so-called color. By contrast, race in Europe, despite efforts to establish a so-called physical scientific basis for its definition, has never achieved in mass usage such fraudulent precision. Consequently, the terms particularly in Europe are often so mingled with notions of cultural identity that they are often indistinguishable from religion and religious prejudice or ethnicity and ethnic prejudice. Of course, none of these efforts at definition can attain the universality they claim since the protean nature of human reality is too complicated and contradictory to be put into the neat pigeon-holes of racism. Race does not exist except in the perverse imagination of racism and racists. So the discussion must begin with the racist understanding of a race defined as a large overarching group marked by fixed, collective, often dominationist, and over determined, hereditarianism. The two most important elements of this definition are fixity and hereditarianism. This is the race of the classic racist imagination, politics, and law of nineteenth and twentieth century Euro-America-South Africa. For example, Nazi antisemitism was based ultimately on religion, but its acolytes were convinced that it was a fixed hereditarian category and, even more significantly, acted accordingly. This paper addresses the tortuous ways in which the three Abrahamic religions have constructed notions of collective identity and the hermeneutics through which they have justified the enslavement of certain groups. In Judaism, this construction has involved the notion of Hebrew Slave versus Canaanite Slave; in Islam, Muslim-born of free ancestry versus Muslim-convert and non-Muslim; in Christianity, such categories are less clearly formulated, though in practice, Christian-born of free ancestry versus non-Christians and converts. However underlying the approach of all three is the convention of taking captives in war. The so-called Curse of Ham is not deeply rooted in any of the Abrahamic religions, but rather it is a Euro-Christian false tradition invented during the early modern era, particularly in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, retroactively imposed on ancient and medieval texts. The early modern contingencies that fabricated such anachronistic racist hermeneutics form the main theme of my presentation.


Most higher plants possess a phase in their life cycle in which tissues can survive desiccation. However, this is restricted to specialized tissues such as seeds and pollen. Resurrection plants are remarkable in that they can tolerate almost complete water loss in their vegetative tissues. The desiccated plant can remain alive in the dried state for several years. However, upon watering the plants rehydrate and are fully functional within 48 h. Underpinning this amazing ability is the capacity to accumulate large amounts of sucrose in the tissues. This sugar has the property of stabilizing enzymes and cellular structures in the absence of water. The sources of carbon that fuel sucrose synthesis are not known, but temporary carbohydrate stores and photosynthesis are the most likely candidates. On rewatering, the sucrose is metabolized rapidly as the tissues rehydrate. Increased expression of a number of genes in response to drought stress have been noted. A number of these are associated with metabolic pathways linked with primary carbohydrate metabolism. However, some genes related to LEA (Late Embryogenic Abundant) proteins have been isolated which suggests they too may play a role in maintaining tissue integrity during desiccation. How these mechanisms are integrated to enable resurrection plants to survive desiccation is discussed.


Recognizing Transsexuals draws on interviews with transsexuals at various stages of transition to offer
an original account of transsexual embodiment and bodily aesthetics. Exploring the reasons for which
transpeople desire to modify their bodies, it moves away from the focus on gender that characterizes
much work on transpeople's embodiment, to investigate the concept of bodily aesthetics. Recent
legislation allowing transsexuals to apply for gender recognition provides the context in which transpeople challenge the conventional
understandings of what it means to be men and women.
The book examines key approaches to recognizing transsexualism from within a variety of fields
and considers transsexuals' bodies, body projects and embodiment in relation to personal,
political and medico-legal fields. It explores the ways in which transpeople's bodily aesthetics
affect social relations – such as sexual relations, acceptance by others and their families –
whilst also considering contemporary political trans community organizations and their public
representation of trans-bodies.
Recognizing Transsexuals is the first sociological examination of how the bodies of transpeople
are figured and reconfigured in socio, politico and medico-legal contexts and considers the
impact of these shifts, and will be of interest to those with interests in embodiment, the
sociology of law, sexology, medical sociology and gender theory.


The use of recombinant DNA technology to transform agricultural plants and animals has been the subject of ethical controversy for the last quarter century. The argument favouring these technologies hinges on their role in lowering costs of farm production, as well as potential benefits to farmers. Arguments against cite a long litany of problems. Environmental and food safety risk debates touch upon both the nature and likelihood of potential hazards, and also the overall philosophy that should guide the assessment and management of these risks. In addition, critics of the technology have argued that risk assessments have neglected two categories of hazard entirely: impact on animals and socio-economic impacts, especially on organic and smallholder farms. The latter issue makes the use of genetic engineering into a key episode in a more comprehensive debate over the future of agricultural production. In addition, ethical debates have taken up the extension of intellectual property rights to genes and their impact on the use, production and control of seeds. Labelling and consumer choice has also been debated. Finally, some authors have extended arguments over the possible unnatural character of genetic engineering from their more conventional medical setting to the domain of food.

