The post-1994 period in the South African economy is characterised, perhaps most powerfully, by the fact that the economy recorded one of its longest periods of positive economic growth in the country's history. One of the more vexing issues within the economic policy terrain in post-apartheid South Africa though, has been the impact of this consistently positive growth performance on social welfare. Many observers have highlighted the potentially harmful consequences of persistently high levels of poverty and particularly, economic inequality on the quality and sustainability of democracy. The evidence suggests, at best, six key trends which are noteworthy in terms of observing changes and challenges in South Africa's second decade of democracy. Firstly, it is clear that both absolute and relative levels of poverty have fallen for African- and female-headed households. And it is a result invariant to the choice of poverty line. Secondly though, we continue to show that race and gender remain overwhelming determinants of this poverty profile. Thirdly, the trends in income inequality suggest that one of the world's most unequal societies has quite possibly become the most unequal. In turn, and our fourth key deduction, it is evident that income inequality between racial groups – to all intents and purposes between Africans and Whites – is driving this overall increase. Our analysis of the nature of economic growth since 1995 suggests that despite positive economic growth, individuals at the top-end of the distribution have gained the most from the post-apartheid growth dividend. Indeed, what this suggests is that the country's current democratic growth model is crafted around supporting incomes at the bottom-end of the distribution through an extensive social transfer programme, whilst offering few returns to those in the middle of the distribution. It is not evident, as South Africa enters its first post-1994 recession with declining tax revenues and rising fiscal deficits, whether such a growth model is indeed desirable or sustainable.


When the Schiavo case burst onto the national scene, most of us assumed that everyone would see the case as we did. But instead, Schiavo showed that U.S. pluralism was alive and well in decisions about life-sustaining treatment. Schiavo demonstrated, too, that at least some of this pluralism reflects misguided myths about human life and death. In this essay, I examine the myths that Schiavo exposed. One such myth is that death with dignity is easily attainable in modern America, as long as people make living wills. Another myth is that only patients themselves are permitted to take quality of life into account when deciding about life-sustaining interventions. A third myth is that research advances are bringing an end to the difficulties of aging. To examine the myths, I draw on public commentary about Schiavo and on four texts published in 2005, when the case was in the headlines.


"Lending of last resort" is one of the key powers of central banks. As a lender-of-last-resort, the Federal Reserve famously supports commercial banks facing distressed liquidity conditions, thereby mitigating destabilizing bank runs. Less famously, lender-of-last-resort powers also influence the distribution of credit among different groups in society and therefore have high stakes for economic inequality. The Fed's role as a lender-of-last-resort witnessed an unprecedented expansion during the 2007-9 Crisis when the Fed invoked emergency powers to lend to a new set of borrowers known as "shadow banks". The decision proved controversial and spurred legislative reform narrowing the Fed's authority as well as an ongoing scholarly debate. Participants in this debate, the article argues, limited their focus to financial stability considerations, thereby neglecting those powers' considerable distributive implications. The article contributes to the current literature by demonstrating the distributive stakes of lender-of-last-resort powers through a concrete historical example: the legislative debate around the 1913 Federal Reserve Act that established the Fed. During that time, three different groups debated the legal definition of "eligible collateral" that the Fed could accept from borrowers to secure emergency loans. The first group was corporate financiers, who were interested in supporting capital markets. The second group was the Democratic framers of the Act, who tried to divert credit away from corporate securities and into small businesses. The third group was farmers that needed credit for developing the agrarian periphery. I argue that each of these groups tried to shape the definition of eligible collateral in ways that would promote that group's unique credit needs and reduce its borrowing costs. For us today, this history is an invitation to reconsider the distributive implications of the current lender-of-last-resort powers and revise them accordingly.


Olympic athletes donAEt get to the top simply because of athletic genes (nature) or determined parents (nurture). Like all performers in pressure situations, their exceptional drive comes from a third factor: an inner desire to be the best they can be. The Winning Factor reveals how to ignite the passion and the resolve required to succeed. As someone who has trained both Olympic athletes and Fortune 500 executives, Peter Jensen knows how to translate the best practices of world-class coaches into the everyday business realm. Readers will discover: o Five key practices of medal-winning coaches: managing themselves, building trust, using imagery, overcoming blocks, and embracing adversity o The secrets behind great communication and truly effective feedback o Insights on leader ship from six Olympic coachesuwith guidelines for applying these lessons to the workplace Packed with engaging stories and enlightening examples, The Winning Factor teaches managers everywhere how to inspire standout performance from their employees.


Sustainable urban water management (SUWM) requires an integrated, adaptive, coordinated and participatory approach. Current urban water policies are beginning to reflect this understanding yet the rhetoric is often not translated to implementation. Despite the 'new' philosophy, urban water management remains a complex and fragmented area relying on traditional, technical, linear management approaches. Despite widespread acknowledgement of the barriers to change, there has been little systematic review of what constitutes the scope of such barriers and how these should be addressed to advance SUWM. To better understand why implementation fails to occur beyond ad hoc project interventions, an extensive literature review of observed and studied barriers was conducted. Drawing on local, national and international literature from the field of integrated urban water management and other similar fields, 53 studies were assessed, resulting in a typology of 12 barrier types. The analysis revealed the barriers are largely socio-institutional rather than technical, reflecting issues related to community, resources, responsibility, knowledge, vision, commitment and coordination. Furthermore, the meta-analysis demonstrated a paucity of targeted strategies for overcoming the stated institutional barriers. Evaluation of the typology in relation to capacity building suggests that these systemic issues require a sophisticated programme of change that focuses on fostering social capital, inter-sectoral professional development, and inter-organisational coordination.


Simulation models and theory prove that emission trading converges to market equilibrium. This paper sets out to falsify these results using experimental economics. Three experiments are conducted for the six largest carbon emitting industrialized regions. Two experiments use auctions: the first single-bid auction and the second a Walrasian auction. The third relies on bilateral, sequential trading. The paper finds that, in line with the standard theory, both auctions and bilateral, sequential trading capture a significant part (88 to 99 percent) of the potential cost savings of emission trading. As expected from dynamic trade theory, all experiments show that the market price converges (although not fully) to the market equilibrium price. In contrast to the theory, the results also suggest that not all countries will gain from trading. In both the bilateral trading experiment and the Walrasian auction, one country will actually be worse off with trade. In particular, bilateral, sequential trading leads to a distribution of gains significantly different from the competitive market outcome. This is due to speculative behavior, imperfect foresight and market power.


This Article was prepared for the Loyola University Chicago Law Journal's Symposium "Decisions, Decisions: Exploring Factors that Affect the Judicial Decision-Making Process." It questions the trend in Supreme Court cases and academic commentary toward greater reliance in patent litigation on the hypothetical "person having ordinary skill in the art" ("PHOSITA") — essentially a person of average abilities in the technical field of the invention. This trend reflects a desire to approach as closely as possible the first-best outcome of accuracy to the technical merits of patent disputes. However, this first-best outcome is impossible given the constraints imposed by lay decision makers. Long-standing proposals to tailor patent litigation institutions to patent law's technical nature by increasing the technical competence of decision makers have made little headway. If lay decision makers are here to stay, then the optimal approach is to tailor patent law to the needs of these lay decision makers, including by reducing and constraining the PHOSITA's role. Lay judges and jurors lack the knowledge, training, and experience to reliably apply the PHOSITA's perspective themselves. Therefore, increased reliance on the PHOSITA equates with increased reliance on expert witnesses, which introduces a host of well-recognized problems. Attempting to approximate the theoretical ideal of technical fidelity through the PHOSITA is misguided due to the errors introduced by the expert witnesses necessitated by lay decision makers. Tailoring patent law to the needs of lay decision makers — including more legalistic and objective doctrines that reduce the role of the PHOSITA — may be optimal in practice, even if second-best in theory.


Previous investigations of patients with gestational trophoblastic neoplasia have shown that their urines often contain carboxyterminal peptide (CTP) fragments of the choriogonadotropin (hCG) beta-subunit as well as forms of hCG deficient in sialic acid. In order to determine whether beta-CTP fragments are among the urinary products of the peripheral degradation of desialylated hCG (as-hCG), using a continuous infusion technique, we gave highly purified as-hCG to humans. Six healthy subjects were given a loading dose of 0.8 mg of as-hCG followed by an infusion of the same preparation. An overall mean infusion rate of 62.9 micrograms/min was maintained for 6 h, and the mean serum concentration of as-hCG achieved during the infusion was 72.1 ng/ml. In all six subjects, beta-CTP fragments were the predominant immunoreactive forms of as-hCG in urine obtained during the infusion. In contrast, the urine of subjects infused with hCG has been shown to contain hCG itself, but nil beta-CTP fragments or as-hCG. After the as-hCG infusion was stopped, the excretion of the beta-CTP fragments in urine declined rapidly. There were no beta-CTP fragments detectable in sera obtained during the infusion or in sera incubated with as-hCG at 37 degrees C. After incubation with as-hCG for 4 h, the urine of normal subjects contained small amounts of beta-CTP fragments; however, the apparent proteolytic activity was too low to account for either the quantity of beta-CTP fragments produced during the infusion or the extremely low levels of as-hCG in the urine. These data demonstrate the existence in humans of a peripheral metabolic pathway that cleaves beta-CTP fragments from as-hCG and allows their excretion in urine. Thus, the frequent presence of beta-CTP fragments in the urines of patients with gestational trophoblastic neoplasia can be accounted for in part by the metabolism of the forms of hCG that bear an altered carbohydrate structure, which are prevalent in this disease.


