This essay engages in a reflection on my degree project for Art in the Public Realm Jag kan inte langre hora syrsorna / I Can no Longer Hear the Crickets which is a spatial sound work, an installation or "auditorium" that consists of what I in this text will call "heterosonic" audio. Heterosonic sounds are limit-phenomena of audition that cannot be defined as belonging to either the audible (sonic) or inaudible (infra- and ultra-sonic) parts of the frequency spectrum, nor to the sonorous or strictly physio-acoustic side of sound. Not heard nor silent, it designates sounds that (most often very high in pitch) – like the chirping of crickets, electro-acoustic "teen deterrents", some screeching train breaks or ringing byproduct noises of electronic equipment – disappear with age, and that is perceivable by one individual's sense apparatus but not by an other's, audible to one ear and inaudible to the other and vice versa. The heterosonic is a displaced phenomena that refuses to act as an external and mediating object between different experiences, in other words not belonging in the empirical and shared world. At the same time it is a moment in everyday events that fractures the intimacy of my own immediate experience and discloses a relational but contradictory (heterological) dimension of individual human perception; asymmetrically intersubjective, social and even interspecific aspects. The heteros – the anonymous "other" – of this hearing has no proper place in or outside my own limits but haunts me as what is otherwise in the same. It is a background noise of silence, discordance of the multivocal, a transformative listening to a sonic dimension of potentiality.


Video streaming has become the most important way to share video and audio over a network. It is being used for video conferencing, e-learning etc. The user"s quality of experience of watching a video is of utmost importance for the content providers. The video quality is much affected because of packet loss and delay in the network which in turn lowers user"s perception on quality of the received videos. In our thesis we try to find out the effect of delay/delay variation on the quality of experience of the users. We try to evaluate the quality of experience using mean opinion score. The quality of experience as perceived by the user is analyzed for all the videos that we have taken and are streamed with constant and varying delay. From this we were able to find the threshold level of delay that is acceptable by the users. The user"s tolerance towards the quality of the video in a network with a varying delay is analyzed. The effect of packet delay has also been investigated and the results have been analyzed using Excel.


This document discusses the metrics to be considered in an evaluation
of new or modified congestion control mechanisms for the Internet.
These include metrics for the evaluation of new transport protocols,
of proposed modifications to TCP, of application-level congestion
control, and of Active Queue Management (AQM) mechanisms in the
router. This document is the first in a series of documents aimed at
improving the models that we use in the evaluation of transport
protocols. This document is a product of the Transport Modeling
Research Group (TRMG), and has received detailed feedback from many
members of the Research Group (RG). As the document tries to make
clear, there is not necessarily a consensus within the research
community (or the IETF community, the vendor community, the operations
community, or any other community) about the metrics that congestion
control mechanisms should be designed to optimize, in terms of
tradeoffs between throughput and delay, fairness between competing
flows, and the like. However, we believe that there is a clear
consensus that congestion control mechanisms should be evaluated in
terms of tradeoffs between a range of metrics, rather than in terms of
optimizing for a single metric.


Abstract Background The benefits of preoperative perforator imaging for microsurgical reconstruction have been well established in the literature. Methods An extensive literature review was performed to determine the most commonly used modalities, and their applicability, advantages and disadvantages. Results The review demonstrated varioius findings including decreases in operative time and cost with the use of CT angiography to identification of perforators for inclusion in flap design with hand-held Doppler ultrasound. Modalities like MR angiography offer alternatives for patients with contrast allergies or renal dysfunction while maintaining a high level of clarity and fidelity. Although the use of conventional angiography has decreased due to the availability of less invasive alternatives, it continues to serve a role in the preoperative evaluation of patients for lower extremity reconstruction. Duplex ultrasonography has been of great interest recently as an inexpensive, risk free, and extraordinarily accurate diagnostic tool. Emerging technologies such as indocyanine green fluorescence angiography and dynamic infrared thermography provide real-time information about tissue vascularity and perfusion without requiring radiation exposure. Conclusion This article presents an in-depth review of the various imaging modalities available to reconstructive surgeons and includes hand held Doppler ultrasound, CT angiography, MR angiography, conventional angiography, duplex ultrasonography, Indocyanine Green Fluorescence Angiography and Dynamic Infrared Thermography.


Starting with the most elementary multiple scattering problem, a symmetrically excited pair of monopoles, we use both "successive-scattering" and "self-consistent" procedures to obtain the closed-form multiply scattered amplitude in terms of the singly scattered value. Then we represent the field for an arbitrary configuration of arbitrary scatterers in terms of the individual, multiply scattered amplitudes, and specify these in terms of singly scattered amplitudes by a system of self-consistent integral equations. Applications are made to fixed configurations (two scatterers, and the diffraction grating), and to random distributions (models for rough surfaces, and for random media). Simple explicit results in terms of isolated scatterer functions are derived, and some of their essential features are given in graphs: the coupling effects for two dielectric rods (intensity and phase) are graphed versus spacing for both polarizations; for the diffraction grating, when a surface wave is "near grazing," the spectral orders show essential features of the anomalies measured by Wood, Strong, and Palmer; for a lossless rough surface, the graphs for both polarizations for the coherently reflected intensity and phase are analogous to those obtained for reflection from a lossy interface (the corresponding results for the incoherent scattering accounting for the loss from the "main beam"); and for a slab region containing a random distribution of nearly transparent large scatterers, we graph the macroscopic parameters, and the coherent and incoherent, forward-scattered intensities versus the fractional volume.


The UK railway network is subjected to an electrification process that aims to electrify most of the network by 2020. This upgrade will improve the capacity, reliability and efficiency of the transportation system by providing cleaner, quicker and more comfortable trains. During this process, railway infrastructures, such as tunnels, require to be adapted in order to provide the necessary clearance for the overhead line equipment, and consequently, a rigorous real-time health monitoring programme is needed to assure safety of workforce. Large amounts of data are generated by the real-time monitoring system, and automated data mining tools are then required to process this data accurately and quickly. Particularly, if an unexpected behaviour of the tunnel is identified, decision makers need to know: i) activities at the worksite at the time of movement occurring; ii) the predicted behaviour of the tunnel in the next few hours.
In this paper, we propose a data mining method which is able to automatically analyse the database of the real-time recorded displacements of the tunnel by detecting the unexpected tunnel behaviour. The proposed tool, first of all, relies on a step of data pre-processing, which is used to remove the measurement noise, followed by a feature definition and selection process, which aims to identify the unexpected critical behaviours of the tunnel. The most critical behaviours are then analysed by developing a change-point detection method, which detects precisely when the tunnel started to deviate from the predicted safe behaviour. Finally, an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) method is used to predict the future displacements of the tunnel by providing fast information to decision makers that can optimize the working schedule accordingly.


Over recent years, a major topic of discussion within the bus industry in both the developed and developing worlds has been the desirability or otherwise of regulating the supply and provision of stage bus services. Proponents of deregulation or free competition seek the complete relaxation of controls, arguing that this induces an increase in, and diversity of, the provision of market orientated services best suited to meet demand characteristics. Opponents of deregulation seek varying levels of control and government involvement, believing market forces may lead to increasing imperfection and imbalances in the provision of services. In addition, opponents of deregulation believe that this leads to a wasteful use of scarce resources with environmental disbenefits. This report adds to the debate by examining the effects of the Government of Zimbabwe's decision in August 1993 to partially deregulate the sector by allowing the introduction of privately operated commuter omnibuses to compete with the existing stage bus operator. Prior to 1993 the stage bus operator, the Zimbabwe United Passenger Company (ZUPCO) enjoyed a monopoly in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe. Clearly it is too soon to make a definitive assessment, that is only possible after a much longer time period has evolved. However, an initial assessment has been made by comparing factors and case study material 'pre' and 'post' August 1993. (A)


Librarians and archivists are intimately involved in scholarly communication systems, both as information providers and instructors. However, very little is known regarding their activities as scholars. This study seeks to examine the scholarly communication practices of librarians and archivists, the role that tenure plays in scholarly communication practices, and the degree to which institutional support is provided in librarians' efforts to consume and disseminate research and reports of best practices. A questionnaire was sent to professional librarians and archivists at 91 ARL institutions. The responses demonstrate that ARL librarians and archivists are avid consumers and creators of scholarship, and they use emerging technologies to stay up-to-date on the profession's latest research.


Objective To evaluate risk factors for severe outcomes in patients with seasonal and pandemic influenza. Design Systematic review. Study selection Observational studies reporting on risk factor-outcome combinations of interest in participants with influenza. Outcomes included death, ventilator support, admission to hospital, admission to an intensive care unit, pneumonia, and composite outcomes. Data sources Medline, Embase, CINAHL, Global Health, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials to March 2011. Risk of bias assessment Newcastle-Ottawa scale to assess the risk of bias. GRADE framework to evaluate the quality of evidence. Results 63 537 articles were identified of which 234 with a total of 610 782 participants met the inclusion criteria. The evidence supporting risk factors for severe outcomes of influenza ranged from being limited to absent. This was particularly relevant for the relative lack of data for non-2009 H1N1 pandemics and for seasonal influenza studies. Limitations in the published literature included lack of power and lack of adjustment for confounders was widespread: adjusted risk estimates were provided for only 5% of risk factor-outcome comparisons in 39 of 260 (15%) studies. The level of evidence was low for "any risk factor" (odds ratio for mortality 2.77, 95% confidence interval 1.90 to 4.05 for pandemic influenza and 2.04, 1.74 to 2.39 for seasonal influenza), obesity (2.74, 1.56 to 4.80 and 30.1, 1.74 to 2.39), cardiovascular diseases (2.92, 1.76 to 4.86 and 1.97, 1.06 to 3.67), and neuromuscular disease (2.68, 1.91 to 3.75 and 3.21, 1.84 to 5.58). The level of evidence was very low for all other risk factors. Some well accepted risk factors such as pregnancy and belonging to an ethnic minority group could not be identified as risk factors. In contrast, women who were less than four weeks post partum had a significantly increased risk of death from pandemic influenza (4.43, 1.24 to 15.81). Conclusion The level of evidence to support risk factors for influenza related complications is low and some well accepted risk factors, including pregnancy and ethnicity, could not be confirmed as risks. Rigorous and adequately powered studies are needed.


