The authors compared 3 measures of readiness to change alcohol use commonly used in clinical research and practice with adolescents: the Readiness Ruler, the SOCRATES (subscales of Recognition and Taking Steps), and a Staging Algorithm. The analysis sample consisted of 161 male and female adolescents presenting for intensive outpatient alcohol-abuse treatment who reported current alcohol use at the initial assessment. Evidence for concurrent validity was assessed by computing simple correlations of each readiness measure with the other 3 and of each readiness measure with drinking behavior (percentage of days abstinent [PDA] and drinks per drinking day [DDD], respectively, in the last 30 days) at the start of treatment and at the 6-month follow-up assessment. Evidence for predictive validity was based on percentage of independent variance accounted for by each of the readiness measures in predicting drinking behavior at 6 months from the start of treatment, and then in predicting drinking behavior at 12 months from the readiness assessment at 6 months. The results showed that all but Recognition had good concurrent validity, the Readiness Ruler score showed consistent evidence for predictive validity, and the Staging Algorithm showed good predictive validity for DDD at 6 and 12 months. For the 82 participants with an alcohol-use disorder diagnosis, the findings for the Ruler and Recognition were similar, but the Staging Algorithm had poorer prediction of DDD at 12 months, and Taking Steps was a better predictor of 6- and 12-month PDA and DDD. Research and clinical implications of the findings are discussed.


Objective: To investigate whether there was difference in levels of procalcitonin (PCT) and C-reactive protein (CRP) in intrauterine infection and non-intrauterine infection and to study the potential of PCT and CRP as for diagnostic markers of intrauterine infection.
Methods: 200 cases were selected, including 98 cases of intrauterine infection and 102 cases of nonintrauterine infection during 2014-16 in Shandong Provincial Hospital Affiliated to Shandong University, China. 50 cases of healthy new-born's was used as a control. The venous blood, cord blood and maternal blood in each group were collected and the levels of PCT and CRP were detected using immunofluorescence assay and immunonephelometric method, respectively. SPSS 18.0 was used to conduct the statistical analysis.
Results: PCT levels in maternal blood of intrauterine infection group were high than the other two groups, but the difference was not significant. However, PCT levels in cord blood of intrauterine infection group were significantly higher than both non intrauterine infection group and the healthy group. PCT levels in the infant's serum of both intrauterine and non-intrauterine infection group were significant higher than the healthy group; but no significant difference was observed in cord blood PCT levels between the non-intrauterine infection group and the healthy control. In intrauterine infection group, CRP levels in both maternal blood and cord blood were significantly higher than the other two groups. However, in infant's serum, no significant different was observed between intrauterine and nonintrauterine infection groups. In both intrauterine and non-intrauterine infection groups, CRP levels were significantly higher in all three blood samples compared with the healthy control.
Conclusion: PCT levels in cord blood could be used as a marker for intrauterine infection and CRP levels in both maternal blood and cord blood could be used as a marker for intrauterine infection.


We introduce a set of tools for interactive modeling of multi-material objects. We use non-manifold surface meshes to define complex objects, which can have multiple connected solid regions of different materials. Our suite of tools can create and edit non-manifold surfaces, while maintaining a consistent labeling of distinct regions. We also introduce a technique for generating approximate material gradients, using a set of thin layers with varying material properties. We demonstrate our approaches by printing physical objects with a multi-material printer.


Mobile media applications need to balance user and group goals, attentional constraints and limited screen real estate. In this paper, we describe the iterative development and testing of an application that explores these trade-offs. We developed early prototypes of a retrospective, time-based system as well as a prospective and space-based system. Our experiences with the prototypes led us to focus on the prospective system. We argue that attentional demands dominate and mobile media applications should be lightweight and hands-free as much as possible.


In this chapter, we describe different methods to estimate an unknown signal from its linear measurements. We focus on the underdetermined case where the number of measurements is less than the dimension of the unknown signal. We introduce the concept of signal sparsity and describe how it could be used as prior information for either regularized least squares or Bayesian signal estimation. We discuss compressed sensing and sparse signal representation as examples where these sparse signal estimation methods could be applied.


In this paper, a longitudinal and lateral control approach based on a nonlinear observer is proposed for a convoy of autonomous vehicles to follow a desired trajectory. To authors best knowledge, this topic has not yet been sufficiently addressed in the literature. The modeling of the vehicles convoy is revisited using robotic method, for simulation purposes and control design. With these models, a sliding mode observer is proposed to estimate the states of each vehicle in the convoy from the available sensors, then a sliding mode control based on this observer is used to control the longitudinal and lateral movement. The validation and performance evaluation are done using the well-known driving simulator Scanner-Studio. The results are presented for different maneuvers of 5 vehicles.


This article examines the determinants of coalition formation on the local level. In addition to standard office- and policy-seeking variables, we incorporate the local institutional setting and the constraints on local coalition politics emerging from patterns of party competition at the superior level of the political system. We test our expectations on the basis of a dataset providing information on the characteristics of potential and formed coalitions in 29 German cities. The results show that – even on the local level, which is often described as less politicised – not only office-seeking variables but also the ideological positioning of parties are good predictors for local coalition formation in German cities. Additionally, our findings suggest that local political actors take the party affiliation of the directly elected mayor into account when forming coalitions in local councils. The findings imply that political actors on all levels of political systems try to maximise their payoffs and form coalitions accordingly.


The Colima Volcanic Complex trends in a nearly N-S direction in western Mexico, and one of its structures, Colima volcano, is the most historically active volcano in the country. Immediately to the N, there is another volcanic center called El Cantaro volcano, whose activity started around 1.7 Ma in its N portion and migrated to the S in various episodes. Volcanic activity migrated further south, from El Cantaro to the Colima Volcanic Complex where the southernmost manifestation, Hijos del Volcan domes, is located on the south slope of Fuego volcano. The above date appears to mark initiation of the rather continuous volcanic activity in the area. It has been noted that these volcanic manifestations lie on, or near the Rivera-Cocos inland plate boundary. Colima's Fuego volcano is also the closest to the Middle America Trench, among the polygenetic volcanoes in Mexico. We submit that the anomalous location of volcanism in this area originates in an anomalous subduction process of the Rivera and Cocos plates and evoke a tectonic model, proposed elsewhere, to support the idea. Modeling gravimetric and aeromagnetic data we locate the magma chambers of the Fuego (active) and Nevado (extinct) volcanoes within a 65 mGals negative Bouguer anomaly elongated in a nearly N-S direction. The corresponding aeromagnetic map displays a magnetic high over the southern portion of the Fuego volcano edifice. We found two additional, associated structures whose anomalies have not been previously reported, which appear to follow the southward magmatic migration pattern. One of them is a collapse structure with a circular topographic expression, and the southernmost is a low-density intrusion ~1 km below sea level, associated with a moderate topographic bulge at the surface that we interpret as a magma body. Five lines cross the anomalies; gravimetric and magnetic fields are concurrently modeled along them to locate the magmatic bodies. In addition to the 2-D models we perform 3-D gravimetric and magnetic inversions. For each field a 3-D mesh is built under the area occupied by the Colima Volcanic Complex, the volume elements are then assigned density or magnetic susceptibility values and their surface contributions in various points are evaluated. The process is iterated until the difference between the measured and the calculated fields is less than a predetermined value. The results of each inversion adequately and independently define the location of the magmatic chambers although they cannot distinguish between the individual chambers of the Nevado and Fuego volcanoes. 2-D and 3-D results complement each other and consistently show the locations of potential magmatic regions. Our models support a multiple, complex magmatic system that appears to continue to spread southwardly, which can pose additional volcanic risks to an already threatened local population.


Side-scan sonar imagery and underwater photography, coupled with bathymetric and sedimentologic data, revealed noteworthy features and the interplay of multiple processes on the north-eastern Brazilian continental shelf. The high-resolution data cover a 500 km2 area of the shallow (~70 m) and narrow (~40 km) shelf, which comprises the submerged portion of the Potiguar Basin; the area includes the partially filled incised valley of the ancient Acu River.The seafloor imagery was integrated with 673 surface sediment samples to distinguish boundaries within the mixed siliciclastic-carbonate region. The sediment grain size increases from nearshore, muddy, siliciclastic sediments to biogenic, coarse sand and gravel on the outer shelf. Carbonate-rich sediment predominates, except on the eastern margin of the Acu Incised Valley (AIV), the nearshore zone and estuary mouths. The AIV is filled mainly with muddy sediments reworked from the latest transgressive deposits. Bedform configurations indicate bottom currents associated with tidal and wave-driven currents.Mixing processes are controlled by the interplay of high hydrodynamic energy regime and shelf physiography. Special attention was paid to the middle and outer shelves, where a large field of newly found reefs occurs between 20 and 50 m depths. The reef substrate is composed of limestones, probably belonging to the Guamare Formation.SCUBA dive inspections revealed benthic colonies (corals: Montastraea cavernosa, Porites astreoides, Siderastrea stellata; sponges: Scopalina ruetzleri, Callyspongia vaginalis, Ectyoplasia ferox, Ircinia sp., Spirastrella sp., Aiolochroia sp.) over fossil reefs. A preliminary examination of the foraminiferal species showed a Caribbean-type reef community, including Amphisorus hemprichii, Amphistegina gibbosa, Archaias angulatus, Heterostegina antillarum, Homotrema rubra, Peneroplis carinatus and P. proteus.