Affordable higher education is, and has been, a key element of social policy in the United States with broad bipartisan support.  Financial aid has substantially increased the number of people who complete university—generally thought to be a good thing.  We show, however, that making education more affordable can increase income inequality.  The mechanism that drives our results is a combination of credit constraints and the 'signaling' role of education first explored by Spence (1973).  When borrowing for education is difficult, lack of a college education could mean that one is either of low ability or of high ability but with low financial resources.  When government programs make borrowing easier or tuition more affordable, high‐ability persons become educated and leave the uneducated pool, driving down the wage for unskilled workers and raising the skill premium.


Title of dissertation: NEAR-GRAZING AND NOISE-INFLUENCED DYNAMICS OF ELASTIC CANTILEVERS WITH NONLINEAR TIP INTERACTION FORCES Ishita Chakraborty, 2012 Dissertation directed by: Professor Balakumar Balachandran Department of Mechanical Engineering Within this dissertation work, numerical, analytical, and experimental studies are conducted with macro-scale and micro-scale elastic structures in the presence of nonlinear force interactions. The specific physical systems explored within this work are an atomic force microscope (AFM) micro-cantilever and a macro-scale cantilever experiencing similar tip interaction forces as the AFM cantilever operated in tapping mode. The tip sample forces in an AFM operation are highly nonlinear, with longrange attractive forces and short-range repulsive forces. In the macro-scale case, magnetic attractive forces and repulsive forces, which arise due to impacts with a compliant surface are used to generate similar nonlinear tip interaction forces. For elastic structures subjected to off-resonance base excitations, bifurcations close to grazing events are studied in detail, and the observed nonlinear phenomena are found to be common across the considered length scales. The dynamics of the considered systems are studied with a reduced-order computational model based on Galerkin projection with a single mode approximation. Along with studies on the bifurcation behavior, the effects of added Gaussian white noise on the system dynamics are also examined. Non-smooth system dynamics is studied by constructing local maps near the discontinuity. Period-doubling events are examined by using Poincare maps and discontinuity mapping analysis. An important component of this dissertation research is the investigations into the effects of noise on the dynamics of these structures. Experimental and numerical efforts are used to examine the stochastic dynamics of the cantilever structures when a random component is added to the harmonic input. The noise effects are studied when the excitation frequency is close to a system resonance as well as when it is off-resonance. An analytical-numerical method with moment evolution equations is used to study the effects of noise. The effects of noise on contact and adhesion phenomena are explored. Through this dissertation work, the importance of considering noise-influenced dynamics in microscale applications such as AFM operations is illustrated. In addition, this work helps shed light on universality of nonlinear phenomenon across different length scales. NEAR-GRAZING AND NOISE-INFLUENCED DYNAMICS OF ELASTIC CANTILEVERS WITH NONLINEAR TIP INTERACTION FORCES by Ishita Chakraborty Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2012 Advisory Committee: Professor Balakumar Balachandran, Chair and Advisor Professor Amr Baz, Department of Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Nikhil Chopra, Department of Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Santiago Solares, Department of Mechanical Engineering Professor Rajarshi Roy, Department of Physics and IPST (Dean's Representative) c © Copyright by Ishita Chakraborty 2012


We propose a cloud-based multimodal dialog platform for the remote assessment and monitoring of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) at scale. This paper presents our vision, technology setup, and an initial investigation of the efficacy of the various acoustic and visual speech metrics automatically extracted by the platform. 82 healthy controls and 54 people with ALS (pALS) were instructed to interact with the platform and completed a battery of speaking tasks designed to probe the acoustic, articulatory, phonatory, and respiratory aspects of their speech. We find that multiple acoustic (rate, duration, voicing) and visual (higher order statistics of the jaw and lip) speech metrics show statistically significant differences between controls, bulbar symptomatic and bulbar pre-symptomatic patients. We report on the sensitivity and specificity of these metrics using five-fold cross-validation. We further conducted a LASSO-LARS regression analysis to uncover the relative contributions of various acoustic and visual features in predicting the severity of patients' ALS (as measured by their self-reported ALSFRS-R scores). Our results provide encouraging evidence of the utility of automatically extracted audiovisual analytics for scalable remote patient assessment and monitoring in ALS.


From an ethical standpoint, there are questions about the best ways to include adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities in research. Scholarship reflects divergent responses to these enduring questions and values that can be at odds with one another. To deepen our understanding of beliefs in the scientific community about how to conduct ethically strong research with adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, we examined the views of researchers who conduct this research and ethics review board members on ethical principles and practices. We conducted four focus groups with 17 researchers and ethics review board members. We asked participants to discuss how to ethically conduct research, relevant factors to consider, appropriate ways to address ethical concerns, and the role of ethical and civil rights principles. Findings indicate support for the use of ethical principles and newer models of disability to promote inclusion in research, a focus on researchers' interpersonal skills and relationships to participants, questions about the best approaches to recruitment, consent, and compensation, and strategies to promote participation in research. These findings reflect the socio-ecological model of disability, civil rights-based interpretations of ethical principles, the provision of accommodations as an ethical imperative, the potential benefits of promoting relationships between researchers and persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and the need for dialogue between researchers and ethics review board members.


A novel circular-concave-and-spherical-convex (CCSC) compound texture in which a spherical convex is created in a circular concave was proposed to further improve the tribological performance of the circular concave texture under hydrodynamic lubrication. A numerical model based on the Reynolds equation was established to explore the effect of the spherical convex on tribological performance. The numerical results indicate that the spherical convex can enhance the lubricant suction and generate second hydrodynamic lubrication in the inlet region and bring about divergent wedge in the outlet region, and the two competing mechanisms determine the load-bearing capacity of the compound texture. There exists an optimal spherical convex height that makes the load-bearing capacity maximum at a specified minimum lubricating film height, and the optimal value decreases with the minimum lubricating film height increasing. For the compound texture with the optimal spherical convex height, the load-bearing capacity rises with the spherical convex bottom diameter increasing. Tribological experiments were conducted to examine the numerical results using a pin-on-disc test machine, and the experimental results agree well with the numerical results. The maximum friction reduction for the compound texture is 44% in comparison with smooth surface, whereas it is 21% compared with the optimal circular concave texture under the same conditions.


We present the first detailed geodetic image of the entire western United States south of lat 42°N, merging both campaign and continuous Global Positioning System (GPS) and very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) data sets in a combined solution for station velocities having a single, uniform reference frame. The results are consistent with a number of features previously observed through local geodetic studies and very sparse space geodetic studies, including a dominant pattern of right-lateral shear associated with the San Andreas fault, rates of the westernmost sites (along the California coast) of 46–48 mm/yr relative to a North America reference frame, and some 11–13 mm/yr of deformation accommodated east of the Sierra Nevada in the Basin and Range province north of lat 36°N. South of 36°N, the solution also shows that the southernmost San Andreas fault system accommodates effectively all interplate motion and that the southern Basin and Range is not deforming significantly. At lat 37°N, the eastern California shear zone appears to exhibit simple shear oriented between ∼N20°W and ∼N40°W relative to North America, with a fairly well defined transition zone from localized shear to diffuse spreading in the Basin and Range. Enigmatically, this transition involves a significant component of contraction normal to the overall shear-zone trend; sites in the Great Basin move southwestward at up to ∼5 mm/yr toward sites within the eastern California shear zone. To the north, in contrast, there appears to be a relatively smooth transition from east-west spreading within the eastern Great Basin to northwest-southeast shear across the westernmost Basin and Range.


A balance between alveolar liquid absorption and secretion is critical for maintaining optimal alveolar subphase liquid height and facilitating gas exchange in the alveolar space. However, the role of cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator protein (CFTR) in this homeostatic process has remained elusive. Using a newly developed porcine model of cystic fibrosis, in which CFTR is absent, we investigated ion transport properties and alveolar liquid transport in isolated type II alveolar epithelial cells (T2AECs) cultured at the air-liquid interface. CFTR was distributed exclusively to the apical surface of cultured T2AECs. Alveolar epithelia from CFTR(-/-) pigs failed to increase liquid absorption in response to agents that increase cAMP, whereas cAMP-stimulated liquid absorption in CFTR(+/-) epithelia was similar to that in CFTR(+/+) epithelia. Expression of recombinant CFTR restored stimulated liquid absorption in CFTR(-/-) T2AECs but had no effect on CFTR(+/+) epithelia. In ex vivo studies of nonperfused lungs, stimulated liquid absorption was defective in CFTR(-/-) alveolar epithelia but similar between CFTR(+/+) and CFTR(+/-) epithelia. When epithelia were studied at the air-liquid interface, elevating cAMP levels increased subphase liquid height in CFTR(+/+) but not in CFTR(-/-) T2AECs. Our findings demonstrate that CFTR is required for maximal liquid absorption under cAMP stimulation, but it is not the rate-limiting factor. Furthermore, our data define a role for CFTR in liquid secretion by T2AECs. These insights may help to develop new treatment strategies for pulmonary edema and respiratory distress syndrome, diseases in which lung liquid transport is disrupted.