The making and self-making of political subjects is a process that presupposes an engagement with both intellectual and tactile materials. One of these intellectual materials is ideology, which stains tactile objects, such as stones and paper, with the heft of its own meanings. Competing ideologies strive to control the meanings of objects. Such has been the case for stones as observed in their use at the concentration camps of the Greek Civil War period, or the camps in Tito's Yugoslavia, or conversely, by the high school students during the December 2008 Events in Athens. Where sovereign power recruits objects and materials as parts of its apparatus, resistance movements appropriate these same objects as means of opposition.


The analysis of the deficits and ethical dilemmas in research will be related to two disciplines of the social sciences: sociology and economics. Research conducted within these disciplines, because of its multi-paradigm nature, tends to be characterized by deficits, not only ethical but also ethical and methodological dilemmas and interpretation reasons. The leading thesis of this paper aims to argue that the looming deficits and ethical dilemmas of Polish researchers in the field of social sciences are two basic but very different premises. The first group of reasons primarily refers to broad ethical deficits, perceived unreliableness in terms of scientific research. It is related mainly to the structural aspects of the functioning of universities and other research units and logic parameterization. In the ethical programs (especially codes of ethics), ethical deficits are identified in three areas of "activity" of research related to the description, diagnosis and interpretation of the results relating to: bragging—e.g. the preparation, recording and publishing of the results that were not obtained; falsification—which means manipulating the research materials, equipment or method, replacing or bypassing the data in such a way that the results are not presented in a true way; plagiarism—the appropriation of other people ideas, methods, results, or terms without proper reference. Plagiarism is also the unauthorized use of information obtained through confidential review of proposals and manuscripts, or e.g. using conference presentations without permission. Its structural evidence is primarily the emphasis on "productivity" and parameterization as the basic criterion, not only of scientific but also academic success-oriented and personalized careers. The second group of reasons refers primarily to broad ethical dilemmas; to the ethical context of social research at every stage of the proceedings: conceptualization, selection of methods, techniques and research tools, conducting research (which concern, for example, the covert participant observation), analysis and interpretation of data, publishing developed and interpreted empirical material. Performing even a cursory analysis of how to present research findings in these two disciplines, you can come to the conclusion that the methodological competence of the investigator does not always go hand in hand with ethical competence. What is more, there is a tendency to downplay the principle that the social sciences should be guided by the principle of the so-called humanistic coefficient.


To achieve high quality initial personalization, recommender systems must provide an efficient and effective process for new users to express their preferences. We propose that this goal is best served not by the classical method where users begin by expressing preferences for individual items - this process is an inefficient way to convert a user's effort into improved personalization. Rather, we propose that new users can begin by expressing their preferences for groups of items. We test this idea by designing and evaluating an interactive process where users express preferences across groups of items that are automatically generated by clustering algorithms. We contribute a strategy for recommending items based on these preferences that is generalizable to any collaborative filtering-based system. We evaluate our process with both offline simulation methods and an online user experiment. We find that, as compared with a baseline rate-15-items interface, (a) users are able to complete the preference elicitation process in less than half the time, and (b) users are more satisfied with the resulting recommended items. Our evaluation reveals several advantages and other trade-offs involved in moving from item-based preference elicitation to group-based preference elicitation.


The zero energy house project talks about sustainability. In general terms the house is designed to produce as much energy as it consume. If you take a look to the house its possible to find several systems that takes as much profit as possible to the renewable energies like photovoltaic electricity production, geothermal energy used to run a heat pump or a well thought isolated house.
First of all it's possible to find general information about the topics in house, to make people understand how our project is working. Later on we will explain the main topics to discuss it and try to work with them.
The first topic of the project consists of the study of the heat transfer between the house and the external environment and the heat transfer between the rooms of the house as well. The walls of the house will be studied. Every wall hasn't the same seriousness inside the house, so, we will try to study and find the best options to improve the insulation system of the house in Kollum.
The house in Kollum has a roof full of solar panels (photovoltaic panels). As it is said in the beginning, the house is supposed to produce the whole amount of energy consumed but, if you take a look into the energy produced by the solar panels, you can realize that it's possible to take advantage of the solar panels to produce more energy or simply waste less money.
The heat pump uses the heat from the ground to provide the heating system and to supply some heat to the sanitary water. It is necessary to study how the heat pump works, to realize what are the inputs and outputs. After make the study it's possible to see that the heat pump works, but you also can realize that the house could use a smaller heat pump. So, we will try to find a better solution for the heat production.
The house uses a solar boiler to preheat the sanitary water. Depending on the period of the year the solar boiler will have different productions. Our goal is to improve the efficiency of the solar boiler to try to get the water as warm as possible without using the heat pump supply.


A policy and legal framework for school libraries is a guiding framework for the provision, development and management of school libraries. Similarly, it is a lever that standardises school library development, management and practice. Although the existence of a policy does not guarantee the development of efficient and functional school libraries, its inherent value cannot be overemphasised. It is widely documented that in South Africa, only 7.2 per cent of public schools have functional school libraries, which are crucial to enrich the quality of teaching and learning and support learners and teachers. The aim of this study was, firstly, to analyse the legal and policy provision for school libraries in South Africa; and secondly, to examine the state of school libraries in Limpopo province, South Africa. The study further sought to establish whether there is divergence or convergence between policy provision and the status of school libraries in Limpopo. The study adopted a quantitative research paradigm and triangulated utilising questionnaires and document analysis as instruments to collect data. The study established that there is a regime of policies related to school libraries, most of which are still in draft form. Furthermore, the study confirmed that provision of policy does not necessarily translate into an efficient school library system. The distinct divergence means that there is no correlation between policy provision and practice. The study recommends that the existing school library policies should be streamlined, adopted and implemented to scale up the development of efficient and functional school libraries in Limpopo.


The article deals with the peculiarities of management of advertising activity. The basic views on the concept of "advertising" are substantiated. Besides, the authors have developed the promising tendencies of the advertising industry, which are connected with the processes of changes in the enterprise. Accordingly, the dynamics of the volume of the advertising market of Ukraine is shown. It was noted that for the last five years the Ukrainian advertising market has shown the highest result in 2017. It is interesting, that today's conditions create a unique environment, in which an enterprise is interested in the effective management of its activities, and it is able to adapt the promotion policy and advertising activity according to the requirements of the target audience.


BACKGROUND
Data is emerging in the human and invertebrate literature demonstrating that mu opiate receptors and morphine are present in cardiovascular tissues in diverse animals, including human tissues, where they may be exerting a cardioregulatory role via stimulation of constitutive nitric oxide (NO) production.

MATERIAL/METHODS
NO release from lobster heart was evaluated without stimulation and after morphine exposure using a real-time NO-specific amperometric probe. In addition, real time NO release was evaluated after treatment with low doses of widely used pesticides (e.g., pyrethroids). Real time RT-PCR was used to investigate the presence of mu opiate receptor subtypes in lobster heart.

RESULTS
Basal NO release occurs in lobster heart at the nanomolar level. Morphine enhanced this level of release; naloxone (an opiate antagonist) blocked it, as did exposure to the NO synthase inhibitor L-NAME. In addition, treatment with the pyrethroids, permethrin and resmethrin, abrogated constitutive NO release from lobster heart. Finally, by way of real time RT-PCR we were able to demonstrate the presence of the micro(3) opiate receptor subtype in lobster heart.

CONCLUSIONS
Rhythmic NO bursts appear to be involved in normal cardiac muscle activity in Homarus americanus. Lobster heart contains morphinergic signaling components capable of slowing down its beating rate via NO production. In addition, compounds such as pyrethroid pesticides may alter normal cardiac activity by interfering with constitutive NO production and thus, depressing basal NO levels. This may ultimately make these animals more susceptible to environmental assaults/toxins.


Envy-freeness is a well-known fairness concept for analyzing mechanisms. Its traditional definition requires that no individual envies another individual. However, an individual (or a group of agents) may envy another group, even if she (or they) does not envy another individual. In mechanisms with monetary transfer, such as combinatorial auctions, considering such fairness requirements, which are refinements of traditional envy-freeness, is meaningful and brings up a new interesting research direction in mechanism design.

In this paper, we introduce two new concepts of fairness called envy-freeness of an individual toward a group, and envy-freeness of a group toward a group. They are natural extensions of traditional envy-freeness. We discuss combinatorial auction mechanisms that satisfy these concepts. First, we characterize such mechanisms by focusing on their allocation rules. Then we clarify the connections between these concepts and three other properties: the core, strategy-proofness, and false-name-proofness.