Key Concepts:

Environmental and food safety hazards associated with genetically modified foods are not unique to the process of transformation that utilises recombinant DNA techniques.

Risk assessment and policy decision making for genetically modified foods has generally excluded socio-economic impacts and effects on small farmers from consideration.

Concern over unequal distribution of power often lurks just beneath the surface of criticisms that have been levied against genetically engineered foods.

Keywords:

agriculture;
farming;
risk;
recombinant DNA;
plants;
patents


It is shown that a new type of instability of a light field in a dissipative medium (spatiotemporal instability, which causes the generation of new types of nonlinear light wave) can be observed by controlling the spatial scale and the topology of the transverse interactions of light fields in a medium with cubic nonlinearity. The excitation conditions for optical reverberators, rotating helical waves, and various dissipative structures are experimentally determined. Transformations and interactions of the structures lead to optical turbulence in both space and time. Physical interpretation of these phenomena is based on the parabolic equation for the nonlinear phase shift. It is found that this theoretical model allows one not only to obtain the excitation conditions but to investigate thoroughly such phenomena as hysteresis and nonlinear interactions of structures.


Polyurethanes (PUs) are considered ideal candidates for drug delivery applications due to their easy synthesis, excellent mechanical properties, and biodegradability. Unfortunately, methods for preparing well-defined PU nanoparticles required miniemulsion polymerization techniques with a nontrivial control of the polymerization conditions due to the inherent incompatibility of isocyanate-containing monomers and water. In this work, we report the preparation of soft PU nanoparticles in a one-pot process using interfacial polymerization that employs a non-isocyanate polymerization route that minimizes side reactions with water. Activated pentafluorophenyl dicarbonates were polymerized with diamines and/or triamines by interfacial polymerization in the presence of an anionic emulsifier, which afforded non-isocyanate polyurethane (NIPU) nanoparticles with sizes in the range of 200-300 nm. Notably, 5 wt % of emulsifier was required in combination with a trifunctional amine to achieve stable PU dispersions and avoid particle aggregation. The versatility of this polymerization process allows for incorporation of functional groups into the PU nanoparticles, such as carboxylic acids, which can encapsulate the chemotherapeutic doxorubicin through ionic interactions. Altogether, this waterborne synthetic method for functionalized NIPU soft nanoparticles holds great promise for the preparation of drug delivery nanocarriers.


The relations between music and narrative were sharply brought into focus in the 1920s and 30s when the new media of radio and cinema revolutionised compositional techniques and informed new aesthetic principles. As Finocchiaro has argued "we can speak of a cinematic paradigm within musical Modernism" (2017: 6). Henri Tomasi (1901-1971) was to become one of the pioneering composers of music for radio plays and films in France in the 1930s and 40s, working with Maurice Gleize, Jacques de Baroncelli, Maurice Cam and Marcel Pagnol (Jacono and Pons, 2015). Drawing on his experience as a professional piano improviser for silent films in the cinemas of Marseille and Paris in the 1920s, he forged a highly personal musical language, shaping modern forms of musical expression. His compositions reflect a fundamentally lyrical approach to music, leading him to become somewhat of a musical maverick in a context where melody and tonality were no longer common currency. In this paper, I will be arguing that Tomasi derived many of his compositional processes from cinematic techniques such as collage, montage, panning, dissolving and framing, and that this innovative approach to musical composition was trialled in his piano scores. His Paysages in particular are composed on three staves, the foregrounded melodic lines being interwoven within the varied dynamic planes and textures of the background elements, creating a rare sense of depth and perspective. The shifts of mood and colouring and a flexible approach to time and rhythm, suggest the fluidity and dramatic motions of a cinematic landscape in movement. Beyond this preoccupation with cinematic effects, I will be led to question his approach to narrative and semiotics in the light of what Irina Rajewsky has described as an intermedial process of transposition (2002) and what Jens Schroter has referred to as transmedial intermediality (2011).


