The aim of this research is to provide to secondary school students and school administrators in Nigerian educational sector a better understanding on students' awareness of Internet plagiarism, attitudes towards plagiarism and perception of plagiarism in the context of writing and doing other assignments online. Methodology adopted is the survey design in which questionnaires and group discussions were used for obtaining data from students. Results shows that more of the students have not even heard the word plagiarism while very few of them could give the meaning of the term plagiarism. The purpose of using the Internet was observed to be on information needs. The work also discovered that students use the Internet more on educational activities especially in the area of doing school assignments. Although, it also showed that the students do not use the Internet in stealing what others have written as well as only few of them accepted that using internet for plagiarism is good because it helps them in meeting up with the challenges of class work and assignments. The results show that teachers do not teach the rules of using content from online and how to cite the works of others so as to avoid plagiarism. Consequently, it was recommended that teachers should enlighten the students on the plagiarism and its consequences.


Andreas Gryphius (1616-1664) was the greatest German poet and dramatist of the 17th century, yet he remains virtually unknown outside his own country. One of the chief reasons for his relative obscurity outside Germany is that almost all studies devoted to him are written in German. Another problem has to do with the inaccessibility of the recondite forms of Baroque literature. This book is designed especially for students and scholars in disciplines other than German, particularly those in comparative literature and the modern languages, where a lack of knowledge about this major German writer distorts a proper international perspective on major figures of the 17th century. But it also addresses the Germanist, especially scholars in Germany; they will find interpretations and a way of presenting them entirely new.


Abstract Mesozoic extensional basins of the Southern Permian Basin (SPB) System became inverted from Late Cretaceous time onwards. Following a first Cretaceous 'Subhercynian' pulse of contractional deformation and basin uplift, several distinct inversion events of Cenozoic age were often described. The oldest of these is the 'Laramide' event of Paleocene age which coincides with the termination of chalk deposition and widespread regression around the North Sea Basin, whose axial part continued to subside. The spatial extent of these effects is too wide to be compatible with inversion by folding and reverse faulting. The width of the uplifting and subsiding regions was also too large to be consistent with folding of the entire lithosphere under tangential compression. There appears to be no unequivocal evidence of discrete structures formed or reactivated in the Laramide event. By contrast, well-documented younger inversion of approximately Late Eocene to Late Oligocene–(Miocene?) age affected the region from the Celtic Sea to the western Netherlands. The associated deformation is weaker than that of the Late Cretaceous event and spatially overlaps with it only in the Southern North Sea. Structural inversion of the SPB thus comprised only two events separated in time and mostly also in space.


The detection of mitochondrial formaldehyde (FA) is of great significance because FA is generated through a one-carbon formaldehyde cycle in mitochondria, and abnormal elevations in FA levels can damage mitochondria by decreasing the mitochondrial membrane potential and inhibiting mitochondrial respiration. Herein, a mitochondria-targetable two-photon probe (Mito-FA-FP) has been well demonstrated. Mito-FA-FP is conjugated with hydrazine as the FA-reactive site and a pyridine derivate as the mitochondria-targetable moiety. After reacting with FA, Mito-FA-FP exhibits dramatic fluorescence enhancement (12-fold) due to suppression of the PET process in the probe and presents good selectivity as well as high sensitivity (LOD: 12.4 μM). Moreover, Mito-FA-FP can be utilized to monitor endogenous FA in mitochondria and evaluate mitochondrial damage caused by FA stress through observing mitochondrial morphology changes. With good two-photon absorption cross-section and high two-photon fluorescence contrast, Mito-FA-FP has been successfully employed for the two-photon fluorescence imaging of basal FA in zebrafish.


### Role of fluids in earth systems with the focus on H2O

Geologic fluids (defined liberally as gases, liquids, and supercritical solutions) act as reaction media, reactants, and carriers of energy and matter in the natural environment. Among the many different types of geologic fluids, those containing volatile C-O-H-N-S species and those enriched in chloride salts (brines) are of particular interest. They occur widely in varied geochemical settings, commonly contain significant quantities of dissolved and suspended compounds (complex hydrocarbons, organic macromolecules, colloids/nanoparticles), play a crucial role as primary reaction media, and are important sources and sinks of greenhouse gases. The consequences of coupled reactive-transport processes common to most geological environments depend on the properties and reactivities of these fluids over broad ranges of temperature, pressure and fluid composition. The relative strengths of complex molecular-scale interactions in geologic fluids, and the changes in those interactions with temperature, pressure, and fluid composition, are the fundamental basis for observed fluid properties. Understanding these solvent-mediated interactions for broad classes of solutes and suspensions in natural systems over the range of conditions typical of geologic fluids will greatly improve our capability to model and predict fluid behavior, reactivity, and the partitioning of elements and isotopes between coexisting species and phases.

Complex intermolecular interactions of C-O-H-N-S fluids (H2O, CO2, H2, H2S, N2, CH4) result in their unique thermophysical properties, including large deviations in the volumetric properties from ideality, vapor-liquid equilibria, and critical phenomena. Water is one of the best general solvents for inorganic materials due to its molecular structure and the distribution of electric charge (Neilson et al. 2002). In aqueous fluids containing various solutes (electrolytes, metals, organic/bio-molecules), numerous solute-solute and solute-solvent reactions lead to specific interactions, including complexation, binding, local ordering, and clustering. Indeed, a key goal in geochemistry is to develop a comprehensive understanding of the …


Aims: The aim of the study is to validate a new classification of pancreatic fistula (PF) and to document risk factors for PF. Methods: A retrospective study was performed on 100 patients who underwent pancreaticoduodenectomy (PD) within a 2-year period. PF was diagnosed according to the criteria developed by an International Study Group on Pancreatic Fistula (ISGPF). Sixteen pre- and intraoperative risk factors for PF were analyzed. Results: Of 100 patients 32 developed PF; grade A in 21 patients, grade B in 10, and grade C in 1.Four risk factors including pathological diagnosis, concomitant surgery, diameter of pancreatic duct, and texture of the remnant pancreas were found to be significantly associated with PF by univariate analysis. Texture of the remnant pancreas and concomitant surgery were demonstrated to be independent risk factors by multivariate logistic regression. If a PF occurred, advanced age was found to be a risk factor for PF grade B by univariate analysis, but age was not an independent risk factor by multivariate logistic regression. Conclusions: The status of the remnant pancreas is identified asa substantial risk factor for PF after PD. When soft remnant pancreas is encountered, more careful handling is required in an attempt to minimize the rate of PF. This study confirms that the ISGPF classification of PF is useful.