Abstract. We present ozone measurements made using state-of-the-art ultraviolet photometers onboard three long-duration stratospheric balloons launched as part of the Concordiasi campaign in austral spring 2010. Ozone loss rates calculated by matching air parcels sampled at different times and places during the polar spring are in agreement with rates previously derived from ozonesonde measurements, for the vortex average, ranging between 2 and 7 ppbv per sunlit hour or between 25 and 110 ppbv per day. However, the geographical coverage of these long-duration stratospheric balloon platforms provides new insights into the temporal and spatial patterns of ozone loss over Antarctica. Very large ozone loss rates of up to 230 ppbv per day (16 ppbv per sunlit hour) are observed for air masses that are downwind of the Antarctic Peninsula and/or over the East Antarctic region. The ozone loss rate maximum downstream of the Antarctic Peninsula region is consistent with high PSC occurrence from CALIPSO and large ClO abundances from MLS satellite observations for 12–22 September 2010, and with a chemical box model simulation using JPL 2011 kinetics with full chlorine activation.


The Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) concept has been adopted into several new military and commercial aircraft programs such as the F-22, F-35, Airbus 380, and Boeing 787. The goal of the IMA concept is to reduce the number and varieties of hardware computing modules and to increase the portability of avionics software. The IMA concept is currently being driven by industry initiatives such as the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACETM) Consortium. It can also be seen in new industry standards such as ARINC 653 which defines an avionics application standard software interface. As a result of the adoption of the IMA concept, new avionics hardware modules are becoming increasingly generic, multipurpose, and reconfigurable based on the loaded software applications. Therefore, the automated test equipment (ATE) used to support maintenance and service of these new avionics systems must consider the use of standard approaches for handling loadable avionics software such as ARINC 615 and 615A software data loaders. This paper provides a brief technical overview of IMA systems and ARINC software data load protocols. It also explores strategies for integrating software data loaders into ATE systems that are required to support IMA based Units Under Test.


OBJECTIVE
Many methods of microscopic penile revascularisation procedures have been employed over the past 2 decades for the treatment of vasculogenic impotence, with varying success rates. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effectiveness and complications of deep dorsal vein arterialisation in the treatment of selected patients with arteriogenic and mixed arteriogenic/venogenic impotence.

METHODS
This involved a retrospective analysis of 6 patients with vasculogenic impotence who presented to Toa Payoh Hospital from December 1991 to November 1994 and had penile revascularisation surgery performed. All patients underwent an extensive preoperative assessment, including dynamic infusion cavernosometry and cavernosography and selective pudendal arteriography.

RESULTS
The 6 patients were aged between 27 and 51 years (mean 44 years). 2 (33%) patients had pure arteriogenic impotence, while 4 (66%) had mixed arteriogenic and venogenic impotence. Two patients (33%) had excellent surgical outcomes and 2 patients (33%) were considered improved. The mean follow-up period was 19.8 months (range 8 to 37). Complications were minimal.

CONCLUSIONS
We conclude that although the results of penile revascularisation are promising in carefully selected patients, further studies with longer follow-up and more objective postoperative tests of hemodynamic and erectile function are needed to assess the true value of this mode of treatment.


Article re-posted with permission from the author as a PDF document as part of an Institutional Repository collection to aggregate Latin American energy policy, dialogue, white papers, reports, and educational materials.


PURPOSE
Invasive intracranial recordings have suggested that high-frequency oscillation is involved in epileptogenesis and is highly localized to epileptogenic zones. The aim of the present study is to characterize the frequency and spatial patterns of high-frequency brain signals in childhood epilepsy using a non-invasive technology.

METHODS
Thirty children with clinically diagnosed epilepsy were studied using a whole head magnetoencephalography (MEG) system. MEG data were digitized at 4,000 Hz. The frequency and spatial characteristics of high-frequency neuromagnetic signals were analyzed using continuous wavelet transform and beamformer. Three-dimensional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was obtained for each patient to localize magnetic sources.

RESULTS
Twenty-six patients showed high-frequency (100-1,000 Hz) components (26/30, 86%). Nineteen patients showed more than one high-frequency component (19/30, 63%). The frequency range of high-frequency components varied across patients. The highest frequency band was identified around 910 Hz. The loci of high-frequency epileptic activities were concordant with the lesions identified by magnetic resonance imaging for 21 patients (21/30, 70%). The MEG source localizations of high-frequency components were found to be concordant with intracranial recordings for nine of the eleven patients who underwent epilepsy surgery (9/11, 82%).

CONCLUSION
The results have demonstrated that childhood epilepsy was associated with high-frequency epileptic activity in a wide frequency range. The concordance of MEG source localization, MRI and intracranial recordings suggests that measurement of high-frequency neuromagnetic signals might provide a novel approach for clinical management of childhood epilepsy.


Tidal transfer of angular momentum is expected to cause hot Jupiters to spiral into their host stars. Although the timescale for orbital decay is very uncertain, it should be faster for systems with larger and more evolved stars. Indeed, it is well established that hot Jupiters are found less frequently around subgiant stars than around main-sequence stars. However, the interpretation of this finding has been ambiguous, because the subgiants are also thought to be more massive than the F- and G-type stars that dominate the main-sequence sample. Consequently, it has been unclear whether the absence of hot Jupiters is due to tidal destruction or inhibited formation of those planets around massive stars. Here we show that the Galactic space motions of the planet-hosting subgiant stars demand that on average they be similar in mass to the planet-hosting main-sequence F- and G-type stars. Therefore the two samples are likely to differ only in age, and provide a glimpse of the same exoplanet population both before and after tidal evolution. As a result, the lack of hot Jupiters orbiting subgiants is clear evidence for their tidal destruction. Questions remain, though, about the interpretation of other reported differences between the planet populations around subgiants and main-sequence stars, such as their period and eccentricity distributions and overall occurrence rates.


The term "culture" has become ubiquitous in both academic and popular conversations, but its usefulness is a point of dispute. Taking the current shift from cultural studies to aesthetics as the latest form of this discussion, Eric Aronoff contends that in American modernism, the concepts of culture and of aesthetics have always been inseparable. The modernist concept of culture, he argues, arose out of an interdisciplinary dialogue about value, meaning, and form among social critics, artists, anthropologists, and literary critics, including figures as diverse as Van Wyck Brooks, Edward Sapir, Willa Cather, Lewis Mumford, John Crowe Ransom, Raymond Weaver, and Allen Tate. These figures proposed new ways to conceive of culture that intertwined theories of aesthetic and literary value with theories of national, racial, and regional identity. Through close readings, Aronoff shows that disciplines and approaches that are often thought of as opposed--cultural anthropology and aesthetics, American literary history and literary criticism, and multiculturalism and regionalism--are in fact engaged in common debate and proceed from shared arguments about culture and form.


Eight clinically anxious and eight non-anxious subjects were exposed to a stimulus equivalence training procedure. Each matching-to-sample training involved threatening situations (A), nonsense syllables (B), and pleasant-state adjectives (C). All subjects met criteria for learning A-B relationships and B-C relationships in a matching-to-sample procedure, but in the critical test phase (where C sample elements are matched to A elements) the non-anxious group differed from the anxious group on two of the three C-A tests. Responding appropriately on all three C-A tests, thus indicating that the stimuli had become members of an equivalence class, occurred in six out of eight non-anxious subjects and only one out of eight anxious subjects. This striking between-group difference suggests that the presence of clinical anxiety can affect stimulus equivalence class formation, and that the procedures used here could be developed as a diagnostic procedure.


Nowadays many people are using online financial transactions. This transaction needs to be secure. A rapid growth in E-Commerce market is seen in recent time throughout the world. With the ever-increasing use of online shopping, Debit or Credit card fraud and personal information security are major concerns for customers, merchants and banks specifically in the case of CNP (Card Not Present). This paper presents a new technique for providing limited data only that is required for fund transfer during online shopping thereby safeguarding customer data and to overcome these problems using visual cryptography.
Visual Cryptography is a secret sharing scheme which owns the technique of sharing the visual information. The Captcha (image) is getting divided into two shares. The basic idea is that the secret captcha is divided into two irregular patterns of images called shares and they can be unraveled without any complicated cryptographic computation.


Abstract
Purpose: This chapter seeks to understand ethnic identification among second-generation consumers by drawing upon the lived experiences of British Indian migrants in England.

Methodology/Approach: The authors analyze interviews with middle-class, Hindu, second-generation British Indian women through Bourdieu's key concepts of capital, field, habitus, and distinction.

Findings: Through resources such as Bollywood cinema, and Indian schools for language, music, and dance, second-generation consumers acquire, use and (re) produce situationally prized subcultural capital for distinction from other ethnic consumers and members of the white majority group. Ethnicity is central to second-generation consumers' identity projects, and their everyday social interactions. Ethnicity is considered in uplifting and empowering terms, and first-generation consumers play a key role in reinforcing this belief.

Research Limitations/Implications: Due to our small sample size, limited by class, religion, and gender, the findings of this chapter might not be generalizable to the wider population. Instead, they can be used to develop new theoretical ways of understanding ethnicity in multicultural settings with long-established migrant populations.

Social Implications: Ethnicity can play a central and positive role in the everyday lives of second-generation consumers. By investigating this further, we can improve our understanding of contemporary, multicultural societies.

Originality/Value of Paper: Prior work in consumer research has focused on understanding first-generation migrant consumers through the lens of acculturation, and foregrounding experiences of stigma and tension. Instead, the authors foreground the positive and uplifting lived experiences of second-generation consumers in relation to their ethnicity. This chapter extends the literature on second-generation ethnic consumer identity work.