An image data warehousing extends a conventional data warehousing to also manipulate images represented by feature vectors and attributes for similarity search. A challenge that arises is the efficient processing of analytical queries extended with a similarity search predicate. These queries have a high computational cost since they require the processing of costly star join operations and distance calculations in the same setting. We consider applications that manage huge volumes of data, where the use of parallel and distributed data processing frameworks is needed. In this article, we introduce two methods to efficiently solve this challenge in Spark. BrOmnImg is based on the integration of the broadcast join and the Omni techniques for the processing of the star join operation and the distance calculations, respectively. BrOmnImgCF extends BrOmnImg by using the conventional predicate to further reduce the number of distance calculations. Compared with the closest method available in the literature, BrOmnImg reduced the time spent on query processing by up to about 65%. Compared with BrOmnImg, BrOmnImgCF improved the performance by up to about 54%.


Lagnub is popularly used by Ata Matigsalog in Arakan, North Cotabato in treating skin infections. Scientific investigation was done to prove its folkloric claim by determining the acute dermal toxicity level, mutagenic activity, antifungal property using Candida albicans ATCC and two clinical isolates and its Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC). Acute dermal toxicity was performed using the fixed dose of dried leaves at 1000 mg/kg (Sighting study) and 1000, 2000 and 5000 mg/kg for the main study. The protocol was based on OECD guideline. Susceptibility test for antifungal activity was done using Kirby-Bauer Method. Two-fold agar dilution was followed for Minimum Inhibitory Concentration and Direct Method of Ames test was performed for mutagenicity. Results showed that the dried leaf crude extract was categorized as non-toxic because there were no deaths of rabbits or evident toxicity at the upper limit dose of 5000 mg/kg. However, Ames test revealed that the dried leaf extract was considered as mutagenic against Salmonella typhimurium TA98. Antifungal activity revealed that the leaf crude extract was interpreted as active having a zone of 16.67 mm ±5.3852 (C. albicans ATCC), clinical isolate 1 is 12.55 ±3.2974 mm, and clinical isolate 2 is 12.51 ±3.4278 mm. Statistically, there was a significant difference in the mean zones of inhibition exhibited by the plant material against the test organisms. Meanwhile, the minimum inhibitory concentration of lagnub was 52, 631.58 μg/mL


Data replication is playing an increasingly important role in the design of parallel information systems. In particular, the widespread use of cluster architectures often requires to replicate data for performance and availability reasons. However, maintaining the consistency of the different replicas is known to cause severe scalability problems. To address this limitation, quorums are often suggested as a way to reduce the overall overhead of replication. In this article, we analyze several quorum types in order to better understand their behavior in practice. The results obtained challenge many of the assumptions behind quorum based replication. Our evaluation indicates that the conventional read-one/write-all-available approach is the best choice for a large range of applications requiring data replication. We believe this is an important result for anybody developing code for computing clusters as the read-one/write-all-available strategy is much simpler to implement and more flexible than quorum-based approaches. In this article, we show that, in addition, it is also the best choice using a number of other selection criteria.


The development of new varieties of perennial plants generally requires lengthy and laborious procedures. In this study, we used ion beam irradiation mutagenesis in an attempt to accelerate the breeding process for perennial plants. We evaluated the biological effects of five ion beam sources (carbon, neon, argon, silicon, and iron) and neutron irradiation on Japanese gentian and apple. These treatments were applied at the National Institute of Radiological Sciences (NIRS) using the Heavy Ion Medical Accelerator in Chiba (HIMAC) and the Neutron-exposure Accelerator System for Biological Effect Experiments (NASBEE). Biological effects were observed in in vitro gentian plants after irradiation with ion beams at <10 Gy, whereas apple trees were less sensitive to ion beam irradiation. The growth of gentians in vitro was repressed by 3 Gy neutron irradiation, while that of grafted apple trees was not affected by 4 Gy neutron irradiation. During in vitro proliferation, seven pink-flowered lines were obtained from originally blue-flowered gentian after C and Ne ion beam irradiation treatments. Genomic and reverse transcription-PCR analyses of these lines suggested that the mutations occurred in the genomic region containing F3'5'H (encoding flavonoid 3',5'-hydroxylase). These results provide useful information for the mutagenesis and breeding of gentian, apple, and other perennial plants.


We study the Personalized PageRank (PPR) algorithm, a local spectral method for clustering, which extracts clusters using locally-biased random walks around a given seed node. In contrast to previous work, we adopt a classical statistical learning setup, where we obtain samples from an unknown nonparametric distribution, and aim to identify sufficiently salient clusters. We introduce a trio of population-level functionals -- the normalized cut, conductance, and local spread, analogous to graph-based functionals of the same name -- and prove that PPR, run on a neighborhood graph, recovers clusters with small population normalized cut and large conductance and local spread. We apply our general theory to establish that PPR identifies connected regions of high density (density clusters) that satisfy a set of natural geometric conditions. We also show a converse result, that PPR can fail to recover geometrically poorly-conditioned density clusters, even asymptotically. Finally, we provide empirical support for our theory.


