The British and American Congo Reform Associations were part of a transnational humanitarian movement that sought to end King Leopold II's hold on the Congo Free State. This thesis is a history of that activism and its subsequent impact on British and American foreign policy towards the Congo issue. It provides a sceptical assessment of the impact of the reform agitation on British and American foreign policy regarding the Congo issue by offering a comparative analysis of the efforts of both organisations in lobbying for reform. The Congo activists used transnational networks to pressurise their respective governments into raising the issue to an international level. This study will examine how transatlantic activism concerning Leopold's actions in the Congo Free State developed into a collaborative effort, whilst also analysing the divisions and fractures within the movement, as well as the difficulties of maintaining transatlantic co-ordination at the turn of the twentieth century. Scrutiny of the role of business interests involved in both supporting and opposing the Congo Reform Association (CRA) and American Congo Reform Association (ACRA) permits an assessment of the motives, and influence exerted, of the business figures involved in the CRA specifically, as well as those interests acting against the wider movement. Congo apologists often claimed that the Congo reform movement was driven by the commercial ambitions of Liverpool shipping merchants, whereas the motives of the activists campaigning for reform are often perceived to be purely altruistic in nature. This thesis argues that quite the opposite was often true of certain members who were self-interested in relation to their drives and ambitions in campaigning for reform in the Congo and used the movement to deflect attention from their own suspect business practices, or attack rivals in the shipping industry. Furthermore, this study offers an assessment of where the British and American associations sit within the history of humanitarian and human rights organisations, positing that they were a bridge between the antislavery movements of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Overall, this thesis offers a detailed examination of the successes and limitations of the transnational activism of both associations during the period of Congo reform activism at the beginning of the twentieth century.


As the sheer volume of available benchmark datasets increases, the problem of joint learning of classifiers and knowledge-transfer between classifiers, becomes more and more relevant. We present a hierarchical approach which exploits information sharing among different classification tasks, in multitask and multi-class settings. It engages a top-down iterative method, which begins by posing an optimization problem with an incentive for large scale sharing among all classes. This incentive to share is gradually decreased, until there is no sharing and all tasks are considered separately. The method therefore exploits different levels of sharing within a given group of related tasks, without having to make hard decisions about the grouping of tasks. In order to deal with large scale problems, with many tasks and many classes, we extend our batch approach to an online setting and provide regret analysis of the algorithm. We tested our approach extensively on synthetic and real datasets, showing significant improvement over baseline and state-of-the-art methods.


Blade tip timing is an effective method for blade vibration measurements in turbomachinery. This method is increasing in popularity because it is non-intrusive and has several advantages over the conventional strain gauge method. Different kinds of sensors have been developed for blade tip timing, including optical, eddy current and capacitance sensors. However, these sensors are unsuitable in environments with contaminants or high temperatures. Microwave sensors offer a promising potential solution to overcome these limitations. In this article, a microwave sensor-based blade tip timing measurement system is proposed. A patch antenna probe is used to transmit and receive the microwave signals. The signal model and process method is analyzed. Zero intermediate frequency structure is employed to maintain timing accuracy and dynamic performance, and the received signal can also be used to measure tip clearance. The timing method uses the rising and falling edges of the signal and an auto-gain control circuit to reduce the effect of tip clearance change. To validate the accuracy of the system, it is compared experimentally with a fiber optic tip timing system. The results show that the microwave tip timing system achieves good accuracy.


Polymerization of 1,3,5-tris(4-bromophenyl)benzene via dehalogenation on graphene and hexagonal boron nitride is investigated by scanning tunneling microscopy experiments and density functional theory calculations. This work reveals how the interactions between molecules and graphene or h-BN grown on Ni(111) govern the surface-confined synthesis of polymers through C-C coupling.


The oxidative pentose phosphate (OPP) cycle is the main route of carbohydrate dissimilation in cyanobacteria in the dark. In heterocysts, the OPP is a supplier of reductant to nitrogenase, thus playing an important role in nitrogen fixation. Molecular genetic analysis of glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PDH) and the other components of the opp cycle have been focused on recently in an effort to understand the function and regulation of the cycle in vegetative cells and in heterocysts of cyanobacteria. This study presents data on nucleotide and amino acid sequences of three enzymes of the OPP cycle (glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase, transaldolase and fructose-l ,6-bisphosphatase) of the filamentous, heterocystous strain Anabaena sp. PCC7120. Mutagenesis studies on the transaldolase gene (tal) of Anabaena sp. PCC7120 and the opcA gene of the unicellular strain Synechococcus sp. PCC7942 are also reported.

A 4,169 bp region around the zwf gene of Anabaena sp. PCC7120 was sequenced. Three genes are located in the region: fop, tal and zwf, which encode fructose-l,6-bisphosphatase (FBPase), transaldolase and glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PDH), respectively. The fop gene encodes a polypeptide of 349 amino acids. The product of the tal gene consists of 381 amino acids. The zwJ gene encodes a protein of 509 amino acids. Four cysteine residues are present in the enzyme. Two of these cysteines (Cys-187 and Cys-445) are absolutely conserved in cyanobacterial G6PDH. This result reinforces the likelihood of their role in the regulation of enzyme activity.

Subclones carrying a range of zwf fragments of Anabaena sp. PCC7120 did not complement the zwJmutant Escherichia coli strain DF214. Western blot analysis showed that Anabaena sp. PCC7120 G6PDH did not express in E. coli DF214. Attempts aimed at production of a deletion/insertion zwf mutant of Anabaena sp. PCC7120 were not successful.

The tal gene of Anabaena sp. PCC7120 was mutated to investigate growth and survival of the mutant cells in the presence and absence of combined nitrogen. Transaldolase activity in the tal mutant cells was similar to that in the wild-type cells. The growth rates of the tal mutant cells were not significantly different from that of the wild-type cells. These results imply that more than one copy of the tal gene is present in the Anabaena sp. PCC7120 genome.

A gene, designated opcA, downstream from the zwf gene of Synechococcus sp. PCC7942 was mutated to investigate the possible effect of the gene on G6PDH activity. G6PDH activity in the mutant cells was reduced by 98.6%. Western blot analysis showed that the zwf was expressed in the opcA mutant cells, but the active form of the enzyme was a considerable reduced. All the results suggest that the opcA gene affects the assembly of G6PDH or enzyme activity, but possibly not expression of the zwf gene.


Ultrasonic surface acoustic wave (SAW) actuation is a promising technique for generating fluid flow in microfluidic devices, with many potential applications in fluid and particle manipulation. One particular application is ultrasonic atomisation, which has already been proposed as an effective means of generating fine particle mists for pulmonary drug delivery. The mechanism behind ultrasonic SAW-induced atomisation is the generation of large capillary waves on the fluid surface which, when at sufficient amplitude, can break off, forming small droplets. Capillary waves appear across a huge range of frequency and length scales in ultrasonic microfluidic systems. The physics behind the generation of these waves is not well understood. For the unstable waves that produce atomised droplets, the process of breaking and droplet ejection has been previously described, and some research has been done in determining the size of droplets ejected. However, the rate of atomisation, and its dependence on excitation level and frequency, is not known. In this thesis we experimentally measure the capillary wave vibrations induced by ultrasonic SAW actuation of a sessile drop, and the rate of atomisation from the drop. Our vibration measurements agree very precisely with the predictions of capillary wave turbulence theory, which predicts a broadband "cascade" power-law relation in the spectrum of vibration. Ours is the first description of wave turbulent behaviour in microfluidic systems; we demonstrate the power-law behaviour over three decades of frequency. We also identify an oscillation at the fundamental resonance frequency of the drop near 200 Hz, which we demonstrate to be directly induced by the excitation at 20 MHz. This fundamental resonance drives the wave turbulent cascade. The atomisation rate is directly connected to this resonance. We show that atomisation does not take place when the excitation level is below a particular threshold; beyond this threshold, atomisation rate steadily increases with excitation amplitude. The threshold behaviour of the resonance is the opposite: steadily increasing with excitation level up to the threshold, then remaining constant above the threshold.


This paper presents a method for optimizing roughing operations in CNC machining, particularly for parts production through a subtractive rapid manufacturing process. The overall objective is to utilize the characteristics of CNC machining (rapid removal rates, suitability for a wide range of materials and precision) whilst obtaining some of the benefits of additive manufacturing (shape flexibility and reduction in process planning effort). The roughing operation in machining is primarily used to remove the bulk material and to approximately shape the workpiece towards the finished form. The manufacturing process described, utilizes a three-axis CNC machine with an indexable fourth axis device that is used to hold and rotate the workpiece. The method uses multiple approaches in roughing operations that differ in the number of orientations and the angles of the orientations. Most of the machining parameters are generalized throughout the process to allow some automation in generating the machining programme. The performance of each of the approaches is evaluated based on the lowest machining time to produce the part.


We examine voting by a board designed to mitigate conflicts of interest between privately informed insiders and owners. Our model demonstrates that, as argued by researchers and the business press, boards with a majority of trustworthy but uninformed "watchdog" agents can implement institutionally preferred policies. Our laboratory experiments strongly support this conclusion. Our model also highlights the necessity of penalties on insiders when there is dissension among board members. However, penalties for dissent appeared to have little impact on the experimental outcomes.