This paper examines material from two companies, HSBC and Orange, to reveal how far the 'Tone of Voice' of these brands expresses their different brand positions. Four linguistic techniques are applied: (i) analysis of chains of reference; (ii) analysis of transitivity and participant roles within clauses; (iii) analysis of presupposition and assumption; and (iv) the analysis of features of tenor such as 'conversationalisation' and informal grammar. It is suggested that these approaches are useful in describing the links between language and brand position. Four research hypotheses are proposed: (i) brand strength, i.e. the strength of the reader's impression of the brand varies depending on the number and nature of referring expressions that relate to the brand; (ii) participant roles, i.e. the reader is influenced by the types of processes ascribed to the brand and its related concepts; (iii) assumption, i.e. presuppositions about reader lifestyles, beliefs and values affects engagement with a brand; and (iv) conversationalisation, i.e. greater frequencies of 'conversational' linguistic features influence readers' affinity with the brand and a willingness to associate the brand with 'human' qualities such as 'approachable'. The paper investigates linguistic markers that relate to these hypotheses in detail, but also proposes two further, as yet untested, hypotheses: (v) explicit evaluation, i.e. the impression of a brand is influenced by the linguistic markers of 'point of view' such as those identified within Appraisal Theory, and (vi) unusualness, i.e. there may be a correlation between low-frequency vocabulary items and collocations and readers' tendencies to associate with the brand qualities such as 'quirky' or 'fun'. The paper also presents a discussion of the use of linguistic techniques for commercial aims, which is a departure from the critical tradition in applied linguistics.


About 8 to 9 percent of children in the United States have a relatively serious disability. Families caring for these children are more likely to experience various economic hardships than other families with children, even when their incomes are the same. Recent research finds that costs associated with raising a disabled child, including lost parental income, average at least $6,150 a year. Costs at the high end, which are more likely to reflect the subset of disabled children who are most impaired, are around $20,000 a year. Supplemental Security Income (SSI) — run by the Social Security Administration, but separate from the Social Security program — offsets some of these costs and helps parents provide the basics that children with disabilities need to thrive and become successful adults. In 2012, the maximum monthly SSI supplement was $698 and the average amount received by child beneficiaries was $619. About 1.3 million low-income children with disabilities — fewer than 1 in 4 children with disabilities — received SSI in August 2012. This relatively low number is mostly due to SSI's means-test and strict disability standard. Recent research finds that SSI increases family economic security, reduces reliance on food stamps and other means-tested assistance, and does not reduce parental employment. Even during the Great Recession, nearly half of children on SSI had a working parent. Because SSI is gradually reduced as parents' earnings increase, the program supports work among families with disabled children. Between 2000 and 2012, the number of children assisted by SSI increased from 847,000 to 1.3 million. The increase is due almost exclusively to an increase in the number of low-income children as their parents lost jobs and earnings during the Great Recession. Federal expenditures on SSI for children are projected to decline as a share of gross domestic product (GDP) going forward.


User experience design is an important part of software product development, and yet software product line engineering has largely ignored this topic. This paper presents a set of industry best practices for user experience design in software product lines. We conducted multiple-case case study research using two different product lines within the multinational company Siemens AG: in a healthcare software division and in an industrial automation software division. We performed a preliminary exploratory study that will serve as a baseline for future research in the design, implementation, and management of user experience design in the context of software product lines. Practitioners can use our findings and the resulting best practices to improve their user experience design, particularly within healthcare and industrial automation software product lines.


STUDY OBJECTIVE--The aim was to determine the relationships between dietary behaviour and biochemical and haematological measures. DESIGN--This was a cross sectional population study. SETTING--The study took place in the general community within Northern Ireland. SUBJECTS--522 randomly selected adults aged 18-64 years took part (65% of the eligible sample). MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS--Four dietary behaviours were identified using principal components analysis from 7 d weighed dietary records described in terms of mean intake of 41 food groups. Haematological and biochemical analyses were carried out on non-fasting blood samples. Social, personal, and lifestyle information was ascertained through interviewer administered questionnaires. Partial correlations controlled for age and smoking behaviour were calculated. There were significant negative associations between iron status measures and the "traditional" behaviour, while the "meat and two veg" behaviour showed positive associations. There were positive associations between the "cosmopolitan" and "convenience" behaviours and folate status in women. White cell count and platelet levels in women were negatively associated with the "traditional" and "cosmopolitan" behaviours. Total cholesterol levels showed significant negative associations with the "cosmopolitan" behaviour in women and HDL cholesterol levels were positively associated with the "cosmopolitan", "convenience" and "meat and two veg" behaviours. CONCLUSIONS--Through a multivariate approach to dietary assessment it is possible to identify food combinations that cluster and interact to influence biochemical and haematological indices of health status.


Olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs) are amongst the best candidates for cell transplantation into lesions of the central nervous system. These specialised glial cells are found in the olfactory system and are associated with the physiological restoration of neuronal circuitry in the first cranial nerve of the adult. There is conflicting evidence on the extent to which OECs promote long distance axonal regeneration when transplanted into spinal cord lesions. In the first chapter of Results (chapter 3) we aimed to determine the potential of OEC transplantation in promoting axonal regeneration beyond the injury. This was investigated by producing a transection of the dorsal columns at the lumbar 3-lumbar 4 (L3-L4) border using a wire knife device that cut ascending primary sensory afferents and immediately after, transplanting olfactory bulb derived OECs into the lesion. Regeneration was assessed in these fibres by injecting the neurotracer biotin dextran amine (BDA) into the left L4 and L5 spinal roots and sacrificing the animals 6 weeks after the lesion. We detected axonal labelling in the lumbar and thoracic cord rostral to the dorsal column lesion; but the labelled axons included spared fibres. For this reason it was necessary to develop a quantification method that included only convincing regeneration and excluded sparing or potential sprouting. With care it was possible to detect convincing axonal regeneration of dorsal root ganglia (DRG) neurons across the lesion in animals transplanted with OECs. Although there have been several claims of axonal regeneration following OEC transplantation in spinal cord pathways information is still lacking on the spatial relationship between regenerating axons and transplanted OECs. To understand this, OECs were transduced before transplantation with a lentiviral vector to express green fluorescent protein (GFP). With this technique it was possible to detect the OECs in the transplanted spinal cord and determine that tract traced axons preferentially regenerated though continuous tracts of GFP labelled OECs in continuity with the transplanted lesion, while they did not normally regenerate through the host spinal cord in areas devoid of OECs.
Regeneration beyond the lesion in OEC transplanted animals was very limited in terms of both distance and numbers of axons. The conditioning lesion of the sciatic nerve is a procedure which appears to prime DRG neurons for growth. We next asked whether the regeneration observed after an OEC transplant alone could be maximised by a combined treatment paradigm that included OEC transplantation and conditioning lesions. Conditioning lesions were performed by transecting the left sciatic nerve at mid thigh level and the spinal cord was lesioned at the L3-L4 level. Long distance bridging axonal regeneration was strongly potentiated (58 fold). As seen in OEC transplanted animals, axons in the distal spinal cord were located preferentially in areas where OECs were also present. Regeneration was also studied at earlier and later time points. The number of regenerating axons was significantly greater if survival time was of 2 weeks from the lesion/transplantation compared to the 6 week survival, while it did not vary significantly between 6 weeks and 17 weeks survival.
Direct comparison of the growth promoting effects exerted by OECs and Schwann cells have not so far been performed on transection type lesions, but only on other lesion models where sparing cannot be ruled out. To understand if these two cell types share similar properties with reference to promoting long distance axonal regeneration, in the second chapter of Results (chapter 4) we consider sciatic nerve derived Schwann cell transplantation alone or in combination with conditioning lesions following the same lesion paradigm in which OECs were transplanted. Interestingly, no significant difference was found between the growth promoting properties of the two glial cells. Furthermore, with Schwann cells as with OECs, regenerating axons in the distal spinal cord were associated mostly with the transplanted cells. To understand whether the long distance axonal regeneration observed was occurring irrespective of the cell type injected, we transplanted sciatic nerve derived fibroblasts in combination with conditioning lesions. With this lesion paradigm significantly less regeneration was detected indicating that fibroblasts are less effective than OECs and Schwann cells in terms of their regeneration promoting properties. On the other hand we determined that OECs, Schwann cells and fibroblasts all preserved the lesion integrity by preventing the lesion from dilating. Importantly, rats are now being used as a model of study for syringomyelia, a pathology that leads to progressive central canal cavitation. We have found that dilation of the central canal normally develops also in the wire knife dorsal column lesion model; however transplantation of OECs or Schwann cells significantly reduced the central canal dilation compared to non-transplanted animals.
Any clinical use of cell transplantation will likely involve a delay between injury and treatment, and since a glial scar will develop and the regenerative response of the axotomised fibres may subside, it is not clear to what extent regeneration will occur. In the third chapter of results (chapter 5) we have therefore investigated whether delayed OEC transplantation might promote a significant level of regeneration. Surprisingly, the distribution of OECs following delayed transplantation was similar to that after an acute transplant and OECs formed tracts that were in continuity with the lesion transplant. The presence of these OEC tracts allowed regenerating axons to bridge the lesion and grow for relatively long distances on the other side. Delayed conditioning lesions were combined with delayed OEC transplantation and boosted axonal growth 9 times compared to delayed OEC transplanted animals.


Dragon fruit dye has been prepared and used in the fabrication of DSSC as sensitizer. The properties of dragon fruit dye have been investigated by UV-Vis and FTIR technique. The absorption spectrum shows a peak value of 535 nm. Chemically dragon fruit dye shows present of intermolecular H-bond, conjugate C=O stretching and esters acetates C-O-C stretching vibration, which is due to the component of anthocyanin. On the other hand, the resistivity of TiO2 film on ITO glass before it is used for the fabrication of DSSC is also investigated. The TiO2 sheet resistivity increase from 1 layer = 22.1 Ω cm to 2 layers = 369.6 Ω cm. Finally, the efficiency of assemble DSSC was evaluated and simulated using a custom made technique. The result shows fill factor, Pmax and efficiency during the present of halogen lamp are 0.30, 13 μW, 0.22%, respectively. We have successfully showed that the DSSC using dragon fruit as a dye sensitizer is useful for the preparation of environmental friendly and low-cost DSSC.