The creation and operation of intergovernmental entities raise special professional responsibility issues for the lawyers involved in the formation and the long-term activities of multi-governmental bodies. It is particularly important for attorneys to pay attention to conflicts of interest that arise from giving simultaneous assistance to several governments, or from representing one entity in negotiations with other governments the attorney or firm represents. This paper briefly reviews various categories of interlocal entities in Washington State, as an example. It points out the distinctly different dynamics during the formation period and the operations period of an intergovernmental body. It then analyzes lawyer ethics problems during formation, and later operation, of an interlocal entity, suggesting ways to minimize violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct. The paper recommends, among other things, that when a lawyer is asked to assist a group of governments conceptualize and document the formation of a new interlocal body, that lawyer must determine whether she will seek to represent all of the governments in that process (obtaining consents under RPC 1.7), or to serve as a third-party neutral under RPC 2.4 (representing no client, but providing a clear explanation of that role). The choice has implications in terms of other concurrent and subsequent representations of parties. Consent letters in either situation should provide warnings about confidential information. When an intergovernmental body enters the operations phase, a lawyer selected to represent that body must analyze the potential conflicts of interest and procure consents — often numerous consents — from various parties. The paper includes sample consent letters.


Induction motors (IMs) play an essential role in the field of various industrial applications. Long-time service and tough working situations make IMs become prone to a broken rotor bar (BRB) that is one of the major causes of IMs faults. Hence, the continuous condition monitoring of BRB faults demands a computationally efficient and accurate signal diagnosis technique. The advantage of high reliability and wide applicability in condition monitoring and fault diagnosis based on vibration signature analysis results in an improved cyclic modulation spectrum (CMS), which is one of the cyclic spectral analysis algorithms. CMS is proposed in this paper for the detection and identification of BRB faults in IMs at a steady-state operation based on a vibration signature analysis. The application of CMS is based on the short-time Fourier transform (STFT) and the improved CMS approach is attributed to the optimization of STFT. The optimal window is selected to improve the accuracy for identifying the BRB fault types and severities. The appropriate window length and step size are optimized based on the selected window function to receive a better calculation benefit through simulation and experimental analysis. Compared to other estimators, the improved CMS method provides better fault detectability results by analyzing vertical vibration signatures of a healthy motor, and damaged motors with 1 BRB and 2 BRBs under 0%, 20%, 40%, 60%, and 80% load conditions. Both synthetic and experimental investigations demonstrate the proposed methodology can significantly reduce computational costs and identify the BRB fault types and severities effectively.


The purpose of this study was to examine how four teachers used the seven processes of videotape analysis to develop an analytic approach and reflective thinking towards their teaching. The study was organized within video clubs and was used to describe the interactions among four teachers about their experiences at a language institute. Data were gathered through videotaped recordings of lessons, observations, interviews, transcripts, and questionnaires. Results showed that the seven processes helped these participants develop an analytic approach to their teaching as well as develop their reflective thinking strategies about their practice. These processes created a framework that helped teachers investigate their methods as well as improve their skills to engage in reflective thinking skills. In addition, it was found that the role of the researcher as a facilitator enhanced the participants' learning.


Introduction: Bacteria plays a principal role in the pathogenesis and progression of pulpal and periapical diseases. The chronic resistant bacterial existence in the root canals has a greater influence on the endodontic treatment outcome by the persistence of periapical tissues. Higher proportions of enterococci, ranging from 29 to 77% are found in filled root canals with the persistent periapical disease. Placement of an intracanal medicament can reduce the bacterial load.
Materials and methods: Extracted and decoronated, 72 nos.
single-rooted human teeth prepared to maintain the root length of 18 mm were selected for the study. After instrumentation, E. faecalis suspension was inoculated in each of the root canal and teeth were incubated at 37°C for 72 hours within the orbital incubator. Root canal samples were randomly divided into four groups. After placement of various medicaments (namely saline, triantibiotic paste, mixture of calcium hydroxide
[Ca(OH)2] and omeprazole and carnosic acid) inside the canal, teeth were divided into three subgroups of five samples and incubated at 37°C under humid conditions for the time period of 24 hours, 48 hours and 7 days within Orbital incubator. Viable cell count assay was used to see the effect of these antimicrobials on E. faecalis biofilm.
Results: Results were statistically evaluated using KruskalWallis one-way analysis of variance tests. A p-value <0.05 was considered significant
Conclusion: Carnosic acid showed better antimicrobial properties compared to TAP, calcium hydroxide and omeprazole over the experimental period of time.


From 2001–2005, a project was undertaken on subantarctic
Macquarie Island to investigate the variation in responses to pedestrian
activity by King Aptenodytes patagonicus, Gentoo Pygoscelis papua and
Royal Eudyptes schlegeli penguins. The overall aim was to produce management-
oriented information both for commercial tourism in the subantarctic
and Antarctic, and for Antarctic Treaty Consultative Parties. A series of experimental
and observational studies were employed to quantify aspects of
physiology, behaviour and reproductive success of these three species of
subantarctic penguins when exposed to pedestrian activity – the most common
form of human activity on Macquarie Island. Key aspects of penguin ecology
likely to yield information valuable to management were investigated, including:
1) the efficacy of current minimum approach distance guidelines for
visitation to penguins; 2) the effect of visitor group size on penguin responses
to pedestrian activity; 3) the role of habituation in penguin responses to pedestrian
activity; 4) the phase of breeding / moult during which penguins are most
sensitive to pedestrian activity; and 5) comparative responses to human
activity between the three species examined. This paper describes key results
from these five studies, and the application for management of humanpenguin
interactions on Macquarie Island and other subantarctic and Antarctic
locations.


Decision-makers tend to view consulting projects in a positive light because that validates their decision to use consultants. That consultants know what they are doing is an undoubted prerequisite for success across all types of projects, not just people-related ones. The more knowledgeable a consultant has proved to be, the more satisfied the client is. Communication is another area where the gap between satisfied and unsatisfied clients is greatest. Among consulting projects that have gone well, it is hard to find a single one that has not involved a joint client-consultant team. Moreover, integration is not just a question of people working together or being based in the same physical location.


This paper examines the causes and treatments of calendar-related movements in the payroll hours and earnings time series from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey. Prior research has established that there is a correlation between the number of workdays in the month and fluctuations in CES hours and earnings. The strongest correlation was determined to exist for reporting establishments with a semi-monthly or monthly payroll. These predictable movements are related to respondent error in semimonthly and monthly payroll reports and processing limitations for payrolls. Currently, the CES hours and earnings series are adjusted for variations in the number of workdays in the 1st through the 15th of the month to treat for these effects. This paper discusses the current methods used to adjust for this effect along with the methods used to monitor changes in these correlations over time. This paper also discusses methods to detect and evaluate any residual effects of these movements in the final seasonally adjusted series and future improvements. The results show that the length of pay period effect exists for the additional data types added to collect hours and payroll for all employees. The models currently used continue to perform well and provide an accurate means of adjusting for the length of pay period effect.


Deep Reinforcement Learning (RL) has emerged as a powerful paradigm to solve a range of complex yet specific control tasks. Yet training generalist agents that can quickly adapt to new tasks remains an outstanding challenge. Recent advances in unsupervised RL have shown that pre-training RL agents with self-supervised intrinsic rewards can result in efficient adaptation. However, these algorithms have been hard to compare and develop due to the lack of a unified benchmark. To this end, we introduce the Unsupervised Reinforcement Learning Benchmark (URLB). URLB consists of two phases: reward-free pre-training and downstream task adaptation with extrinsic rewards. Building on the DeepMind Control Suite, we provide twelve continuous control tasks from three domains for evaluation and open-source code for eight leading unsupervised RL methods. We find that the implemented baselines make progress but are not able to solve URLB and propose directions for future research.


ABSTRACT The reconstruction of Stone Age subsistence in Finland is almost solely based on the study of burned bone assemblages from settlement sites. Seal bones dominate Stone Age refuse fauna while bird and fish bones are almost absent. The problem of the absence of bird and fish bones has been acknowledged, but so far the dominance of seal bone has been taken as a sign of (specialized) seal hunting as the main subsistence activity. In this article we question the use of archaeological refuse fauna as the single basis for the study of hunter-gatherer subsistence. We conducted a series of experiments to test how interspecies differences in bone characteristics may bias our current understanding of Finnish prehistoric subsistence. Our preliminary results clearly show interspecies differences in bone combustion qualities and in bone preservation. Further structural and densitometric analyses reveal significant differences in the medullary cavity of seal vs. terrestrial mammal bones. Our results also open new perspectives concerning the use of bone as an additional fuel source in prehistoric hearths.


Catharanthus roseus is a well known medicinal plant and is used for curing various human ailments. The dry leaf powder of C. roseus [1.5mg/kg b.w and 3.0 mg/kg b.w] was investigated for its antidiabetic, antihyperlipidemic and antioxidative efficacy in male albino Wistar rats. Rats were rendered hyperlipidemic by feeding high fat high cholesterol diet and diabetic by single intraperitoneal injection of freshly prepared streptozotocin [45mg /kg b.w.]. Glibenclamide was used as a standard reference drug. The experimental diets were supplemented for a period of 45 days. High fat-high cholesterol feeding and STZ induced diabetes resulted in significant increase in blood glucose, lipid profile and oxidative stress levels of blood and hepatic tissues of rats. Treatment with C. roseus significantly restored the physiological parameters to near normal. The effect of C. roseus [3mg/kg b.w] was better than glibenclamide. Results suggest that C. roseus possess a significant antidiabetic, antihyperlipidemic and antioxidative effect by attenuating biochemical and physiological alterations in HFHC diet fed animals and STZ induced diabetic rats. C. roseus can be used as a prophylactic agent for prevention and progression of lipid abnormalities associated with diabetes in STZdiabetic rats by virtue of various essential antioxidant, antidiabetic compounds and phytonutrients. ABSTRACT


The Levenberg-Marquardt parameter identification method is often used in tandem with numerical Runge-Kutta model simulation to find optimal model parameter values to match measured data. However, these methods can potentially find erroneous parameter values. The problem is exacerbated when discontinuous models are analyzed. A highly parameterized respiratory mechanics model defines a pressure-volume response to a low flow experiment in an acute respiratory distress syndrome patient. Levenberg-Marquardt parameter identification is used with various starting values and either a typical numerical integration model simulation or a novel error-stepping method. Model parameter values from the error-stepping method were consistently located close to the error minima (median deviation: 0.4%). In contrast, model values from numerical integration were erratic and distinct from the error minima (median deviation: 1.4%). The comparative failure of Runge-Kutta model simulation was due to the method's poor handling of model discontinuities and the resultant lack of smoothness in the error surface. As the Levenberg-Marquardt identification system is an error gradient decent method, it depends on accurate measurement of the model-to-measured data error surface. Hence, the method failed to converge accurately due to poorly defined error surfaces. When the error surface is imprecisely identified, the parameter identification process can produce suboptimal results. Particular care must be used when gradient decent methods are used in conjunction with numerical integration model simulation methods and discontinuous models. Parameter identification, Physiological modelling, Numerical integration, Hickling model, Alveolar recruitment.