Abstract The ecology of Australia's tropical savannas is shaped by the near-pervasive influence of fire. Constituting ∼20% of Australia's land area, tropical savannas contribute >75% of the area burnt in Australia each year. Across most of Australia's tropical savannas, components of biodiversity are declining, including many species of birds. This review seeks to assess whether that decline is linked to current fire regimes. However, relevant studies are few, short-term and opportunistic, and indicate rather than demonstrate the effects of fire. There is no set of agreed paradigms for contextualising the relationship between birds and fire regimes in this region or for any management consequences. We conclude that the current fire regime is suboptimal for many species of birds, particularly for granivores, frugivores, hollow-dependent species and those that nest on or near the ground. For conservation reserves, we recommend that fire management protocols include the explicit targets that: (1) at least 25% of the savanna landscape is at least 3 years unburnt; (2) at least 5% is at least 10 years unburnt; (3) fire-sensitive non-savanna vegetation types are increasing or stable and (4) populations of selected hollow-nesting, ground-nesting, frugivorous and granivorous birds are increasing or stable. We also identify key knowledge gaps that currently inhibit conservation management.


Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common childhood malignancy in Bangladesh. ALL is treated with chemotherapy due to high responsiveness. After chemotherapy infection may occur which increases the time of aplasia. For this purpose, reliable laboratory tests that will indicate early haematological recovery are needed. At present, absolute neutrophil count (ANC), reticulocyte counts and peripheral blood film (PBF) examination are used after chemotherapy for prediction of bone marrow recovery. Reticulocyte quantification in the peripheral blood samples, as a percentage or absolute count with immature reticulocyte fraction (lRF) are a reliable measure of haematological recovery established by many studies. This cross sectional study was carried out to evaluate the haematopoietic recovery in children with ALL by automated reticulocyte analysis. Total fifty patients were enrolled in this study on remission induction phase. They received the drugs of the protocol of UKALL-XI. All patients were between 8 months to 15 years age range with a mean age of 5.5 ±3.2. In this study the recovery of reticulocyte percentage occurred at a median of 20 days; ARC 18 days; IRF 16 days; HFR 18 days and ANC was obtained after a median of 23 days. This study established that among the various parameters IRF recovered earlier than others. Keywords: Immature Reticulocyte Fraction(lRF); High fluorescent reticulocyte (HFR); Low fluorescent reticulocyte (LFR); Middle fluorescent reticulocyte (MFR); Absolute neutrophil count (ANC); Absolute Reticulocyte count(ARC). DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bjpath.v26i1.9128 BJPATH 2011; 26(1): 10-13


HUMAN SETTLEMENTS should, by definition, be places of convenience and solace. And, regardless of whether a human settlement is of suburban standard or of township standard, its inhabitants should be able to carry out their daily activities conveniently, consistently and affordably. Inconvenient environments, such as informal settlements, restrict lifestyles, reduce choices and build frustration, resulting in service delivery protests. This means, to sustain progress, urban planners and engineers should ensure the necessary infrastructure be put in place regardless of environment, with the only differentiator being the size, cost and quality of houses and other improvements (e.g. gardens, swimming pools, etc.).


ABSTRACT Open kindergartens are a low-threshold pedagogical service that preschool-aged children, accompanied by an adult caregiver, can attend without appointment or registration. The aims of this study were to examine users' experiences with the open kindergarten in Norway and to identify predictors for the overall satisfaction with the service. User satisfaction surveys were conducted over a 6-8-week period between 2015 and 2018 in open kindergartens in 11 municipalities in Norway. Every adult user who visited the open kindergarten during the survey period received a survey; 292 completed it (response rate 56%). The users were very satisfied with the open kindergarten and found it beneficial for themselves and the child. Multilevel analyses identified that four out of the eight scales, namely the physical environment, the evaluation of the staff and the benefits for the child and the caregivers, were significant predictors for the overall satisfaction of the users with the open kindergarten. The results suggest that the open kindergarten is an important arena that is highly valued by its users. The service complements the other existing communal health-care services for children and their families and fills a gap that no other service covers.