Many observers have noted that the sea is full of loud sounds, both ongoing and episodic. Among the many sources of natural ambient noise are wave action, physical processes such as undersea earthquakes, and biological activities of shrimps, fish, dolphins and whales. Despite interest by acoustics experts, sound production by cephalopods has been reported only twice, both involving squid. The 'faint poppings' produced were thought to result from fluttering of the thin external lips of the squid's funnel while water is being expelled through it. Otherwise, no information is available on cephalopod sounds. Here we present a noise produced by a stressed common octopus. The event was filmed and recorded in the wild. The hypothesis we offer to explain how this sound was produced is cavitation, which has been documented in several biological systems. In our case, the water expelled through the funnel may have created a jet with a velocity so high that the turbulent pressure dropped locally below the vapour pressure of the water. Seawater contains gas microbubbles, which will grow in size when they are entrained in the region of low pressure. Subsequently, the bubbles collapse violently when pressure rises again. The sound produced by the octopus is like a gunshot, and distinct lights observed at the same time contradict the existence of a simple pressure wave and point to the possible presence of gas-bubbles, which would change the light intensity by reflection and refraction of the sunlight. This behaviour seems to be a defensive strategy to escape from vibration-sensitive predators.


As an approach to the problem of seismic vulnerability evaluation of existing buildings using the predicted vulnerability method, numerical models can be applied to define fragility curves of typical buildings which represent building classes. These curves can be then combined with the seismic hazard to calculate the seismic risk for a building class (or individual buildings). For some buildings types, mainly the unreinforced masonry structures, such fragility analysis is complicated and time consuming if a Finite Element-based method is used. The FEM model has to represent the structural geometry and relationships between different structural elements through element connectivity. Moreover, the FEM can face major challenges to represent large displacements and separations for progressive collapse simulations. Therefore, the Applied Element Method which combines the advantages of FEM with that of the Discrete Element Method in terms of accurately modelling a deformable continuum of discrete materials is used in this paper to perform the fragility analysis for unreinforced masonry buildings. To this end, a series of nonlinear dynamic analyses using the AEM has been per-formed for two unreinforced masonry buildings (a 6-storey stone masonry and a 4-storey brick masonry) using more than 50 ground motion records. Both in-plane and out-of-plane failure have been considered in the damage analysis. The distribution of the structural responses and inter-storey drifts are used to develop spectral-based fragility curves for the five European Macroseismic Scale damage grades.


Variational Autoencoders (VAEs) have seen widespread use in learned image compression. They are used to learn expressive latent representations on which downstream compression methods can operate with high efficiency. Recently proposed 'bits-back' methods can indirectly encode the latent representation of images with codelength close to the relative entropy between the latent posterior and the prior. However, due to the underlying algorithm, these methods can only be used for lossless compression, and they only achieve their nominal efficiency when compressing multiple images simultaneously; they are inefficient for compressing single images. As an alternative, we propose a novel method, Relative Entropy Coding (REC), that can directly encode the latent representation with codelength close to the relative entropy for single images, supported by our empirical results obtained on the Cifar10, ImageNet32 and Kodak datasets. Moreover, unlike previous bits-back methods, REC is immediately applicable to lossy compression, where it is competitive with the state-of-the-art on the Kodak dataset.


The Application of Generalizability theory to test construction provides a flexible and practical framework and yet still remains inaccessible to test developers because of its technical and mathematical approach to measurement.
Different methods of test construction to measure mastery of a universe in cognitive domain have been proposed. Simple random and stratified t random sampling procedures are two such models.
The focus of this study was to examine the application of Generalizability Theory when tests have been constructed using the two models and administered to a group of students. Both coefficients alpha (6) and alphas (ft) as indices of generalizability were computed. The findings indicated that a test constructed using simple random sampling procedure had a better coefficient of generalizability although within the comparison analysis indicated that taking stratification into account increased the generalizability of the test and that generalizability theory could be" applied to the construction of achievement tests.


Abstract Background: Physical activity provides fundamental health benefits and plays a positive role in physical well-being. The aim of this present study was to investigate whether a 6-month physical activity program could influence physical self-esteem and frequency of physical activity in physically inactive female high school students in short- and long-term periods and whether personality traits were related to physical activity behaviour and compliance with the program. Methods: The study was a cluster-randomised controlled intervention study including 104 physically inactive female high school students aged 16–19 years, 60 females in an intervention group and 44 females in a control group. The intervention group exercised at sport centres at least once per week during a 6-month period. Questionnaires were used for evaluation. Results: At a 6-month follow up, the intervention group improved physical self-perception in all subdomains and significantly improved physical condition, physical self-worth and self-related health compared to the control group. At 1-year follow up, 25 females out of 53 females were still physically active, and all ratings remained almost the same as at the 6-month follow up. There were no particular personality traits that were dominant in the groups. Conclusion: A 6-month physical activity program can positively influence physical self-esteem and the frequency of physical activity, both from a short- and long-term perspective.


Geographically distributed software development projects are becoming commonplace due to the wide-spread use of network technologies. Software development is an activity that is based on intensive cooperation among groups of developers. Therefore, network technologies used to support such projects have to provide proper support for this cooperation.It is shown in this thesis that the (software) product being developed by a group of developers plays an essential role as a resource for cooperation. The product is used for externalizing knowledge, for resolving misunderstandings, and for coordinating the daily activities of the developers. Continuous, flexible and customized access to the product is shown to be a necessary prerequisite for using the product as a resource for cooperation. It is also shown, through a case study of a geographically distributed project, that geographical distribution hampers continuous, flexible, and customized access to the product. This often leads to break-downs in coordination and cooperative learning in product development projects.A product-based shared interaction model is proposed as a suitable approach for supporting distributed product development projects in using the product as a resource for cooperation. The model emphasizes the uncertain nature of product development processes, and therefore does not impose any predefined patterns of cooperation. Instead, the model simulates some of the properties of the physical space. Awareness mechanisms are used to provide the developers with continuous information about the modifications to the shared product. A flexible interface to the product allows the developers to modify and annotate the product according to their emerging needs. Local customization mechanisms are used to allow the product to be used as a boundary object.The product-based shared interaction model is formalized in form of a generic framework. The framework consists of three service layers, each with a well-defined set of services. The lower layers of the framework are concerned with cooperation in large groups, and use a shared product space for supporting shared interaction involving the product. The higher layers of the framework emphasize close and dynamic cooperation among the developers in smaller groups, and use centers of interaction for supporting cooperation in shared workspaces. The framework is implemented in form of a generic shared interaction platform that can be used to construct a range of cooperation support environments for product development projects. One such environment is described in details and demonstrates how the framework can solve some of the problems of geographically distributed product development projects.


XML Schema awareness has been an integral part of the XQuery language since its early design stages. Matching XML data against XML types is the main operation that backs up XQuery type expressions, such as typeswitch, instance of, or certain XPath operators. This interaction is particularly vital in data-centric XQuery applications, where data come with detailed type information from an XML Schema document.
 So far there has been little work on the optimization of those operations. This work presents an efficient implementation of the runtime aspects of XML Schema support. We propose type ranks as a novel and uniform way to implement all facets of type matching in the W3C XQuery Recommendation. As a concise encoding of the type hierarchy defined by an XML Schema document, type ranks minimize the cost of checking the runtime type of XQuery singleton items. By aggregating type ranks, we leverage the grouping capabilities of modern DBMS implementations to efficiently execute type matching on XQuery sequences. In addition, we improve the complexity bounds incurring with typeswitch expressions over existing approaches. Experiments on an off-the-shelf database system demonstrate the potential of our approach.


Many cytokines are able to stimulate the antitumor immune response. However, in order to avoid the toxic effects due to systemic injection, it is necessary to concentrate the cytokines in the tumor microenvironment. Current methods, based on the transfer of cytokine genes into tumor cells, still suffer drawbacks. We describe an alternative approach using recombinant cytokines genetically conjugated to a membrane anchor derived from diphtheria toxin. Interleukin-2 anchored to lymphoma and melanoma cells remained displayed on their surface and were not internalized. Injection of these cell preparations to mice led to an immune response able to prevent or slow tumor growth following tumor challenge.