Among drivers of environmental change, artificial light at night is relatively poorly understood, yet is increasing on a global scale. The community‐level effects of existing street lights on moths and their biotic interactions have not previously been studied. Using a combination of sampling methods at matched‐pairs of lit and unlit sites, we found significant effects of street lighting: moth abundance at ground level was halved at lit sites, species richness was >25% lower, and flight activity at the level of the light was 70% greater. Furthermore, we found that 23% of moths carried pollen of at least 28 plant species and that there was a consequent overall reduction in pollen transport at lit sites. These findings support the disruptive impact of lights on moth activity, which is one proposed mechanism driving moth declines, and suggest that street lighting potentially impacts upon pollination by nocturnal invertebrates. We highlight the importance of considering both direct and cascading impacts of artificial light.


Born in Paris in 1905, Sartre was a professor of philosophy when he joined the French Army at the outbreak of World War II. Captured by the Germans, he was released, after nearly a year, in 1941. He immediately joined the French resistance as a journalist. In the postwar era Jean-Paul Sartre - philosopher, critic, novelist, and dramatist - became one of the most influential men of this century. He died in Paris in 1980.


Since the first systemic social study on disaster, the "Halifax-Explosion" by Prince (1920) and the study by Carr (1932) on a general disaster-stage-model, the sociological research on disasters has mushroomed not only linearly but exponentially (Quarantelli,1978: 2). To a certain extent, this growth might have been induced by the auto-dymanics of academia (see Kreps, 1979; Quarantelli, 1979), but in the main it reflects the fact that the traditional modes of explaining and coping with disasters had become meaningless and insufficient. "Modern" societies, characterized by perpetual social change and cultural development, were facing the need for new modes of explanation and better ways of coping with disasters. The reasons for this need are described by B. A. Turner:


Votes for Women brings together in one volume recent scholarship on the struggle of American women for the suffrage. Paralleling recent efforts in popular culture to restore to our national past the story of how women got the vote, these original essays present the latest and best in that history. Each of the eleven essays illuminates some aspects of the long battle that lasted from the 1850s to the passage of the suffrage amendment in 1920. From their antecedents in the minds of women like Mary Wollstonecraft and Frances Wright to the beginnings of an organization like the women who met at Seneca Falls in 1848 to the civil disobedience during World War 1 orchestrated by Alice Paul's National Woman's Party, the essential elements of a tumultuous story emerge. So too do the themes and historical controversies about suffrage and its leaders. The authors focus on the activities of suffrage opponents as well as the ways in which the suffrage battle is interwoven with constitutional issues involving the federal government and the states. Other essays look at the suffrage struggle in its regional setting, especially in the West and the South. Because this is a story that depends on individual leaders such as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Sojourner Truth and Alice Paul, the lives of these women become a significant thread tying the story together. Baker's introductory essays set the stage for revisiting suffrage by making explicit the similarities and differences in interpretations of suffrage and what the battle for suffrage tells us about women's history. She suggests that this new material shows how the suffrage movement intersected with historical developments in national experience - it cannot be isolated from other events in American history. In an epilogue, Anne Firor Scott considers the difference that the vote has made for women and men in the 20th century.


The RDF-based Europeana Data Model (EDM) (EDM Primer, 2013) is used by Europeana, the European Digital Library, for representing heterogeneous data coming from museums, libraries, archives and galleries. The model combines various standards and existing ontologies and is very generic to suit many different cases. In order to represent rich metadata, the EDM can be specialised for specific domains as done by the Digitised Manuscripts to Europeana (DM2E) project for the domain of handwritten manuscripts with the DM2E model. Before creating the DM2E model, decisions on a general modelling approach had to be made including the method of reusing external resources (Droge, Iwanowa et al., 2013), decisions on the granularity of the specialisation and instruments of documentation. Model-related research questions are: What is the best way for creating a shared ontology for representing manuscripts in a digital library and how can diverse ontology requirements be combined without leading to a model which is too general? The first step in the model creation was to analyse the metadata about manuscripts coming from different data providers and in different formats like TEI, METS/MODS, MARC21 or provider-specific schemas. Furthermore, it was investigated if the data meets the mandatory requirements of the EDM. Additional properties, classes, resource definitions, restrictions and recommendations were added to the EDM which resulted in the DM2E model. The first operational version of the model was created in April 2013 and since then iteratively refined. New functions of the model include the representation of uncertain timespans and hierarchical objects. The DM2E model will be discussed in its current representation. First mappings from provided data to the model will be analysed. Data mapped to the DM2E model is dereferenceable and will not only be delivered to Europeana but also be available via a LOD access point (Heath & Bizer, 2011). Keywords : DM2E Model, Europeana Data Model, Linked Data, Ontology Development, Digital Libraries.


Since the pioneering work by Julius Adler in the 1960's, bacterial chemotaxis has been predominantly studied as metabolism-independent. All available simulation models of bacterial chemotaxis endorse this assumption. Recent studies have shown, however, that many metabolism-dependent chemotactic patterns occur in bacteria. We hereby present the simplest artificial protocell model capable of performing metabolism-based chemotaxis. The model serves as a proof of concept to show how even the simplest metabolism can sustain chemotactic patterns of varying sophistication. It also reproduces a set of phenomena that have recently attracted attention on bacterial chemotaxis and provides insights about alternative mechanisms that could instantiate them. We conclude that relaxing the metabolism-independent assumption provides important theoretical advances, forces us to rethink some established pre-conceptions and may help us better understand unexplored and poorly understood aspects of bacterial chemotaxis.


In this paper, we address the problem of controlling multiple flexible joint robots manipulating a common load cooperatively. The load position and velocity tracking errors are shown to converge to zero. The internal forces exerted on the load are also shown to converge to their desired trajectories. Asymptotic stability of the system is insured regardless of the joint flexibility and despite the fact that force sensors mounted on the robot wrist are not employed.


Measurements of in vivo chlorophyll a fluorescence made non-invasively on micro- phytobenthos samples represent the depth integration of the fluorescence emitted at different depths within the sediment. The effects of depth integration on fluorescence parameters and implications for the calculation and interpretation of indices used in quenching analysis were studied using a simula- tion model based on fluorescence light curves (Fs and Fm' vs E curves), light attenuation coefficients, and microalgal biomass profiles. Results indicate that the use of depth-integrated fluorescence measurements leads to a significant light-dependent overestimation of the physiological value of the effective Photosystem II (PSII) quantum yield and of the relative electron transport rate, which may exceed 40% at saturating light levels. As a result, light curves derived from depth-integrated mea- surements appear to saturate at higher irradiances, or to be less photoinhibited when compared to the physiological response of the microalgae. Furthermore, they can vary due to changes in the vertical distribution of microalgal biomass not reflecting alterations in microalgal physiology. The results obtained from the numerical simulations were confirmed experimentally, and variations in fluores- cence emission attributable to depth integration were also found in fluorescence light curves from the literature. A set of recursive equations was derived to allow the estimation of the physiological light response through the deconvolution of light curves computed from depth-integrated fluorescence measurements made on undisturbed samples.