Crosstalk within cable bundles can degrade system performance. In aircraft systems that use shielded twisted pairs, the crosstalk occurs primarily in the connector where individual signal wires are not shielded or twisted. In many cases, the parameters which determine crosstalk within the connector are unknown because the connector is closed and wires cannot be easily accessed. Expanding on prior research [14], a methodology for measuring coupling parameters and modeling crosstalk within aircraft cable connectors at low frequencies (<;400 MHz) was developed. The values of mutual inductance and capacitance were extracted from measurements made with a vector network analyzer (VNA). The characteristics of the individual wires were extracted from VNA-measured TDR response. The accuracy of the model was evaluated through comparison of simulated and measured results. Additionally, a closed-form solution was developed to estimate the worst-case envelope of the differential crosstalk. The calculated results match the measured peak values well. This worst-case crosstalk estimate allows effective evaluation of the impact of crosstalk within different connectors. The developed method can be effective for analyzing complex aircraft cable assemblies and connectors without requiring extensive knowledge of the assembly procedure.


Macrofossils from Pleistocene sediments in western Tasmania are investigated in order to reconstruct vegetation from this critical period. in the history of Australia's vegetation. The microfossil record shows that many taxa. notably the common Tertiary taxa Nothofagus subgenus Brassospora. Araucariaceae. Dacrycarpus and Dacrydium. were present in western Tasmania during the Latest Pliocene or Earliest Pleistocene but are now extinct from Tasmania. Most of these taxa are likely to have been rainforest species, but some may have been from sclerophyll vegetation (e.g. Beauprea). A few of these persisted into the Early-Middle Pleistocene and only Quintinia to the Late Pleistocene.
Macrofossils of now globally and regionally extinct taxa occur in the Early Middle Pleistocene Regatta Point sediments. Most of these extinct taxa are not distinct in the relatively good microfossil record of that area. Some clearly sclerophyllous taxa have become extinct e.g. Banksia strahanensis and Oxylobium sp. nov. Rainforest taxa no longer occurring in Tasmania have affinities with species from temperate New Zealand (e.g. Quintinia sp. nov.), montane north-eastern New South Wales and Queensland (e.g. Rubus cf. moorei forma glabra, aff. Austromyrtus and Laurophyllum sp.). Macrofossils of only one extinct species occur in sediments younger than Regatta Point: Banksia kingii from the Late Pleistocene Melaleuca Inlet sediments.
Local climatic and vegetation reconstructions for the times of deposition are made -for the Regatta Point, the middle Pleistocene Regency and the late Pleistocene Melaleuca Inlet sediments based on floristics. Vegetation reconsttuctions include analysis of diversity using both floristics and a modified rarefaction method. Both climatic and vegetation reconstructions are interpreted in terms of taphonomic studies both in this work and elsewhere. Regression modelling of the leaf size of N. cunninghamii from modern forest floor litter against BIOCLIM synthetic climatic parameters indicates that leaf length is well correlated to temperature of the growing season and palaeo-temperatures are estimated for the fossil floras.
The extinctions are interpreted in terms of the climatic and vegetation reconstructions of the sites and broader scale knowledge of late Cenozoic climate, vegetation and glacial history. Many Tertiary taxa survived the climatic disruptions of the Early Pleistocene, but probably become extinct directly or indirectly due to the glaciations of the Middle Pleistocene. Rainforest diversity is lower now than during the Early Pleistocene, but the results are ambiguous for overall diversity. There is no reason to suspect that Tasmania could not support more diverse rainforest under modern conditions.


"No Justice. No Peace." The mass arrest and detention of over 1,105 people during the Toronto G20 summit in June 2010, including author Meaghan Daniel, prompted reflection on the connections between justice and peace and in particular, between peaceful protest, policing, detention and the justice system. The record breaking weekend of mass arrests and temporary detention of people described as "innocent bystanders" and "peaceful protestors" provoked an ongoing conversation about the criminalization of protest. It is the authors' hope to extend this conversation beyond these (un)common criminals to the "every day" processes of criminalization and imprisonment that go largely unquestioned in this country. The article shares the narrative of Meaghan's arrest and detention while participating as a legal observer during the G20 summit weekend. In the course of telling that story, the authors briefly reflecting on two themes: (1) the criminalization of dissent, including through the power to arrest for "breach of the peace" and the apparent impotence of constitutionally entrenched rights to free expression and peaceful assembly to restrain such police power; and (2) connections between the experiences and activism of the G20 detainees and the thousands of other prisoners in Canada – these "common criminals" with whom progressive social movements have not always seen common cause.