The following thesis explores the social identities of TertuIIian, a Christian from Carthage who lived from approximately 160 to 220. After exploring the implications of calling TertuIIian an "African Theologian," the introduction interacts with the work done on TertuIIian in the past, concluding that although he was once read Euro-centrically and assumed to be a Roman, explicitly, and a European, implicitly, scholars in recent decades have deconstructed the biographical information of TertuIIian, leaving his African origin as one of the only undisputed aspects of his life. However, while scholars have located TertuIIian within the broader movements of the Roman Empire, few have explored the North African milieu in relation to Tertullian's writings. In order to contribute to this area of scholarship, theories from the discipline of Social Anthropology are accommodated and applied to selections of Tertullian's writings, thereby exploring Tertullian's construction of his own identities. The social theories applied, namely, social identity, kinship identity, class identity, ethnic identity and religious identity, are used heuristically to read the sources from Roman Africa in order to inquire as to the various identities constructed by individuals and groups. Within the social context of Roman Africa, this study establishes the categories of Roman colonizers, indigenous Africans and new elites. The third category, new elites, is actually meant to destabilize the other two, denying any "essential" Roman or African identity. Once the context has been framed, the thesis investigates samples from Tertullian's writings to compare his construction of his own identities and the identities of his rhetorical opponents. In order to interpret Tertullian's social identities, one chapter compares the identities Tertullian constructs in his works Apologeticum and Ad nationes. The similarity of these two tracts allows for an inquiry into TertuIIian's "Other" and the "Other" Tertullian constructs for his audiences. The subsequent chapter applies kinship theory in order to compare Tertullian's ideals with those of Roman kinship and early Christian kinship. Therein, the usual discussion of Tertullian's view of marriage is readdressed by comparing the kinship identities and ideals forwarded in his works Ad uxorem 1 and 2. Closely connected to Tertullian's kinship identity is that of his class identity, and, while his exact status and class may be elusive in historical terms, one can explore his socio-economic ingroup and outgroup as he portrays them in De cultujeminarum 1 and 2. Tertullian's ethnic identity is discussed in a chapter that interprets his works De uirginibus ueland is and De pallio, in which it is suggested that Tertullian establishes boundaries between his own ethnic group and that of Roman colonizers. The last form of identity discussed, religious identity, involves a reinterpretation of TertuIIian's use of the New Prophecy. Therein, Tertullian's religious "Other" is understood to be constructed with not only "psychic" rhetoric, but also with Roman imagery. The overall study finds Tertullian's identities to be manifold, complex and discursive. Additionally, his writings are understood to reflect antagonism towards Romans, including Christian Romans, and Romanized Africans. While TertuIIian accommodates much from (Graeco-)Roman literature, laws and customs, he nevertheless retains a strongly stated non-Roman-ness and an African-ity which have been almost entirely neglected in past studies, and it is this aspect, therefore, which is highlighted in the present thesis. ii


One of the attractions of medieval urban history is the fact that major conceptual problems in the field continue to be debated. In a stimulating review article by J.H. Mundy, 'Philip Jones and the medieval Italian city-state', J. of European Economic History, 28 (1999), 185–200, one distinguished scholar is taxed for holding views now dismissed by some, but of which he is by no means a unique surviving representative. One of these views assumes a clear distinction between the antique city, supposedly a bureaucratic centre with limited economic functions, and the medieval city, as the home of industrious artisans and nascent capitalism. The image of the non-profit-making ancient town may be overly indebted to the nature of the literary sources and to the prevalent interests of classicists; but, although many would now agree that both the elements in the above equation need qualifying, a more focused comparison is presently lacking, and a fine book is still waiting to be written on the transition from the ancient world to the middle ages in urban history.


A dense fog with the visibility less than 100 m over 6 hours occurred around the Hangzhou Bay off the coast of the western part of the East China Sea on 24–25 June 2013 during Meiyu period. This study focuses on the physical mechanism involved in the fog process by using in-situ observations and model. The analysis indicates that the land-sea thermal contrast played an essential role in the fog episode, while a weak low-pressure wedge associated with the Meiyu front and the diurnal variation in temperature provided background conditions. Induced by the strong land-sea thermal contrast, a secondary circulation formed in the lower levels of the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) over the coast. The southeasterly wind and subsiding motion associated with the secondary circulation contributed to the moisture supply and the lowering of the boundary layer, favoring fog formation and maintenance. The fog maintained until the weakening of the temperature gradient between land and sea, when the downward flow was replaced by upward motion controlled by the approaching of a low-pressure center. These results are helpful for improving coastal fog forecast in Meiyu period and for our understanding of mechanisms involved in coastal fog processes.


Petroleum generation largely occurs through the thermal decomposition of organic matter. The presence of oil-bearing fluid inclusions and pyrobitumen in Archean rocks suggests that similar processes operated as early as ca. 3.25 Ga. However, direct evidence of petroleum generation from potential source rocks is lacking, and an abiogenic origin has been proposed for some Archean carbonaceous residues. Pilbara craton ca. 3.2 Ga and ca. 2.63 Ga black shales were found to contain abundant kerogenous streaks and laminae, as well as bitumen nodules (comprising a radioactive mineral core surrounded by a carbonaceous rim) and pyrobitumen (formerly petroleum) globules, films, and aggregates. The bitumen nodules formed around detrital radioactive grains via polymerization of fluid hydrocarbons generated within the shale and represent diagnostic indicators of oil generation in ancient shales. The bitumen globules, films, and masses are preserved within authigenic pyrite and demonstrate that a separate hydrocarbon phase had developed in the shale matrix during burial, providing compelling evidence for in situ petroleum generation and expulsion. The abundance of bitumen nodules and residual pyrobitumen in black shales across the Pilbara craton suggests that hydrocarbon generation from kerogenous shales was a common phenomenon during the Middle to Late Archean. The petroleum was generated from organic matter that accumulated in marine environments, most probably comprising the remains of photosynthetic and chemosynthetic organisms, pointing to a sizeable biomass as early as 3.2 Ga.


Although applied behavior analysis has generated many highly effective behavior-change procedures, the procedures have not always been effectively disseminated. One solution to this problem is the use of video technology, which has been facilitated by the ready availability of video production equipment and software and multiple distribution methods (e.g., DVD, online streaming). We review a recent DVD that was produced to disseminate the successful experimental functional analysis procedure. The review is followed by general recommendations for disseminating behavior-analytic procedures via video technology.


Throughout the world, girls and women are interested in their looks. What has been perceived as an enjoyable part of life is however imbued with negative economic and psychological costs which are rarely calculated. International studies confirm the disturbing trend that body dissatisfaction and the perception that one is too large (even if this is not the case) undermine adolescent girls' academic achievement. It doesn't lead to failure, but to a diminishing in confidence and hence in performance. The marketing of beauty aimed at girls as young as five through to women in their seventies has made the idea of beauty more accessible but simultaneously, the narrowing of the ideal standard to very young women with one body type, one look, one shape, one colour, one breast or buttock size whose images are then photo-shopped to create bodies that rarely exist in real life - and are frequently unrecognizable to the model herself - has had many unfortunate consequences. The beauty ideals which saturate all media from facebook, to tumblr, to instagram, to mainstream magazines, music videos and billboards, create anxiety and shame around personal appearance.Concern about looks, size, weight, shape and attractiveness filch girls' and women's minds, passions and bodies. There is an urgent need for multi-level intervention to reverse the trend of poor body image and poor body confidence. The silent self-attacks are thwarting girls' ambitions at exactly the time when society is apparently opening up to them. Programmes and social policy that can interrupt the cycle of undermining that is intensifying need to be underpinned by robust research, which can demonstrate the economic and psychological case for underpinning girls' capability and can demonstrate the effectiveness of such strategies. The substantial economic costs of clinical eating disorders and obesity have been assessed in terms of present and future expenditure to the NHS and opportunities lost for young women. However, no costing exists of the ubiquitous breeding of body insecurity which takes form in the growth of appearance anxiety, body dysmorphias, bulimic behaviours, compulsive eating, and confidence issues, many of which are now normative and widespread among adults and young people. It is urgently required.