Extended network life is one of the fundamental objectives in the design of Wireless Sensor Network systems. Clustering protocols help in achieving this objective in an efficient and scalable manner by organizing nodes into small hierarchical groups. In single hop clustering protocols, assumptions are made about direct communication from the cluster heads to the base station. Such assumptions seem too strong for realistic situations as the cluster head may have limited radio transmission range in some cases. Relay nodes could be used to leverage additional energy saving through multi-hop transmissions. Moreover, for a randomly deployed homogeneous network, placement of either relays or cluster heads at predetermined locations poses challenges including mobility, location awareness and energy provisioning. In this paper we propose a three-tier architecture for randomly deployed wireless sensor networks without making any assumptions about mobility and placement of nodes at desired locations. We also propose and evaluate heuristic based algorithms for relay node selection. Simulation results demonstrate significant gains in network life time by using the proposed algorithms.


Entrepreneurial orientation (EO) has received substantial conceptual and empirical attention, representing one of the few areas in entrepreneurship research where a cumulative body of knowledge is developing. The time is therefore ripe to document, to review, and to evaluate the cumulative knowledge on the relationship between EO and business performance. Extending beyond qualitative assessment, we undertook a meta–analysis exploring the magnitude of the EO–performance relationship and assessed potential moderators affecting this relationship. Analyses of 53 samples from 51 studies with an N of 14,259 companies indicated that the correlation of EO with performance is moderately large (r = .242) and that this relationship is robust to different operationalizations of key constructs as well as cultural contexts. Internal and environmental moderators were identified, and results suggest that additional moderators should be assessed. Recommendations for future research are developed.


J. A. Chalmers, R. C. Whittaker, N. Skaarup & T. C. R. Pulvertaft write: Geoffroy et al. 1998 have published an account of field measurements of the structure of the Palaeogene lavas exposed in western Disko, central West Greenland. They show that the lavas generally dip westwards and that the dips increase from low values immediately west of the Disko gneiss ridge to over 30° on parts of the west coast. These dipping lavas are cut by a set of faults that strike N-S and NW-SE and generally have downthrow to the east or ENE. The tectonic analysis suggests that tilting of the lavas was syn-magmatic. The field work and structural analysis described by Geoffroy et al. 1998 appears to us to be a good and competent piece of work, on which they are to be congratulated. However, in their discussion section, they develop a model based on their work which makes a forecast about the structure offshore that is contradicted by published data to which Geoffroy et al. refer, but choose to ignore. Geoffroy et al. 1998 point out that the pattern of dips and faults within the lavas along the west coast of Disko is similar to the pattern of dips and faults described from the onshore part of the East Greenland flexure by Nielsen & Brooks (1981) and Larsen et al. 1995, and they refer also to Fitton et al. 1995 who trace the geochemical signature of the continent-ocean transition in the seaward-dipping reflectors close to the


OBJECTIVES
Polymorphisms in the hepatic lipase (LIPC -514C > T) and cholesteryl ester transfer protein (CETP I405V) genes affect high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-c) levels, but their relationship with cardiovascular disease and their combined effect is unclear. The objectives of the current study were to characterize the effect of the hepatic lipase variant, and its interaction with the CETP variant, in terms of cholesterol levels, atherosclerosis, and risk of myocardial infarction (MI).

DESIGN
The study was conducted in the Rotterdam Study, a large single-center prospective cohort study in people aged 55 yr and older. Lipid levels were analyzed using linear regression models, and risk of MI was assessed with Cox proportional hazards models.

RESULTS
The hepatic lipase variant was associated with an increase in serum HDL-c levels of 0.11 mmol/liter in both genders, whereas an increased risk of MI was observed only in men [hazard ratio, 1.32 (95% confidence interval, 1.05-1.66) for CT vs. CC and 1.75 (95% confidence interval, 1.39-2.20) for TT vs. CC]. This effect was independent of serum HDL-c. LIPC -514C > T interacted with CETP I405V with respect to serum HDL-c concentrations. Those homozygous for both mutations saw a marked elevation in HDL-c levels (0.29 mmol/liter, P(interaction) = 0.05). These increased HDL-c levels, however, were not inversely associated with atherosclerosis or MI risk.

CONCLUSIONS
LIPC genotype affects HDL-c levels and risk of MI in males. The interaction of this variant with CETP on HDL-c levels helps elucidate the underlying mechanisms and suggests that the beneficial effects of CETP inhibition may vary in particular subgroups.


We investigate the performance of frequency-hopped OFDMA (FH-OFDMA), where subcarriers are assigned to users according to predetermined hopping patterns. Some of the patterns carry pilot symbols, which the users track to estimate their channel and perform coherent detection. We develop a simple theoretical framework in order to evaluate the bit error probability (BEP) over each data pattern, when trellis-coded modulation (TCM) is employed for error protection. Our analytical results illustrate that appropriately constructing the patterns, given the channel parameters, can have a significant effect on the performance experienced by different users of this OFDMA system. An intuitively pleasing trade-off between channel estimation quality and performance enhancement due to frequency diversity is also revealed, as the channel becomes more frequency selective


Accurate prediction of power generation capability needs proper assessment of blade loading and wake behavior. In this regard, the Sliding Mesh Interface (SMI) approach and the Actuator Line Model (ALM) are two diverse computational fluid dynamics (CFD) based approaches of simulating the turbine behavior, each having its own merits and demerits. The SMI technique simulates the unsteady flow by explicitly modeling the blades and their rotation using a dynamic mesh, while in Actuator Line Model, the blades are not modeled explicitly but each blade is resolved as a rotating line (made of N actuator segments), over which the forces are computed. The current work focuses on simulating an industrial scale reference turbine and in differentiating the near wake dynamics predicted by these two approaches using Large Eddy Simulation (LES) and Proper Orthogonal Decomposition (POD) technique (a data mining tool). Initially, the ALM is compared with FAST model for the prediction of variation of power coefficient with the Tip Speed Ratio (TSR). The ALM is able to capture the varying trend and it predicts a similar optimum tip speed ratio as the FAST model. At this optimum TSR condition, the ALM is compared with the SMI method for a study limited to the near wake region. Comparisons between SMI and ALM shows that : (a) The SMI is predicting more complex 3D nature of the flow, and (b) the POD shows that ALM captures the shear regions of wake but it does not capture the vast compendium of length and time scales of eddies as SMI does. However, despite these limitations, the ALM has been able to capture the qualitative trend in wake deficit and the power coefficient variation with tip speed.