This study investigated roles of age, gender and self-efficacy of vocational workers on anxiety manifestation. A total number of 141 subjects were drawn from 5 states: Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo States of South-East Geo-political zone. State and Trait anxiety inventory and self-efficacy scale were used for data gathering/collection. Statistical was done using multivariate analysis of variance statistics (MANOVA). In addition, a factorial design guided the comparative study. The result showed that Catholic vocational workers with high self-efficacy (HSE=43.425) experienced state anxiety more than those with low self-efficacy (LSE= 41.180). The female vocational workers were found to be significantly high in trait anxiety (FTA= 61.943) than male (MTA= 55.234). However, self-efficacy was not significant. Conversely, there was a significant first interaction of age, gender and self-efficacy on state anxiety. The findings were discussed and recommendations were made.


PURPOSE. This was a pilot project for an intended larger study to determine the most highly recommended published research papers for use in teaching introductory survey courses in exercise physiology at both the undergraduate and the master's degree level. METHODS. Using Web sites of relevant departments of selected colleges and universities in Texas, we identified 38 faculty members that likely had taught introductory, survey courses in exercise physiology, and their email addresses. We sent a survey to these 38 via email, requesting response via return email, and we sent a follow-up email reminder 15 days after the initial email. The survey requested demographic information that we thought might be related to recommendations of research literature. And for undergraduate and master's degree levels separately, the survey instrument asked for response to: "I do not think there are any specific research papers that students . . . should be exposed to. . .[and] If you did not mark the previous statement, please list papers . . ." RESULTS. Two persons replied that they had not taught introductory, survey courses. Twelve individuals who had taught such courses (33% of 36 potentially eligible survey recipients) responded to the survey. All 12 had taught an undergraduate course; for these, number of years of teaching ranged from 3 to 35 (mean = 15). Nine had taught a master's level course; for these, number of years of teaching ranged from 3 to 25 (mean = 11). Of the 12 respondents who had taught an undergraduate course, eight (67%) recommended no specific research papers. The other four recommended a total of 24 specific papers, four original reports and 20 other types (e.g., reviews, position stands, editorials). No paper was recommended by more than one person. Six (67%) of the nine who had taught master's level courses recommended no specific papers. Three reported that they required specific papers, but only one provided a list. CONCLUSIONS. This pilot study suggested that the larger-scale study is feasible and would yield results of interest to faculty who teach introductory exercise physiology courses. The results suggest that most faculty do not recommend specific research papers that students should consistently be exposed to in introductory, survey courses in exercise physiology at either the undergraduate or the master's degree level. The validity of generalizing these results is very low, however.


[Mathematical notation cannot be correctly represented here; please see PDF below for full equations.] We study questions related to stability and approximation of the system of linear neutral delay differential equations [equation] with appropriate initial data. Here [A, B subscript 1, B subscript 2,..., B subscript n and C subscript 1, C subscript 2,..., C subscript n] are complex [m x m] matrices for a natural number [m] and [r subscript 1, r subscript 2,... r subscript n] are positive numbers. We construct a new delay-independent sufficient condition for exponential stability of the solution semigroup associated with this equation. We obtain our condition by using the idea of renorming the state space to obtain a strong dissipative inequality on the generator of the solution semigroup. We also construct a new semidiscrete approximation scheme which yields convergence for both the solution semigroup and its adjoint. Finally, we discuss several examples to compare our results with existing results in the literature.


INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES: Despite its utility in the non-neurogenic population, limited objective data exists regarding the efficacy of autologous pubovaginal sling (PVS) placement for management of urinary incontinence in patients with neurogenic bladder (NGB). We aim to assess long-term outcomes of PVS in neurogenic urinary incontinence. METHODS: This is a retrospective review of patients with NGB who received an autologous PVS from January 1st, 2000 - December 31st, 2017 at a single center. Patients with NGB undergoing PVS were identified from electronic medical record using CPT codes. Subjective and objective outcomes were collected including American Urologic Association Symptom Index (AUA-SI) and Incontinence Symptom Index (ISI). RESULTS: Thirty-one women with NGB receiving PVS were included. Patients had a mean age of 55±16 years and BMI of 28.7±7 kg/m2. Six patients (19.3%) had previously failed PVS. Preoperatively, patients were managed with clean intermittent catheterization (CIC) (64.5%), urethral catheter (16.1%), ileovesicostomy (6.4%), and suprapubic tube (SPT) (3.2%). Cross-over PVS placement technique was used in 16.1% and 67.7% had concomitant procedures including 8 augmentations, 3 ileovesicostomies, and 4 SPTs. At a mean follow-up of 36±24 months, 23 patients (74.2%) reported continued incontinence. Mean AUA-SI scores decreased from 14.8±9.8 to 9.7±10.3 (p=0.002), AUA-QoL from 5.0±1.87 to 2.9±2.1 (p=0.100), ISI-Severity from 17.3±10.1 to 10.7±9.5 (p=0.039), and ISI-Bother from 4.2±2.6 to 3.2±2.6 (p=0.016) (Figure 1). Four women underwent ileal conduit for persistent incontinence. CONCLUSIONS: While most patients continued to have incontinence after PVS, significant improvement in objective measures was noted. This data is limited by a small retrospective nature of the review and further studies are needed to understand the role of PVS as a treatment option for urinary incontinence in NGB. Figure. No caption available. Source of Funding: None