Parliamentary House of Lords, London Lord Owen is a doctor by training and was neurology and psychiatric registrar at St Thomas's. Hospital, London, before becoming a Research Fellow. He then entered politics and in Labour Governments served as Navy Minister, Health Minister and Foreign Secretary. He co-founded the Social Democratic Party and was its leader from 1983–1990. From 1992–1995 he served as EU peace negotiator in the former Yugoslavia. He now sits as an independent social democrat in the House of Lords. He strongly opposed the Government's Health and Social Care Act 2012 believing it to be 'fatally flawed'. His book The Health of the Nation. NHS in Peril was published in 2014. From 1995–2015 he had business interests in America, Russia and the UK. Lord Owen has long been interested in the inter-relationship between politics and medicine and has written extensively on the subject including In Sickness and In Power: Illness in Heads of Government, military and business since 1900 and The Hubris Syndrome: Bush, Blair and the Intoxication of Power. He is Chairman of the Daedalus Trust charity, which promotes multidisciplinary research into personality changes associated with the exercise of power in all walks of life. Other publications include his autobiography, Time to Declare (1991); Time to Declare: Second Innings (abridged and updated, 2009) Balkan Odyssey (1995); The Hidden Perspective. The Military Conversations of 1906–1914 (Haus, 2014), and Europe Restructured. The Eurozone Crisis and the UK Referendum (Methuen ebook, 2015). His latest book published in 2016 is Cabinet's Finest Hour. The Hidden Agenda of May 1940 (Haus, 2016). The sicknesses that heads of government have either brought to office, or developed while occupying high office, and the consequences of being ill for the business of government are a fascinating study. David Owen, who has long been interested in the inter-relationship between politics and medicine, has studied in depth the effect of physical illness on such political personalities as Sir Anthony Eden at the time of Suez in 1956; John F. Kennedy and the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961; the last Shah of Iran; and President Mitterrand of France who suffered from prostate cancer. But within his book In Sickness and in Power, there is another interesting and far from uncommon phenomenon to which leaders in all walks of life are susceptible, including the military and business. That is how the very experience of holding office seems to develop into something that causes them to behave in ways that, on the face of it at least, seem symptomatic of a change in personality. The phenomenon of something happening to a person's mental stability when in power has been observed for centuries and the causal link between holding power and aberrant behaviour was captured by Bertrand Russell in his reference to "the intoxication of power". Power is a heady drug, which not every leader has the necessary rooted character to counteract. To do so requires a combination of common sense, humour, decency, scepticism and even cynicism that treats power for what it is – a privileged opportunity to influence, and sometimes to determine, the turn of events. Although hubris may be associated with leaders' personality traits such as narcissism (including grandiosity, see Pincus and Lukowitsky, 2010) which have been widely documented and researched in management and organisation studies (e.g. Maccoby, 2004), Owen specifically describes Hubris Syndrome as a unique and acquired personality disorder that develops only after a leader has held power for a period of time, moreover it is only applicable if there is no history of psychiatric illness. The 14 symptoms for Hubris Syndrome were mapped by Owen and Davidson (Brain, 2009) against the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders 4th edition (DSM IV) criteria for narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), antisocial personality disorder and histrionic personality disorder and serves to distinguish Hubris Syndrome from other seemingly related disorders. More recently David Owen spoke of the relevance of DSM-5 to hubris syndrome, which is now perhaps better seen as an acquired personality trait rather than a disorder. Neuroscientists can discover through brain imaging, blood and urine tests more about the presentations of abnormal personality. Physicians, psychologists and psychiatrists can all help in identifying features of hubris. David Owen is convinced only a multidisciplinary approach can be expected to provide answers on how to recognise and reduce the impact of hubris syndrome. References . Pincus AL, Lukowitsky MR. Pathological narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology2010;6:421–446. . Maccoby M. Narcissistic leaders: The incredible pros, the inevitable cons. Harvard Business Review2004January;92–101. . David Owen and Jonathan Davidson, 'Hubris Syndrome: An acquired personality disorder? A study of US Presidents and UK Prime Ministers over the last 100 years'. Brain2009;132:1396–1406. . David Owen, 'Hubris Syndromeand Hubris trait', Speech to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, 20 January 2016. www.lorddavidowen.co.uk . John Coates, The Hour Between Dog and Wolf (Fourth Estate, 2012, Penguin 2013).


The article deals with the problem of intertextuality in the stories by Alexej Varlamov. The authors provide two meanings of intertextuality as an author's strategy or style, shaping of a text meaning by another text and the intertextual view of literature critizism. V. Meskin, V. Ratnikova reveal references to the Pushkin's fairytale "Skazka o care Saltane" and to the intellectual novel "Igra v biser" (" Das Glasperlenspiel") written by Hesse in the story "Zdravstvuj, knjaz'!" written by Varlamov.


In Kerala, South India, young people, especially women, are encouraged to become nurses in order to migrate abroad for work and thereby improve the financial status of their family. Meanwhile, many of their parents remain in India by themselves. This is occurring in the context of a strong popular discourse of elder abandonment, related to the local norms of intergenerational co-habitation. Based on fieldwork in Kerala and one of the nurses' destination countries, Oman, I present evidence that complicates this discourse by showing how: (1) migration is a form of elder care practice in itself; and (2) care for the elderly continues across countries and continents with the help of information and communication technologies (ICTs). Using the theoretical approaches of science and technology studies, I analyze ICTs as key members of care collectives and argue that ICTs have a significant role in reshaping care relations at a distance.


The aim of this chapter is to provide a literature review on daily recovery during non-work time. Specifically, next to discussing theories that help us understand the process of recovery, we will clarify how recovery and its potential outcomes have been conceptualized so far. Consequently, we present empirical findings of diary studies addressing the activities that may facilitate or hinder daily recovery. We will pay special attention to potential mechanisms that may underlie the facilitating or hindering processes. Owing to the limited research on daily recovery, we will review empirical findings on predictors and outcomes of a related construct, namely need for recovery. We conclude with an overall framework from which daily recovery during non-work time can be understood. In this framework, we claim that daily recovery is an important moderator in the process through which job characteristics and their related strain may lead to unfavorable states on a daily basis.


Rationale: Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is characterized by pulmonary vascular remodeling with aberrant pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMCs) proliferation, endothelial dysfunction, and extracellular matrix remodeling. Objective: Right ventricular (RV) failure is an important prognostic factor in PAH. Thus, we need to elucidate a novel therapeutic target in both PAH and RV failure. Methods and Results: We performed microarray analysis in PASMCs from patients with PAH (PAH-PASMCs) and controls. We found a disintegrin and metalloproteinase with thrombospondin motifs 8 (ADAMTS8), a secreted protein specifically expressed in the lung and the heart, was up-regulated in PAH-PASMCs and the lung in hypoxia-induced pulmonary hypertension (PH) in mice. To elucidate the role of ADAMTS8 in PH, we used vascular smooth muscle cell-specific ADAMTS8-knockout mice (ADAMTSΔSM22). Hypoxia-induced PH was attenuated in ADAMTSΔSM22 mice compared with controls. ADAMTS8 overexpression increased PASMC proliferation with downregulation of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK). In contrast, deletion of ADAMTS8 reduced PASMC proliferation with AMPK upregulation. Moreover, deletion of ADAMTS8 reduced mitochondrial fragmentation under hypoxia in vivo and in vitro. Indeed, PASMCs harvested from ADAMTSΔSM22 mice demonstrated that phosphorylated dynamin-related protein 1 (DRP-1) at Ser637 was significantly up-regulated with higher expression of pro-fusion genes (Mfn1 and Mfn2) and improved mitochondrial function. Moreover, recombinant ADAMTS8 induced endothelial dysfunction and matrix metalloproteinase activation in an autocrine/paracrine manner. Next, to elucidate the role of ADAMTS8 in RV function, we developed a cardiomyocyte-specific ADAMTS8 knockout mice (ADAMTS8ΔαMHC). ADAMTS8ΔαMHC mice showed ameliorated RV failure in response to chronic hypoxia. In addition, ADAMTS8ΔαMHC mice showed enhanced angiogenesis and reduced RV ischemia and fibrosis. Finally, high-throughput screening revealed that mebendazole, which is used for treatment of parasite infections, reduced ADAMTS8 expression and cell proliferation in PAH-PASMCs and ameliorated PH and RV failure in PH rodent models. Conclusions: These results indicate that ADAMTS8 is a novel therapeutic target in PAH.


In 1910 the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie at Leiden obtained the important egg collection from Surinam, brought together by Messrs.
F. P. and A. P. Penard. Owing to different circumstances this collection as a whole was not studied again, and, with the exception of some notes in papers by Schonwetter (1932, 1933) nothing has been published upon the material since it came into the Museum. In 1941 and 1942 I had the opportunity to rearrange the oological collections of the Leiden Museum, and during this work the Penard material was incorporated into the general collection. During my study of the material I became convinced that it is worth while to publish more detailed data than those contained in the works of the Penard's. This especially holds as the measurements given by the cited authors as a rule are too large.
In the collection there are a large number of eggs not collected in Surinam, but in the U. S. A. (e. g., 14/2 and 2/1 of Cathartes aura (L.)), or in Brazil, etc. As a rule these eggs from outside Surinam are not dealt with in the present paper.
As far as concerns the nomenclature adopted in the present paper, the first name is that of the Check-List by Peters (1931-1940) or of the Catalogue by Cory and Hellmayr (1918-1938), the latter was used for those families which have not yet appeared in the former work. Next to this name in brackets the name is given as used by the Penard's.
The material from Surinam is listed under each species as, e.g., 3/3, 7/2, etc., which means that the collection contains 3 sets of 3 eggs and 7 sets of 2.
As far as concerns the colour, in some cases I made use of Ridgway's


Purpose: Active computer gaming (ACG) is a way for older people to participate in strength and balance exercise. Involving older adults in the development of a bespoke ACG system may optimise its usability and acceptability. The aim of this study was to employ user-centred design to develop an ACG system to deliver strength and balance exercises, and to explore its safety, usability and acceptability in older adults. Design/methodology/approach: This paper describes user involvement from an early stage, and its influence on the development of the system to deliver strength and balance exercises, suitable for display on a flat screen or using an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset. It describes user testing of this ACG system in older adults. Findings: Service users were involved at two points in the development process. Their feedback was used to modify the ACG system prior to user testing of a prototype of the ACG system by n=9 older adults. Results indicated the safety, usability and acceptability of the system, with a strong preference for the screen display. Research limitations/implications: The sample size for user testing was small; however, it is considered to have provided sufficient information to inform the further development of the system. Practical implications: Findings from user testing were used to modify the ACG system. This paper identified that future research could explore the influence of repeated use on the usability and acceptability of ACG in older adults. Originality/value: There is limited information on the usability and acceptability virtual reality headsets in this population.