Background: A resurgence of group A s hemolytic Streptococcus infections such as fasciitis, cellulitis and Strptococcal Toxic Syndrome has been observed recently. Aim: To study the clinical features of patients with group A s hemolytic Streptococcus infections in a regional hospital. Patients and methods: Retrospective review of medical records of patients notified as having a group A s hemolytic Streptococcus tissue infection, between 1994 and 1999. Results: twenty four patients were notified in the period as having a group A s hemolytic Streptococcus infection and 18 (13 male, mean age 39 tears old) had tissue involvement. Eleven patients had a fasciitis (61%), six had a cellulitis (33%) and 14 patients (77%), a Streptococcal Toxic Shock Syndrome. Eight patients died during hospital stay. The infection portal of entry was identify in 13 patients (the skin in 10 and intramuscular injections in three). Deceased patients had a longer lapse of disease before admission than patients discharged alive (5(range 3h-7 days) and 2.1 (range 6h-5 days) respectively). In seven patients a quick serological test, designed for pharyngeal infections was performed and it was positive in five. Blood cultures were positive in seven patients and in 11, the germ was isolated from the lesions. Conclusions: As the early diagnosis of group A s hemolytic Streptococcus tissue infections has a prognostic value, the population should be instructed to recognize early signs and symptoms of these infections (Rev Med Chile 2000; 128: 1215-19)


Background: Several studies have shown the positive effects of adapted physical activity (APA) on physical and mental health (MH) during the lifetime. The aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of a specific APA intervention program in the improvement of the health-related quality of life (QOL) and functional condition of spine in elderly women. Methods: Thirty women were recruited from a senior center and randomly assigned to two groups: control group (CG; age: 69.69 ± 7.94 years, height: 1.57 ± 0.06 m, weight: 68.42 ± 8.18 kg, body mass index [BMI]: 27.88 ± 2.81) and trained group (TG; age: 68.35 ± 6.04 years, height: 1.55 ± 0.05 m, weight: 64.78 ± 10.16 kg, BMI: 26.98 ± 3.07). The APA program was conducted for 8 weeks, with two training sessions/week. CG did not perform any physical activity during the study. Spinal angles were evaluated by SpinalMouse ® (Idiag, Volkerswill, Switzerland); health-related QOL was evaluated by SF-36 Health Survey, which assesses physical component summary (PCS-36), mental component summary (MCS-36), and eight subscales: physical functioning, role-physical, bodily pain, general health perception, role-emotional, social functioning, vitality, and MH. All measures were recorded before and after the experimental period. Results: In TG, compared to CG, the two-way analysis of variance with repeated measures with Bonferroni post hoc test showed a relevant improvement in lumbar spinal angle ( ° ) and in SF-36 outcomes after the intervention period. We showed a significant increase in physical functioning, bodily pain, and MH subscales and in PCS-36 and MCS-36 scores in TG compared to CG. In particular, from baseline to posttest, we found that in TG, the PCS-36 and MCS-36 scores increased by 13.20% and 11.64%, respectively. Conclusion: We believe that an 8-week APA intervention program is able to improve psychophysical heath in elderly people. During the aging process, a dynamic lifestyle, including regular physical activity, is a crucial factor for public and health care systems to improve QOL and physical fitness in aging people.


Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a major health concern in the United States (US) with over 140,000 new cases diagnosed in 2012. The most common site for CRC metastases is the liver. Hepatic resection is the treatment of choice for colorectal liver metastases (CLM), with a 5-year survival rate ranging from 35% to 58%. Unfortunately, only about 20% of patients are eligible for resection. There are a number of options for extending resection to more advanced patients including systemic chemotherapy, portal vein embolization (PVE), two stage hepatectomy, ablation and hepatic artery infusion (HAI). There are few phase III trials comparing these treatment modalities, and choosing the right treatment is patient dependent. Treating hepatic metastases requires a multidisciplinary approach and knowledge of all treatment options as there continues to be advances in management of CLM. If a patient can undergo a treatment modality in order to increase their potential for future resection this should be the primary goal. If the patient is still deemed unresectable then treatments that lengthen disease-free and overall-survival should be pursued. These include chemotherapy, ablation, HAI, chemoembolization, radioembolization (RE) and stereotactic radiotherapy.


Gold mineralization at the Tropicana mine occurs within the Plumridge terrane along the eastern margin of the Archean Yilgarn craton in the Albany-Fraser orogen, Western Australia. Mineralization is hosted in a favorable syenitic lithofacies of the Tropicana Gneiss with a minimum igneous age of 2638 ± 4 Ma (2 σ ) and which was metamorphosed to mid-amphibolite to lower granulite facies in the period ca. 2638 to 2520 Ma.

The Tropicana Gneiss was exhumed to crustal levels equivalent to greenschist-facies conditions by the time of economic gold mineralization. The major gold-bearing pyrite-biotite-sericite mineralization formed in association with shear zones during northeast-southwest compression (D3) that postdated W- to NW-verging thrusting (D2). The late fluid-induced event (Tropicana event; Doyle et al., 2013; Blenkinsop and Doyle, 2014) produced a mineral assemblage indicative of greenschist-facies conditions. The paucity of water in granulite-facies gneisses under retrograde conditions suggests that fluids were introduced from an external source for both mineralization and the younger metamorphic event. This occurred at ca. 2520 Ma as determined from biotite (ca. 2515 Ma, 40Ar/39Ar age), pyrite (ca. 2505 Ma, Re-Os, Pb/Pb ages), and tungsten-rich rutile (2521 ± 5 Ma, U-Pb age): the latter is considered to provide the best direct measurement age of gold mineralization.

The Tropicana Gneiss was derived from the upthrusted easternmost margin of the underlying Yilgan craton, or represents a relatively small (160 km long × 50 km wide) remnant crustal block accreted to the Yilgarn craton sometime between ca. 2.6 and 2.5 Ga. The timing of the Tropicana mineralization is distinctly younger than greenstone-associated gold deposits elsewhere in the Yilgarn craton. As in the Dharwar craton, India, and the Limpopo belt, Zimbabwe, economic gold mineralization at Tropicana postdates the major peak of Late Archean world-class gold mineralization (ca. 2.65 Ga) by more than 100 m.y.

The Tropicana Gneiss was relatively unaffected during the younger Albany-Fraser orogeny, with only minor remobilization of gold. Deformation may have been localized at the margins of the domain, between constituent ridged structural blocks, and/or within discrete high-strain shears.


In the last two years, some Mediterranean regions have obtained significant benefits from the contraction of large tourist investments marking contrasting trends, as in the case of Sardinia and other Italian and Spanish sub-regions (conceivably due to their perception as safer locations).  In global tourism, security and safety have become complex issues with a wide range of components including consumer protection, legal protection of tourists, environmental security, disaster protection, data safety, personal safety in communication, quality assurance of services.  The vulnerability of tourism to external negative events, such as tourism terrorism, has defined the increasing importance of tourism safety and security management in a global approach as an integral part of the tourism industry's operations.