We made a theoretical investigation on the top-hat-beam Z scan when the nonlinear media possess third- and fifth-order nonlinearities simultaneously. A high-accuracy method was proposed to allow the determination of the nonlinear refraction coefficients related to the third- and fifth-order effects. We also reconfirmed the common procedure for dividing the contributions of the third- and fifth-order effects to the nonlinearity in the top-hat-beam Z-scan measurements; the results indicated that the common procedure can be still employed for the determination of the third-order nonlinearity, whereas it is inapplicable for the fifth-order nonlinearity. We investigated experimentally, as a test, the nonlinear refraction of a Disperse Yellow 7 thin film by using the top-hat-beam Z-scan technique, with 35-ps-duration pulses at a 1064-nm wavelength.


Since the Apple iPhone's launch in 2007 in an exclusive arrangement with AT&T, it has garnered overwhelmingly positive responses from consumers and from the media. With its success, exclusive contracts between handset makers and wireless carriers have come under increasing scrutiny by regulators and lawmakers. Such practices have been criticized by regulators, by the media, and by "locked-out" consumers, due to the fact that a consumer has to subscribe to a particular service provider if he or she strongly prefers one handset to others. In this paper, we empirically examine the impact of handset exclusivity arrangements on consumer welfare. First we study consumers' purchase decisions for mobile services that include the choice of a handset and of a service provider. We do so by combining panel data on consumers' purchase decisions with supplemented data on prices and features of common handsets. Next, assuming a Stackelberg leader-follower relationship between the handset manufacturers and the service providers, and using our demand estimates, we recover the markups for the players in the market. We then simulate what would have happened in the counterfactual scenario when the iPhone is available from all carriers. Our results suggest that, if we take into account adjustments in handset prices from handset manufacturers and service providers in response to the change in market structure, consumer welfare will increase by $326 million without the exclusive arrangement. We view our analysis as a starting point to a more complete characterization of consumer behavior and the complex relationships among players in this industry.


Phenological change in long-distance migratory birds has responded less to climate change than that in short-distance migrants and residents. A general lack of information about the timing of migration in the winter quarters has prevented progress in interpreting the causes. Here we report long-term information on first arrival of barn swallows Hirundo rustica to—and last departure from—a major roost in South Africa during 1993–2010, a period when climate change at the breeding grounds was particularly pronounced. Although first arrival in autumn advanced by more than 2 wk, there was a tendency for a delay in last departure during spring, suggesting that cues for earlier spring departure from the winter quarters were missing. During 1999–2009, timing of moult was delayed, which may explain why spring migration by trans-Saharan migratory birds did not advance in this period.


It has been shown that concession timing can influence a negotiator's satisfaction with and judgment of the negotiation partner, the quality of the object, and the agreed upon price (Kwon & Weingart, 2004). Study 1 tested whether the concession timing effect holds when a negotiator believes the other party is cooperatively oriented. The results suggest that a negotiator's belief about the other party's cooperative social motive overrides the concession timing effect. Specifically, if the other party was believed to be cooperative, negotiators did not feel dissatisfied with the outcome or the negotiating partner and did not evaluate the value of the object as being low, even when the other party made early concessions. Study 2 examined the interaction effects of concession timing and cooperative expectations in a more general setting (i.e., a negotiation between friends or between strangers) and investigated the mechanisms through which cooperative expectations override the concession timing effect. Results showed that trust between negotiators and negotiation scripts both played a role.