Blocking JAG1-mediated activation of NOTCH signaling converts secretory club cells into ciliary cells in the airway. Defective mucus clearance or excess mucus production contribute to multiple respiratory disorders, including asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. In the airway, mucus is produced by club and goblet cells and transported by ciliated cells, all of which are present in the epithelium. During development, ligands of the Jagged family, JAG1 and JAG2, activate NOTCH signaling in adjacent cells to specify these cells. In experiments with adult mice, Lafkas et al. found that inhibition of JAG1 with an isoform-specific, function-blocking antibody decreased the number of club cells, while increasing the number of ciliated cells, without altering either cell death or cell proliferation. Blocking both JAG1 and JAG2 function with specific antibodies resulted in loss of nearly all club cells, except those at two sites, and an increase in the number of ciliated cells in the epithelium. Consistent with transdifferentiation of club cells into ciliated cells, JAG blockade induced the appearance of a small number of cells with markers of both club and ciliated cells, and lineage-tracing experiments with club cells confirmed that JAG inhibition promoted this transdifferentiation event. Exposure of the mice to function-blocking antibodies specific for the various NOTCH isoforms indicated that NOTCH2 was the main receptor responsible for the JAG1-mediated maintenance of club cells. In a mouse model of respiratory disease associated with excess mucus production, inhibition of JAG function, either JAG1 specifically or both JAG1 and JAG2, reduced goblet cell metaplasia when administered shortly after the inflammatory stimulus and reversed goblet cell metaplasia when administered more than a month after the inflammatory stimulus, when metaplasia was well established. JAG blockade did not alter the severity of inflammation or the infiltration of immune cells following the inflammatory stimulus, indicating that the effects were specific to the epithelium and not secondary to altered immune response. These results not only demonstrate plasticity in the cells of the adult airway, but suggest that selective JAG antagonism may be a specific therapeutic option in airway diseases associated with excess mucus production or defective clearance. D. Lafkas, A. Shelton, C. Chiu, G. de Leon Boenig, Y. Chen, S. S. Stawicki, C. Siltanen, M. Reichelt, M. Zhou, X. Wu, J. Eastham-Anderson, H. Moore, M. Roose-Girma, Y. Chinn, J. Q. Hang, S. Warming, J. Egen, W. P. Lee, C. Austin, Y. Wu, J. Payandeh, J. B. Lowe, C. W. Siebel, Therapeutic antibodies reveal Notch control of transdifferentiation in the adult lung. Nature 528, 127–131 (2015). [PubMed]


Any opinions expressed in this memoir are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Academy of Sciences.


Mortality often is much higher in male than in female broiler breeders (36.2% vs. 11.1%), making it necessary to introduce additional males during the breeding cycle. While it is known that males perform better on low protein diets, they usually are fed the same diet as the hens in order to reduce feed transportation costs and eliminate the chance of the hens receiving the wrong feed. Hen diets are high in Calcium (Ca) which may be detrimental to male performance and may cause kidney damage as the males excrete the excess Ca. In an effort to understand the extent of kidney damage that occurs in male broiler breeders, 136 males that had been on commercial breeder hen diets for 41 or 42 wks were euthanized and their kidneys evaluated. Data collected included body weight, left and right kidney weights and the incidence of macroscopically visible uroliths within the ureters or ureteral branches. The bilateral symmetry of the two kidneys (heavy:light kidney weight ratio) was assessed as an indicator of subclinical kidney damage. The results revealed that only 55.6% of the males had kidneys that were bilaterally symmetrical (within 10% by weight). Left kidneys were significantly heavier than right kidneys (10.07 vs. 9.26 g, respectively) and the left kidney was larger in 76.3% of the birds. Uroliths were found in 7.4% (10/136) of the males. These results indicate that broiler breeder males fed high levels of Ca develop kidney asymmetry and urolithiasis, which can contribute to their high mortality levels.


In recent years muscle dysmorphia has attracted the interests of sport, exercise, and clinical psychologists, researchers, and the popular media. In this article we review muscle dysmorphia literature and propose a framework to advance knowledge about the condition's development and sustainment. Existing research is focused on social variables correlated with muscle dysmorphia (e.g., social support), and cognitions, emotions, and behaviours displayed by individuals with the condition (e.g., exercise dependence and steroid abuse). The proposed framework draws on the extant body image and body dysmorphic disorder literature to address gaps identified in current muscle dysmorphia knowledge. In particular, little attention has been given to mechanisms by which the condition develops and is sustained, and learning theory is proposed as one possibility. In addition to extending muscle dysmorphia knowledge, the framework is offered as a way to stimulate a range of investigations adding to current understanding. The inclusion of learning theory, for example, may provide insights leading to the identification of suitable treatments for people whose health and well-being has been reduced as a result of experiencing muscle dysmorphia.


This study was an investigation of mission, vision, funding strategies, and student services for distance learning as expressed by university administrators in land grant universities and state universities, and those institutions that are designated as both land grant and state universities by the state legislature. Three research questions guided the study.
The study employed a survey distributed through e-mail. The questionnaire was sent to 261 senior administrators; the chief academic officers, chief business officers, and chief information officers in 37 land grant and state universities and 13 institutions that are both land grant and state universities. The return rate was 30%.
The institutional mission and administrator's vision for offering distance learning survey responses were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The study also used correlation, confirmed by factor analysis, to determine if there was a relationship among the administrators' responses regarding mission, vision, and funding. The data were analyzed with ANOVA and fishers least means difference test. These tests determined if there were differences in the administrators' responses between the type or sizes of higher education institutions on mission, vision of administrators. The data analysis indicated that the type of institution did not yield significant differences. The difference of means test indicated there were differences in the student population size of the institutions.
The responses indicated the mission or purpose for offering distance learning was to save money for the institution, and support degree completion for former students. The responses related to administrative vision show initiating a distance learning program and a being leader among higher education institutions were the reasons for a distance learning program.
The content analysis method was employed to determine the roles of the administrators in the survey. The administrators' responses related to distance learning were consistent with their roles in the institution.
The study also produced results related to student services institutions provide for distance learning students, how the student services were provided, on or off campus or both locations and the funding sources for the student services.


How reliably do action potentials in cortical neurons encode information about a visual stimulus? Most physiological studies do not weigh the occurrences of particular action potentials as significant but treat them only as reflections of average neuronal excitation. We report that single neurons recorded in a previous study by Newsome et al. (1989; see also Britten et al. 1992) from cortical area MT in the behaving monkey respond to dynamic and unpredictable motion stimuli with a markedly reproducible temporal modulation that is precise to a few milliseconds. This temporal modulation is stimulus dependent, being present for highly dynamic random motion but absent when the stimulus translates rigidly.


Time synchronization is an extremely important service in wireless sensor networks. The notion of time on a node is maintained using crystal oscillators. These oscillators are designed to oscillate at a particular frequency called the nominal frequency, but typically there is always some deviation. This deviation is caused due to a wide variety of reasons which include manufacturing variations, environmental factors such as temperature, pressure, humidity. Even aging of the crystal is a long-term factor influencing the oscillation of a crystal. Various time synchronization protocols have been developed over the years which perform message exchanges at different points in time to keep the clocks in sync. These points are called the resynchronization points, and are essential because in spite of periodic synchronization, the clocks continue to drift apart with time. One way to avoid frequent resynchronization is to locally compensate for the drifts once a synchronization is performed. Ideally, these drifts are due to a combination of various factors and we should compensate for each of them. In this report, we focus on the drift caused due to temperature(which is also the most dominant factor) and ways to compensate for it. There are various techniques which have been developed to perform compensation for temperature induced drifts. The techniques rely on creation of a look-up table which relates the different temperature ranges with the corresponding frequency drifts. Since, this table is highly specific to a crystal, we need to perform the measurements for the look-up table during the manufacturing phase of every crystal. Thus, most of these techniques turn out to be costly. In this report we try to use the communication network between nodes, to populate the entries of the look-up table online. We also exploit the known relationship between frequency drift and temperature (which is a cubic polynomial) to estimate the parameters of the polynomial and use it for local compensation.


Abstract The obligation to train troops in international humanitarian law (IHL) is simply stated and its implementation delegated to State discretion. This reflects a past assumption that mere dissemination of IHL would be an effective contribution to the prevention of violations. Academic literature has evolved so that dissemination alone is now known to be insufficient for compliance, while the ICRC's integration model emphasizes the relevance of IHL to all aspects of military decision-making. A separate process, the ICRC/Government of Switzerland Initiative on Strengthening Compliance with IHL, is still in its consultative stages at the time of writing, but may result in voluntary State reporting and/or thematic discussions at meetings of States. This article synthesizes academic and practitioner insights on effective IHL training, and suggests a collaborative rubric for informative, standardized reporting on IHL training. Such a rubric could enable States and researchers to share best practice and future innovations on IHL training, using a streamlined, cost-effective tool.


Ice sheet models are the only physically-based tools that allow us to simulate the future evolution of the Antarctic
Ice Sheet, including its contribution towards changes in global sea level. However, due to limitations in our
understanding of ice sheet dynamics, modelling is an inherently uncertain exercise. A typical approach towards
optimising ice sheet models is to "tune" key physical parameters by finding the values that give the most realistic
simulations of the present-day ice sheet, based on criteria such as ice sheet geometry or ice velocity. However, this
approach assumes that there are no errors in the boundary conditions being used to drive the models.
Here, we use the Parallel Ice Sheet Model to explore the sensitivity of the simulated Antarctic Ice Sheet to
the available geothermal heat flux (GHF) datasets. We find that the choice of GHF is a significant source of
uncertainty, leading to basin-wide differences in excess of 1000m in the simulated ice thickness. Using different
GHF datasets to drive the model, we then "tune" it by determining the optimal values of key physical parameters.
We show that the parameter combinations obtained are sensitive to the choice of GHF.
Our results highlight the importance of GHF in ice sheet modelling. Reliable GHF estimates are critical to
optimising numerical models of the Antarctic Ice Sheet and, therefore, to reducing uncertainty in projections of
future global sea level rise.


BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE
This study investigated changes in the severity of gastric metaplasia (GM) of the duodenal mucosa before and after ulcer healing and Helicobacter pylori eradication. It also investigated whether deformity of the duodenal bulb affects the severity of GM and the likelihood of ulcer recurrence.