Abstract Objective: Many studies suggest that age at onset (AAO) is an important factor for clinically differentiating patients with juvenile and adult onset of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD). The present international study aimed to assess the prevalence of different AAO groups and compare related socio-demographic and clinical features in a large sample of OCD patients. Methods: A total of 431 OCD outpatients, participating in the ICOCS network, were first categorised in groups with childhood (≤12 years), adolescent (13–17 years) and adult-onset (≥18 years), then in pre-adult and adult onset (≥18 years) and their socio-demographic and clinical features compared. Results: Twenty-one percent (n = 92) of the sample reported childhood onset, 36% (n = 155) adolescent onset, and 43% (n = 184) adult onset. Patients with adult onset showed a significantly higher proportion of females compared with the other subgroups (χ2 = 10.9, p< 0.05). Childhood- and adolescent-onset patients had been more frequently treated with cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), compared to adult-onset patients (χ2 = 11.5; p < 0.05). The pre-adult- versus adult-onset analysis did not show any additional significant difference. Conclusions: The present international multicentre study confirms that OCD onset occurs more frequently before adult age, with approximately one out of five patients showing childhood onset. Pre-adult onset was associated with higher rate of CBT, while adult onset was more prevalent in females.


A number of fungal species, particularly Candida species, are opportunistic pathogens capable of causing disease in humans. These range from relatively mild infections in healthy individuals (e.g. thrush) to life threatening systemic infections and colonisation of major organs in immunocompromised individuals. Existing methods of identifying Candida species in clinical samples are time and resource intensive and are not always specific enough to differentiate between drug-susceptible and drug-resistant species. Atlas Genetics have developed a novel electrochemical assay for the detection of nucleic acid from target pathogens using PCR followed by hybridisation by labelled probes. The work describes the development of a suite of probes and optimisation of reaction conditions for the rapid detection of fungal pathogens using this assay. A suite of five species-specific probes was developed to detect the five most clinically relevant Candida species as well as a pan-fungal probe capable of detection of DNA from any fungal species. Additionally, since the assay was novel, the work investigated other aspects such as probe and primer design which led to the development of a quick bioinformatics approach for design of species-specific probes which is also described. The results demonstrated that species-specific detection of C. albicans, C. glabrata, C. parapsilosis, C. tropicalis and C. krusei was possible, and that there was no cross reactivity exhibited by any probe with isolates from a test panel of other Candida species. The limit of detection of the assay was shown to be approximately one genome in 1ml of blood or 10 whole cells in 1ml of blood. The use of solid-state electrodes for detection provides an opportunity for miniaturisation of the assay into a robust, easily operated, portable system capable of rapid detection of pathogenic DNA in clinical samples either at point of care or in the microbiological laboratory.


The passage of Republic Act 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act signed by President Benigno Aquino III in 2013, provided for a basic education system consisting of at least one year of pre-school education or kindergarten, six years of elementary school, and six years of secondary school. The Duterte administration has opted to continue this reform. As a contribution to the reform effort, this paper discusses the history of the K-12 rollout, and the emerging challenges in K-12 implementation. It also outlines steps for the consideration of policy makers in moving K-12 forward more effectively. The principal challenge flagged by this paper is to distinguish issues and challenges in program and policy roll-out, from more strategic issues that K-12 will surely help to uncover. Because K-12 requires collective action across many agencies and entities, both public and private, as well as national and local, accurately diagnosing when and where bottlenecks in implementation take place will be critical in continuing to build on this reform.


The University of Washington's BioRobotics Laboratory, under the direction of Dr Blake Hannaford, supported the University of Cincinnati's telesurgery effort during the NEEMO 12 mission conducted May 7-18, 2007. The UW RAVEN telerobotic system was deployed to the Aquarius Habitat to conduct a variety of research tasks. The goals of this mission were to advance and demonstrate technologies related to remote healthcare for astronauts on extended space missions. In particular, the capability of surgical intervention by remotely operated surgical robotics. Two surgical robots were deployed into the Aquarius habitat, the UW RAVENand the SRI, International M7 robot. Control of the robots was provided over an Internet link from UW (Seattle, WA) and SRI (Palo Alto, CA), respectively. The last 10 mile connection to the remote site was provided by a microwave link from shore to buoy and a 20m cable down to the habitat. Organization for the remote surgery component of the NEEEMO-12 mission is included expertise from Dr. Hannaford, Dr. Jacob Rosen, Mr. Mitch Lum, and Ms Diane Friedman. RAVEN was succesfully operated in the NEEEMO habitat and teleoperated from Seattle.


The objective of this prospective, multicentre, non-controlled, open-label study was to evaluate the effects of an iodine-restricted food on circulating total thyroxine (TT4) concentrations and clinical parameters in client-owned cats with hyperthyroidism. Two hundred and twenty-five cats were enrolled in the study and adapted to the iodine-restricted food. Data from physical examinations, questionnaires completed by veterinarians and owners, and circulating concentrations of TT4, urea and creatinine were recorded at weeks 0, 4 and 8. The study group included 136 female and 89 male cats (median age 15 years, range 4–21 years). Group 1 (n = 113) had been on previous anti-thyroid medication, while group 2 (n = 112) consisted of newly diagnosed cats. No differences were found between the two groups at any time point. Circulating TT4 concentrations had decreased (P <0.0001) at week 4 and did not change significantly from week 4 to week 8. Circulating TT4 concentration was within the reference range in 56/88 cats at week 4 and in 51/68 cats at week 8. Clinical parameters (vomiting, polyuria, polydipsia, hyperactivity, polyphagia, weight loss, hair coat quality, and quality of life) had improved (P <0.0001) by week 4. Circulating creatinine concentration decreased (P = 0.001) from week 0 to week 4. Side effects associated with feeding the iodine-restricted food were not observed. In conclusion, in client-owned cats with hyperthyroidism an iodine-restricted food is a valuable management option to normalise circulating TT4 concentrations, and improve clinical signs of hyperthyroidism within 4 weeks. This applies to newly diagnosed cats, as well as to previously diagnosed cats receiving anti-thyroid drugs.


This paper aims to investigate the influence of tip clearance on aerodynamic damping maps of an oscillating low pressure turbine (LPT) unshrouded blade row. Full-scale time-marching RANS CFD simulations in ANSYS CFX® v.16.2 employing models with 0%, 1%, 2% and 3% of span tip clearance are adopted. Tip clearance flow leads to a significant influence on the aerodynamic damping for blade torsion mode shape and least stable IBPA = 45°. No trend in local work coefficient are observed on the suction side, although increasing tip gap leads to a stabilizing trend on the pressure side. Aerodynamic damping maps are constructed for each tip gap. Torsion axes on the forward portion of the airfoil are found to be more stable than its aft counterparts. Bending dominated mode shapes are more stable in the cascade tangential direction. Finally, tip clearance leads to small changes in flutter characteristics for a few pitching axis locations.


A series of experiments were performed examining the evolution of blast waves produced by laser irradiation of a target immersed in gas. Blast waves were produced by illumination of wires by 1 kJ, 1 ns laser pulses from the Z-Beamlet laser at Sandia National Laboratories. The blast waves were imaged by probe laser pulses at various times to examine the trajectory, radiative precursor, and induced perturbations on the blast wave front. Well defined perturbations were induced on the blast wave front with arrays of wires placed in the gas and the results of the experiments are compared to the theoretical predictions for the Vishniac overstability. It is found that the experimental results are in general agreement with these theoretical predictions on thin blast wave shells and are in quantitative agreement in the simplest case.