This paper proposes a heuristic algorithm for effectively summarizing the work of novice robot operators, e.g., ones recruited through crowdsourcing platforms, in search and rescue-like tasks. Such summaries can be used for many purposes, perhaps most notably for monitoring and evaluating an operator's performance in settings where information gaps preclude automatic evaluation. The underlying idea of our method is dividing the task timeline into intervals, and extracting a subset of high-scoring and low-scoring segments within, using a heuristic scoring function. This results in a short effective summary of the operator's work, based on which several other crowdworkers can evaluate her performance. The effectiveness of the proposed method was extensively evaluated and compared to a large set of alternative methods through a series of experiments in Amazon Mechanical Turk. The analysis of the results reveals that the proposed method outperforms all tested alternatives. Finally, we evaluate the performance one may achieve with the use of machine learning for predicting the operator's performance in our domain. While this approach manages to reach a performance level similar to the one achieved with summaries, it requires an order-of-magnitude greater effort for training (measured in terms of crowdworkers time).


The hypothesis was that owing to their high bioavailability, zinc oxide nanoparticles (NanoZnO) can effectively replace (Zn) salts and reduce Zn excretion with faeces. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of NanoZnO on the development of chicken embryos, the growth of broiler chickens, and Zn excretion with faeces. At day 1 of incubation, 120 eggs were randomly divided between a control group (not injected) and groups injected with a hydrocolloid of NanoZnO in increasing concentrations (50, 100, 500 mg/L). At day 19 of incubation, no differences were observed in the bodyweight, but 100 and 500 mg/L affected liver and heart weights, indicating that high levels of NanoZnO may induce differential organ development. In the subsequent experiment, 308 chickens were randomly divided into six groups. The control diet was supplemented with 55 mg Zn/kg (standard level), the 0 group received no Zn supplement, and groups fed NanoZnO received 25%, 50%, 75%, and 100% of the standard level. The 100% replacement of ZnO with NanoZnO increased the chickens' bodyweight compared with the standard level of ZnO, but to the same level as the diet without ZnO supplementation. Furthermore, NanoZnO did not reduce the content of Zn in faeces, which was only significantly lower in the group without ZnO supplementation in comparison with other groups. The results indicate that the replacement of ZnO with NanoZnO had no negative effects on chicken growth. Compared with ZnO, NanoZnO did not reduce Zn excretion with faeces.
Keywords: broiler, development, excretion, mineral, nanonutrition


Abstract In the oil fields in the Central Graben of the North Sea, Maastrichtian chalk is an important hydrocarbon reservoir, but oil may also be found in the Danian chalk, consisting of white chalk interbedded with clay layers. Within the chalk section, discrete intervals appear like chalk but contain large amounts of quartz (up to 100%). The aim of the present investigation is to reveal the mechanism for formation of the quartz in these intervals and to discuss their regional distribution and importance for the reservoir properties. Samples of chalk, including quartz-rich intervals, and clay layers from three wells SA-1, Rigs-1 and Rigs-2 in the South Arne Field have been investigated. Calcite-free residues obtained using a buffered dissolution of calcite were investigated using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy. The main silica phase in the Upper Cretaceous−Danian chalk in the three wells is a nano-size α-quartz. This has probably formed from Si dissolved from radiolarians in the free-water phase. The 600 Ǻ diameter a-quartz spheres precipitated in the free-water phase with subsequent flocculation of the spheres and sedimentation of the flocs. Variations in the proportion of quartz in the chalk are attributed to variations in the amount of radiolarians in combination with variations in CO2 concentrations in the water; increased CO2 causes dissolution of coccoliths and thus a relative enrichment in quartz. This formation mechanism is regional and makes it probable that the layers rich in nano-quartz may be found over large areas provided that the chalk is authigenic. Quartz-rich layers are generally of low permeability and in areas with authigenic chalk these layers may act as internal seals in chalk reservoirs.


This paper presents two case studies about private actors aspiring to realize their innovative ideas on land management and design in two small areas in the Netherlands. One case involves an area that is to be partly forested in line with operative policies to establish a large urban green structure; the second case is an area that is part of a national ecological structure and already primarily consists of forest. However, in both areas various groups and organizations were seeking to implement alternative land uses and taking action to promote their ideas. It was clear from the start that the ways in which the initiators of these ideas gave meaning to the areas differed from the ideas enshrined in existing policies. The case studies show that there was ample innovative potential at the local level and that ideas do get implemented with considerable effort, due to factors such as personal zeal, perseverance, trust and empathy that developed in people "in the field." However, an analysis of the cases also shows that there has been only limited discussion about the possible wider policy implications of these local innovations. Thus, the study revealed an asymmetry between local innovative potential and an apparent lack of responsiveness on the part of established policy. The study used the policy arrangements approach, consisting of 1) an analysis of the relationships between discourses, actor coalitions, rules and resources at the level of day-to-day interactions between the initiatives and established policy, and 2) an analysis of the relationship between these day-to-day interactions and an assumed more general, structural process of sub-politicization. The study concludes that there was a simultaneous occurrence of sub-politicization and depoliticization which both have significant impacts on the direction of green space policies and determining who can participate in them.


The main goal of this paper is to estimate to what extent the federal government of the United States insures member states against regional income shocks. We find that a one dollar reduction in a region's per capita personal income triggers a decrease in federal taxes of about 34 cents and an increase in federal transfers of about 6 cents. Hence, the final reduction in disposable per capita income is on the order of 60 cents. That is, between one third and one half of the initial shock is absorbed by the federal government. The much larger reaction of taxes than transfers to these regional imbalances reflects the fact that the main mechanism at work is the federal income tax system which in turn means that the stabilization process is automatic rather than specifically designed each time there is a cyclical movement in income. Some economists may want to argue that this regional insurance scheme provided by the federal government is an important reason why the system of fixed exchange rates that exists within the United States today has survived without major problems. Under this view, the creation of a European Central Bank that issues unified European currency without the simultaneous introduction (or expansion) of a fiscal federalist system could put the project at risk. Rough calculations of the impact of the existing European tax system on regional income suggests that a one dollar shock to regional GDP will reduce tax payments to the EEC government by half a cent!. Hence, the current European tax system has a long way to go before it reaches the 34 cents of the U.S. Federal Government.


Digital archaelogy and virtual reality with archaeological artefacts have been quite hot research topics in the last years 55,56 . This thesis is a preperation study to build the background knowledge required for the research projects, which aim to computerize the reconstruction of the archaelogical data like pots, marbles or mosaic pieces by shape and ex ural features. Digitalization of the cultural heritage may shorten the reconstruction time which takes tens of years currently 61 ; it will improve the reconstruction robustness by incorporating with the literally available machine vision algorithms and experiences from remote experts working on a no-cost virtual object together. Digitalization can also ease the exhibition of the results for regular people, by multiuser media applications like internet based virtual museums or virtual tours. And finally, it will make possible to archive values with their original texture and shapes for long years far away from the physical risks that the artefacts currently face. On the literature 1,2,3,5,8,11,14,15,16 , texture analysis techniques have been throughly studied and implemented for the purpose of defect analysis purposes by image processing and machine vision scientists. In the last years, these algorithms have been started to be used for similarity analysis of content based image retrieval 1,4,10 . For retrieval systems, the concurrent problems seem to be building efficient and fast systems, therefore, robust image features haven't been focused enough yet. This document is the first performance review of the texture algorithms developed for retrieval and defect analysis together. The results and experiences gained during the thesis study will be used to support the studies aiming to solve the 2D puzzle problem using textural continuity methods on archaelogical artifects, Appendix A for more detail. The first chapter is devoted to learn how the medicine and psychology try to explain the solutions of similiarity and continuity analysis, which our biological model, the human vision, accomplishes daily. In the second chapter, content based image retrieval systems, their performance criterias, similiarity distance metrics and the systems available have been summarized. For the thesis work, a rich texture database has been built, including over 1000 images in total. For the ease of the users, a GUI and a platform that is used for content based retrieval has been designed; The first version of a content based search engine has been coded which takes the source of the internet pages, parses the metatags of images and downloads the files in a loop controlled by our texture algorithms. The preprocessing algorithms and the pattern analysis algorithms required for the robustness of the textural feature processing have been implemented. In the last section, the most important textural feature extraction methods have been studied in detail with the performance results of the codes written in Matlab and run on different databases developed.


Computer architecture is the conceptual design and fundamental operational structure of a computer system. It's a blueprint and functional description of requirements and design implementations for the various parts of a computer, focusing largely on the way by which the central processing unit (CPU) performs internally and accesses addresses in memory. In this paper, we present an overview of parallel computer architectures and discuss the use of fiber optics for clustered or coupled processors. Presently, a number of computer systems take advantage of commercially available fiber optic technology to interconnect multiple processors, thereby achieving improved performance or reliability for a lower cost than if a single large processor had been used. Optical fiber is also used to distribute the elements of a parallel architecture over large distances; these can range from tens of meters to alleviate packaging problems to tens of kilometers for disaster recovery applications.