Adaptive dimensional search (ADS) algorithm is a recently proposed metaheuristic optimization technique for discrete structural optimization problems. In this study, discrete sizing optimization problem of steel frames is tackled using the ADS algorithm. An important feature of the algorithm is that it does not use any metaphor as an underlying principle for its implementation. Instead, the algorithm employs an efficient performance-oriented methodology at each iteration for convergence to the optimum or a near optimum solution. The performance of the ADS is investigated through optimum design of five real-size steel frame structures and the results are compared versus several contemporary metaheuristic techniques. The comparison of the obtained numerical results with those of available designs in the literature reveals the reliability and efficiency of the ADS in optimum design of steel frames.


This paper reports on a quiz robot experiment in which we explore similarities and differences in human participant speech, gaze, and bodily conduct in responding to a robot's speech, gaze, and bodily conduct across two languages. Our experiment involved three-person groups of Japanese and English-speaking participants who stood facing the robot and a projection screen that displayed pictures related to the robot's questions. The robot was programmed so that its speech was coordinated with its gaze, body position, and gestures in relation to transition relevance places (TRPs), key words, and deictic words and expressions (e.g. this, this picture) in both languages. Contrary to findings on human interaction, we found that the frequency of English speakers' head nodding was higher than that of Japanese speakers in human-robot interaction (HRI). Our findings suggest that the coordination of the robot's verbal and non-verbal actions surrounding TRPs, key words, and deictic words and expressions is important for facilitating HRI irrespective of participants' native language. Keywords: coordination of verbal and non-verbal actions; robot gaze comparison between English and Japanese; human-robot interaction (HRI); transition relevance place (TRP); conversation analysis


NoiseBear is a wireless malleable controller designed for, and in participation with, physically and cognitively dis- abled children. The aim of the project was to produce a musical controller that was robust, and flexible enough to be used in a wide range of interactive scenarios in partici- patory design workshops. NoiseBear demonstrates an open ended system for designing wireless malleable controllers in different shapes. It uses pressure sensitive material made from conductive thread and polyester cushion stuffing, to give the feel of a soft toy. The sensor networks with other devices using the Bluetooth Low Energy protocol, running on a BlueGiga BLE112 chip. This contains an embedded 8051 processor which manages the sensor. NoiseBear has undergone an initial formative evaluation in workshop ses- sions with four autistic children, and continues to evolve in series of participatory design workshops. The evaluation showed that controller could be engaging for the children to use, and highlighted some technical limitations of the design. Solutions to these limitations are discussed, along with plans for future design iterations.


The instinct of human beings is very complex. The understanding of this instinct needs a strong dimensional analysis of the knowledge of discourse. The computer systems are now trained to realize how things operate in a real-time environment for intelligent analysis. This effort although very progressive has a restriction. There is an intelligence gap which makes human one step above the machine. The fuzzy logic system can be employed to make a machine understand this intelligence gap in a better way. In other words, fuzzy logic is a computational Intelligence technique that makes a computer understand and think the way humans do. The fuzzy logic system is now attracting scientists and engineers around the world since by integrating its abilities with soft computing techniques like neuro and chaos computing, genetic algorithm, probability reasoning, and immune networks, it can handle the problems that had not been solved before. Not only has the fuzzy system significantly enhanced knowledge-based or expert system technology, but it has also primarily changed the granularity of intelligence. For example, with the help of the fuzzy logic system, industrialists of home appliances are today embedding intelligence in specific productsThe aim of this study is two folds: first, to understand the fuzzy logic system for effective decision making and second, to demonstrate the presence of this intelligence gap through real-time examples. The examples are selected cautiously to illustrate and demonstrate the applications of the fuzzy logic system for every reader. Key Terms: Intelligent Data Analysis, Fuzzy Logic Systems, Machine Learning, Genetic Algorithms, Probability Modelling


Abstract This paper summarizes recent results obtained on chemical modifications of smectites. These include replacement of exchangeable cations with protons, a process connected with smectite autotransformation - attack of protons on the layers and liberation of central atoms from the octahedral and tetrahedral sheets, causing modification of the acid sites on the particles. More severe modifications occur during dissolution in inorganic acids, when the layers are dissolved and threedimensional amorphous silica is formed. The negative charge on the smectite layers can be increased via reduction of structural Fe(III) to Fe(II) or decreased via fixation of small exchangeable cations, such as Li+, upon treatment at elevated temperatures. Heating for 24 h at different temperatures between 100 and 300ºC leads to a series of chemically similar materials of different charge, prepared from the same parent mineral. Such series are suitable for investigation of the effect of the layer charge on selected properties of smectites. Fe(II) can be partly stabilized in reduced smectites by Li fixation upon heating.


Capital investment is an important economic activity that
contributes to economic growth. Aggressive capital formation leading to
high economic growth can be the result of either public expenditure policies for welfare betterment or private initiatives, which enable the
market mechanism to operate effectively and efficiently. In Malaysia, the
private sector plays an active role in economic development, so its ability
to raise external funding must not be en cumbered by restrictive policies
that increases costs of financing. Thus, the first objective of this study is
to search for a link between the amount of capital rises by the private
sector and changes in macroeconomic factors. Time constraints limit the
study to external capital funding in the form of equity only, both seasoned
and unseasoned ones. Apart from relating the volume of equity raised to a
certain macro economic variable,the research is extended to identifying factors in explaining the price behaviour of rights is sue announcements
and listing of IPOs.
This study is based on findings in the U.S. that volume and price
behaviour of equity issues (particularly seasoned equity) are influenced
by movement of the business cycle as measured by the National Bureau of
Economic Research (NBER). Since similar index is not available in
Malaysia, a proxy closely related to variations in the business cycle was
used. This proxy is the term premium, which is the excess of the average
20-year Malaysian Government Securities (MGS) yield over the3-month
Treasury bill (TB) yield. Evidence of a significant association between
term premiums and movements of the business cycle in the U.S. is the
basis, which led to the adoption of this variable in the study.
The research design used in this study is the event study
methodology to measure price behaviour of rights issues and IPOs, and the
ordinary least square regression method to determine the variables
explaining the price behaviour. The market-adjusted return was used to derive abnormal returns of rights issues.


Recently, genome wide association studies (GWAS) have identified a number of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) as being associated with coronary heart disease (CHD). We estimated the effect of these SNPs on incident CHD, stroke and total mortality in the prospective cohorts of the MORGAM Project. We studied cohorts from Finland, Sweden, France and Northern Ireland (total N=33,282, including 1,436 incident CHD events and 571 incident stroke events). The lead SNPs at seven loci identified thus far and additional SNPs (in total 42) were genotyped using a case‐cohort design. We estimated the effect of the SNPs on disease history at baseline, disease events during follow‐up and classic risk factors. Multiple testing was taken into account using false discovery rate (FDR) analysis. SNP rs1333049 on chromosome 9p21.3 was associated with both CHD and stroke (HR=1.20, 95% CI 1.08–1.34 for incident CHD events and 1.15, 0.99–1.34 for incident stroke). SNP rs11670734 (19q12) was associated with total mortality and stroke. SNP rs2146807 (10q11.21) showed some association with the fatality of acute coronary event. SNP rs2943634 (2q36.3) was associated with high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol and SNPs rs599839, rs4970834 (1p13.3) and rs17228212 (15q22.23) were associated with non‐HDL cholesterol. SNPs rs2943634 (2q36.3) and rs12525353 (6q25.1) were associated with blood pressure. These findings underline the need for replication studies in prospective settings and confirm the candidacy of several SNPs that may play a role in the etiology of cardiovascular disease. Genet. Epidemiol. 2009. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Opened in 1878, Cincinnati Music Hall is the performance venue for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra concerts, opera and the May festival of Music. Originally the three part complex was designed to house horticultural displays, art and industrial exhibitions all centered around the structurally central 3500-seat Music Hall. The exterior of the building is remarkable in its' use of red and black pressed brick accented with carved stone ornaments and wrought iron work. Remodeling in 1895 introduced electrical lighting, a ceiling mural by Arthur Conrad Thomas and a Beaux Arts style proscenium that created a more formal interior. The 1970 renovation added rehearsal halls, stage property shops and extensive stage equipment.


The failure of justice in the cases of the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four, the Maguire Seven and others in the late 1980s heightened public and media awareness of criminal appeals, a subject previously of interest mainly to legal practitioners and judges involved in the appeal process. Practitioners' guides provided information on how to appeal convictions and sentences imposed in magistrates' courts and in the Crown Court, but there was no literature which attempted a critical examination of the law and state of criminal appeals in England and Wales or any assessment of post-appeal remedies for those like the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four, and the Maguire Seven, who did not initially succeed in having their convictions quashed on an appeal. English Criminal Appeals seeks to fill this gap, and in addition to outline the development of judicial and extra-judicial remedies against wrongful conviction and inappropriate sentence since 1844 when the first bill to establish a court capable of reviewing convictions on indictment was presented to Parliament.


During the past decade, full-waveform inversion (FWI) has advanced rapidly in the seismic industry. FWI research and applications are making continual progress to address the technical and business challenges we face today in the upstream sector. Key hallmarks of this technology range from velocity-modeling building to producing high-resolution subsurface images in complex environments. The significant work on FWI in the last decade clearly indicates that it is one of the top fields of research in the geophysical community with the potential to extract enhanced subsurface information from seismic data.