METHODS
Eleven patients were consecutively enrolled in this study. They all had duodenal ulcer(s) and H. pylori infection, for which they had received anti-H. pylori triple therapy during the active ulcer stage, and had all undergone serial endoscopic examinations during both the active ulcer and scarring ulcer stages, and at 1 year after ulcer healing. Duodenal biopsies were obtained at each endoscopy to identify the severity of GM. Duodenal ulcers were divided into three types by bulbar shape and GM was classified into four grades of severity.

RESULTS
All 11 patients had increased GM severity just after ulcer healing. The 1-year follow-up study revealed that the GM was unchanged in six of eight patients with grade 3 GM severity at the scarring stage, while in the other two it regressed to grade 1 or 2; these two patients suffered ulcer recurrence. A markedly deformed bulb (type III) was found in three patients, of whom two had ulcer recurrence.

CONCLUSION
Two characteristic conditions were found in patients with duodenal ulcer recurrence after H. pylori eradication: a markedly deformed bulb with grade 3 GM at the scarring stage, and a change in GM from high to low grade at or around the previous ulcer site after ulcer healing.


INTRODUCTION Invasive plants are introduced species that can thrive in areas beyond their natural range of dispersal (USDA-NISIC, 2014). They naturalize over large areas, displace native plants, and disrupt natural ecosystems (Ranney, 2004). In Florida, over 1.5 million acres (approximately 600,000 ha) of public conservation lands have been invaded by introduced plant species (Fig. 1), and approximately USA$7 million was spent on management and control of invasive upland plants in 2011 (FFWCC, 2011). In the USA, control costs and production losses due to weeds was estimated at US $30.6 billion per year (Cusack et al., 2009). For example, purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria), was introduced from Europe to USA in the early 1800s. Purple loosestrife is now found in all continental states except Florida (Blossey, 2002) and accounts for USA$50 million per year in control costs and forage losses. Mexican petunia, Ruellia simplex (previously also known as R. brittoniana, R. coerulea, R. malacosperma, and R. tweediana), was introduced to Florida from Mexico sometime before 1940 (Hupp et al., 2009) and has now naturalized throughout the state, plus six other southern USA states, Puerto Rico, the USA Virgin Islands and Hawaii (USDA-NRCS, 2014). It is considered as a Category I invasive species in Florida because it is altering native plant communities by displacing native species and changing community structures or ecological functions (FLEPPC, 2013). However, there is no evidence that it is hybridizing with native species (Freyre and Tripp, 2014). Sales of R. simplex 'Purple Showers' in Florida were ranked third for herbaceous perennials after pentas and lantana (Rick Brown, Riverview Flower Farms, pers. comm.), so a breeding program aiming to develop sterile, non-invasive cultivars was established at the University of Florida in 2007 (Freyre et al., 2012a). This species will be described in more detail in this paper.


Background: Diabetes prevalence rate in Malaysia has risen much faster than expected. The prevalence of diabetes in Malaysia is above average when compared to the estimation by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) for all regions in the world and has already reached the projected prevalence for the year 2030. The latest Malaysian National Health and Morbidity survey (2011) indicated that the prevalence of diabetes is 15.2% for population above the age of 18 years old. Various studies in Malaysia have demonstrated poor diabetic self-management among patients and high complications. Research on diabetes in Malaysia has mainly adapted a biomedical and epidemiological approach. Thus far, research in Malaysia has failed to assess patients' personal beliefs about their illness. This study employs a mixed- methods approach that triangulates findings from two data collection methods to gain a coherent insight into illness beliefs among Malaysian Type 2 diabetes patients using a psychological approach grounded in self-regulatory theory.

Aims: Study 1 was conducted to investigate: (1) the cognitive representations of illness among patients suffering from type 2 diabetes in Malaysia, (2) the emotional representations of illness among patients suffering from type 2 diabetes in Malaysia, and (3) the management/coping styles adopted by patients suffering from type 2 diabetes in Malaysia. Study 2 was conducted to investigate the relationships between patients' illness perceptions and their adherence to self-care regimens. As Malaysia is a country with diverse ethnicity, the secondary aim of this study is to determine whether there are cultural differences in the way in which patients with type 2 diabetes from different ethnic groups conceptualise their illness and treatment.

Method: In study 1, data was obtained by conducting semi-structured one-to-one interview with participants. The data obtained was analysed using principals of grounded theory. In study 2, data was obtained using structured questionnaires. Participants were required to fill in 3 questionnaires (demographic questionnaire, IPQ-R Diabetes questionnaire and summary of diabetes self- care activities). Data were analysed using SPSS version 22.0. Various analyses, such as descriptive analysis and Pearson correlations, were conducted. Group differences were examined by a Kruskal–Wallis H test.

Results: Study 1 found that patients adopted positive cognitive representation, such as determination. The findings also suggest that patients viewed their relationship with their healthcare provider positively, which supported disease management. Patients with determination and good health provider support adopted problem based coping. Some patients had negative emotional representations towards diabetes, such as fear. In addition, patients' management of diabetes was affected by various psycho-social factors, such as the lack of understanding of family and stress. All patients expressed that Malaysian food culture had a negative impact of diabetes management. This study also revealed that some patients adopted emotional focused coping, specifically by keeping their diabetic status a secret.

Results of Study 2 indicated there was a strong negative correlation between the self-care total score and consequences subscale, personal control subscale, treatment control subscale and emotional representation subscale. There was a significant negative correlation between the self-care total score and illness cohesion subscale. There was also a significant negative correlation between the self-care total score and identity subscale. This study also found that there was a difference in the ways in which different ethnic groups conceptualise their illness.


This article explores the critical ways in which the relationship between landscape and memory is mediated by performance—through song, dance, ritual and the movements of the living and the dead. In the Lihir group of islands, in Papua New Guinea, these acts of memorialisation are rehearsed on a remarkable stage, an involuted cosmography or sacred geography in which the cosmological point of origin, the sacred rock of Ailaya, is also the ultimate destination for all human and spirit forms. Spirit beings are held to have emerged from the Ailaya, spreading across the island group, their tracks charting the links amongst distant clan members and the networks of alliance between trading partners. It is to the Ailaya that the spirits of deceased Lihirians must return, following preparatory mortuary rites and sung along a route that recalls the spirit connections. This teleological process is mapped through an account of the performance of relationships between people and land, to which an additional layer of complexity is added by the presence of a giant gold mine, in which the Ailaya is again the central feature.


Nearly every commodity imaging system we directly interact with, or indirectly rely on, leverages power efficient, application-adjustable black-box hardware image signal processing (ISPs) units, running either in dedicated hardware blocks, or as proprietary software modules on programmable hardware. The configuration parameters of these black-box ISPs often have complex interactions with the output image, and must be adjusted prior to deployment according to application-specific quality and performance metrics. Today, this search is commonly performed manually by "golden eye" experts or algorithm developers leveraging domain expertise. We present a fully automatic system to optimize the parameters of black-box hardware and software image processing pipelines according to any arbitrary (i.e., application-specific) metric. We leverage a differentiable mapping between the configuration space and evaluation metrics, parameterized by a convolutional neural network that we train in an end-to-end fashion with imaging hardware in-the-loop. Unlike prior art, our differentiable proxies allow for high-dimension parameter search with stochastic first-order optimizers, without explicitly modeling any lower-level image processing transformations. As such, we can efficiently optimize black-box image processing pipelines for a variety of imaging applications, reducing application-specific configuration times from months to hours. Our optimization method is fully automatic, even with black-box hardware in the loop. We validate our method on experimental data for real-time display applications, object detection, and extreme low-light imaging. The proposed approach outperforms manual search qualitatively and quantitatively for all domain-specific applications tested. When applied to traditional denoisers, we demonstrate that---just by changing hyperparameters---traditional algorithms can outperform recent deep learning methods by a substantial margin on recent benchmarks.


[1] We present the first high-time resolution two-dimensional images of X-ray emissions from lightning. The images were recorded at a rate of 10 million per second using a new pinhole-type camera, located 44 m from rocket-and-wire-triggered lightning. We report observations of two dart leaders, one in each of two lightning flashes triggered during the summer of 2010 in north-central Florida. In both events, as the dart leader approached the ground, the X-ray source was also seen to descend along the previous lightning channel. For the second event, the X-ray source exhibited a downward speed of 4.5 × 107 m/s, in agreement with independent dE/dt time-of-arrival (TOA) measurements of the speed of the dart leader front, demonstrating that the dart leader front was the source of the X-ray emission. The camera also recorded bursts of MeV gamma rays originating from the dart leader and/or the ground attachment process of the leader. Overall, these results provide new insight into the production of energetic radiation and the propagation and attachment of lightning, all of which remain poorly understood.