Proximate stressors such as destructive fishing are key drivers of coral reef degradation. Conservation strategies that marshal local action and are tailored to the preferences of the target group are thus needed to sustain coral resources. We experimentally analyze the behavior of marine resource users in a coastal village in Indonesia to gain insight into whether people prefer to donate time or money to environmental or other charitable causes. Each person is subject to one of four treatments: monetary donation, monetary donation match, volunteer time donation, and volunteer time donation match. Contrasting with the existing literature, we find that participants give significantly more when donating money compared to time. We also find that matching donations increases the percent of people giving but does not increase the amount donated. This research furthers our understanding of what motivates resource users in a developing country to contribute to the provision of public goods.


The Alternating Direction Method of Multipliers (ADMM) has received lots of attention recently due to the tremendous demand from large-scale and data-distributed machine learning applications. In this paper, we present a stochastic setting for optimization problems with non-smooth composite objective functions. To solve this problem, we propose a stochastic ADMM algorithm. Our algorithm applies to a more general class of convex and nonsmooth objective functions, beyond the smooth and separable least squares loss used in lasso. We also demonstrate the rates of convergence for our algorithm under various structural assumptions of the stochastic function: O(1/√t)) for convex functions and O(log t/t) for strongly convex functions. Compared to previous literature, we establish the convergence rate of ADMM for convex problems in terms of both the objective value and the feasibility violation. A novel application named Graph-Guided SVM is proposed to demonstrate the usefulness of our algorithm.


ReFramingl comprises an introduction, five chapters and a conclusion. The
introduction describes the inception of the project in a study of writing practiceS
among'a group of fiction writers, which identifies a process of self-transformation as
an experience common to members of the group. Having identified this experience as
the subject of study for a thesis,it gives a rationale for a choice of the work of
poet and novelist Janet Frame,in that she enacts through her writing a process of
subjective change that embodies the self-transformation identified as integral to
creative practice. The introduction also signals the project of reading the work of
Midhel de Certeau, and Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari alongside that of Frame, as
theorists who offer approaches to understanding subjective trasformation.

Chapter One places the work of Frame alongside that of the literary theorist and
philosopher Michil de Certeau as a way of reading motivation in Frames's work. This
chapter conducts a thematic survey of the novels' concerns with experiences of
subjective confinement, using Certeau's figuration of language structures as sites of
constraint and subversion, and linking Frame's response with Certeau's ideas of
tactics and strategies.

Chapter Two surveys the work of the philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari . .
on processes of creative thought as they relate to narratorial practices in Frame's
novels, and relates her project to their concept of becoming, via the genre of minor
literature. The chapter presents an argument that Frame's writing enacts a double
becoming in that her creation of altered subjective space for herself also creates
possibilities of collective change.

Chapter Three conducts a chronological survey of Frame's novels, identifying
structural elements and linguistic approaches to the creation of altered subjectivity in
writing. It treats Frame's body of work a written entity characterised by an
elaboration of the procedures and concepts through which subjective change can be
understood. Another movement of double becoming is presented in the movement by
which the praxis of each successive book forms'a 'theoretical" base for further praxis
in the work that follows.

Chapter Four approaches the relation of a reading/writing collective to this
transformative theorising of subjectivity through a writing practice. The chapter '
begins by considering ways in which Frame gives voice to the connection of writing
to the collective, tracing her characters' articuilation of a responsibility to speak before
those who have been unable to do so. It goes on to consider the reflex of this. doubling
of Frame's becoming,through responses of the collective to herwork.

Chapter Five comprises a collection of poems written as part of the thesis, enacting
and meditating on ways my own theoretical and writing practices have modified one
another in the process of thinking and writing. The poems are also a direct response to
Frame's work, thus forming an extension of the previous chapter's considerations of
collectivity in reading/writing.

The conclusion summarises the movement of ideas throughout the thesis using
Frame's references to-point of view as a structuring device.


This work had the objective to analyze technological efforts and to evaluate the innovative performance of biotechnology and biosciences companies in Belo Horizonte, (MG, Brazil). In order to reach these objectives, a survey was undertaken in eight companies. Data collection was undertaken with an existent questionnaire found in the literature of sciencebased companies, therefore a replication process was carried out The analyses of collected information have indicated that the companies have expended substantial technological efforts oriented towards internal R&D in their majority. A minority of companies have expended less expressive technological efforts related to technology acquisition through external sources. The internal R&D activities observed are more directed to product than to process innovation. As for innovative performance, the results have evidenced that it is concentrated in the minority of companies and the number of substantially new products is superior to the number of technologically improved products launched in the market.


This paper emphasizes the importance of implementation of Lithuanian electronic government (e-government) concept, generalizes legal acts for e-government and the current situation in the field of electronic servines in Lithuania. The paper starts with the analysis of Lithuanian legislation and scientific literature, then discusses e-government development trends. By reffering to the classification of content maturity of European internet websites an existing supply of e-government services is discussed. With regard to importance of informatikon provided by government institutions to the public a special attention is paid to the demand of egovernment services. It is analysed referring to the information provided by the Department of Statistics by the Government of the Republic of Lithuania.


The ABA Standards now require formative assessment to be integrated into law school courses, and there is extensive literature, both in legal education and education more generally, about the goals and methods for formative assessment. This Article makes the key insights of that literature accessible and actionable for professors teaching tax courses. This crash course on formative assessment is intended to enable tax professors to integrate formative assessment into their classrooms effectively and efficiently without having to become legal pedagogy scholars in addition to being tax law scholars. The formative assessment techniques discussed herein range from those that require relatively little time and effort to those that may be particularly impactful but that require additional time and work. This Article also discusses strategies for reducing the burden of even the work-intensive approaches. Ultimately, by using numerous examples from basic federal income tax, corporate tax, and partnership tax courses, I hope to make it easier for tax professors to figure out which approach(es) to formative assessment is(are) likely to work best for their students, make it easier for tax professors to implement their chosen formative assessment techniques in their classrooms, and make it easier for tax professors to achieve their goals for their classes as successfully as possible, all at as little cost as possible.


Abstract In symmetric multilevel inverters, there is a tradeoff between the output quality and the reliability and efficiency of the converter. New asymmetric and hybrid solutions, using different voltages and devices in various parts of the inverter, promise significant improvements for medium-voltage applications. This paper investigates such a hybrid asymmetric nine-level inverter. It consists of a three-phase three-level main inverter, with a two-leg two-level sub inverter in series with each phase (Fig 1). To keep the power part simple and the efficiency high, the sub inverters have no feeding from the net and can only supply reactive power. But the nonsupplied intermediate-circuit capacitors form an unstable system. This paper proposes a control method to stabilize their voltages. Power balancing is guaranteed by varying the common-mode voltage, using an on-line nonlinear model-predictive controller. The controller predicts the system evolution as a function of the control inputs. A cost function of system and control quantities is iteratively minimized in real time, to ñnd the optimal control to apply to the system. Simulations and measurements demonstrate stable behaviour in steady state and during transients. The originality of this paper is the application of nonlinear model-predictive control in power electronics.


The main aim of this paper is to evaluate the effects of reaeration coefficient on the river water dissolved oxygen, case study Dinachal River, IRAN. To achieve this goal, water quality samples were collected along a reach of 2 kilometers of the river in September 2013. Electrical Conductivity, pH, Dissolve Oxygen, Biochemical Oxygen Demand, Nitrate and Phosphorus are the main quality parameters which were measured in laboratory, using the above mentioned collected water samples. Streeter-Phelps model has been used to simulate dissolved oxygen in the river analytically and to improve the output of the model; advection, dispersion and decay rate terms were included to the basic form of the Streeter-Phelps equation. Also, dissolved oxygen concentration in the river has been simulated involving FTCS, QUICKEST, Upstream and Lax-Wendroff numerical methods. The reaeration coefficient has been estimated using four empirical equations including; Oconnor-Dobbins, Langbein-Durum, Boulton and Ling et al. The results show that Up-stream numerical method containing Boulton reaeration Coefficient equation has the most accurate results, with the amounts of Pearson correlation coefficient and Mean Absolute Errors equal to 0.995 and 0.033, respectively. Generally speaking, numerical methods in contrast to analytical solution of the Streeter-Phelps equation showed more accurate results, which is due to existing of the empirical coefficients in the Streeter-Phelps equation.


Microparticle image velocimetry (μPIV) is used to measure the grease velocity profile in small seal-like geometries and the radial migration of contaminant particles is predicted. In the first part, the influence of shaft speed, grease type, and temperatures on the flow of lubricating greases in a narrow double restriction sealing pocket is evaluated. Such geometries can be found in, for example, labyrinth-type seals. In a wide pocket the velocity profile is one-dimensional and the Herschel-Bulkley model is used. In a narrow pocket, it is shown by the experimental results that the side walls have a significant influence on the grease flow, implying that the grease velocity profile is two-dimensional. In this area, a single empirical grease parameter for the rheology is sufficient to describe the velocity profile. In the second part, the radial migration of contaminant particles through the grease is evaluated. Centrifugal forces acting on a solid spherical particle are calculated from the grease velocity profile. Consequently, particles migrate to a larger radius and finally settle when the grease viscosity becomes large due to the low shear rate. This behavior is important for the sealing function of the grease in the pocket and relubrication.