This project explores the causes behind the recent decline in the Labor Force Participation (LFP) rate. The analysis examines the evolution of the LFP rate for different demographic groups to gauge the effect of demographic changes. An integral part of the project is an investigation of the flows of workers into and out of the labor force to determine whether the LFP rate has been declining because more workers are leaving or because fewer workers are entering the labor market. The project also studies the evolution of wages and finds that the decline in the LFP rate is often accompanied by a declining real wage, which is indicative of the relative importance of demand versus supply factors.


We consider a memoryless unobservable single-server queue where customers are homogeneous with respect to their reward (due to service completion) and with respect to their cost per unit of time of waiting. Left to themselves, it is well known that in equilibrium they will join the queue at a rate that is higher than it is socially optimal. We show that if customers draw a random preemptive priority parameter prior to deciding whether or not to join, the resulting equilibrium joining rate coincides with the socially optimal one. We also introduce some variations of this regulation scheme and review a few existing schemes from the literature. We suggest a classification of all these schemes, based on a few key properties, and use it to compare our new schemes with the existing ones.


Abstract The validation of computer codes related to the thermal-hydraulic analyses of nuclear reactors is a challenging undertaking because of the complexity of the phenomena involved, e.g., boiling, condensation, and mixing. In the frame of the ongoing validation of the best-estimate system code TRACE, the present paper focuses on the phenomena taking place during the quenching of the hot surface of the fuel rod simulator with cold water. Since TRACE describes the physical phenomena with empirical correlations derived from experiments, it is necessary to ensure that these correlations are valid if applied to similar experiments but different boundary conditions. By means of an uncertainty and sensitivity study, the influence of the empirical models and their associated uncertainties on selected output parameters is quantified and the parameters with the largest sensitivity are evaluated.


The article discusses the constitution of a new therapeutic emotional cultural style in post-Soviet Russia. Its manifestations are particularly evident in the media, where off-the-shelf forms of Western late capitalist popular culture are imitated, seemingly in a one-to-one fashion. Engaging with the literature on emotional capitalism, the author points to the particular conditions in which therapeutic culture is being adapted in Russia. The alternative tradition of subjectivity in the Russian/Soviet cultural universe lacks a therapeutic Self, and the post-Soviet discursive condition is characterized by a gap in authoritative discourses of articulation of individual and private life. It is argued that as a result of these conditions the therapeutic culture is developing in post-Soviet Russia prior to or without psychology, and above all, it is not a product or function of psychological knowledge. The article"s empirical focus is on examples of translation of therapeutic forms in the field of TV media.


OBJECTIVE To compare the outcome of acute myocardial infarction in NIDDM patients and nondiabetic control subjects. The relation of glycemic control, duration of diabetes, and major diabetic complications to the outcome of acute myocardial infarction in diabetic subjects was investigated. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS This was a prospective, hospitalbased, case-control study. RESULTS One hundred and ninety-six NIDDM patients and 196 nondiabetic control subjects with acute myocardial infarction were entered into the study: 23.5% of diabetic subjects and 34.2% of control subjects received thrombolytic therapy (P < 0.05). Diabetic subjects showed signs of reperfusion less often than control subjects (P < 0.05). Mortality was higher in the diabetic group (17.3 vs. 10.2%, P < 0.05). Pump failure (38.3 vs. 16.8%, P < 0.01) and cardiogenic shock (9.7 vs. 3.6%, P < 0.05) also occurred more frequently in diabetic subjects. Loss of heart rate variability was correlated with both pump failure and mortality; proliferative retinopathy was correlated with pump failure. Glycemic control and other diabetic complications did not correlate with outcome. CONCLUSIONS Our findings confirm the higher mortality and incidence of pump failure in acute myocardial infarction with co-morbid diabetes. They suggest that the less frequent use of thrombolytic therapy, lower reperfusion rates, and more advanced coronary artery disease might be contributory. The presence of autonomic neuropathy and microvascular disease probably also contribute to poor outcome; other major diabetic complications and diabetic control did not influence outcome.


In the project CardioViz we explore a novel system for long-term Electrocardiogram (ECG) monitoring. In contrast to conventional ECG monitoring, the system additionally provides means to capture contextual information, such as activity, location and photos. We investigate how contextual information can be helpful when assessing long term ECG data and when relating anomalies to certain real-world situations. We assume that contextual information correlated over time with the ECG data allows for a better understanding. In the prototype we show the ECG signal together with photos and notes overlayed on a map. It seems that by these hints users can more easily remember where they were and hence what situation might be related to a specific period in the ECG. CardioViz consists of a mobile phone based client application and web based backend. The client application uses the sensors in the phone (e.g. camera) as well as further sensors (ECG, Accelerometer, GPS) connected via Bluetooth.


The popular yet paradoxical idea of a diverse global community raises questions about language and translation. Would a global community with a global language lose its other languages? Would a global community without a global language be able to interact efficiently across thousands of linguistic frontiers? One strategy that might make global community compatible with linguistic diversity is panlingual transparency via aspectual phased translation . With it, translators translate aspects of a discourse at each phase of a multiphase process, rather than translating the discourse in its entirety in a single act. In an initial simple model, communication in a global community relies on translation partitioned into four phases; the translation in each is either linguistic or cultural , but not both. A source discourse is translated culturally (within the source language), then linguistically (from the source language to a global representation), then linguistically (from the global representation to the target languages), then culturally (within the target languages). Such partitioning could elevate productivity by facilitating divisions of labor between professional and lay translators and between human and machine translators, and by letting monolinguals act as translators.


A bis-aniline-cross-linked Au nanoparticles (NPs) composite is electropolymerized on Au surfaces. The association of trinitrotoluene, TNT, to the bis-aniline bridging units via pi-donor-acceptor interactions allows the amplified detection of TNT by following the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) reflectance changes as a result of the coupling between the localized plasmon of the AuNPs and the surface plasmon wave associated with the gold surface. The detection limit for analyzing TNT by this method is approximately 10 pM. The electropolymerization of the bis-aniline-cross-linked AuNPs composite in the presence of picric acid results in a molecular-imprinted matrix for the enhanced binding of TNT. The imprinted AuNPs composite enabled the sensing of TNT with a detection limit that corresponded to 10 fM. Analysis of the SPR reflectance changes in the presence of different concentrations of TNT revealed a two-step calibration curve that included the ultrasensitive detection of TNT by the imprinted sites in the composite, KassI. for the association of TNT to the imprinted sites, 6.4 x 10(12) M-1, followed by a less sensitive detection of TNT by the nonimprinted pi-donor bis-aniline sites (KNIass. = 3.9 x 10(9) M-1). The imprinted AuNPs composite reveals impressive selectivity. The structural and functional features of the bis-aniline-cross-linked AuNPs composites were characterized by different methods including ellipsometry, AFM, and electrochemical means. The dielectric properties of the AuNPs composite in the presence of different concentrations of TNT were evaluated by the theoretical fitting of the respective experimental SPR curves. The ultrasensitive detection of the TNT by the AuNPs composite was attributed to the changes of the dielectric properties of the composite, as a result of the formation of the pi-donor-acceptor complexes between TNT and the bis-aniline units. These changes in the dielectric properties lead to a change in the conductivity of the AuNPs matrix.


The features like optimized utilization of remotely available resources and dynamic load-balancing provide significant enhancements in overall system performance in distributed systems. These features may be implemented by applying the dynamic process migration mechanism in which an executing process is migrated from a highly loaded workstation to some lightly loaded workstation in the distributed system. The technique called process checkpointing is required to collect the present-state details of the desired executing process which is to be migrated to some workstation in the distributed system. Identifying an executing process's address-space details and exploring the set of virtual memory area contents currently possessed by the said process is considered to be one of the most difficult tasks for process migration. This paper discusses a kernel-level solution for the problem of checkpointing the process's desired virtual memory areas. The paper claims better results of the method suggested here over other solutions available. An attempt is made to suggest a solution for the Linux kernel 2.6.25 environment.


Four short, simple measures of arm function, suitable for use with patients recovering from acute stroke, are described. These tests are: the Frenchay Arm Test, the Nine Hole Peg Test, finger tapping rate and grip strength. Good interobserver and test-retest reliability was demonstrated for all tests, and the Frenchay Arm Test was shown to be valid. Normal values for all tests were established on 63 controls. It was found that the limited sensitivity of the Frenchay Arm Test could be improved using the Nine Hole Peg Test and grip strength. Recovery of arm function has been studied in a sample of 56 patients seen regularly over the first 3 months after their stroke, using these standard measures. The results demonstrated a wide variation in recovery curves between patients. The use of the Nine Hole Peg Test enabled further recovery to be detected after patients achieved a top score on the Frenchay Arm Test. Failure to recover measureable grip strength before 24 days was associated with absence of useful arm function at three months. Measurement of finger tapping rate was not useful.