Abstract. Biomass burning is a main source for primary carbonaceous particles in the atmosphere and acts as a crucial factor that alters Earth's energy budget and balance. It is also an important factor influencing air quality, regional climate and sustainability in the domain of Pan-Eurasian Experiment (PEEX). During the exceptionally intense agricultural fire season in mid-June 2012, accompanied by rapidly deteriorating air quality, a series of meteorological anomalies was observed, including a large decline in near-surface air temperature, spatial shifts and changes in precipitation in Jiangsu province of East China. To explore the underlying processes that link air pollution to weather modification, we conducted a numerical study with parallel simulations using the fully coupled meteorology–chemistry model WRF-Chem with a high-resolution emission inventory for agricultural fires. Evaluation of the modeling results with available ground-based measurements and satellite retrievals showed that this model was able to reproduce the magnitude and spatial variations of fire-induced air pollution. During the biomass-burning event in mid-June 2012, intensive emission of absorbing aerosols trapped a considerable part of solar radiation in the atmosphere and reduced incident radiation reaching the surface on a regional scale, followed by lowered surface sensible and latent heat fluxes. The perturbed energy balance and re-allocation gave rise to substantial adjustments in vertical temperature stratification, namely surface cooling and upper-air heating. Furthermore, an intimate link between temperature profile and small-scale processes like turbulent mixing and entrainment led to distinct changes in precipitation. On the one hand, by stabilizing the atmosphere below and reducing the surface flux, black carbon-laden plumes tended to dissipate daytime cloud and suppress the convective precipitation over Nanjing. On the other hand, heating aloft increased upper-level convective activity and then favored convergence carrying in moist air, thereby enhancing the nocturnal precipitation in the downwind areas of the biomass-burning plumes.


Knowledge based techniques have been used to automatically detect surface land mines present in thermal and multispectral images. Polarization-sensitive infrared sensing is used to highlight the polarization signature of man-made targets such as land mines over natural features in the image. Processing the thermal polarization images using a background-discrimination algorithm, we were able to successfully identify eight of the nine man-made targets, three of which were mines, with only three false targets. A digital camera is used to collect a number of multispectral bands of the test mine area containing three surface land mines with natural and man-made clutter. Using a supervised and unsupervised neural network technique on the textural and spectral characteristics of selected multispectral bands (using a genetic algorithm tool), we successfully identified the three surface mines but obtained numerous false targets with varying degrees of accuracy. Finally, to further improve our detection of land mines, we use a fuzzy rule-based fusion technique on the processed polarization resolved image together with the output results of the two best classifiers. Fuzzy rule-based fusion identified the locations of all three land mines and reduced the number of false alarms from seven (as obtained by the polarization resolved image) to two. Additional experiments on several other images have also produced favorable results at this early stage in testing the algorithm and comparing it with an existing commercial system.


Total Quality Management (TQM) is a philosophy for continuously improving services
and/or products. Organisations which have adopted TQM have gained many benefits in
terms of profits, employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction. Despite such benefits,
research data has revealed that more than 2/3 of organisations which adopted TQM
ended up failing to implement it. Therefore many researchers have suggested
conducting organisational readiness assessment prior to the implementation phase. The
Libyan HEIs believed that TQM would solve many of their problems and some
Universities had shown an intention to implement a TQM approach.
There is some literature on readiness for implementing TQM. The majority of the
studies have dealt with the manufacturing sector, fewer have covered the service sector,
even fewer have studied Higher Education and none have investigated the Libyan
Higher Education sector.
The main aim of this research was "to investigate the factors that affect the readiness
for implementing TQM within Libyan HEIs". This research has adopted a
phenomenological philosophy and has used multiple case studies as a research strategy.
Two case study organisations were selected from Libyan public Universities. The
relevant data was collected using different sources of evidence such as semi-structured
interviews, documentation, archival records and direct observations. Explanation
building methods were employed to analyse the collected data.
The following contributions to knowledge have emerged from this research. The
research provides specific original findings which include: one of the motives behind
the intention for implementing TQM was to apply and maintain the University's
regulations; staff had a perception that God was monitoring their job performance and
staff considered that one of the roles of continuous improvement was to improve ethical
aspects of the behaviour of staff members. In addition, the findings of this research
strengthen the existing literature on TQM in HEIs and reduce the gap in knowledge
applying to Libyan studies.


Sola Scriptura offers a multi-disciplinary reflection on the theme of the priority and importance of Scripture in theology, from historical, biblical-theological and systematic-theological perspectives, aiming at the interaction between exegesis and dogmatics.


Retailers can exploit the consumer willingness to substitute to improve their profit, service level and waste. This paper investigates to what extent such improvement can be realised by the replenishment decisions. Two order policies are compared: one policy neglecting product substitution, and a new policy that decides on order quantities for all products simultaneously meanwhile anticipating stock-outbased substitution. Both policies are analysed by simulation-based optimisation. Besides finding the optimal parameter values or a variety of settings by exact enumeration (as a benchmark), we present for the case of one-way substitution a heuristic search procedure. The heuristic finds (nearly) optimal parameter values quickly and turns out to find optimal parameter values in almost all settings. An average profit increase of almost 9% is obtained when anticipating on substitution, while waste levels can decrease with more than 35%. A clear trade-off between service levels and profit/waste levels is found. Assuming the retailer aims at profit maximisation, the service level of one product maybe very low or even zero. The results provide the following managerial insights in: (i) the service levels and waste levels that maximize the retailer's profit, (ii) whether a product should be removed from the assortment, (iii) the profit loss and waste increase of setting a higher (sub optimal) service level, e.g. for strategic reasons. Reversely, one may learn from the results what the profit margin of a product should be to justify a certain service level to a profit maximizing retailer. These insights maybe useful to retailers whose primary objective is beyond profit maximisation.


It is shown that a relativistic particle has an upper limit of the mass and energy when it is accelerated to the speed of light. Now we can calculate the limiting parameters of the relativistic particles by the use of the normalized relativistic factor in Einstein's relativistic equations. For example, the maximum mass of the relativistic proton is a limited number. The state of the relativistic particle is described by a mass balance and an energy balance. The energy balance includes the maximum energy of a relativistic particle and her real energy and her hidden energy.


Background: Pre-eclampsia (PE) is a devastating pregnancy-associated disorder affecting 5–8% of pregnant women worldwide. It emerges as an autoimmune-driven disease. The autoantibodies against angiotensin type 1 receptor II have been proposed to account for PE symptoms. CD19(+)CD5(+) B-1a B cells constitute the main source of natural and polyreactive antibodies, which can be directed against own structures. Objectives: The aim of this study was to identify the B-cell subpopulation responsible for autoantibody production during PE and its correlation with b subunit of hCG levels. CD19+CD5+ B-cell percentages were measured using flow cytometry in 36 PE women in their third trimester (20 severe and 16 mild) and 15 age-matched normotensive pregnant women with normally developing pregnancies in their third trimester. Patients and methods: We observed significantly higher levels of frequency of CD19+/CD5+ B lymphocytes in the mild and severe PE groups compared with the levels observed in normotensive women with normally developing pregnancies in the third trimester (mild PE, 28.7 ± 14.3%, n = 16; severe PE, 29.9 ± 9.8%, n = 20; control, 11.3 ± 6.4%, n = 15; P < 0.01 and P < 0.001, respectively). However, comparison of the mild PE group with the severe PE group showed comparable levels of CD19+/CD5+ B cells (P > 0.05). Results: Correlation between the percentages of CD19+/CD5+ B lymphocytes and b hCG levels was not significant. Moreover, correlations between the percentages of CD19+/CD5+ B lymphocytes and other laboratory parameters were not significant. Conclusion: CD19+/CD5+ cells emerge as a novel PE marker. Their frequency does not seem to be regulated by the increased serum hCG levels. The detection and quantification of CD19+/CD5+ cells in maternal blood may open vast new therapeutic opportunities.


I don't come from a University, I'm one of those community/trade union/political activists with an interest in Labor History": this was my catch cry as I was approached by different people at the Conference. I should explain further that this Conference was, as I understand it, a 'typical university' conference, very unlike the nursing conferences I am used to. Nursing conferences have drug companies paying for the lunches, they are always held in conference rooms in hotels and everyone is dressed in suits; it's all very formal and usually all women. This one was informal, with about 150 people, lots of them men, held in the Alexander Library Theatrette and in the surrounding buildings, with a culture all of its own, i.e., academics and aspiring academics giving papers on left-wing issues, with a number of 'other' people. I was part of the 'other' people. This journal article is available in Illawarra Unity Journal of the Illawarra Branch of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History: http://ro.uow.edu.au/unity/vol1/iss3/2


This paper investigates estimating the association parameter of Morgenstern type bivariate distribution using a modified maximum likelihood method where the regular maximum likelihood methods failed to achieve estimation. The simple random sampling, concomitant of ordered statistics and bivariate ranked set sampling methods are used and compared. Efficiency and bias of the produced estimators are compared for two specific examples, Morgenstern type bivariate uniform and exponential distributions.


Using hand-collected data on the backgrounds of venture capitalists (VCs), we show that in a typical venture capital firm in our sample, 13.9% of VCs have been entrepreneurs before becoming a VC, referred to as entrepreneur VCs. Both OLS and 2SLS analyses suggest that venture capital firms employing a greater fraction of entrepreneur VCs have better performance. In addition, the positive effect of entrepreneur VCs on venture capital firm performance is stronger for smaller and younger venture capital firms, and venture capital firms specializing in high-tech industries and in early-stage investments. We further explore performance implications of VCs with prior experience in a finance-related field (i.e., Wall Street experience) and prior experience in a non-finance related field (i.e., Main Street experience). We find that contrary to prior experience in entrepreneurship, neither prior experience in Wall Street nor in Main Street is significantly related to venture capital firm performance. Finally, we provide evidence that entrepreneur VCs have greater individual performance in terms of VC rankings established by Forbes. Overall, our results are consistent with the idea that entrepreneur VCs have a better understanding of the business of starting and developing a new firm due to their first-hands experience, and play an important role in reducing the gaps in information and difference of opinions between an entrepreneur and the VCs backing the entrepreneur.