A reduction in emissions from transport is essential and requires a system wide approach, inclusive of technological and behavioural changes. Defining capacity in urban transport as the space through which transport demand can be met, the research explores where there is excess capacity in the system and how this could be used to reduce emissions. Capacity may be physical capacity in the roadspace or seats within vehicles, or temporal capacity, where there are fluctuations in the use of the system, such as peak and off-peak flows. This is complementary to the International Energy Agency (IEA)'s definition of urban transport energy efficiency as maximising travel activity whilst minimising energy consumption through a range of approaches and techniques. This paper proposes that interventions designed to enable behavioural change could reduce emissions by changing the way that the urban transport system is used. Drawing on the literature, this work demonstrates how effective use of excess capacity might be facilitated through measures such as smarter choices programmes and the application of intelligent transport systems (ITS). Case studies are provided as examples of ways that urban transport infrastructure can be adapted for more efficient use, including shared space projects and the 'complete streets' policy in New York City. The paper concludes by presenting the potential impacts of effective use of excess capacity for reducing urban transport emissions as demonstrated through the case studies.


The Art of Twentieth-Century American Poetry: Modernism and After. Charles Altieri. Oxford: Blackwell, 2006. 245 pp. $89.95 (cloth). Charles Altieri's book is richly rewarding, but it is also frustrating. The frustration stems in large part from its identity, discussed openly in the book's introduction. It is clear that Altieri considers this an "Introduction" to American poetry, as he compares it to two other introductory works on the same topic also published by Blackwell, namely Christopher MacGowan's Twentieth-Century American Poetry (2004), and Marjorie Perloff's 21st-century Modernism: The New Poetics (2002). It is not clear why Perloff's book or Altieri's own are classed as introductions to their subjects, as both forward sophisticated arguments that demand familiarity with their topics on the part of their readership. Altieri rightly points out, however, that MacGowan's book is invaluable for "any student who wants basic information" (2) about twentieth-century America's most influential poets. It allows Altieri to free himself from the demands of a comprehensive survey and to pursue what he terms a more "idiosyncratic path" (2). Blackwell is right, however, not to market his book as an introduction, for as Altieri disarmingly warns us "[T]here will be times when this book will prove somewhat rough going" (2). This is indeed true, but despite this, the central arguments of the book are undeniably fascinating. Altieri plots the rise of modernist poetry out of its desire to absorb the impact scientific thought had had in challenging traditional conceptions of modes of perception and comprehension. Older scientific models informed the still venerated literary values of "copying nature in order to disclose principles of behavior that could be generalized" (3). Modernist experiment, however, embodied the desire to explore art forms that honored the findings of the "new realism" in science, by shifting attention, in poetry's case, to the "felt moment of perception" (4). This in turn offered hope for "relief from an over-moralized world long on opinion and short on fresh intense modes of feeling" (5). Altieri's focus on the scientific influences on the development of modern poetry brings to the fore his book's focus on "the most important psychological feature of this new constructivism," namely "impersonality," defined here as "the reliance on the expressive power of the work rather than the expressive power of the artist's meditative presence" (6). However, this central feature of modernist poetry also determined the nature of the crisis it was to face, for, as Altieri explains, "[T] he separation on which modernism thrived, between the authority of the art and the presumed and problematic authority of 'sincere' artists, left it with almost no means to take up the traditional roles of delighting and instructing - at a time when an emerging economic depression made the lack of overt instruction seem irresponsible" (7). Altieri uses Williams to exemplify how "the limitations of early modernism became painfully evident" (99). The poet is seen to move rapidly away from the confidence of Spring and All in 1922, when he had reveled in "how his lyrics might draw 'many broken things into a dance giving them thus a full being'" (99). With The Descent of Winter (1928), Williams "finds his imagination haunted by the absence of what might transform making into loving, seeing into compassionate identification" (101). For Altieri, Williams's 1935 collection, An Early Martyr and Other Poems, acts as the arch-signifier of the cul-de-sac into which modernist poetry had run itself, as it sought but failed to find the means by which poetry could reengage with pressing social concerns. …


This paper utilizes frequency-domain techniques to identify and characterize economically important properties of government spending. Using post-war data for the United States, the paper first identifies peaks in the estimated spectra of the major components of fiscal spending. Second, the paper examines the relationship between these fiscal variables and various measures of aggregate economic activity. The analysis reveals that defense spending is best modeled as exogenous with respect to the aggregate economy and that nondefense spending (growth) appears to be white noise. Further, the unemployment rate has a very high coherency at the business cycle frequencies with unemployment insurance but far smaller coherency with other transfer payments. Finally, the paper finds a moderate degree of direct substitutability between certain types of government spending and private consumption and in the process illustrates how spectral techniques can be readily combined with a standard intertemporal optimizing model.


The article highlights the results of diagnosis of forming moral and aesthetic component of personal and professional readiness of teachers to educational activities in school. The study of moral and aesthetic readiness of students was conveyed using the method of diagnosis empathetic abilities (V. Boyko), the author's methods of detection of readiness for activities of actional moral and aesthetic sense and personal predisposition to conflict behavior (test K. Thomas). The experiment proved that future teachers have had developed moral ideals and spiritual values; and formed aesthetic consciousness (feelings, attitudes, tastes, needs, feelings) and motivation and are ready for active transformative activities in the system of interpersonal communication. The majority of future teachers who participated in the study display a lack of following formed skills and abilities: attention, perception and thinking focused on the state, problems and behavior of another person; emotional sensitivity, the abilities to observe behavior of a partner, traits that promote openness, the ability to understand another person on the mutual basis due to emotional flexibility and the ability to accept other behaviour. This may adversely affect their future professional activities, including working with neglected pupils and their parents. The author considers that a high level of moral consciousness of a teacher being a unity of rational and sensual aspects to facilitate moral and aesthetic relations in professional collaboration.


Tumid lupus erythematosus (TLE) is a rare variant of cutaneous lupus erythematosus. The clinical diagnosis can be difficult to ascertain as it often presents with negative serology and without associated systemic symptoms. We present two pediatric cases of TLE: a young girl with erythematous facial papules and a second with purple and grey facial plaques. Biopsies displayed a lymphocytic infiltrate consisted with TLE and both improved on antimalarials. These cases highlight the varied morphologies and bring greater awareness of TLE and its treatments.


This article analyzes the grounds, procedures and conditions required by International Human Rights Law and International Humanitarian Law for pretrial detention of suspected terrorists for purposes of criminal law enforcement, and for their preventive detention for security and intelligence purposes. Recognizing the difficulties in securing sufficient admissible evidence to prosecute terrorists within the tight time limits imposed by international law, the Article nonetheless suggests that indefinite detention, solely or primarily for purposes of intelligence interrogation, is probably not lawful under U.S. or international law. Preventive detention for security purposes, on the other hand, is generally permitted by international law, provided it is based on grounds and procedures previously established by law; is not arbitrary, discriminatory or disproportionate; is publicly registered and subject to fair and effective judicial review; and the detainee is not mistreated and is compensated for any unlawful detention. In Europe, however, even with these safeguards, preventive detention for security purposes is generally not permitted, unless a State in time of national emergency formally derogates from its obligation to respect the right to liberty under the European Convention on Human Rights. The Article concludes that if preventive detention of suspected terrorists for security purposes is to be allowed at all, its inherent danger to liberty must be appreciated, its use kept to an absolute minimum, and the European model should be followed, that is, such detention should be permitted only by formal derogation in time of national emergency, and then only to the extent and for the time strictly required.


We present a surfactant-mediated approach to the production of single-crystal Bi3O4Br nanorings via a simple solvothermal method. The ring-like morphology is rare among bismuth oxyhalides, and the reaction pathways are superior to traditional chemical transformations. In detail, Bi3O4Br nanorings are prepared in three stages: (1) the formation of precursors, (2) selective etching and (3) Ostwald ripening. During these steps, the extra usage of templates is avoided and a series of useful intermediates are obtained. Besides, this method can be extended to fabricate other bismuth oxyhalide nanorings. Under visible-light irradiation, all of our samples are photo-activated. The Bi3O4Br nanorings exhibit an efficient oxygen-evolution rate (72.54 μmol h−1) and pollutant degradation rate (4.71 × 10−2 g min−1 m−2), which can be attributed to their unique ring structures and band potentials. Thus, the surfactant-mediated chemical conversion strategy not only paves a new way to enhance the photocatalytic activity of bismuth oxyhalides, but also provides an important large-scale route for designing other nanomaterials with ring-like structures.


Low temperature hydrothermal systems hosted in the volcanic oceanic crust are responsible for ∼20% of Earth's global heat loss. Marine sediment ponds comprise an important type setting on young ridge flanks where hydrothermal circulation advectively extracts lithospheric heat, but the nature of coupled fluid‐heat transport in these settings remains poorly understood. Here we present coupled (fluid‐heat) numerical simulations of ocean crustal hydrogeology in and below North Pond, a sediment pond on ∼8 Ma seafloor of the North Atlantic Ocean. Two‐ and three‐dimensional simulations show that advective transport beneath North Pond is complex and time varying, with multiple spatial and temporal scales, consistent with seafloor and borehole observations. A unidirectional, single‐pass flow system is neither favored nor needed to match the spatial distribution of seafloor heat flux through North Pond sediments. When the permeability of the crustal aquifer is relatively high (10−10–10−9 m2), simulations can replicate much of the observed variability and suppression of seafloor heat flux and can explain basement overpressures and transient perturbations in pressure and temperature in the upper volcanic crust. Simulation results can also help explain heterogeneity in pore fluid chemistry and microbiology in the crust. Although driven by the same physical processes, the dynamics of hydrothermal circulation below North Pond are different from those seen on "discharge‐dominated" ridge flanks, where the permeability and exposed area of isolated basement outcrops control the extent of regional heat extraction.