The International Arctic Ocean Expedition of 1991 measured number concentrations of condensation nuclei and cloud condensation nuclei from 1 August to 6 October between latitudes 70°N and 90°N. Changes in concentration of more than a factor of 2 in 1 h or less were frequent in spite of the long distances from significant sources and often appeared in groups separated by times of the order of 1 h. These observations provide a unique opportunity to study interacting meteorological mechanisms in the stable marine boundary layer. It is suggested that most of these changes were due to two factors: (1) large vertical concentration gradients caused mainly by interaction of aerosol and clouds and (2) intermittent localised mixing into the shallow surface mixed layer, caused by atmospheric wave motions or roll vortices. Quasi-periodic changes of smaller amplitude were present for about 35% of the total time with mean periods in the range 60–90 min. About 1/6 of the sudden large changes, usually involving an isolated decrease and recovery in accumulation mode particle number concentrations, is attributed to mixing caused by shear-induced Kelvin-Helmholtz breaking waves. Regular sequences of maxima and minima were about as common but involved 2/3 of all such changes because of the number of events in each sequence. Satellite images, radiosonde wind profiles and the typical mean periods suggested that roll vortices were common in the high Arctic. The associated mixing changes seemed to account adequately for the alternating maxima and minima in aerosol number concentrations. The special conditions of atmospheric stability and high frequencies of low cloud cover in the high Arctic combined with the absence of strong local sources of particles have allowed us to identify processes of mixing that often drastically modified aerosol size distributions and concentrations near the surface which are likely to have a far more general application. These factors have to be added to studies of chemical and physical processes influencing the life cycle of the aerosol and air transport, in order to understand the sources, sinks and to define the radiative forcing by the atmospheric aerosol in the Arctic and elsewhere. DOI: 10.1034/j.1600-0889.1996.t01-1-00009.x


Suicide has consistently been associated with depression and treated as such by medical professionals. However, we must remember that it is an independent entity, with numerous factors contributing to such feelings, and should approach it accordingly, looking to understand the patients' perspective. Suicide in terminally ill patients is no different, and steps to prevent the hastening of death should be taken in line with the intentions of palliative care.


GPU computing is a new paradigm in high performance signal and image processing. Massive parallel processing offered by the GPUs provides high acceleration of computations when they are properly implemented. Ultrasound image reconstruction is one of these highly parallel classes of algorithms. Massive amount of multichannel input data and deterministic order of execution makes US applications good candidates for high performance GPU implementation. Our goal is to design a versatile ultrasound platform with GPU real-time processing. The project is based on a new system architecture allowing for bandwidth and scalability of processing power. We implemented and optimized SAFT image reconstruction algorithms on CUDA. The study shows that a single GTX-580 GPU card is capable of reconstructing the 128-channel I/Q data into 256×256 High Resolution Images (HRI) at a frame-rate of 44.64 fps which is an equivalent of 5700 Low Resolution Images (LRI) per second.


Recent studies have demonstrated some success in improving speech intelligibility when either competing voices or reverberation are present, using an adaptive beamformer in the first case and a fixed‐weight beamformer in the second. The present study evaluates the effectiveness of a hybrid beamformer incorporating the strengths of an adaptive beamformer with the advantages of an optimally chosen fixed‐weight beamformer. Received signals at a short array of microphones in a room were simulated for a single talker and for a babble of voices at each of several interferer locations. Three rooms with different absorption coefficients were simulated. Conditions with more than one simultaneous interferer location and with starts and stops of an interferer are being tested. Success of the hybrid adaptive beamformer is being assessed by informal listening and by measuring the intelligibility‐weighted improvement in SNR. Preliminary results appear promising.


Teachers in medical school have the golden opportunities to shape and change the future of medical discoveries, by inspiring new generation of medical doctors for research, education, and clinical trials. For some medical students, they can determine the choice of their medical subspecialty. A good teaching of best quality will be delivered when there is deep understanding of different educational learning theories that influence leaning. It is expected that medical education will focus on: integration of information between basics sciences and clinical sciences, changing learning structure and learning in community and remote settings, authentic curriculum (adding social and behavioural sciences) and students and student engagement. The concept of students; engagement with curriculum was endorsed by the General Medical Council (GMC) in 2011 and the Association for Medical Education in Europe (AMEE) in 2015. The four key principles that can be applied by medical teachers in their day to day teaching are based on the feedback, activity, individualisation, and relevance. Importantly, feedback provides basis for correcting mistakes, clarifying goals, and reinforcing good practices. The activity meant to indicate that student is actively involving in learning. Individualisation meant to be learning experiences that matches the need of individual student. The relevance of the materials taught (clinical, basic sciences and social and behavioural sciences, communication skills, professionalism and evidence-based medicine). Therefore, the role of the teachers may be more important than the leaning style, especially in medicine and in particular academic medicine. In this review, I will explain why the adoption of theories of learning style may decrease the potential of doctors to explore other beneficial options that add more diversity and success to their career and be part of the academic medicine. It is possible that the attributes of our good medical teachers can influence our progress in our medical career rather than the learning style.


Today's publicly available pedestrian navigation systems still use paradigms developed for car navigation. In this paper, we present a novel landmark-based pedestrian navigation model using open source tools and open data from OpenStreetMap, which is available globally and free of charge. This approach ensures that our landmark navigation model is widely applicable, rather than restricted to a certain area with exceptional data sources. Our contributions cover algorithms for extraction, weighing, and selection of landmarks based on their suitability, as well as the generation of landmark-based navigation instructions for a given pedestrian route. The system has been implemented using PostGIS as a data store and QGIS for algorithm development. First field tests with pedestrians show promising results by confirming that our weighted landmark selection outperforms a simple baseline approach by reducing the number of navigation errors and revealed future challenges for the generation of intuitive pedestrian navigation instructions.


Physical damage to oil palm roots affects the palm's ability to acquire nutrients. In spite of this huge impact on the palm, the effects of root loss on palm nutrient status are unknown and this is unfortunate because optimal palm nutrient status is an important factor in fruit production. In trying to understand the effects of damage to the roots and the consequent effects on the palms, the impact of root damage was simulated by severing roots within 0%, 25% and 50% of the palm circle. Five months after the roots were severed, changes in leaf nutrient levels in the various treatments were observed. Each treatment was replicated five times, using one palm per replicate. The impact of losing 25% of the roots within the palm circle changed the leaf K concentration and also the N:K ratio significantly (p 0.05) in the N, P, Mg and B leaf concentrations compared to control. Further assessment of the impact of root loss on nutrient uptake by the palm, especially by the surviving tertiary roots, was made using 32 P isotope. Five surviving tertiary roots from each treatment were placed in contact with the 32 P solution, and the amount of isotope absorbed by the palms from the various treatments over a fixed time was measured. No difference in the amount of the isotope absorbed was observed.


The Russian writer Andrei Platonov (1899-1951), after years of severe Soviet-Stalinist censorship against him, begins to review new publications in the Russian language for the literary magazine "Literaturnoe Obozrenie". The April issue of the magazine contains A. Klimentov's article (Klimentov was Platonov's real name) on "The Story of My Life" by Akaki Tsereteli (1840-1915). The work by the prominent Georgian writer and poet was translated into Russian and published in Moscow in 1940 on the occasion of his 100th birthday anniversary. Platonov analyzes the book, discovering in it the spirit of the epoch, the paradigmatic language and the classical traditions of the Georgian literature. He respects the moral character and cultural significance of the Georgian writer, but at the same time points out that Tsereteli's literary world is far from Platonov's.


The publication of the Department of Health White Paper "The Health of the Nation" (1992) and "Our Healthier Nation" (1998) gave emphasis to the importance of nutritional health of the nation at all ages. It is clear that the achievement of specific targets for pregnancy and infancy as set out in the White Paper will involve the training of all health care professionals in nutrition education. This book responds to the challenge and focuses on good nutrition for and during pregnancy, in low birth weight infants, and during infancy. It has a strong public health emphasis, dealing with health prevention issues for the Nation s younger population. The text is written as a scientific reference book for those seeking to apply science in the support of a successful pregnancy and in the prevention of nutritional problems during foetal and early post natal life. The importance of optimal nutrition during these periods of life is emphasised by the overwhelming evidence that nutritional problems in early embryonic life may cause congenital malformations and during late foetal life and early post natal life may set the molecular programme for later disease development.


BACKGROUND
The role of hyperbaric oxygen (HBO2) for the treatment of diabetic foot ulcers (DFUs) has been examined in the medical literature for decades. There are more systematic reviews of the HBO2/DFU literature than there have been randomized controlled trials (RCTs), but none of these reviews has resulted in a clinical practice guideline (CPG) that clinicians, patients and policy-makers can use to guide decision-making in everyday practice.

METHODS
The Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS), following the methodology of the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) Working Group, undertook this systematic review of the HBO2 literature in order to rate the quality of evidence and generate practice recommendations for the treatment of DFUs. We selected four clinical questions for review regarding the role of HBO2 in the treatment of DFUs and analyzed the literature using patient populations based on Wagner wound classification and age of the wound (i.e., acute post-operative wound vs. non-healing wound of 30 or more days). Major amputation and incomplete healing were selected as critical outcomes of interest.

RESULTS
This analysis showed that HBO2 is beneficial in preventing amputation and promoting complete healing in patients with Wagner Grade 3 or greater DFUs who have just undergone surgical debridement of the foot as well as in patients with Wagner Grade 3 or greater DFUs that have shown no significant improvement after 30 or more days of treatment. In patients with Wagner Grade 2 or lower DFUs, there was inadequate evidence to justify the use of HBO2 as an adjunctive treatment.