A key ingredient for semi-analytic models (SAMs) of galaxy formation is the mass assembly history of haloes, encoded in a tree structure. The most commonly used method to construct halo merger histories is based on the outcomes of high-resolution, computationally intensive N-body simulations. We show that machine learning (ML) techniques, in particular Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), are a promising new tool to tackle this problem with a modest computational cost and retaining the best features of merger trees from simulations. We train our GAN model with a limited sample of merger trees from the EAGLE simulation suite, constructed using two halo finders–tree builder algorithms: SUBFIND–D-TREES and ROCKSTAR–ConsistentTrees. Our GAN model successfully learns to generate well-constructed merger tree structures with high temporal resolution, and to reproduce the statistical features of the sample of merger trees used for training, when considering up to three variables in the training process. These inputs, whose representations are also learned by our GAN model, are mass of the halo progenitors and the final descendant, progenitor type (main halo or satellite) and distance of a progenitor to that in the main branch. The inclusion of the latter two inputs greatly improves the final learned representation of the halo mass growth history, especially for SUBFIND-like ML trees. When comparing equally sized samples of ML merger trees with those of the EAGLE simulation, we find better agreement for SUBFIND-like ML trees. Finally, our GAN-based framework can be utilised to construct merger histories of low and intermediate mass haloes, the most abundant in cosmological simulations.


The unfolding influence of music and sound on the fundamental structure of the biomedical sciences, from ancient times to the present. Beginning in ancient Greece, Peter Pesic writes, music and sound significantly affected the development of the biomedical sciences. Physicians used rhythmical ratios to interpret the pulse, which inspired later efforts to record the pulse in musical notation. After 1700, biology and medicine took a "sonic turn," viewing the body as a musical instrument, the rhythms and vibrations of which could guide therapeutic insight. In Sounding Bodies, Pesic traces the unfolding influence of music and sound on the fundamental structure of the biomedical sciences.
 Pesic explains that music and sound provided the life sciences important tools for hearing, understanding, and influencing the rhythms of life. As medicine sought to go beyond the visible manifestations of illness, sound offered ways to access the hidden interiority of body and mind. Sonic interventions addressed the search for a new typology of mental illness, and practitioners used musical instruments to induce hypnotic states meant to cure both psychic and physical ailments. The study of bat echolocation led to the manifold clinical applications of ultrasound; such sonic devices as telephones and tuning forks were used to explore the functioning of the nerves.
 Sounding Bodies follows Pesic's Music and the Making of Modern Science and Polyphonic Minds to complete a trilogy on the influence of music on the sciences. Enhanced digital editions of Sounding Bodies offer playable music and sound examples.


The effect of competition on the quality of health care remains a contested issue. Most empirical estimates rely on inference from non experimental data. In contrast, this paper exploits a pro-competitive policy reform to provide estimates of the impact of competition on hospital outcomes. The English government introduced a policy in 2006 to promote competition between hospitals. Patients were given choice of location for hospital care and provided information on the quality and timeliness of care. Prices, previously negotiated between buyer and seller, were set centrally under a DRG type system. Using this policy to implement a difference-in-differences research design we estimate the impact of the introduction of competition on not only clinical outcomes but also productivity and expenditure. Our data set is large, containing information on approximately 68,000 discharges per year per hospital from 160 hospitals. We find that the effect of competition is to save lives without raising costs. Patients discharged from hospitals located in markets where competition was more feasible were less likely to die, had shorter length of stay and were treated at the same cost.


Sex, race, gender, sexuality, color, religion, language, nationality, ethnicity, culture, poverty - socially constructed categories, social tropes that relegate "others" to subordinated positions in the varied and various cultural and economic marketplaces of both global and local societies. Richard Delgado's transformational work engages all of these tropes insightfully, disturbingly, and illuminatingly. His rich literature conceptualizes persons as multidimensional, complex beings and exposes society as the pre-fabricated stage in which diverse interactions evolve. Delgado's epistemological stance is fluid, non-rigid, and grounded on subjectivity.In this essay I will focus on Delgado's latest book When Equality Ends: Stories About Race and Resistance. I will develop how that work injects invaluable dimensions of international human rights law and theory into contemporary domestic jurisprudence. I will also explore the benefit that Delgado's treatment of international human rights law and theory will bring to both critical and human rights perspectives in the analysis of law, theory, and policy.Part One of this piece will suggest how conversations about human rights law can enrich Critical Theory, as well as how Critical Theory can serve to develop, expand, and transform human rights norms. Part Two will look more specifically at Cultures, Colors, and Clashes to illustrate the value of the analysis that is suggested in Part One. The Conclusion underscores the utility of Professor Delgado's rich and creative work in guiding global understanding on multidimensionality, interconnectivity, and intersectionality.


Australian water policy and management are undergoing rapid and immense change in response to drought, technological advances, climate change and demographic and economic shifts. The National Water Initiative and the 2007 Australian Government water policy statements propose a fundamental shift in how Australians will use and manage water in the future. The implementation of the national water policy presents many challenges - the creation of water rights and markets, comprehensive water planning, new legislative settings, community participation in water management, linking urban and rural water management, and more. Managing Water for Australia brings together leading social sciences researchers and practitioners to identify the major challenges in achieving sustainable water management, to consolidate current knowledge, and to explore knowledge gaps in and opportunities for furthering water reform.


High strength and high toughness are usually mutually exclusive in materials. Among all
material classes, ceramics exhibit a high stiffness and strength, but they present a limited
plastic deformation, which results in a moderate toughness. However, tough ceramics have
been obtained using anisotropic particles organized in a "brick and mortar" microstructure,
inspired by the structure of the natural nacre. Here, we propose to build nacre-like ceramic
composites from colloidal suspensions using heteroaggregation of particles. Two different
shaping processes are used: direct settling of suspensions or freeze-granulation. After sintering, in both cases, the platelets alignment is very good, close to that of platelets in natural
nacre, with a slightly better one noted for direct settling. Despite a better platelet alignment,
the toughness is lower than in previous studies showing that further improvement of the interfacial phases present in the material must now be considered to reinforce its mechanical
behavior.


We estimated the import and export elasticities of Pakistan trade with traditional trade partners and some Asian countries to see the dynamics of Pakistan trade from 1973 to 2008. OLS results suggest that income is the principal determinant of exports and imports. Pakistan exports are cointegrated with Japan and USA while the imports are cointegrated with UAE and USA. Pakistan imports and exports are cointegrated with Bangladesh and Sri Lanka but not with India and China. Income and exchange rate are both important determinants of foreign trade. Continuing its trade with traditional partners and making efforts for greater market access to USA and EU, Pakistan should make efforts to increase its trade with Asian countries notably China and India because both are fast growing economies and have huge market.


Fresh water—the bloodstream of the biosphere—is at the center of the planetary drama of the Anthropocene. Water fluxes and stores regulate the Earth's climate and are essential for thriving aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, as well as water, food, and energy security. But the water cycle is also being modified by humans at an unprecedented scale and rate. A holistic understanding of freshwater's role for Earth system resilience and the detection and monitoring of anthropogenic water cycle modifications across scales is urgent, yet existing methods and frameworks are not well suited for this. In this paper we highlight four core Earth system functions of water (hydroclimatic regulation, hydroecological regulation, storage, and transport) and key related processes. Building on systems and resilience theory, we review the evidence of regional‐scale regime shifts and disruptions of the Earth system functions of water. We then propose a framework for detecting, monitoring, and establishing safe limits to water cycle modifications and identify four possible spatially explicit methods for their quantification. In sum, this paper presents an ambitious scientific and policy grand challenge that could substantially improve our understanding of the role of water in the Earth system and cross‐scale management of water cycle modifications that would be a complementary approach to existing water management tools.


In the title molecule, C20H13F3N2, the benzimidazole unit is close to being planar [maximum deviation = 0.012 (1) Å] and forms dihedral angles of 31.43 (7) and 61.45 (9)° with the 4-(trifluoromethyl)phenyl and 1-phenyl rings, respectively; the dihedral angle between these rings is 60.94 (10)°. In the crystal, C—H⋯F hydrogen bonds link the molecules into chains along the c-axis direction. The CF3 group is rotationally disordered with an occupancy ratio of 0.557 (8):0.443 (8) for the F atoms.


Hospital Pharmacy welcomes contributions to this column. Articles originally published in pharmacy department newsletters are reprinted here. Material is selected because of its educational value to pharmacists or because it demonstrates the type of information of interest to newsletter readers. If you wish to have your newsletter material considered for publication in this column, mail a copy—along with a computer disk containing the document—to Neil M. Davis, Editor-in-Chief, Hospital Pharmacy, 1143 Wright Drive, Huntingdon Valley, PA 19006-2721.


This paper investigates how compositional changes in the UK labour market affect the matching process between vacancies and job seekers. We augment a state space representation of the aggregate matching function with a measure of job seekers' 'search intensity' that is recovered from micro-data on individual unemployment-to-employment transitions, in line with recent developments in the literature. The baseline results show that matching efficiency declined by around 15% between 1995 and 2010 but subsequently recovered by about 5 percentage points in the last six years. Compositional changes in the labour force that improved aggregate search intensity prior to the 2008 recession will tend to obscure the decline in aggregate matching efficiency unless controlled for properly. Considering broader definitions of job seekers that include marginally-attached workers and on-the-job searchers exacerbates the registered decline in matching efficiency. Changes in 'recruiting intensity' and the share of vacancies posted by different industries provide a potential explanation for some, but not all, of the initial fall in matching efficiency that preceded the 2007–08 recession. Finally, we quantitatively analyse how labour force heterogeneity and changes in matching efficiency have affected the shape and location of the UK Beveridge Curve.