A Payment Cost Minimization (PCM) auction has been proposed as an alternative to the Offer Cost Minimization (OCM) auction to be used in wholesale electric power markets with the intention to lower the procurement cost of electricity. Efficiency concerns about this proposal have relied on the assumption of true production cost revelation. Using an experimental approach, I compare the two auctions, strictly controlling for the level of unilateral market power. A specific feature of these complex-offer auctions is that the sellers submit not only the quantities and the minimum prices at which they are willing to sell, but also the start-up fees that are designed to reimburse the fixed start-up costs of the generation plants. I find that both auctions result in start-up fees that are significantly higher than the start-up costs. Overall, the two auctions perform similarly in terms of procurement cost and efficiency. Surprisingly, I do not find a substantial difference between less market power and more market power designs. Both designs result in similar inefficiencies and equally higher procurement costs over the competitive prediction. The PCM auction tends to have lower price volatility than the OCM auction when the market power is minimal but this property vanishes in the designs with market power. These findings lead me to conclude that both the PCM and the OCM auctions do not belong to the class of truth revealing mechanisms and do not easily elicit competitive behavior.


Middle-class Brits are embarrassed, awkward, and charmingly insecure in their tastes. The Art of Being Middle-Class, based on stories from cult blog The Middle Class Handbook, is here to help. What are the essential topics to cover when talking about other couples? What do you do about the awkward bag on the seat moment? How do you subtly boast about your summer holiday destination? What does your cooker hood say about you? With tips on taste and etiquette, a conspiratorial cheer here and there, and a kick up the bum when necessary, this book sets out to help our marvellous British MCs be the best they can be. Praise for The Middle Class Handbook: "Indispensable...whether you're middle class or pretending not to be." GQ magazine. "Hilarious...we laughed our organic, brushed cotton socks off." Grazia. "The Middle Class Handbook skewers the middle classes, and then dissects them with ruthless comical accuracy." Esquire.


Preface. Foreword to the First Edition. Mathematical Symbols. Abbreviations. 1 Introduction: Subject and Methods. 1.1 Objectives. 1.2 Definitions of Chemical Bonding and Transition Metal Coordination System. 1.3 The Schrodinger Equation. Summary Notes. References. 2 Atomic States. 2.1 One-Electron States. 2.2 Multielectron States: Energy Terms. Summary Notes. Questions. Exercises and Problems. References. 3 Symmetry Ideas and Group-Theoretical Description. 3.1 Symmetry Transformations and Matrices. 3.2 Groups of Symmetry Transformations. 3.3 Representations of Groups and Matrices of Representations. 3.4 Classification of Molecular Terms and Vibrations, Selection Rules, and Wigner-Eckart Theorem. 3.5 Construction of Symmetrized Molecular Orbitals and Normal Vibrations. 3.6 The Notion of Double Groups. Summary Notes. Exercises. References. 4 Crystal Field Theory. 4.1 Introduction. 4.2 Splitting of the Energy Levels of One d Electron in Ligand Fields. 4.3 Several d Electrons. 4.4 f -Electron Term Splitting. 4.5 Crystal Field Parameters and Extrastabilization Energy. 4.6 Limits of Applicability of Crystal Field Theory. Summary Notes. Questions. Exercises and Problems. References. 5 Method of Molecular Orbitals and Related Approaches. 5.1 Basic Ideas of the MO LCAO Method. 5.2 Charge Distribution and Bonding in the MO LCAO Method and the Case of Weak Covalency. 5.3 Methods of Calculation of MO Energies and LCAO Coefficients. 5.4 Semiquantitative Approaches. 5.5 Semiempirical Methods. 5.6 Fragmentary Calculations, Molecular Mechanics, and Combined Quantum/Classical (QM/MM) Modeling. 5.7 General Comparison of Methods. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 6 Electronic Structure and Chemical Bonding. 6.1 Classification of Chemical Bonds by Electronic Structure and Role of d and f Electrons in Coordination Bonding. 6.2 Qualitative Aspects and Electronic Configurations. 6.3 Ligand Bonding. 6.4 Energies, Geometries, and Charge Distributions. 6.5 Relativistic Effects. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 7 Electronic Control of Molecular Shapes and Transformations via Vibronic Coupling. 7.1 Molecular Vibrations. 7.2 Vibronic Coupling. 7.3 The Jahn-Teller Effect. 7.4 Pseudo-Jahn-Teller Effect and the Two-Level Paradigm. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 8 Electronic Structure Investigated by Physical Methods. 8.1 Band Shapes of Electronic Spectra. 8.2 d d, Charge Transfer, Infrared, and Raman Spectra. 8.3 X-Ray and Ultraviolet Photoelectron Spectra EXAFS. 8.4 Magnetic Properties. 8.5 Gamma-Resonance Spectroscopy. 8.6 Electron Charge and Spin Density Distribution in Diffraction Methods. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 9 Stereochemistry and Crystal Chemistry. 9.1 Definitions. Semiclassical Approaches. 9.2 Vibronic Effects in Stereochemistry. 9.3 Mutual Influence of Ligands. 9.4 Crystal Stereochemistry. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 10 Electron Transfer, Redox Properties, and Electron-Conformational Effects. 10.1 Electron Transfer and Charge Transfer by Coordination. 10.2 Electron Transfer in Mixed-Valence Compounds. 10.3 Electron-Conformational Effects in Biological Systems. Summary Notes. Exercises and Problems. References. 11 Reactivity and Catalytic Action. 11.1 Electronic Factors in Reactivity. 11.2 Electronic Control of Chemical Activation via Vibronic Coupling. 11.3 Direct Computation of Energy Barriers of Chemical Reactions. Summary Notes. Questions and Problems. References. Appendixes. Answers and Solutions. Subject Index. Formula Index.


AIM
This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between anthropometric measurements and mortality among community-dwelling frail elderly.

METHODS
This study was a prospective cohort analysis of 520 community-dwelling elderly registered in the Nagoya Longitudinal Study for Frail Elderly (NLS-FE). Data included the participants' demographic characteristics, body mass index (BMI), mid-arm circumference (MAC), triceps skinfold (TSF), and arm muscle area (AMA), basic activities of daily living, comorbidity. BMI and TSF values were categorized into three groups, respectively, according to above the 75th percentile, the 25-75th percentile, and below the 25th percentile of Japanese Anthropometric Reference Data (JARD 2001). Survival analysis of 21-month mortality was conducted using Kaplan-Meier curves and multivariate Cox proportional hazards models.

RESULTS
BMI and TSF were independent risk factors for 21-month mortality in the study participants. Significant higher risk of 21-month mortality was observed in participants below the 75th percentile of BMI or below the 25th percentile of TSF set in JARD 2001. A striking increase in the risk of 21-month mortality, adjusting for potential confounding factors, was observed in the below 75th percentile of the BMI group with a below 25th percentile TSF of JARD 2001, compared with the 75th or above percentile BMI group with the 25th or above percentile TSF.