CONCLUSIONS
Clinicians, patients, and policy-makers should engage in shared decision-making and consider HBO2 as an adjunctive treatment of DFUs that fit the criteria outlined in this guideline. The current body of evidence provides a moderate level of evidence supporting the use of HBO2 for DFUs. Future research should be directed at improving methods for patient selection, testing various treatment protocols and improving our confidence in the existing estimates.


This research examines the ways that highly ranked, competitive Scrabble players develop their skills and expertise. It focuses on the role of social interactions in the development of their expertise as members of the community of practice of Scrabble players. Using nine case studies and semi-structured interviews as a primary source of data, the research seeks to explore the range of interactions of the experts with other Scrabble players and the curriculum of knowledge that facilitated their journey from novice to expert. The professional interactions among peers in reference to tournaments, the bonds and friendships that have developed in the social sphere that accompanies club and tournament play, and specific relationships within the community such as rivalries, alliances and mentor/protege relationships have been identified. In addition, the development and maintenance of cognitive and metacognitive skills of the experts, both inside and outside of the community, are explored.


In this book Rita Ricardo Campbell translates the arcane intricacies of Social Security into terms intelligible to lay readers. She thereby fills the long-standing need for a lucid, up-to-date, authoritative guide to the system. She not only examines the gulf between how the sytem ideally should work and how it actually does work, but also offers incisive, realistic proposals for overdue reforms. Social Security is a subject no one can afford to ignore or fail to understand. At its inception the maximum tax per person was $60 per year; today its almost $2,000. Thirty-two million individuals currently receive benefits, and 90 percent of the workforce pays Social Security taxes; nearly one-half pay more in social security than in federal income tax. For those who seek an intelligent analysis of Social Security Campbell's book will be welcome and invaluable.


Avian leukosis virus-induced erythroblastosis results from the specific interruption of the host oncogene, c-erbB, by the insertion of an intact provirus. This insertion results in the expression of two size classes (3.6 and 7.0 kilobases [kb]) of truncated c-erbB transcripts which are initiated in the 5' long terminal repeat of the integrated provirus. Through sequence analysis of erbB cDNA clones we have previously shown that the 3.6-kb activated erbB mRNA contains portions of viral gag and env genes fused to c-erbB sequences (T.W. Nilsen, P.A. Maroney, R.G. Goodwin, F.M. Rottman, L.B. Crittenden, M.A. Raines, and H.-J. Kung, Cell 41:719-726, 1985). In this report we show that the 7-kb mRNA differs from the shorter activated c-erbB mRNA in the length of its 3' untranslated sequence such that the longer mRNA has an extremely long (4.3 kb) 3' untranslated sequence. Additionally, we demonstrate that activated c-erbB mRNA precursors can be processed by alternative splicing to yield mRNAs with viral gag sequences fused directly to c-erbB sequences. Finally, blot hybridization evidence suggests that the two size classes of activated c-erbB mRNA in erythroblastic tissue represent truncated versions of the two c-erbB mRNAs present in normal tissue.


This thesis presents a comprehensive analysis of the gambling activities of Aboriginal people living in remote areas of the Northern Territory, Australia. Extended fieldwork was carried out in the remote community of Maningrida, Arnhem Land. The research focused on card games played in the community. In addition, research was conducted in a large urban gambling venue in Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory, that examined remote Aboriginal people's access to, and use of, poker machines (electronic gaming machines). The findings describe complex social, economic and political processes at work within both community card games and the urban gambling venue from an anthropological perspective.  The findings suggest that Aboriginal people in Maningrida benefit socially, economically and politically through membership in the informal regulatory structures that existed within card games. However, the community also identified problems relating to card games, particularly in relation to the impact of card games on children. This research also found that, although playing poker machines in an urban gambling environment was an activity that remote Aboriginal people engaged in and enjoyed, it did not offer the same social and economic opportunities as card games. There was a distinct reliance on social relationships within the urban gambling venue,and the efforts and attempts made by people to continue to gamble in groups (despite the individualised nature of poker machines) was significant. Aside from winning a large sum of money, the economic benefits for remote Aboriginal people attending the venue were minimal. The information gathered through this fieldwork has significant implications in terms of the development of relevant harm-minimisation strategies. Finally, the research found that the Aboriginal people involved in this research defined 'problem gambling' differently from mainstream definitions. The research found that Aboriginal people defined 'problem gambling' as a person neglecting or rejecting social relationships and obligations as a result of gambling. The findings from this research identify a significant need for the development of a national strategy in Australia to address the issues that Aboriginal people face in relation to gambling.


This chapter reports on the work activities, time-use patterns, and stress patterns of ten health care managers in Sweden. The qualitative and quantitative evidence reveals the fragmentation in their nine-hour working days where each activity, on average, lasts only ten minutes. The time-use patterns vary individually though some patterns are related to position and unit type. Activities deal with the coexisting and competing logics of employeeship, administration, and strategy and risk handling. None of the managers' approaches for handling the multiple legitimation processes and delimiting their workload boundaries really challenges the complexity of the coexistence of the multiple logics or the boundlessness of their working hours. Using biophysical measures, the research finds that stress reported by the managers is caused by (a) interruptions during challenging tasks and (b) personal situations such as private dilemmas and conflict-loaded or ineffective meetings. It is important to acknowledge managers' fragmented working situation and to recognize that management should be seen as collective process, or as part of an administrative system.


Physically interesting behaviour can arise when soft matter is confined to nanoscale dimensions. A highly relevant biological example of such a phenomenon is the Nuclear Pore Complex (NPC), found perforating the Nuclear Envelope of all eukaryotic cells. In the central conduit of the NPC, of 30-60 nm diameter, a disordered arrangement of proteins regulates all macromolecular transport between the nucleus and the cytoplasm. Its selectivity for larger macromolecules relies on changes in a permeability barrier that is formed by these unstructured proteins, induced by interactions of these proteins with molecules called Nuclear Transport Receptors (NTRs), which can chaperone larger macromolecules through the NPC. The exact mechanism for the transport selectivity is unknown. To model these unstructured proteins in the nanoscale channel of the NPC, a density functional theory approach is developed that treats the proteins as interacting polymers. This new method is tested against Monte Carlo to show its validity. A detailed comparison between this model system and those previously proposed in the literature is provided. In a parameter range relevant for the NPC, the system shows bimodal behaviour The polymers can alternate between two condensed states: An open state, in which this condensation takes place at the channel wall, and a closed state in which it occurs at the channel centre. We then extend this model by including explicitly the effect of Nuclear Transport Receptors on the conformations of the polymers. The model takes into account the finite size of the transport receptors relative to the NPC diameter. Mapping the polymer and transport receptor behaviour over a set of physiologically relevant parameters gives different structural scenarios for the various hypothesized transport mechanisms. Further to this, the transport rates for each parameter set can be obtained, showing whether such parameters are consistent with experimental evidence. In addition to this, we study the effect of relaxing some of the assumptions of our model, specifically by looking at azimuthal symmetry breaking effects in two dimensions. We also compare our model to experimental results measuring the thickness of planar polymer brushes comprised of NPC proteins to further justify parameter choices.


Golgi phosphoprotein 3 (GOLPH3) is a conserved protein of the Golgi apparatus that in humans has been implicated in tumorigenesis. However, the precise function of GOLPH3 in malignant transformation is still unknown. Nevertheless, clinicopathological data shows that in more than a dozen kinds of cancer, including gliomas, GOLPH3 could be found overexpressed, which correlates with poor prognosis. Experimental data shows that overexpression of GOLPH3 leads to transformation of primary cells and to tumor growth enhancement. Conversely, the knocking down of GOLPH3 in GOLPH3-overexpressing tumor cells reduces tumorigenic features, such as cell proliferation and cell migration and invasion. The cumulative evidence indicate that GOLPH3 is an oncoprotein that promotes tumorigenicity by a mechanism that impact at different levels in different types of cells, including the sorting of Golgi glycosyltransferases, signaling pathways, and the actin cytoskeleton. How GOLPH3 connects mechanistically these processes has not been determined yet. Further studies are important to have a more complete understanding of the role of GOLPH3 as oncoprotein. Given the genetic diversity in cancer, a still outstanding aspect is how in this inherent heterogeneity GOLPH3 could possibly exert its oncogenic function. We have aimed to evaluate the contribution of GOLPH3 overexpression in the malignant phenotype of different types of tumor cells. Here, we analyzed the effect on cell migration that resulted from stable, RNAi-mediated knocking down of GOLPH3 in T98G cells of glioblastoma multiforme, a human glioma cell line with unique features. We found that the reduction of GOLPH3 levels produced dramatic changes in cell morphology, involving rearrangements of the actin cytoskeleton and reduction in the number and dynamics of focal adhesions. These effects correlated with decreased cell migration and invasion due to affected persistence and directionality of cell motility. Moreover, the knocking down of GOLPH3 also caused a reduction in autoactivation of focal adhesion kinase (FAK), a cytoplasmic tyrosine kinase that regulates focal adhesions. Our data support a model in which GOLPH3 in T98G cells promotes cell migration by stimulating the activity of FAK.


While showing great promise, Bitcoin requires users to wait tens of minutes for transactions to commit, and even then, offering only probabilistic guarantees. This paper introduces ByzCoin, a novel Byzantine consensus protocol that leverages scalable collective signing to commit Bitcoin transactions irreversibly within seconds. ByzCoin achieves Byzantine consensus while preserving Bitcoin's open membership by dynamically forming hash power-proportionate consensus groups that represent recently-successful block miners. ByzCoin employs communication trees to optimize transaction commitment and verification under normal operation while guaranteeing safety and liveness under Byzantine faults, up to a near-optimal tolerance of f faulty group members among 3f + 2 total. ByzCoin mitigates double spending and selfish mining attacks by producing collectively signed transaction blocks within one minute of transaction submission. Tree-structured communication further reduces this latency to less than 30 seconds. Due to these optimizations, ByzCoin achieves a throughput higher than PayPal currently handles, with a confirmation latency of 15-20 seconds.