Perimeter security mechanisms, such as firewalls, do not provide adequate protection once the adversary has penetrated the perimeter either because the firewall was bypassed or because the adversary is an insider trusted party. By gaining presence inside a communication network, even at a few locations (routers and links) of strategic importance, the adversary gains the advantage to disrupt the operation of the whole network, in the absence of suitable protection mechanisms. In this paper, we contribute to protocols (that are termed Byzantine detection protocols) that enable a network to identify the (initially unknown) locations of the adversary inside the network, so that they can be subsequently bypassed, by improving their capability for recovery as well as their overhead. The fault detection state that is obtained by Byzantine detection pertains to triplets of a link and its two adjacent routers without any implication on the faultiness of individual elements of the triplet. Our first contribution is an algorithm that estimates the degree of penetration of the adversary inside the network given this ambiguous fault detection state and its application to the problem of balancing the performance of the detection protocol with its recovery time capability (two parameters that, as we show, can be at a trade-off). Our second and third contributions are on the Byzantine detection mechanisms. We present a generic mechanism that a source router can use to securely obtain arbitrary router-specific feedback and a data forwarding protocol with Byzantine detection capability that significantly improves the performance of previous proposals.


We present a foveated gesture recognition system that guides an active camera to foveate salient features based on a reinforcement learning paradigm. Using vision routines previously implemented for an interactive environment, we determine the spatial location of salient body parts of a user and guide an active camera to obtain images of gestures of expressions. A hidden-state reinforcement learning paradigm based on the partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP) is used to implement this visual attention. The attention module selects targets to foveate based on the goal of successful recognition, and uses a new multiple-model Q-learning formulation. Given a set of target and distracter gestures, our system can learn where to foveate to maximally discriminate a particular gesture.


Prior research suggests a correlation between incarceration and marital dissolution, although questions remain as to why this association exists. Is it the stigma associated with "doing time" that drives couples apart? Or is it simply the duration of physical separation that leads to divorce? This research utilizes data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY79) and the Survey of Officer and Enlisted Personnel to shed light on these questions. The findings generally support a separation explanation of the incarceration-divorce relationship. Specifically, the data show that exposure to incarceration has no effect on marital dissolution after duration of incarceration is taken into account. In addition, across both datasets we find that individuals who spend substantial time away from spouses are at higher risk of divorce. The findings point to the importance of spousal separation for understanding the incarceration-marital dissolution relationship. Moreover, and in contrast to settings in which stigma appears quite salient (e.g., labor markets), our results suggest that the shared history and degree of intimacy among married partners may weaken the salience of the stigma of incarceration. Findings are discussed in the context of a burgeoning body of work on the collateral consequences of incarceration and have implications for the growing pool of men in American society returning from prison.


This paper examines the essential role played by language in the provision of services to facilitate interchanges between persons of different origins in order to enable not just the performance of these activities, but also to make it possible for the participants, who may not share cultural assumptions or values, to (re)negotiate their relations and identities. This is precisely a key sector in the new economies, and the way in which linguistic resources are managed by the multinational firms and other institutions of the developed world is reminiscent of colonial times, particularly in Spain. Within this frame, this paper focuses on the linguistic practices in some of these newly created institutional spaces in the service sector, particularly in settings where Spanish has a role to play. The analysis of linguistic policies and interactions shows how, depending on whether they concern public/private service-providers, participants mobilise their linguistic resources to (re)construct different relations and meanings within these varying institutional settings. The paper also examines how multilingualism is managed in these institutional encounters. In this context, tensions between the reproduction of a monolingual ideology of 'one state – one language' and the actual multilingual practices inevitably arise, making the unravelling of these new linguistic landscapes a challenge. It is the institutions, not the users, that decides how linguistic resources have to be managed, and several pieces of evidence of the lack of adaptation to user's needs are supplied, which can be seen as part of an ethnocentric approach corresponding to the values of the host community. Such a sociolinguistic order shapes interaction and reinforces asymmetries. The analysis also shows the active involvement of social actors who can reproduce as well as challenge this sociolinguistic order.


The 'Hestia Project' uses a bottom-up approach to quantify fossil fuel CO2 (FFCO2) emissions spatially at the building/street level and temporally at the hourly level. Hestia FFCO2 emissions are provided in the form of a group of sector-specific vector layers with point, line, and polygon sources to support carbon cycle science and climate policy. Application to carbon cycle science, in particular, requires regular gridded data in order to link surface carbon fluxes to atmospheric transport models. However, the heterogeneity and complexity of FFCO2 sources within regular grids is sensitive to spatial resolution. From the perspective of a data provider, we need to find a balance between resolution and data volume so that the gridded data product retains the maximum amount of information content while maintaining an efficient data volume. The Shannon entropy determines the minimum bits that are needed to encode an information source and can serve as a metric for the effective information content. In this paper, we present an analysis of the Shannon entropy of gridded FFCO2 emissions with varying resolutions in four Hestia study areas, and find: (1) the Shannon entropy increases with smaller grid resolution until it reaches a maximum value (the max-entropy resolution); (2) total emissions (the sum of several sector-specific emission fields) show a finer max-entropy resolution than each of the sector-specific fields; (3) the residential emissions show a finer max-entropy resolution than the commercial emissions; (4) the max-entropy resolution of the onroad emissions grid is closely correlated to the density of the road network. These findings suggest that the Shannon entropy can detect the information effectiveness of the spatial resolution of gridded FFCO2 emissions. Hence, the resolution-entropy relationship can be used to assist in determining an appropriate spatial resolution for urban CO2 flux studies. We conclude that the optimal spatial resolution for providing Hestia total FFCO2 emissions products is centered around 100 m, at which the FFCO2 emissions data can not only fully meet the requirement of urban flux integration, but also be effectively used in understanding the relationships between FFCO2 emissions and various social-economic variables at the U.S. census block group level.


Background: Frozen shoulder is a condition characterized by pain and global restriction of movement with loss of external rotation. Cardiac surgery may predispose frozen shoulder as patients tend to immobilize their upper limbs after surgery. Objectives: The aim of this study is to analyze the clinical profile of patients presenting with symptoms of periarthritis shoulder and to determine the incidence of frozen shoulder among patients undergoing cardiac surgery as well as to find the factors associated with its development. Methods: It is a clinical observational study done in the Cardiology Department of Chettinad Hospital and Research Institute, Chennai, between August 2015 and May 2016, on 100 patients who underwent cardiac surgery and attended the follow-up session as an outpatient. Data were collected by face-to-face interview using a standardized questionnaire. Respondents presenting with pain and restricted movement of shoulder joint with positive limitation in lateral rotation, abduction, and medial rotation (LAM) test were considered to have frozen shoulder. Each participant was followed up for 3 months postcardiac surgery. Results: The mean age of the study participants was 53.63 ± 13.03 years, and 65% were males. Of the 100 participants, 20 (20%) developed frozen shoulder. Age (P < 0.01), diabetes mellitus (<0.01), hypertension (P < 0.001), type of surgery (P < 0.02), and regularity of physiotherapy follow-up (P < 0.01) had significant association with positive LAM test on univariate analysis. However, on multivariate logistic regression analysis, only hypertension and physiotherapy regularity were found to have a trend toward a significant independent association with the occurrence of frozen shoulder (P = 0.090 and 0.097, respectively). Conclusion: The present study shows that cardiac surgery increases the risk of developing frozen shoulder during the early postoperative period. Statistically significant correlation existed between positive LAM test and age of the patients, presence of diabetes mellitus and hypertension, type of cardiac surgery, and the regularity of physiotherapy follow-up.


Online controlled experiments (OCEs), also known as A/B tests, have become ubiquitous in evaluating the impact of changes made to software products and services. While the concept of online controlled experiments is simple, there are many practical challenges in running OCEs at scale. To understand the top practical challenges in running OCEs at scale and encourage further academic and industrial exploration, representatives with experience in large-scale experimentation from thirteen different organizations (Airbnb, Amazon, Booking.com, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Lyft, Microsoft, Netflix, Twitter, Uber, Yandex, and Stanford University) were invited to the first Practical Online Controlled Experiments Summit. All thirteen organizations sent representatives. Together these organizations have tested more than one hundred thousand experiment treatments last year. Thirty-four experts from these organizations participated in the summit in Sunnyvale, CA, USA on December 13-14, 2018.
 While there are papers from individual organizations on some of the challenges and pitfalls in running OCEs at scale, this is the first paper to provide the top challenges faced across the industry for running OCEs at scale and some common solutions.


An absolute scale of performance is set up in terms of the performance of an ideal picture pickup device, that is, one limited only by random fluctuations in the primary photo process. Only one parameter, the quantum efficiency of the primary photo process, locates position on this scale. The characteristic equation for the performance of an ideal device has the form BC2α2=constantwhere B is the luminance of the scene, and C and α are respectively the threshold contrast and angular size of a test object in the scene. This ideal type of performance is shown to be satisfied by a simple experimental television pickup arrangement. By means of the arrangement, two parameters, storage time of the eye and threshold signal-to-noise ratio are determined to be 0.2 seconds and five respectively. Published data on the performance of the eye are compared with ideal performance. In the ranges of B(10−6 to 102 footlamberts), C(2 to 100 percent) and α(2′ to 100′), the performance of the eye may be matched by an ideal device having a quantum efficiency of 5 percent at low lights and 0.5 percent at high lights. This is of considerable technical importance in simplifying the analysis of problems involving comparisons of the performance of the eye and man-made devices. To the extent that independent measurements of the quantum efficiency of the eye confirm the values (0.5 percent to 5.0 percent), the performance of the eye is limited by fluctuations in the primary photo process. To the same extent, other mechanisms for describing the eye that do not take these fluctuations into account are ruled out. It is argued that the phenomenon of dark adaptation can be ascribed only in small part to the primary photo-process and must be mainly controlled by a variable gain mechanism located between the primary photo-process and the nerve fibers carrying pulses to the brain.