[1] We use space-based observations of NO2 columns from the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) to map the spatial and seasonal variations of NOx emissions over Africa during 2000. The GOME observations show not only enhanced tropospheric NO2 columns from biomass burning during the dry season but also comparable enhancements from soil emissions during the rainy season over the Sahel. These soil emissions occur in strong pulses lasting 1–3 weeks following the onset of rain, and affect 3 million km2 of semiarid sub-Saharan savanna. Surface observations of NO2 from the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC)/Deposition of Biochemically Important Trace Species (DEBITS)/Africa (IDAF) network over West Africa provide further evidence for a strong role for microbial soil sources. By combining inverse modeling of GOME NO2 columns with space-based observations of fires, we estimate that soils contribute 3.3 ± 1.8 TgN/year, similar to the biomass burning source (3.8 ± 2.1 TgN/year), and thus account for 40% of surface NOx emissions over Africa. Extrapolating to all the tropics, we estimate a 7.3 TgN/year biogenic soil source, which is a factor of 2 larger compared to model-based inventories but agrees with observation-based inventories. These large soil NOx emissions are likely to significantly contribute to the ozone enhancement originating from tropical Africa.


ABSTRACT The cue-response theory is herewith proposed to replace the coma cue-response conceptual framework as a nursing theory for care of patients with acquired brain injury (ABI). After ABI, nurses assess patients and develop an understanding of their condition by interpreting meaning from physiologic and observational or behavioral cues. These interpretations form the basis for optimizing the timing of discrete nursing interventions; the outcome of which influences the trajectory toward recovery or toward secondary brain injury. The cue-response theory applies specifically for nurses' use to determine which interventions should be used and when those interventions should be carried out. The theory recognizes the knowledge potential and knowledge produced in the context of nursing care of all patients with ABI, not just those with coma, and broadens our understanding of how the timing of nursing interventions directly impacts secondary brain injury and the brain entropy state.


In the United States, only 6% of the 1.5 million faculty in degree-granting postsecondary institutions is Black. Research shows that, while many institutions tout the idea of diversity recruitment, not much progress has been made to diversify faculty ranks, especially at research-intensive institutions. We're Not Ok shares the experiences of Black faculty to take the reader on a journey, from the obstacles of landing a full-time faculty position through the unique struggles of being a Black educator at a predominantly white institution, along with how these deterrents impact inclusion, retention, and mental health. The book provides practical strategies and recommendations for graduate students, faculty, staff, and administrators, along with changemakers, to make strides in diversity, equity, and inclusion. More than a presentation of statistics and anecdotes, it is the start of a dialogue with the intent of ushering actual change that can benefit Black faculty, their students, and their institutions.


A bovine genomic DNA library was surveyed with respect to the template activity for RNA-primed DNA synthesis by calf thymus DNA polymerase alpha-primase complex. About 7% of the single-stranded DNA clones contained distinct initiation sites consisting of pyrimidine clusters of pyrimidine-rich sequences. The initiation sites were located at or near the 3'-end of the pyrimidine clusters. One of these sequences, containing a 10-mer pyrimidine cluster with major initiation sites, was analyzed in detail. By the successive substitutions of pyrimidines in the cluster with oligodeoxydenylate [(dA)n] in the 5' to 3' direction, the minimum length of the initiation sequence was estimated to be as long as the 7-mer. In contrast, when one or three pyrimidines at the 3'-end of the cluster were replaced with (dA)n, the priming activity was largely lost, indicating that these pyrimidine residues were indispensable for priming. Furthermore, base substitutions of upstream or downstream sequences outside the pyrimidine cluster also decreased the total priming frequencies. Interestingly, the base substitutions inside or outside of the pyrimidine cluster sometimes caused a shift in the major priming sites. These results indicate that the minimum priming unit of the CTPPS1 template for RNA-primed DNA synthesis consists of a pyrimidine cluster (6-mer) with one purine at its 3'-border and that both the 3'-downstream 6-bases and the 5'-upstream 17-bases modulate the priming by enhancing the priming frequency and/or slightly shifting the sites of initiation of primer synthesis. It was also revealed that the lengths of the product RNA primers became shorter as the length of pyrimidine cluster was shortened by substitution with (dA)n. The gel retardation assay further showed that the complex formation between DNA polymerase alpha-primase and the DNA templates was strongly in competition with poly(dC), poly(dG), and poly(dT) but not with poly(dA). Furthermore, template activities as well as the pyrimidine contents of a series of base-substituted DNA correlated well with their affinities to the enzyme, as measured by both gel retardation assay and their Km values for the priming reaction. Apparently, DNA polymerase alpha-primase primarily recognizes the minimum priming unit consisting of a pyrimidine cluster with a purine at the 3'-boundary of purine, but the initiation of primer RNA synthesis can be modified by pyrimidine residues outside of the minimum priming unit.