Scale-invariant features are widely used for image retrieval and shape classification. The curvature of a planar curve is a fundamental feature and it is geometrically invariant with respect it the coordinate system. The curvature-based feature varies in position when multi-scale analysis is performed. Therefore, it is important to recognize the scale in order to detect the feature point. Numerous shape descriptors based on contour shapes have been developed in the field of pattern recognition and computer vision. A curvature scale-space (CSS) representation cannot be applied to a contour fragment and requires the tracking of feature points. In a gradient-based curvature computation, although the gradient computation considers the scale, the curvature is normalized with respect to not the scale but the contour length. The scale-invariant feature transform algorithm that detects feature points from an image solves similar problems by using the difference of Gaussian (DoG). It is difficult to apply the SIFT algorithm to a planar curve for feature extraction. In this paper, an automatic scale detection method for a contour fragment is proposed. The proposed method detects the appropriate scales and their positions on the basis of the difference of curvature (DoC) without the tracking of feature points. To calculate the differences, scale-normalized curvature is introduced. An advantage of the DoC algorithm is that the appropriate scale can be obtained from a contour fragment as a local feature. It then extends the application area. The validity of the proposed method is confirmed by experiments. The proposed method provides the most stable and robust scales of feature points among conventional methods such as curvature scale-space and gradient-based curvature.


When I casually mention that the most frequent representations of male homosexuality in Japan (outside the pages of the gay press) appear in manga (comics) written by and for women, I am usually met with an incredulous 'Why?' This always strikes me as odd, for few people react with surprise to the fact that male pornography is full of 'lesbian' sex. If heterosexual men enjoy the idea of two women getting it on, why should heterosexual women not enjoy the idea of two men bonking? In English-speaking societies, many women do just this, and what's more they write about it and illustrate it in 'slash fiction' (Penley 1992; Cicioni 1998). This almost exclusively female genre takes the male leads from popular television dramas and 'slashes' them, making the series' homosocial and at times homoerotic subplots explicitly homosexual. Beginning in the Star Trek fandom subculture of the mid 70s where sexually explicit Kirk/Spock (or K/S) stories were first written, the genre has expanded to include almost any TV series where the bond between male characters is sufficiently intense to permit sexual readings. Starsky/Hutch stories were popular for a time in the late 70s, the male members of the cast of British sci-fi series Blakes 7 were slashed throughout the 80s, and, more recently, The X-Files' Mulder has found himself slashed with both his boss Skinner and his nemesis, Krycek. These stores are written, collected, edited and circulated by women fans in print-version zines and, increasingly, on the Internet. (For an introduction to slash fandom on the Net click here).


This article begins with the observation that the scope of federal trademark protection has experienced hypertrophic growth in recent decades. Over the course of this expansion, trademark law has become unmoored from its supposed ideological foundations, and come to encroach on an ever-wider array of important social goods, such as free speech and vigorous competition in the marketplace. I argue that two factors are primarily responsible for this state of affairs: (1) trademark law's idiosyncratic test for infringement liability, which produces a "likelihood-of-confusion feedback loop" that drives the continuous expansion of substantive trademark rights; and (2) federal trademark law's lack of a robust doctrinal "safety valve" of the sort found in copyright and patent law, without which judges have no normative "foot" to put down.

To remedy this situation, I propose to equip judges with the equitable defense of "trademark misuse," which has been repeatedly advocated by defendants and commentators, but not yet recognized by any federal court. In crafting the new doctrine, I first examine the respective paths of the copyright fair use, patent misuse, and copyright misuse defenses, and borrow the best aspects of each, while attempting to avoid each doctrine's flaws. I then look to the public policies underlying trademark protection, and design a multi-factor test that strives to achieve a balance between flexibility and predictability. It is my hope that this article will highlight the pressing need for the adoption of the trademark misuse defense, and that the federal courts will utilize my framework as a way of overtly and systematically attending to important normative considerations that trademark law cannot effectively address in its current form.


Hydrologic similarity between catchments, derived from similarity in how catchments respond to precipitation input, is the basis for catchment classification, for transferability of information, for generalization of our hydrologic understanding and also for understanding the potential impacts of environmental change. An important question in this context is, how far can widely available hydrologic information (precipitation-temperature-streamflow data and generally available physical descriptors) be used to create a first order grouping of hydrologically similar catchments? We utilize a heterogeneous dataset of 280 catchments located in the Eastern US to understand hydrologic similarity in a 6-dimensional signature space across a region with strong environmental gradients. Signatures are defined as hydrologic response characteristics that provide insight into the hydrologic function of catchments. A Bayesian clustering scheme is used to separate the catchments into 9 homogeneous classes, which enable us to interpret hydrologic similarity with respect to similarity in climatic and landscape attributes across this region. We finally derive several hypotheses regarding controls on individual signatures from the analysis performed here.


Introduction of intermittent electricity production systems like wind power and solar systems to electricity market together with the consumption-based electricity production resulted in numerous start/stops, load variations and off-design operation of water turbines. The hydropower systems suffer from the varying loads exerted on the stationary and rotating parts of the turbines during load variations which they are not designed for. On the other hand, investigations on part load operation of single regulated turbines, i.e., Francis and propeller, proved the formation of rotating vortex rope (RVR) in the draft tube. The RVR induces oscillating flow both in plunging and rotating modes which results in oscillating force with two different frequencies on the runner blades, bearings and other rotating parts of the turbine. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of transient operations on the pressure fluctuations on the runner and mechanism of the RVR formation/mitigation. Draft tube and runner blades of the Porjus U9 model, a Kaplan turbine, were equipped with pressure sensors. The model was run in off-cam mode during different load variation conditions to check the runner performance under unsteady condition. The results showed that the transients between the best efficiency point and the high load happens in a smooth way while transitions to/from the part load, where rotating vortex rope (RVR) forms in the draft tube induces high level of fluctuations with two frequencies on the runner; plunging and rotating mode of the RVR.


Nasal NK/T cell lymphoma is a rare and distinct type of extranodal Non-Hodgkin' s lymphoma. Current study has proved that Radiotherapy is the most effective treatment method in the early stage nasal NK/T cell lymphoma, but there is no universal standard for concrete radiotherapy modality, such as the radiation target, the radiation dose and preventive neck radiation. Most studies have proved that radiotherapy of extended field and higher dose achieved good effect in early stage nasal NK/T cell lymphoma.And the studies also do not suggested preventive neck radiation in local stage patients, but it need further study in the extensive stage patients.

Key words:
Lymphoma,Non-Hodgkin; Nasal Cavity; Radiation target; Radiation dose; Preventive neck radiation


BACKGROUND
The efficacy of ad libitum low-fat diets in reducing body weight and fat in overweight and obese adults remains controversial.

METHODS
We examined the effect of a 12-week low-fat, high-complex carbohydrate diet alone (HI-CHO) and in combination with aerobic exercise training (HI-CHO + EX) on body weight and composition in 34 individuals with impaired glucose tolerance (20 women and 14 men; mean +/- SEM age, 66 +/- 1 years). Participants were randomly assigned to a control diet (41% fat, 14% protein, 45% carbohydrates, and 7 g of fiber per 1000 kcal), a HI-CHO diet (18% fat, 19% protein, 63% carbohydrates, and 26 g of fiber per 1000 kcal), or a HI-CHO diet plus endurance exercise 4 d/wk, 45 min/d, at 80% peak oxygen consumption (HI-CHO + EX). Participants were provided 150% of estimated energy needs and were instructed to consume food ad libitum. Total food intake, body composition, resting metabolic rate, and substrate oxidation were measured.

RESULTS
There was no significant difference in total food intake among the 3 groups and no change in energy intake over time. The HI-CHO + EX and HI-CHO groups lost more body weight (-4.8 +/- 0.9 kg [P=.003] and -3.2 +/- 1.2 kg [P=.02]) and a higher percentage of body fat (-3.5% +/- 0.7% [P=.01] and -2.2% +/- 1.2% [P=.049]) than controls (-0.1 +/- 0.6 kg and 0.2% +/- 0.6%). In addition, thigh fat area decreased in the HI-CHO (P=.003) and HI-CHO + EX (P<.001) groups compared with controls. High carbohydrate intake and weight loss did not result in a decreased resting metabolic rate or reduced fat oxidation.

CONCLUSION
A high-carbohydrate diet consumed ad libitum, with no attempt at energy restriction or change in energy intake, results in losses of body weight and body fat in older men and women.


The Educational Alumni Support Project (EdASP) indicated that there is an urgent need for the teaching profession to support casual beginning teachers (CBTs). The EdASP that was carried out at the University of New England provided online support for primary and secondary beginning teachers, yet the majority of postings were submitted by CBTs. In general, these casual teachers experienced feelings of alienation, culture shock, a lack of school and systemic support, and are often not considered part of the school community by staff or students. The analysis of postings by CBTs provides further insight into the difficulties they face, as well as reveals or reinforces strategies that could effectively facilitate their teaching. Many of these findings are not new, yet the call to aid casuals continues to be overlooked. This need for support is both professional and pragmatic. Ethically, education – a nurturing profession – should support its novices. In addition, the transition period from pre‐service to professional teacher has significant implications for teacher educators plus the potential retention of teachers.