Background It is believed that laboratory tariffs in Iran don't reflect the real costs. This might expose private laboratories at financial hardship. Activity Based Costing is widely used as a cost measurement instrument to more closely approximate the true cost of operations. Objective This study aimed to determine the real price of different clinical tests of a selected private clinical laboratory. Methods This study was a cross sectional study carried out in 2015. The study setting was the private laboratories in the city of Kerman, Iran. Of 629 tests in the tariff book of the laboratory (relative value), 188 tests were conducted in the laboratory that used Activity Based Costing (ABC) methodology to estimate cost-price. Analyzing and cost-price estimating of laboratory services were performed by MY ABCM software Version 5.0. Results In 2015, the total costs were $641,645. Direct and indirect costs were 78.3% and 21.7% respectively. Laboratory consumable costs by 37% and personnel costs by 36.3% had the largest share of the costing. Also, group of hormone tests cost the most $147,741 (23.03%), and other tests group cost the least $3,611 (0.56%). Also after calculating the cost of laboratory services, a comparison was made between the calculated price and the private sector's tariffs in 2015. Conclusion This study showed that there was a difference between costs and tariffs in the private laboratory. One way to overcome this problem is to increase the number of laboratory tests with regard to capacity of the laboratories.


AbstractPoor glycemic control is related to an increased risk of end-stage renal disease (ESRD). This study investigated the association between medication adherence and the risk of ESRD in patients with newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus.In this population-based cohort study, we used the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) to identify 559,864 patients with newly diagnosed or treated diabetes mellitus who were ages from 20 to 85 years between 2001 and 2008. We identified 1695 patients with ESRD during the study period. The mean follow-up time of the patients with ESRD was 5.7 years. Time-dependent Cox proportional hazards regression was performed to estimate the hazard ratios for ESRD among the patients with newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus.After adjustment for various covariates, nonadherence to oral antihyperglycemic medication (OAM) was associated with a higher risk of ESRD compared with adherence to OAM (hazard ratio [HR], 1.11; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.01–1.23). The effects of nonadherence to OAM on the risk of ESRD were significant for patients without hypertension, without gout, without chronic kidney disease, undergoing OAM polytherapy, and undergoing metformin polytherapy (HR [95% CIs], 1.18 [1.00–1.39], 1.13 [1.02–1.26], 1.17 [1.03–1.33], 1.22 [1.08–1.38], and 1.13 [1.02–1.25], respectively).In conclusion, nonadherence to OAM therapy is associated with ESRD. Adherence to medication therapy can prevent the progressive loss of renal function and ESRD for patients with diabetes.


Women in paid work from low income families are engaged in poorly paid, precarious employment, even as they are overburdened with unpaid care work responsibilities. This double burden has depleting consequences for both their mental and physical wellbeing, as well as those of their children. For women in these contexts to move from a double burden to a "double boon", women's economic empowerment programmes have to both improve the options and conditions of women's paid work and recognise, reduce and redistribute their unpaid care work burdens.


This paper shows that the leverage ratio affects repo intermediation for banks and non-bank financial institutions. We exploit a novel regulatory change in the UK to identify an exogenous intensification of the leverage ratio and combine this with supervisory transaction-level data capturing the near-universe of gilt repo trading. Studying adjustments at the dealer-client level and controlling for demand and confounding factors, we find that dealers subject to a more binding leverage ratio reduced liquidity in the repo market. This affected their small but not their large clients. We further document a reduction in frequency of transactions and a worsening of repo pricing, but no adjustment in haircuts or maturities. Finally, we find evidence of market resilience, based on existing, rather than new repo relationships, with foreign, non-constrained dealers stepping in. Overall, our findings help shed light on the impact of Basel III capital regulation on repo markets.


Nanophotonic waveguides and components are promising for use in the large-scale integration of photonic circuits. Coupling light between nanophotonic waveguides and a single-mode fiber is an important problem and many different solutions have been proposed and demonstrated in recent years. In this paper, we discuss a grating coupler approach. Grating couplers can be placed anywhere on a circuit and can easily be integrated. We have experimentally demonstrated >30% coupling efficiency with a 1 dB bandwidth of 40 nm on standard wafers. Theoretically, the coupling efficiency can be improved to >90% using an optimized grating design and layer stack. The fabrication of the couplers in silicon-on-insulator and in indium phosphide membranes is also discussed.


Zinc chloride is a source of zinc used in various pharmaceutical/nutraceutical formulations. The objective of the current study was to investigate the impact of The Trivedi Effect® - Energy of Consciousness Healing Treatment (Biofield Energy Treatment) on physical, structural, thermal, and behavioral properties of zinc chloride using PXRD, PSD, FT-IR, UV-vis, and DSC analysis. Zinc chloride was divided into two parts – one part was control, while another part was treated with The Trivedi Effect® remotely by twenty renowned Biofield Energy Healers and defined as The Trivedi Effect® Treated sample. A significant alteration of the crystallite size and relative intensities of the PXRD peaks was observed in The Trivedi Effect® treated sample compared with the control sample. The average crystallite size of the treated sample was significantly increased by 23.18% compared with the control sample. The particle size values at d10, d50, and d90 values were significantly decreased by 3.70%, 4.13%, and 6.13%, respectively in the treated sample compared with the control sample. Therefore, the surface area of the treated sample was increased by 4.21% compared with the control sample. The FT-IR spectroscopic analysis revealed that Zn-Cl stretching in the control sample was found at 512 cm-1, whereas it was significantly shifted upward to 520 cm-1 in the treated sample. The UV-vis analysis exhibited that wavelength of the maximum absorbance (λmax) of the control and treated samples were at 197.6 nm and 197.1 nm, respectively. The DSC analysis exhibited that the melting temperature was decreased by 0.22%, while decomposition temperature was increased by 2.56% in the treated sample compared to the control sample. The latent heat of fusion of the treated sample (320.44 J/g) was significantly decreased by 16.70% compared with the control sample (284.67 J/g). Similarly, the enthalpy of decomposition of the treated sample (952.53 J/g) was significantly increased by 122.61% compared with the control sample (427.90 J/g). Thus, the results indicated that the thermal stability of the treated zinc chloride was improved compared with the control sample. The current study anticipated that The Trivedi Effect® - Energy of Consciousness Healing Treatment might lead to produce a thermally stable new polymorphic form of zinc chloride, which would be more soluble and bioavailable compared with the untreated compound. Hence, the treated zinc chloride would be very useful to design better nutraceutical/pharmaceutical formulations that might offer better therapeutic response against inflammatory diseases, immunological disorders, aging, stress, cancer, etc.


The use of waterproofing in construction industry was established in October 1837 by Mr. Claridge in investigation of the possibilities of water proof material for construction use. Then, further investigation was done repeatedly to find the best techniques and materials for the use of waterproofing materials in construction industry. It is has been used some year 1845 and by the year 1860, it had become one of the most indispensable technique in the construction industry. The materials and technologies of water proofing has developed vastly into world usage in new and existing buildings both internally and externally.Generally, waterproofing is a technique with the ability to resist the penetration of water into the building or any part of building elements.This characteristic is important to avoid any dampness to the building interiors which is one of the most causes of building defect. It is often rated first among the most causes of construction complaints,continually creating unnecessary problems. No single building component producing such enormous problems has so little standardization on which to base improvements. The construction industry has yet to adopt the principle that the entire exterior facade must be treated as single cohesive unit elements in which all individual components are transitioned into one another in completely waterproof detailing.
Different types of waterproofing materials are useful for different types of buildings, the usage, the weather type, etc. The installation process must catch up with technology advances in materials and systems.These manufactured products do not produce leakage; it is rather the improper detailing or lack thereof in integrating products into a structure that causes the problem. Waterproofing manufacturers must also become more responsive in providing information on the correct details for transitions and termination methods used to incorporate their materials into composite building elements.


A new two-terminal circuit element-called the memristorcharacterized by a relationship between the charge q(t)\equiv \int_{-\infty}^{t} i(\tau) d \tau and the flux-linkage \varphi(t)\equiv \int_{- \infty}^{t} v(\tau) d \tau is introduced as the fourth basic circuit element. An electromagnetic field interpretation of this relationship in terms of a quasi-static expansion of Maxwell's equations is presented. Many circuit-theoretic properties of memistors are derived. It is shown that this element exhibits some peculiar behavior different from that exhibited by resistors, inductors, or capacitors. These properties lead to a number of unique applications which cannot be realized with RLC networks alone. Although a physical memristor device without internal power supply has not yet been discovered, operational laboratory models have been built with the help of active circuits. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the properties and potential applications of memristors.


We present an algorithm for computing the relative perceptual saliencies of the features of a three-dimensional object using either goodness-of-view scores measured at several viewpoints or perceptual similarities among several object views. This technique addresses the inverse, illposed version of the direct problem of predicting goodness-of-view scores or view point similarities when the object features are known. On the basis of a linear model for the direct problem, we solve the inverse problem using the method of regularization. The critical assumption we make to regularize the solution is that perceptual salience varies slowly on the surface of the object. The salient regions derived using this assumption empirically indicate what object structures are important in human three-dimensional object perception, a domain where theories typically have been based on somewhat ad hoc features.