CONCLUSION
The combination of BMI and TSF is a predictor of 21-month mortality among older people with ADL dysfunction.


Hemodynamic activity in occipital, temporal, and parietal cortical areas were recently shown to correlate across subjects during viewing of a 30-minute movie clip. However, most of the frontal cortex lacked between-subject correlations. Here we presented 12 healthy naïve volunteers with the first 72 minutes of a movie ("Crash", 2005, Lions Gate Films) outside of the fMRI scanner to involve the subjects in the plot of the movie, followed by presentation of the last 36 minutes during fMRI scanning. We observed significant between-subjects correlation of fMRI activity in especially right hemisphere frontal cortical areas, in addition to the correlation of activity in temporal, occipital, and parietal areas. It is possible that this resulted from the subjects following the plot of the movie and being emotionally engaged in the movie during fMRI scanning. We further show that probabilistic independent component analysis (ICA) reveals meaningful activations in individual subjects during natural viewing.


Many states--and more particularly rural states--have trouble funding technology in education even when state technology coordinators know the benefit each technology initiative will provide to its students. Furthermore, many teachers lack training in computer technology, and they do not have the time, resources, or opportunity to explore it on their own. In the case of North Dakota, a partial answer to the funding question came from a $287,000 grant to North Dakota State University's School of Education from the USWEST Foundation in 1995. The grant was used to fund a multifaceted project designed to assist K-12 teachers integrate multimedia educational tools into their day-to-day teaching (Hosskisson & Stammen, 1997; Nelson & Sologuk, 1996). Although the project focused on teachers and educators using multimedia, the methodologies adopted and the lessons learned may be applicable in other domains. Furthermore, because the curriculum materials were implemented as learning modules on the World Wide Web (WWW or Web), issues of translating traditional paper-based courseware into a interactive, nonlinear, Web-based curriculum can be addressed. CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT METHODOLOGY Designing and implementing effective education and training materials-- especially when they incorporate and/or integrate new technologies--is a difficult task, because course design and its implementation are often likely to extend the competencies of any one individual (Hoskisson, Stammen, & Nelson, 1996). One of the project's underlying goals was to investigate how well Ohio State University's Systematic Curriculum Instructional Development (SCID) and Developing a Curriculum (DACUM) processes functioned as methods for creating competency-based curriculum and instructional materials in a largely interdisciplinary environment. Another project goal was to investigate whether or not these processes--which are well established for creating effective print-based curriculum materials--would also be applicable to creating Web-based curriculum materials. DEVELOPING A CURRICULUM (DACUM) DACUM is a relatively new and innovative approach to occupational analysis developed by the Center for Education and Training for Employment at Ohio State University. It has proven to be a very effective method of quickly determining, at relatively low cost, the competencies or tasks that must be performed by persons employed in a given job or occupational area. The profile chart that results from the DACUM analysis is a detailed and graphic portrayal of the skills or competencies involved in the occupation being studied. The DACUM analysis can be used as a basis for curriculum development, training needs assessments, student achievement records, worker performance evaluations, competency test development, and job descriptions. DACUM has been successfully used to analyze occupations at the professional, technical, skilled, and semiskilled levels. DACUM operates on the following three premises: * expert workers can describe and define their job more accurately than anyone else, * an effective way to describe a job is to define the tasks that expert workers perform, and * all tasks, to be performed correctly, demand certain knowledge, skills, tools, and attitudes. A carefully chosen group of about eight to ten experts from the occupational area form the DACUM committee. Committee members are recruited directly from business, industry, or the professions. The committee works under the guidance of a facilitator for two days to develop the DACUM chart. Modified small-group brainstorming techniques are used to obtain the collective expertise and consensus of the committee. The DACUM committee is carefully guided through each of the following steps by the facilitator: * Orientation * Review of job or occupational area description * Identification of general areas of job responsibility * Review and refinement of task statements * Sequencing of task statements * Identification of general knowledge and skill requirements of the occupation, tools, equipment, supplies, and materials used, and desirable worker traits and attitudes * Other options, as desired (that is, identification of entry-level tasks) Because of their current occupational expertise, committee participants do not need to make any advance preparations. …


Carry-free addition and borrow-free subtraction of modified signed-digit trinary numbers with optical symbolic substitution are presented. The proposed two-step and three-step algorithms can be easily implemented by using phase-only holograms, optical content-addressable memories, a multichannel correlator, or a polarization-encoded optical shadow-casting system.


Eighteen small shallow lakes located in the Northern Patagonian Lake District, in southern South America, were sampled in 2001 and analysed for the main chemical variables (pH, conductivity, alkalinity, major ions and nutrients). The study lakes span a wide geographical and altitudinal range and belong partly to the Pacific and partly to the Atlantic watershed. The main aim of this study was to investigate the relationships between water chemistry and physical/geographical properties of these lakes. Secondly, the nitrogen content of the lakes was considered in detail, and results compared to those obtained in previous studies carried out in other remote areas of the globe (the Central Southern Alps in Italy, the Sierra da Estrela region in Portugal, the Svalbard Islands in the Arctic, the Khumbu-Himal region in Nepal, and the Terra Nova Bay area in Antarctica). In the Alps, lakes are characterised by markedly high nitrogen concentrations, manly as nitrate, due to the high inputs of nitrogen compounds from downwind sources like the Po Plain in Northern Italy. Conversely, lakes at remote locations such as the Andes, Antarctica and Himalaya are characterised by a low nitrogen content, mainly as organic nitrogen. This status is related to the limited atmospheric inputs of nitrogen affecting these regions.