The field of swarm robotics has been growing fast over the last few years. Using a swarm of simple and cheap robots has advantages in various tasks. Apart from performance gains on tasks that allow for parallel execution, simple robots can also be smaller, enabling them to reach areas that can not be accessed by a larger, more complex robot. Their ability to cooperate means they can execute complex tasks while offering self-organised adaptation to changing environments and robustness due to redundancy. In order to keep individual robots simple, a control algorithm has to keep expensive communication to a minimum and has to be able to act on little information to keep the amount of sensors down. The number of sensors and actuators can be reduced even more when necessary capabilities are spread out over different agents that then combine them by cooperating. Self-organised differentiation within these heterogeneous groups has to take the individual abilities of agents into account to improve group performance. In this thesis it is shown that a homogeneous group of versatile agents can not be easily replaced by a heterogeneous group, by separating the abilities of the versatile agents into several specialists. It is shown that no composition of those specialists produces the same outcome as a homogeneous group on a clustering task. In the second part of this work, an adaptation mechanism for a group of foragers introduced by Labella et al. (2004) is analysed in more detail. It does not require communication and needs only the information on individual success or failure. The algorithm leads to self-organised regulation of group activity depending on object availability in the environment by adjusting resting times in a base. A possible variation of this algorithm is introduced which replaces the probabilistic mechanism with which agents determine to leave the base. It is demonstrated that a direct calculation of the resting times does not lead to differences in terms of differentiation and speed of adaptation. After investigating effects of different parameters on the system, it is shown that there is no efficiency increase in static environments with constant object density when using a homogeneous group of agents. Efficiency gains can nevertheless be achieved in dynamic environments. The algorithm was also reported to lead to higher activity of agents which have higher performance. It is shown that this leads to efficiency gains in heterogeneous groups in static and dynamic environments.


Performance pay for tax collectors has the potential to raise revenues, but might come at a cost if it increases the bargaining power of tax collectors vis-a-vis taxpayers. We report the first large-scale field experiment on these issues, where we experimentally allocated 482 property tax units in Punjab, Pakistan, into one of three performance pay schemes or a control. After two years, incentivized units had 9.4 log points higher revenue than controls, which translates to a 46% higher growth rate. The scheme that rewarded purely on revenue did best, increasing revenue by 12.9 log points (64% higher growth rate), with little penalty for customer satisfaction and assessment accuracy compared to the two other schemes that explicitly also rewarded these dimensions. The revenue gains accrue from a small number of properties becoming taxed at their true value, which is substantially more than they had been taxed at previously. The majority of properties in incentivized areas in fact pay no more taxes, but instead report higher bribes. The results are consistent with a collusive setting in which performance pay increases collectors' bargaining power over taxpayers, who have to either pay higher bribes to avoid being reassessed or pay substantially higher taxes if collusion breaks down. JEL Codes: D73, H26, H83, J33.


A rating system for leaf pubescence is needed to characterize cotton cultivars having intermediate densities of leaf trichomes. We propose a system that is based on visual examination of the relative density, distribution and length of abaxial trichomes. Our objectives were to evaluate trichome density associated with this proposed leaf pubescence rating system, to evaluate the variation of trichomes on leaves located at different positions on the main stem, and to compare leaf pubescence ratings of cultivars made over locations and years. Number of trichomes (defined as total number of trichomes and trichome branches) associated with each leaf rating was determined from leaves sampled over three years. Leaves of contrasting cultivars were also sampled from the top, middle and bottom of plants in 1995 and 2001. Pubescence of each leaf was rated both years, and trichomes were counted in the 2001 tests. Leaf pubescence of cultivars in state variety tests was rated over locations and years. Differences in density of trichomes between leaf pubescence ratings were found. Pubescence ratings and trichome counts were highest for upper canopy leaves. Trichomes became less dense as leaves enlarged, then tended to abscise as leaves aged, therefore leaf pubescence should be rated using the youngest, fully expanded main-stem leaves. Within each field test, leaf pubescence ratings varied significantly among cultivars and were consistent for cultivars at different locations and across years. These data indicate that the rating system has a morphological basis and can be used to characterize the leaf pubescence of cotton cultivars.


This study provides information about average annual use of the following automotive lighting equipment by U.S. drivers: low- and high-beam headlamps, turn signals, back-up, license plate, parking, sidemarker, stop, and tail lamps. The data were collected as part of a naturalistic field study of crash warning systems. Eighty-seven randomly selected drivers from southeastern Michigan were provided with instrumented research vehicles (11 identical 2003 Nissan Altimas) for periods averaging 26 days and instructed to drive the research vehicle in place of their personal vehicle. The results are presented for each lamp type in terms of the average annual hours of use and minutes used per 100 km driven. These findings are discussed in relation to the rated life of various bulbs and the median life of vehicles in the U.S.


While it is generally argued that a stronger labor market is negatively associated with crime, there exists a "consensus of doubt" around the relationship between employment and crime. This paper examines the impact of the rise of female labor participation in manufacturing on various types of crimes in Mexico from 1998 to 2012. A fixed effects specification and an instrumental variable approach with regional and time fixed effects are employed to compare the crime rates in municipalities that were heavily exposed to local factory openings to municipalities that did not receive a labor shock of the same magnitude. By introducing a gender component in the analysis, we provide evidence of a gender differential impact of employment on various forms of crime. Our findings shed the light on the importance of gender in the crime-employment relationship and inform policy makers interested in designing crime prevention programs.


Background: The analysis of arterial blood gas (ABG) is an invasive procedure that is used frequently in the emergency department (ED) to evaluate the acid-base status of critically-ill patients. However, capnometry is an alternative procedure that has been used in recent years to determine the metabolic status of patients' blood. Considering the correlation between end-tidal carbon dioxide (ETCO2) and arterial partial pressure of carbon dioxide (PaCO2) identified in the previous studies and the strong correlation between PaCO2 and bicarbonate (HCO3−), we assumed that ETCO2 might be a useful parameter in predicting the presence of metabolic acidosis. The aim of this study was to determine the correlation between ETCO2 and the parameters of ABG in adult patients who were likely present metabolic acid-base disturbances in the Emergency Department of Imam Reza Hospital, the largest academic hospital in Mashhad in northeast Iran. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study conducted during six months on 62 adult patients who presented with suspected metabolic acid-base disorders to the ED. The exclusion criteria were patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases, loss of consciousness, intubated patients, and those who were unable to tolerate capnography. The patients' demographic information and vital signs were recorded. Also, ABG and ETCO2 results were recorded. The Pearson product moment correlation analysis and linear regression were used to determine the correlation between ETCO2 and ABG parameters. Results: Sixty-four patients were enrolled, consisting of 37 men and 27 women with a mean age of 55.4 ± 22.7 years. The most common complaints presented were nausea and vomiting (n = 24). The average value for ETCO2 was 26.2 ± 6.1. There were significant linear correlations between ETCO2 level, pH (r = 0.368), HCO3− (r = 0.869), PaCO2 (r = 0.795), and Base Excess (B.E.) (r = 0.346). HCO3 and PaCO2 were the significant predictor values for ETCO2 (linear regression analysis). Conclusion: ETCO2 can be an appropriate indicator to estimate HCO3− and PaCO2 in critical emergency situations, but it cannot be used as an indicator to estimate all ABG variables.


PURPOSE
Preferential expression of the gamma(2) chain of laminin-5 in invading carcinoma cells has been implicated in tumor invasion. The aim of this study was to clarify the clinicopathological and prognostic significance of laminin gamma(2) chain expression in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (SCC).

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN
We analyzed the association between immunohistochemically detected laminin gamma(2) chain expression in esophageal SCC and clinicopathological characteristics, and we investigated whether laminin gamma(2) chain is a predictor of recurrence and/or survival.

RESULTS
The cytoplasm of carcinoma cells was stained for laminin gamma(2) at levels much stronger than those in normal esophageal basement membrane. The immunoreactivities at the invasive front were often more intense than those at the superficial layer. Sections with immunostaining signals in >30% of carcinoma cells at the invasive front, which were observed in 44 of 100 cases, were judged to be positive for laminin gamma(2) chain. Laminin gamma(2) chain positivity was significantly correlated with depth of invasion, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, advanced pTNM stage, recurrence, and recurrence within the first postoperative year. Patients with laminin gamma(2) chain-positive carcinoma had a significantly shorter disease-free and overall survival time than did those with laminin gamma(2) chain-negative carcinoma. Laminin gamma(2) chain retained its significant predictive value for disease-free and overall survival in multivariate analysis that included conventional clinicopathological factors.

CONCLUSIONS
Our results suggest that the laminin gamma(2) chain plays a key role in the progression of esophageal carcinoma and that its detection is useful for the prediction of recurrence and poor prognosis.


Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death. Beyond first line treatment, few therapeutic options are available, particularly for squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Here, we have explored the phospholipidomes of 30 human SCCs and found that they almost invariably (in 96.7% of cases) contain phospholipids with longer acyl chains compared to matched normal tissues. This trait was confirmed using in situ 2D-imaging MS on tissue sections and by phospholipidomics of tumor and normal lung tissue of the L-IkkαKA/KA mouse model of lung SCC. In both human and mouse, the increase in acyl chain length in cancer tissue was accompanied by significant changes in the expression of acyl chain elongases (ELOVLs). Functional screening of differentially expressed ELOVLs by selective gene knockdown in SCC cell lines followed by phospholipidomics revealed ELOVL6 as the main elongation enzyme responsible for acyl chain elongation in cancer cells. Interestingly, inhibition of ELOVL6 drastically reduced colony formation of multiple SCC cell lines in vitro and significantly attenuated their growth as xenografts in vivo in mouse models. These findings identify acyl chain elongation as one of the most common traits of lung SCC discovered so far and pinpoint ELOVL6 as a novel potential target for cancer intervention.