OBJECTIVE
To examine the association between availability of lethal methods of suicide and method-specific suicide rates at the city/ county level in Taiwan.

METHOD
Age-adjusted and age-specific suicide rates of 23 cities/counties in Taiwan for the years 1999 to 2003 were calculated. Partial correlation coefficients were used to examine cross-sectional associations between independent variables, i.e., proportion of agricultural population and proportion of households living on the sixth floor or above, and suicide rates by different methods (poisoning by solids/liquids, jumping, and hanging) after adjusting for unemployment rates and prevalence of depression.

RESULTS
The partial correlation coefficient was 0.77 (p < .001) for proportion of agricultural population with solids/liquids poisoning suicide rates. It was 0.73 (p < .001) for the proportion of households living on the sixth floor or above with suicide rates by jumping. Correlations between hanging suicide rates and proportion of agricultural population or between hanging suicide rates and proportion of households living on the sixth floor or above were not significant.

CONCLUSION
The results showed strong positive associations between access to lethal methods and method-specific suicide rates. Controlling the availability of pesticides and fencing high buildings or installing window guards may be effective measures for suicide prevention.


The purpose of this paper is to propose a nonparametric interest rate term structure model and investigate its implications on term structure dynamics and prices of interest rate derivative securities. The nonparametric spot interest rate process is estimated from the observed short-term interest rates following a robust estimation procedure and the market price of interest rate risk is estimated as implied from the historical term structure data. That is, instead of imposing a priori restrictions on the model, data are allowed to speak for themselves, and at the same time the model retains a parsimonious structure and the computational tractability. The model is implemented using historical Canadian interest rate term structure data. The parametric models with closed form solutions for bond and bond option prices, namely the Vasicek (1977) and CIR (1985) models, are also estimated for comparison purpose. The empirical results not only provide strong evidence that the traditional spot interest rate models and market prices of interest rate risk are severely misspecified but also suggest that different model specifications have significant impact on term structure dynamics and prices of interest rate derivative securities.


Performance analysis is carried out for a multihop optical ShuffleNet with full wavelength conversion to evaluate the effect of wavelength converters on the bit-error-rate (BER) and packet-error-rate (PER) performance. Computed results show that there is a significant decrease in BER with an increase in the number of wavelength converters nw for the same transmitter power. Further, an increase of nw is needed at increased network load g; for example, to achieve the maximum throughput, nw ≈ 10 and nw ≈ 20 are needed corresponding to g = 0.5 and g = 1.0. It is found that when convolutional coding is applied, the required number of wavelength converters is greatly reduced at the full load g = 1.0.


We present a tensor product formulation for Hilbert space-filling curves. Both recursive and iterative formulas are expressed. We view a Hilbert space-filling curve as a permutation which maps two-dimensional 2ntimes2n data elements stored in the row major or column major order to the order of traversing a Hilbert space-filling curve. The tensor product formula of Hilbert space-filling curves uses several permutation operations: stride permutation, radix-2 gray permutation, transposition, and antidiagonal transposition. The iterative tensor product formula can be manipulated to obtain the inverse Hilbert permutation. Also, the formulas are directly translated into computer programs which can be used in various applications including R-tree indexing, image processing, and process allocation, etc


The large body of evidences indicate that epidermal growth factor (EGF) is synthesized, stored and secreted by the submandibular glands and also by the sublingual glands. EGF shows stimulating activity on various epidermal epithelial tissues both in vitro and in vivo. A series of observations suggest that the growth factors and in particular EGF plays an important role in the male reproductive system. The concentration of EGF in the submandibular gland and plasma of the female mice increases substantially during pregnancy. The midgestational sialoadenectomy of female mice reduces EGF level.
 To show the effect of salivariadenectomy of the pregnant mother, on the development and function of testis, testicular lactase dehydrogenase isoenzyme was studied biochemically and electrophoretically. LDH-X is one of the LDH isoenzymes which is unique to pachytene spermatocytes, spermatids and mature sperm. The pregnant females were salivariadenectomised (sublingualectomy, sialoadenectomy and both sublingualectomy + sialoadenectomy) at 10th day of their gestation period. The 20 days, 45 days, 60 days old male offsprings of salivaridenectomised mother as well as male offsprings of the same age of sham operated mother were sacrificed by the cervical dislocation and their testis were used to study the electrophoretic separation of lactate dehydrogenase and estimation of lactate dehydrogenase.
 In the testis of 20 days, 45 days, 60 days normal mice of sham operated mother, the LDH was separated into six bands i.e. I, II, III, IV, V and LDH-X. But in the testis of above aged mice of sublingualctomised, sialoadenectomised and salivariadenectomised mother, LDH-X band was disappeared. The LDH activity was decreased significantly in the testis of 20 days, 45 days, 60 days offsprings of sublingualectomised mother as compared to normal mice of sham operated mother. The above results suggest that maternal EGF affects the development and functions of testis.


It's a Excel basics book that every civil engineer should have read by now. It addresses skills that may not be covered in most Excel for civil engineering texts, such as step by step guides to create an application program and how to convert the steps into VBA code, how to perform matrix operations (multiplication and inversion) using Excel-VBA, macro for creating an engineering chart, a brief and simple guide to become an instant Excel-VBA programmer, and more... Also to be presented the depiction in AutoCAD program. Yes! AutoCAD is chosen because one of its advantages that relies on high drawing accuracy. You will learn how to create a simple AutoCAD script file using Excel formulas and Excel-VBA. It is expected that you will be able to create simple Cartesian graph in AutoCAD, even you are an AutoCAD first time user! This book contains the author's collection of custom functions and also a series of engineering calculation programming that are very useful to adopt. With the ease of working with Excel, coupled with benefit of the given examples in this book, it is expected to increase the interest of the reader to create new original application programs. Thus, each model or even a specific calculation will be an exciting challenge for a programming job is already enjoyable. Happy Excel programming!


Friedman (1955) argued that giving parents freedom to choose schools would improve education. His argument was simple and compelling because it extended results from markets for consumer goods to education. We review the evidence, which yields surprisingly mixed results on Friedman's prediction. A key reason is that households often seem to choose schools based on their absolute achievement rather than their value added. We show this can be rational in a model based on three ingredients economists have highlighted since Friedman worked on the issue. First, education is an investment into human capital (Becker, 1964). Second, labor markets can feature wage premia: individuals of a given skill level may receive higher wages if they match to more productive firms (Card et al., 2018). Third, distance influences school choice and the placements schools produce (Abdulkadiroglu et al., 2017, Weinstein, 2017). These imply that choice alone is too crude a mechanism to ensure the effective provision of schooling.


Automatic structuring (feature coding and object recognition) of topographic data, such as that derived from air survey or raster scanning large-scale paper maps, requires the classification of objects such as buildings, roads, rivers, fields and railways. The recognition of objects in computer vision is largely based on the matching of descriptions of shapes. Fourier descriptors, moment invariants, boundary chain coding and scalar descriptors are methods that have been widely used and have been developed to describe shape irrespective of position, orientation and scale. The applicability of the above four methods to topographic shapes is described and their usefulness evaluated.

All methods derive descriptors consisting of a small number of real values from the object's polygonal boundary. Two large corpora representing data sets from Ordnance Survey maps of Purbeck and Plymouth were available. The effectiveness of each description technique was evaluated by using one corpus as a training-set to derive distributions for the values for supervised learning. This was then used to reclassify the objects in both data sets using each individual descriptor to evaluate their effectiveness. No individual descriptor or method produced consistent correct classification.

Various models for the fusion of the classification results from individual descriptors were implemented. These were used to experiment with different combinations of descriptors in order to improve results. Overall results show that Moment Invariants fused with the minfusion rule gave the best performance with the two data sets. Much further work remains to be done as enumerated in the concluding section.


The spectral function can be introduced into the transverse wave-number representation of TE modes in a dielectric slab guide. The modified representation provides a connection to the theory of singular ordinary differential equations. By making use of this theory, some exact solutions to novel dielectric slab guides can be found. The Gel'fand–Levitan integral equation is used to construct an example that has the interesting feature that Bragg reflection is used to confine the field.