The launch of artificial satellites (as early as in 1957), specifically the launch of the first laser tracked satellite, Beacon-B, in 1964, has provided data sets which have allowed researchers to probe the long to medium components of the gravitational field of the Earth. In particular, observational data recorded at satellite laser ranging tracking stations have since been used to develop models that quantify the global long-wavelength and medium-wavelength gravity field of the Earth. Currently, literature reviewing gravity field models with geophysical applications is scarce and not up to date. The most recent review paper was published more than a decade ago. In the interim, there has been an unprecedented increase in gravity field modelling, which can be attributed to the deployment of new and dedicated satellite missions. As a result, a number of existing geopotential models have been improved and new models have been developed. Each of these models differs in accuracy and spatial-temporal scale. This review extends the earlier review of gravity field models, by incorporating up-to-date research efforts in geopotential modelling with geophysical applications in oceanography, hydrology, geodesy and solid Earth science.


A new processes for fabricating NiO exchange bias layers has been developed. The process involves the direct ion beam sputtering (IBS) of a NiO target. The process is simpler than other deposition techniques for producing NiO buffer layers, and facilitates the deposition of an entire spin-valve layered structure using IBS without breaking vacuum. The layer thickness and temperature dependence of the exchange field for NiO/NiFe films produced using IBS are presented and are similar to those reported for similar films deposited using reactive magnetron sputtering. The magnetic properties of highly textured exchange couples deposited on single crystal substrates are compared to those of simultaneously deposited polycrystalline films, and both show comparable exchange fields. These results are compared to current theories describing the exchange coupling at the NiO/NiFe interface.


It continues to be heavily disputed whether foreign aid promotes economic growth in developing countries. In most cross-country regressions, aid is considered effective only if it shifts recipient countries to a significantly higher and sustainable growth path. We apply an alternative approach which is less demanding, based on the concept of temporary growth accelerations suggested by Hausmann, Pritchett and Rodrik. In assessing what can reasonably be expected from the donors' modest aid efforts, we do not only employ aggregate aid data but we also differentiate between major aid categories, including grants, loans and so-called short-impact aid. It turns out that aid flows have a small but significantly positive effect on the conditional probability of growth accelerations. This result holds across different estimation methods. Short-impact aid is found to be more effective in this respect, while we reject the view that grants are superior to loans. To the contrary, we find a stronger effect of loans. Furthermore, aid has become more effective during the second half of our sample. Typically, however, the significance of results crucially depends on the criteria applied to identify growth accelerations.


Abstract Background Despite a population of over 180 million and over 115,950 new cases of cancer diagnosed every year, Nigeria has no dedicated medical oncologists (MO). Most oncology care is delivered through surgical (SO) and radiation oncologists (RO) who number less than 50 in the entire country. With the limited number of oncology professionals, cancer patients experience poor outcomes, with a less than 10% of 5-year cancer survival rate. Methods The participants were nominated by their institutions to attend the medical oncology training. Through the support of FSP and U.S. Embassy in Nigeria, MGM and TOC delivered 10-days of lectures based on ASCO, ESMO and NCCN guidelines in Abuja, Nigeria. Participants represented 15 Nigerian states, including 5 of the 6 ethnic and geographic regions. Mean correct scores of participants that completed both the pre- and post-course 25 question tests (composed by 2 of the authors TOC and MGM) were compared using GraphPad Prism 7.0a by Paired t-tests. Results Forty-four oncologists were identified of which 11 (25%) were females. Twenty-five (57%) completed both the pre- and post-tests and fully participated in the 10-day lecture series. 12 participates that completed the training were residents and 12 were attending physicians. One doctor did not identify as a resident or attending. Of the 25 that completed both tests, percentage of correct answers increased from 45% to 59% (2-sided p-value Conclusions MO education coordinated by FSP and PPB improved MO knowledge in Nigeria regardless of participant background. Similar models may be employed across Sub-Saharan Africa. Reasons for lost participation need to be defined. Legal entity responsible for the study Project PinkBlue. Funding United States of America Department of State. Disclosure All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.


Using  a  representative  national  sample  of  personal  networks,  this  article explores  how  the  spatial  dispersion  of  networks,  residential  mobility  and  social support  are  linked.  Three  issues will  be  addressed  here.  Firstly,  how  is  the  spatial dispersion of personal networks related  to  individuals' social characteristics, network composition  and  residential  mobility?  Secondly,  how  do  the  spatial  dispersion  of networks,  residential mobility  and  their  combined  effect  influence  the  number  and (thirdly) the structure of emotional support ties? Results showed that the extent of the support was affected neither by  the geographical distribution of  the networks nor by residential mobility. Living  far  from one's birthplace, however,  exerted  two distinct, and opposite effects on the support network structure. On the one hand, mobility led to high spatial dispersion of personal contacts, which  in  turn  favored a sparsely knit network centered around the mobile individual. On the other hand, by controlling for the effect of distance between the contacts, we found that  individuals that cited  long‐ distance  ties  tended  to  be  part  of more  transitive  support  networks  than  those  that cited  local  ties. We  interpreted  the  latter  effect  as  evidence  that  transitive  ties may survive greater spatial distances than intransitive ones. These findings are discussed in view of spatial mobility and social network research.


Informal payments for health care are common in most former communist countries. This article explores the demand side of these payments in Albania. Using tobit and Heckman selection models we control for individual determinants of informal payments in outpatient and inpatient health care. Propensity score matching (PSM) techniques are used to investigate the changes in the characteristics of people paying informally over the different years. Our findings suggest that vulnerable groups in society remain less protected against such payments and policy measures have not reached the most deprived regions of the country.


This thesis focuses on mechanisms and processes underlying spatial patterns of resistance and virulence and on local adaptations in plant–parasite interactions. The model system used comprises the plant host Salix triandra, the pathogenic rust fungus Melampsora amygdalinae, the leaf beetle Gonioctena linnaeana, and the galler Pontania triandrae. In this work, I (1) emphasize the most important factors determining the outcome of a plant–pathogen interaction, and the types of systems in which local adaptations can be expected, (2) examine the resistance structures of different populations of S. triandra, and whether the leaf beetle G. linnaeana responds to the local conditions of the populations of S. triandra in Sweden, and (3) address whether the distribution of parasites on S. triandra can be explained by the plant content of secondary metabolites.A review of several studies of the subject leads to the conclusion that adaptation of pathogens to their local hosts is more likely to be found in systems in which the pathogen is host-specific, non-systemic, and has a larger dispersal range and evolutionary potential than its host does. Furthermore, the scale of the study must be adjusted to that of the pathogen's local population distribution. In addition, the temporary nature of host–pathogen interactions influences the importance of sample size, and too-small sample sizes can lower the chance of finding local adaptations, even though they may have evolved in a given system. The results of an inoculation experiment using material from physically isolated natural populations of S. triandra and M. amygdalinae confirm the importance of previous conclusions.Spatial variation in the resistance structure of S. triandra also has effects on the insect herbivore G. linnaeana, which has responded by adapting to the local hosts. However, local differences in secondary chemistry affect different parasites in different ways, and while P. triandrae is attracted by high levels of phenolic compounds, including tannins, M. amygdalinae and G. linnaeana are more rarely found on plant individuals with high concentrations of tannins. In addition, brood deposition by adult females of G. linnaeana and the performance of larvae are positively affected by luteolin-7-glucoside and an additional unidentified flavonoid, whereas they are negatively affected by the presence of (+)-catechin and high levels of tannins.Our results also show that plants traits that provide resistance to one type of parasite do not necessarily provide resistance to others. This indicates that different natural enemies potentially assert divergent selection pressure on S. triandra phenotypes which can be important for maintaining phenotypic variation in plant species.


The present study deals with a very significant issue in Jordan, which is the Jordanian women's empowerment in the Northern provinces (Irbid, Ajloun, and Jarash). It aims at discovering the constraints that face women's empowerment of Jordan to serve and develop their society through developing a questionnaire to collect data, and calculate the arithmetic means and standard deviations of each constraint. The study also aims at measuring the impact of technical and vocational educational programs on women empowerment of Jordan to serve and develop their society, by conducting a pretest and posttest pilot study to measure the trainees acquirement level of the executive secretarial skills through the designed training program, in order to help them getting job opportunities instead of waiting for their rank in the civil service bureau, and to assist them by acquiring the technical and vocational empowerment skills, and teach them the required skills in office management and secretarial work, which will contribute to increasing their employment ratios, as shown later. The programs came as a result of survey that shows the need for such well-trained secretaries and office works to fulfill the demands of both private and public sectors in the Northern provinces. Study sample consists of 50 unemployed female trainees who hold bachelor or diploma certificates, who were put through the educational program which was held over a period of nine months for two years (2015-2017) within two groups of 25 trainees. The program results showed statically a significant difference between the pretest and posttest of program aspects, in favor of posttest value, it showed that means of all constraints ranged between (3.22–3.53), with the social constraints ranked first with a mean and standard deviation of (M=3.53, SD= 1.21), and the personal constraints ranked last with a mean and standard deviation of (M=3.22, SD= 1.17). It also showed that women trainees employment has a high ratio of 84%, due to the empowerment of these women which broaden their minds and opened up for them new avenues and job opportunities by training them on the technical knowledge and skills which are required to be qualified executive secretaries. Furthermore, this program has positive effects on the social and economic lives of trainees.