How to build a convergence within the diversity of integrationist experiences? How can global efforts converge with regional and national realities through a glocal (global + local) governance that supports a productive integration and generates sustainable jobs? In this context of new challenges, Latin America must face the transformation of the Chinese economic model. After years of keeping prices of raw materials high, an exponential growth and an active investment policy in the region, Chinese economy grows at a slower rate, shows greater financial volatility, and shifts the focus from production to consumption. How will this metamorphosis impact on Latin-American development? What are the ways to overcome the stage of mere exchange of commodities for industrial products? How to move forward to a technology transfer that fosters innovation and facilitates export diversification? World-class authors, diplomats, negotiators, academics and private sector representatives analyze here the outlook of the linkage with the Asian giant. From an interdisciplinary approach, the Institute for the Integration of Latin America and the Caribbean (INTAL), a unit of the Department of Integration and Trade of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), makes through this volume a contribution to building a regional agenda to jointly address the questions of the current scenario.


Natural disasters such as a hurricane can result in massive timber loss in a forested region. Timber prices in the affected region can drop sharply at the beginning and then recover gradually. In this study, the determinants of timber price recovery and the magnitudes of their contributions are analyzed through a partial equilibrium displacement model. Hurricane Hugo of 1989 is used to calibrate the model for pine sawtimber and pulpwood markets separately in South Carolina, USA. The amount of timber inventory loss and intensity of salvage harvests are found to be the leading determinants behind timber price recovery, and they can explain the recovery thoroughly if the uncertainty of model inputs is also considered simultaneously. The impact of curve rotation (i.e., the change in demand or supply elasticity across the quarters) is small and hardly separable from that of model input uncertainty. A potential trade between the damaged and surrounding regions after the hurricane can be used to explain some of the price recoveries, but the amount of trade is likely to be small, especially for pulpwood.


Background: Idiopathic guttate hypomelanosis (IGH) is a common pigmentary disorder encountered in older age group, causing cosmetic disfigurement with considerable psychological impact. Diagnosis is generally based on history and clinical features. In the situation of diagnostic dilemma, dermoscopic examination is the quick and easiest method to solve the clinical uncertainty and thereby avoid unnecessary biopsies. Objectives: The aims of the study were to describe the varied clinical presentations and to enumerate the dermoscopic features of IGH. Methods: Study was conducted after obtaining approval from Institutional Ethics Committee. All the patients presenting with IGH attending the Department of Dermatology were examined and enrolled for the study after taking written informed consent. Each subject was evaluated by detailed personal history, clinical examination and dermoscopic examination. Results: A total of 100 patients of IGH were included in the study. The most affected age group was 46–65 years (52%). Females were most commonly affected with M: F ratio 1:1.17. Different dermoscopic patterns of IGH documented were amoeboid (58.2%), feathery (19.1%), petaloid (14.5%) and nebuloid (8.2%). Ten percent of the patients showed more than one patterns. Conclusion: Dermoscope aids in evaluation of different patterns of IGH lesions, which helps to differentiate it from other hypopigmented conditions with considerable overlap in the site, morphology and clinical features. Dermoscopic analysis makes it easier to diagnose the disorder and subsequently plan for the appropriate treatment.


In this paper, we analyze transnational support for insurgent groups from principal agent perspective. We focus on both the supply side, i.e., when other states are willing to support insurgent groups in other states, and the demand side, i.e., when groups are willing to accept such support, with the strings that this may entail. We test our hypotheses using new disaggregated data on insurgent groups. Our results suggest that transnational rebel support is influenced both by characteristics of the rebel groups as well as linkages between rebel groups and actors in other countries. More specifically, we find that transnational support is more likely for moderately strong groups, where support is more likely to be influential, in the presence of transnational constituencies, and when the government receives foreign support. By contrast, conventional country characteristics believed to influence the outbreak of civil war appear to be unrelated to whether rebels receive transnational support.


Elections have become a major feature with which countries attempt to reinforce their identity of being democratic and inclusive modern states. In South Africa, four general elections have been conducted to elect the president of the Republic since the demise of apartheid. During each of these elections different popular cultural forms are deployed in the campaigns and other related discussions around the electoral process and its larger implications for the nation. This article examines the way in which two radio talk shows functioned as popular cultural platforms for debates around the 2009 South African elections. Drawing on material from SAfm's 'The After Eight Debate' and Talk Radio 702's 'The Redi Direko Show' the article argues that debates during election periods on these radio talk shows reflected a consciousness about time and contestations for power as participants tried to use the shows to reposition themselves and negotiate new identities in the quest for advantage. Adopting a qualitative methodological approach, the article combines material from recorded episodes of the two radio talk shows that dwell on issues around the 2009 general elections, with interviews with purposively sampled participants on the show for the purpose of analysis. It concludes that radio talk shows do not just open up the public domain during major political events such as elections, they also contribute to our understanding of the essence of time and power relations which define contemporary South African society.


Objective To calculate the burden of road traffic accidents in Kathmandu Valley and then extrapolate this to the national level. Methods A prospective study was performed to compute the burden of road traffic accidents by quantification of disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) using the Global Burden of Disease Study method on the basis of 1-year data from nine hospitals in Nepal and the Department of Forensic Medicine and cross-checked with the Nepal Traffic Directorate. Multiple methods were applied to the extrapolated population metrics of the burden of road traffic accidents in Nepal. Results The total number of years of life lived in disability, years of life lost, and DALYs in Nepal were 38,848±194, 119,935±1464, and 158,783±1658 (95% confidence interval) respectively. The number of years lost because of morbidity and death was similar in Kathmandu Valley. Most (75%) of the DALYs resulted from years of life lost in Nepal. Males accounted for 73% of DALYs. Almost half (44%) of the DALYs were contributed by the group aged 15–29 years. Conclusion This study is the first to calculate the burden of road traffic accidents in Nepal using Nepal's own data. Nepal needs to develop and enhance its own system to identify significant public health issues so as to set national priorities for prevention of road traffic accidents.


Differential evolution is a very simple but very powerful stochastic optimizer. Since its inception, it has proved very efficient and robust in function optimization and has been applied to solve problems in many scientific and engineering fields. In Differential Evolution , Dr. Qing begins with an overview of optimization, followed by a state-of-the-art review of differential evolution, including its fundamentals and up-to-date advances. He goes on to explore the relationship between differential evolution strategies, intrinsic control parameters, non-intrinsic control parameters, and problem features through a parametric study. Findings and recommendations on the selection of strategies and intrinsic control parameter values are presented. Lastly, after an introductory review of reported applications in electrical and electronic engineering fields, different research groups demonstrate how the methods can be applied to such areas as: multicast routing, multisite mapping in grid environments, antenna arrays, analog electric circuit sizing, electricity markets, stochastic tracking in video sequences, and color quantization. Contains a systematic and comprehensive overview of differential evolution Reviews the latest differential evolution research Describes a comprehensive parametric study conducted over a large test bed Shows how methods can be practically applied to mobile communications grid computing circuits image processing power engineering Sample applications demonstrated by research groups in the United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, Turkey, China, and Eastern Europe Provides access to companion website with code examples for download Differential Evolution is ideal for application engineers, who can use the methods described to solve specific engineering problems. It is also a valuable reference for post-graduates and researchers working in evolutionary computation, design optimization and artificial intelligence. Researchers in the optimization field or engineers and managers involved in operations research will also find the book a helpful introduction to the topic.


We studied the effect of deep-seated left hemispheric lesions on cortical blood flow in 18 right-handed aphasic stroke patients. Regional cerebral blood flow was measured at rest and during the performance of a functional naming test using the two-dimensional xenon-133 inhalation method. Compared with 10 controls, at rest the patients showed regional cortical hypoperfusion in the left frontoparietal region. In the controls, activation patterns from the rest to the test condition involved mainly the left hemisphere areas. In the patients, a lack of blood flow change was observed in several areas that were usually hypoperfused at rest. However, in patients with slight verbal expression disorders there were obvious blood flow increases in other brain regions in both hemispheres. Such cortical functional reorganization and the presence of a remote cortical dysfunction could play a role in the pathophysiology of language disorders.


We consider the classic problem of interval estimation of a proportion p based on binomial sampling. The 'exact' Clopper–Pearson confidence interval for p is known to be unnecessarily conservative. We propose coverage adjustments of the Clopper–Pearson interval that incorporate prior or posterior beliefs into the interval. Using heatmap‐type plots for comparing confidence intervals, we show that the coverage‐adjusted intervals have satisfying coverage and shorter expected lengths than competing intervals found in the literature.