ABSTRACT Dissatisfaction is one of the factors that drive customers' decisions to reduce repurchase intention. Repurchase is crucial to the success of online stores. The present study attempts to examine what coping behavior will be triggered by negative emotion in e-commerce and examines the potential influence of coping behavior on customer repurchase decisions in e-commerce. A research model that reflects the relationships among dissatisfaction, negative emotion, and customers' behavior is developed and tested by structural equation modeling on data sets consisting of 411 subjects in China. Our findings show that negative emotion is an important mediator between dissatisfaction and repurchase intention. Different coping behaviors have different impacts on repurchase intention. Based on empirical findings, we offer managerial suggestions for enhancing purchase intention in e-commerce. Keywords: Dissatisfaction, Negative emotions, Repurchase intention, Coping behavior, E-commerce 1. Introduction Ensuring customer satisfaction is the goal of online sellers [Eid 2011], but few sellers can guarantee that customers will be completely satisfied with every purchase. It can be reasonably assumed that satisfaction leads to repurchase behaviors [Fornell & Wernerfelt 1987]. Similarly, dissatisfaction is one of the factors that lead to customers' reduced repurchase intentions [Lam et al. 2004]. However, customers often decide to leave a supplier because of inadequate responses rather than for the dissatisfying problem itself [Bitner et al. 1990]. Based on the assumption that customers often complain before they leave suppliers, service recovery and complaint management efforts are employed as the main methods for retaining customers [Holloway & Beatty 2003; Schoefer & Ennew 2005]. However, customers don't always show dissatisfaction before they leave a provider [Colgate & Hedge 2001] and the phenomenon is especially prevalent in e-commerce. Online shops have provided customers with services through which they can post reviews about products purchased online, and these reviews are made available to other prospective customers. For example, bulletin board systems (BBS) on eBay.com link to Twitter and Facebook; in China, BBS on Taobao.com (the largest consumer-to-consumer (C2C) marketplace in China and is provided by Alibaba) links to popular social networking sites. However, it is not particularly common for customers to post online reviews. According to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) [CNNIC 2009], only 29.5% of customers are inclined to comment on their online purchases. Among the customers who shared their purchase information, 63.8% provided reviews in the e-shops' BBS, and about 65.7% reviewed their purchases on social networking sites such as blogs, virtual spaces and virtual communities. Some dissatisfied customers express their dissatisfaction to sellers through their complaining behaviors, while others do not necessarily report their dissatisfaction directly to the sellers-they tend to remain silent about the problems, or they seek support via social networking sites. Because of these tendencies, it is not enough to retain or recover customers just by handling complaints in e-commerce. Other post-purchase behaviors triggered by dissatisfaction should also be carefully examined [Stewart 1998]. Post-purchase behaviors are influenced by emotions rather than cognitive aspects [Bigne & Andreu 2004; Bonifield & Cole 2007]. Previous studies have indicated that an unfavorable service experience will result in negative emotions [Bougie et al. 2003]; and negative emotions signal a great need for coping behaviors such as complaining and non-complaining [Lazarus 1991; Chebat et al. 2005; Chebat & Slusarczyk 2005]. However, insufficient research has been conducted regarding the relationship between negative emotions and customer post-purchase behavior in e-commerce. …


The state of Tibetan culture within contemporary China is a highly politicized topic on which reliable information is rare. But what is Tibetan culture and how should it be developed or preserved? The Chinese authorities and the Tibetans in exile present conflicting views on almost every aspect of Tibetan cultural life. Ashild Kolas and Monika Thowsen have gathered an astounding array of data to quantify Tibetan cultural activities--involving Tibetan language, literature, visual arts, museums, performing arts, festivals, and religion. Their study is based on fieldwork and interviews conducted in the ethnic Tibetan areas surrounding the Tibetan Autonomous Region--parts of the Chinese provinces of Sichuan, Gansu, Yunnan, and Qinghai. Aware of the ambiguous nature of information collected in restricted circumstances, they make every effort to present a complete and unbiased picture of Tibetan communities living on China's western frontiers. Kolas and Thowsen investigate the present conditions of Tibetan cultural life and cultural expression, providing a wealth of detailed information on topics such as the number of restored monasteries and nunneries and the number of monks, nuns, and tulkus (reincarnated lamas) affiliated with them; sources of funding for monastic reconstruction and financial support of clerics; types of religious ceremonies being practiced; the content of monastic and secular education; school attendance; educational curriculum and funding; the role of language in Tibetan schools; and Tibetan news and cultural media. On the Margins of Tibet will be of interest to historians and social scientists studying modern China and Tibetan culture, and to the many others concerned about Tibet's place in the world.


ABSTRACT
 The five species of genus Euthacanthus Powrie, 1864 are reduced to two species on morphological and stratigraphical evidence. Euthacanthus macnicoli Powrie, 1864 and Euthacanthus grandis Powrie, 1870 are here synonymised in the type species E. macnicoli Powrie, 1864. In a previous article, Euthacanthus gracilis Powrie, 1870 and Euthacanthus elegans Powrie, 1870 were combined in the species E. gracilis, and the fifth species, Euthacanthus curtus Powrie, 1870, was reassigned to Uraniacanthus curtus (Powrie, 1870). In this work, we give an in-depth study of the full range of morphological and histological structure of scales over the body of E. macnicoli, as well as of fin spine structure. Our study reveals new features of E. macnicoli, including a large ornamented dorsal sclerotic bone, ornament on the branchiostegal plates, a separate series of gular rays, calcified cartilage forming the jaws, and a postbranchial protruding spinose plate rather than the flat prepectoral plate previously described.


Contents 653 I. 654 II. 657 III. 659 IV. 661 V. 662 VI. 663 VII. 665 665 References 665 SUMMARY: Biological decomposition and wildfire are connected carbon release pathways for dead plant material: slower litter decomposition leads to fuel accumulation. Are decomposition and surface fires also connected through plant community composition, via the species' traits? Our central concept involves two axes of trait variation related to decomposition and fire. The 'plant economics spectrum' (PES) links biochemistry traits to the litter decomposability of different fine organs. The 'size and shape spectrum' (SSS) includes litter particle size and shape and their consequent effect on fuel bed structure, ventilation and flammability. Our literature synthesis revealed that PES-driven decomposability is largely decoupled from predominantly SSS-driven surface litter flammability across species; this finding needs empirical testing in various environmental settings. Under certain conditions, carbon release will be dominated by decomposition, while under other conditions litter fuel will accumulate and fire may dominate carbon release. Ecosystem-level feedbacks between decomposition and fire, for example via litter amounts, litter decomposition stage, community-level biotic interactions and altered environment, will influence the trait-driven effects on decomposition and fire. Yet, our conceptual framework, explicitly comparing the effects of two plant trait spectra on litter decomposition vs fire, provides a promising new research direction for better understanding and predicting Earth surface carbon dynamics.


Designing Carbon Dioxide Traps One widely discussed means of stemming the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is to capture the gas prior to its emission and then bury it. The materials currently known to best adsorb CO2 for this purpose tend to involve amine groups; however, the precise molecular details of adsorption often remain murky, and rational improvement of sorbent properties by structural modification has been challenging. Vaidhyanathan et al. (p. 650; see the Perspective by Lastoskie) have crystallographically resolved the binding motifs of CO2 in an amine-bearing metal-organic framework solid. Accompanying theoretical simulations matched the experimental observations. Crystallographic resolution of bound carbon dioxide in a porous solid validates methods of theoretically predicting binding behavior. Understanding the molecular details of CO2-sorbent interactions is critical for the design of better carbon-capture systems. Here we report crystallographic resolution of CO2 molecules and their binding domains in a metal-organic framework functionalized with amine groups. Accompanying computational studies that modeled the gas sorption isotherms, high heat of adsorption, and CO2 lattice positions showed high agreement on all three fronts. The modeling apportioned specific binding interactions for each CO2 molecule, including substantial cooperative binding effects among the guest molecules. The validation of the capacity of such simulations to accurately model molecular-scale binding bodes well for the theory-aided development of amine-based CO2 sorbents. The analysis shows that the combination of appropriate pore size, strongly interacting amine functional groups, and the cooperative binding of CO2 guest molecules is responsible for the low-pressure binding and large uptake of CO2 in this sorbent material.


Central bank forward guidance emerged as a pertinent tool for monetary policymakers since the Great Recession. Nevertheless, the effects of forward guidance remain unclear. This paper investigates the effectiveness of forward guidance while relaxing two standard macroeconomic assumptions: rational expectations and frictionless financial markets. Agents forecast future macroeconomic variables via either the rational expectations hypothesis or a more plausible theory of expectations formation called adaptive learning. A standard Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model is extended to include the financial accelerator mechanism. The results show that the addition of financial frictions amplifies the differences between rational expectations and adaptive learning to forward guidance. The macroeconomic variables are overall more responsive to forward guidance under rational expectations than under adaptive learning. During a period of economic crisis (e.g. a recession), output under rational expectations displays more favorable responses to forward guidance than under adaptive learning. These differences are exacerbated when compared to a similar analysis without financial frictions. Thus, monetary policymakers should consider the way in which expectations and credit frictions are modeled when examining the effects of forward guidance.


Understanding flow in the three-dimensional phase space is challenging both to human experts and current computer science technology. To break through the barrier, we are building a program called PSX3 that can autonomously explore the flow in a three-dimensional phase space, by integrating AI and numerical techniques. In this paper, I point out that quasi-symbolic representation called flow mappings is effective as a means of capturing qualitative aspects of three-dimensional flow and present a method of generating flow mappings for a system of ordinary differential equations with three unknown functions. The method is based on a finding that geometric cues for generating a set of flow patterns can be classified into five categories. I demonstrate how knowledge about interaction of geometric cues is utilized for intelligently controlling numerical computation.


Consideration for the energy consumption and environmental impacts is required depending on the changed capacity under a flexible and reconfigurable manufacturing environment. This article focuses on a holistic production planning approach in a reconfigurable manufacturing system. The energy consumption and material flows that are incurred on the reconfigurable manufacturing system are defined from the perspective of the processing plan describing how to make a part. The suggested energy estimation model integrates the existing literature and set up a newly modified model including diverse part handling systems such as automated guided vehicle and conveyor in more detail. Alternative system reconfigurations are analysed in order to dynamically evaluate the performance in terms of different holistic criteria such as the energy consumption, environmental effects and throughput. A production planning model with the multi-objective function for minimising the energy consumption and maximising the throughput is developed. The benefit coming from the adoption of suggested model has been addressed with reference to a real industrial use case study.