Consider a finite group G and subgroups H,K of G. We say that H and K permute if HK = KH and call H a permutable subgroup if H permutes with every subgroup of G. A group G is called quasi-Dedekind if all subgroups of G are permutable. We can define, for every finite group G, an arithmetic quantity that measures the probability that two subgroups (chosen uniformly at random with replacement) permute and we call this measure the subgroup permutability degree of G. This measure quantifies, among others, how close a finite group is to being quasi-Dedekind, or, equivalently, nilpotent with modular subgroup lattice. The main body of this thesis is concerned with the behaviour of the subgroup permutability degree of the two families of finite simple groups PSL2(2), and Sz(q). In both cases the subgroups of the two families of simple groups are completely known and we shall use this fact to establish that the subgroup permutability degree in each case vanishes asymptotically as n or q respectively tends to infinity. The final chapter of the thesis deviates from the main line to examine groups, called F -groups, which behave like nilpotent groups with respect to the Frattini subgroup of quotients. Finally, we present in the Appendix joint research on the distribution of the density of maximal order elements in general linear groups and offer code for computations in GAP related to permutability. Caminante, son tus huellas el camino, y nada más; caminante, no hay camino, se hace camino al andar. Antonio Machado Proverbios y cantares XXIX, Campos de Castilla


The acquisition of expert performance has been studied for decades across a range of human performance domains. Ericsson, Krampe, and Tesch-Romer (1993) proposed a theoretical framework termed the theory of deliberate practice to account for the characteristics and developmental experiences of individuals who acquire exceptional levels of performance in any discipline. This theory proposes that acquiring expertise across any domain is the result of undertaking an extensive acquisition period of approximately ten years involving the accumulation of thousands of hours of physically and mentally demanding practice regimes whilst overcoming effort, motivational and resource constraints that serve as barriers to the attainment of elite performance. Therefore, this thesis aimed to contribute to the under researched area of golf development systems by examining the applicability of deliberate practice theory in acquiring elite male adolescent golfer status.

The first study, of four, utilised self-report diary logs to reveal the durations, types and intensities of golf activities undertaken by nine aspiring elite adolescent golfers over a nine month period and compared actual and retrospective accounts. In total, 62 percent of all golf activities were classified as either golf competitions or competitive practice rounds undertaken with high amounts of physical and mental effort and fun. This approach to development was beneficial for lowering the golf handicaps of several participants. Results reveal the performance improvements which aspiring elite adolescent golfers experienced whilst engaging with regular golf competitions and practice rounds instead of deliberate practice specific activities. However, such improvements did plateau once performers reached a handicap approaching two. Retrospective recall was also revealed as an accurate method to determine volumes and conditions of golf activities undertaken over a nine month period. Non-significant differences were revealed between actual and recalled data (training volumes p = 0.94, physical effort p = 0.83, mental effort p = 0.44, and fun p = 0.13) and effect sizes were small ranging (d = 0.03 – 0.31)

The second study retrospectively examined the sports participation and practice trends of current elite adolescent male English golfers. It was found how these individuals tended not to participate within golf specific deliberate practice regimes until the mid-teenage years and instead encountered a diversified introduction to several sports, which included golf, within a playful, fun, non-competitive environment that resembled key tenets of deliberate play theory (Cote, 1999). A change in emphasis towards on-going golf development occurred around the age of 16 when exposure with golf specific deliberate practice became more evident once participants had gained selection for county and English Golf Union representative golf teams.

The third study used interpretative phenomenological analysis to explore the experiences of golfers who had all successfully travelled the path from novice to elite adolescent golfer status. Four super-ordinate themes emerged from participants accounts which revealed how elite adolescent golfers experienced supportive parents and a diversified enjoyable introduction to a range of sports. This was followed by a self-determined commitment to golf in the mid teenage years and a strategic approach to developing excellence which recognised the important role that psychology may play post 16 years of age.

The forth study aimed to discover if the introduction of a golf specific deliberate practice intervention would improve putting performance and influence future practice behaviours of five aspiring elite adolescent golfers who had no prior experience of specialised golf training protocols. Participants completed a 13 week AB single-subject multiple-baseline design, social validation measures and five month follow up interviews. Mean putting performance was significantly higher (t4 = 6.94, p = .002, d = 3.12) in the intervention phase (M = 6.20, SD = 0.51) than the baseline phase (M = 4.64, SD = 0.57). All participants enjoyed undertaking deliberate practice, experienced a range of psychological and technical improvements, adapted current training schedules to mirror deliberate practice and committed long term to activities of this nature.

In conclusion, the findings of the four empirical studies within this thesis suggest long term deliberate practice is not a pre-requisite throughout childhood and the early teenage years for securing selection within international adolescent golf squads. However, engagement in deliberate practice post 16 years of age was found to be an important training strategy for the continued performance development of emerging and elite level adolescent golfers. The pathway to elite adolescent status more closely resembled Cote's (1999) deliberate play theory with sampling during early childhood, specialising during early teenage years, and investment in later teenage years. The collective findings of this thesis may provide players, coaches, applied sport psychologists and policy makers involved within golf talent development systems with clearer insights into conditions of participation and practice that appear optimal for achieving adolescent golfing excellence.


Low-cost end treatments for concrete barriers and crash cushions/impact attenuators are explored and described for low-speed (40 mph or less) highways. Various proprietary and non-proprietary end treatments have been developed and used in recent years, but most of these systems are costly and are designed for an impact speed of up to 60 mph. As part of the process of collecting information on these devices, a number of selected State Departments of Transportation (DOTs) were contacted to obtain their experiences in using crash cushions/impact attenuators on their low-speed highways. While most of the DOTs contacted have been using these systems at hazardous locations on low-speed highways, they felt that there is a need for inexpensive low-speed crash cushions and attenuators which would serve the purpose at such locations. Research reports, vendor literature,and contacts with State DOTs yielded 25 different barrier end treatment systems, and these are described in this report.


Most human-computer interaction (HCI) techniques cannot fully capture the richness of the user's thoughts and intentions when interacting with a computer system. For example, when we communicate with other people, we do not simply use words, but also accompanying cues that give the other person additional insight to our thoughts. At the same time, several physiological changes occur that may or may not be detected by the other person. When we communicate with computers, we also generate these additional signals, but the computer cannot sense such signals, and therefore ignores them. Detecting these signals in real time and incorporating them into the user interface could improve the communication channel between the computer and the human user with little additional effort required of the user. This communication improvement would lead to technology that is more supportive of the user's changing cognitive state. Such improvements in bandwidth are increasingly valuable, as technology becomes more powerful and pervasive, while our cognitive abilities do not change considerably.
In this dissertation, I explore using brain sensor data as a passive, implicit input channel that expands the bandwidth between the human and computer by providing supplemental information about the user. Using a relatively new brain imaging tool called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), we can detect signals within the brain that indicate various cognitive states. This device provides data on brain activity while remaining portable and non-invasive. This research aims to develop tools to make brain sensing more practical for HCI and to demonstrate effective use of this cognitive state information as supplemental input to interactive systems.
First, I explored practical considerations for using fNIRS in HCI research to determine the contexts in which fNIRS realistically could be used. Secondly, in a series of controlled experiments, I explored cognitive multitasking states that could be classified reliably from fNIRS data in offline analysis. Based on these experiments, I created Brainput, a system that learns to identify brain activity patterns occurring during multitasking. It provides a continuous, supplemental input stream to an interactive human-robot system, which uses this information in real time to modify its behavior to better support multitasking. Finally, I conducted an experiment to investigate the efficacy of Brainput and found improvements in performance and user experience.


To date, few studies have explored the subjective experience of identity and personhood in individuals with dementia, particularly among those living in long-term care facilities. As the population in the United States continues to age and dementia becomes more prevalent, the need to understand the experiences of persons with dementia will only increase. This paper used Noblit and Hare's (1988) meta-ethnography to synthesize existing qualitative research on the experience of personhood in dementia in long-term care. Seven studies representing a variety of professional disciplines, qualitative methodologies, and geographic locales were included. A first level of synthesis identified four major themes relating to personhood in dementia: personhood in their world, personhood and maintaining human connection, expressing the distinctiveness of personhood, and personhood and the role required in this place. A second level of synthesis linked these four themes within an integrative framework. This framework describes the experience of personhood in dementia as one of adjustment, characterized by both reconciliation and disconnect between past and present selves. The findings of this study suggest that the narrative of loss of personhood in dementia be challenged and that both the past and present identities of persons with dementia be honored and embraced.


This paper selectively surveys Southeast Asian economic development over the past half-century and anticipates some of the region's challenges if it is to progress to the ranks of developed countries. In the long sweep of development, three key features stand out. First, the region's "initial conditions" in the early post-independence period appeared to be quite unfavorable. The literature at this time reflected the resulting pessimism. But, second, several countries belong to the very small group to have achieved historically unprecedented growth since the 1960s. The drivers of rapid growth remain contested. But the common feature has been a strong commitment to reasonably broad-based economic growth. Moreover, third, the propensity for growth in the region has spread as countries have progressively joined the regional and global mainstream. Policy regimes that favored outward orientation and prudent macroeconomic management have generally resulted in faster growth. The accurate forecasting of crises and growth decelerations has proven to be elusive, reinforcing the view that an eclectic, historical, and multi-disciplinary framework is necessary to understand the region's long-term development dynamics.