In The New Jim Crow, civil rights lawyer and Ohio State University law professor Michelle Alexander examines the legal and social framework that supports the regime of mass incarceration of black men in the United States. As Alexander carefully recounts, beginning in the early 1980s with President Reagan's declaration of a ''War on Drugs,'' a number of policy initiatives, Supreme Court decisions, and vested interests, aided and abetted by political divisiveness and public apathy, coalesced to create the social, legal, and political environment that has supported mass incarceration ever since. Alexander's analysis reveals disturbing parallels between the racial caste systems of slavery, Jim Crow, and today's mass incarceration of black men in our country. In the end, however, Alexander shies away from proposing a potentially successful strategy for redressing the dilemma she so carefully depicts. Rather, she ''punts,'' or ''cops out,'' as we would have said in earlier eras. Alexander begins her analysis with a brief history of the several hundred years of variously oppressive race relations between whites and blacks in the United States. Quite correctly, Alexander observes that this history may be fruitfully understood as a sequence of renascent forms of social control refashioned to the new tenor of the times. Thus, Alexander traces the history of American political rhetoric in the latter half of the twentieth century where ''law and order'' comes to constitute code for ''the race problem'' and a policy of malign neglect toward African Americans is transmuted into an active political strategy devised to develop Republican political dominance in the southern states. Ultimately, as we know, the twin themes of crime and welfare propelled Ronald Reagan into the presidency. Searching for a follow-up initiative to define his early presidency, Reagan settled on increased attention to street crime, especially drug law enforcement. In short, the War on Drugs was not some disembodied social agenda, nor was it driven by public demand, as only two percent of Americans believed crime was an important issue at the time. Rather, as Alexander shows, the War on Drugs was a direct outgrowth of race-based politics and therefore the fact that it has had a disproportionate impact on young black men should come as no surprise. Alexander next turns her attention to the interwoven details of the social, legal, and political fabric that wrap the War on Drugs in supportive garb. As Alexander recites, the War on Drugs is the cornerstone on which the current regime of race-based mass incarceration rests because: (a) convictions for drug offenses are the single most important cause of the explosion in incarceration rates since 1980, and (b) black Americans are disproportionately arrested, convicted, and subjected to lengthy sentences for drug offenses when compared to white Americans, even though drug use rates among white Americans have been consistently shown to be higher than for black Americans. Thus, any practices or policies that support the execution of the War on Drugs support the continuation of our movement toward mass incarceration of an entire category of Americans. Among the many developments Alexander reviews, one may note: changes in Supreme Court doctrine with respect to police stops, warrantless searches, consent searches, and suspicionless police sweeps for drug activity; federal initiatives to offer grants to support narcotics task forces; the development and expansion of modern drug forfeiture laws which permitted state and local law enforcement agencies to keep the vast majority of seized cash and assets in drug raids; and the legislative enactment of mandatory minimum and ''three strikes'' sentencing schemes, and their ready


Metastatic prostate cancer (PCa) is still an incurable disease. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) may be an overlooked source of cancer biomarkers and therapeutic targets. We therefore performed RNA sequencing on paired metastatic/non-metastatic PCa xenografts derived from clinical specimens. The most highly up-regulated transcript was LOC728606, a lncRNA now designated PCAT18. PCAT18 is specifically expressed in the prostate compared to 11 other normal tissues (p<0.05) and up-regulated in PCa compared to 15 other neoplasms (p<0.001). Cancer-specific up-regulation of PCAT18 was confirmed on an independent dataset of PCa and benign prostatic hyperplasia samples (p<0.001). PCAT18 was detectable in plasma samples and increased incrementally from healthy individuals to those with localized and metastatic PCa (p<0.01). We identified a PCAT18-associated expression signature (PES), which is highly PCa-specific and activated in metastatic vs. primary PCa samples (p<1E−4, odds ratio>2). The PES was significantly associated with androgen receptor (AR) signalling. Accordingly, AR activation dramatically up-regulated PCAT18 expression in vitro and in vivo. PCAT18 silencing significantly (p<0.001) inhibited PCa cell proliferation and triggered caspase 3/7 activation, with no effect on non-neoplastic cells. PCAT18 silencing also inhibited PCa cell migration (p<0.01) and invasion (p<0.01). These results position PCAT18 as a potential therapeutic target and biomarker for metastatic PCa.


Our research focuses on the metatexts signed by Lucian Blaga as a translator. We prove that, due to the preference of Blaga for ethnocentric translation and his philosophy on poetic translation seen as interpretation, he is a translation theorist. The premise on which we base our research is represented by the remark belonging to Sean Cotter, according to which, in the case of Blaga, translation is a manner of challenging the linguistic policy imposed in Romania during the 1950s by the new regime. In this regard, we analyse the dichotomy margins vs centre in translation and the importance of the translation process in Romania during that decade. The pattern suggested by Lawrence Venuti in nowadays Translation Studies is reversed in the case of the translation subjected to our study: the translator abandons its "invisibility", while ethnocentric translation becomes, in itself, a technique of resistance. The analysis of certain metatexts signed by Blaga proves that he had a modern philosophy on translation, which allows us to consider him a translation scholar avant la lettre. Thus, a careful analysis of metatexts signed by translators of that period would contribute to a greater visibility of trends existing in Romanian Translation Studies.


We present apparatus that allows in-situ optical measurements of the evolving real contact area between a rigid glass and a deformable Al6026 surface with 700 nm of lateral and 20 nm of vertical resolution. In previous experimental studies of multi-asperity real contact area this was investigated either with much less accuracy or did not include the full (loaded) nominal contact area, which can hinder the relevant sub-micron deformation phenomena. During experiments involving the real contact area, the contact load and asperity deformations are simultaneously measured. To show the relevance of the developed experimental procedure measurements are compared to the results calculated with the Greenwood-Williamson (GW) and a modified Abbott-Firestone (AF(H)) models, which represent the two extreme deformation-regime models. The AF(H) model shows relatively good agreement between the real contact area and the asperity deformations (< 60 %), while the GW model deviates by up to 10 times, depending on the deformation value. In contrast, the GW model shows better agreement for the relationship between the contact load and the asperity deformation (< 20 %), while the AF(H) deviates by more, approximately 30 %. The results also indicate that the real contact area is a non-linear function of the contact load, while theoretical models predict their linearity. Finally, it is demonstrated that the real contact area reaches only up to 9 % of the nominal value in the loading range up to the material yield strength, as calculated for the nominal contact parameters.


Near-field, broadband optical spectroscopy of metamaterials is reported. A compact, easy to assemble supercontinuum light source, coupled with a near-field scanning optical microscope and spectrometer provide the means to locally probe the spectral response of a nanorod metamaterial sample. Spectral maps of near-field transmittance are obtained for the spectral range from 500 to 950 nm. In comparison to far-field measurement, the average of the near-field mappings shows a significant increase in transmittance. The uniqueness of the spectral maps and the increased transmittance indicates a strong nanoantenna effect between the sample and the plasmonic near-field aperture. r 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. PACS: 78.67. n; 87.64.Xx; 4255.Tv; 81.07. b


A sequence of global ocean circulation models, with horizontal mesh sizes of 0.5°, 0.25° and 0.1°, are used to estimate the long-term dispersion by ocean currents and mesoscale eddies of a slowly decaying tracer (half-life of 30 years, comparable to that of 137Cs) from the local waters off the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plants. The tracer was continuously injected into the coastal waters over some weeks; its subsequent spreading and dilution in the Pacific Ocean was then simulated for 10 years. The simulations do not include any data assimilation, and thus, do not account for the actual state of the local ocean currents during the release of highly contaminated water from the damaged plants in March–April 2011. An ensemble differing in initial current distributions illustrates their importance for the tracer patterns evolving during the first months, but suggests a minor relevance for the large-scale tracer distributions after 2–3 years. By then the tracer cloud has penetrated to depths of more than 400 m, spanning the western and central North Pacific between 25°N and 55°N, leading to a rapid dilution of concentrations. The rate of dilution declines in the following years, while the main tracer patch propagates eastward across the Pacific Ocean, reaching the coastal waters of North America after about 5–6 years. Tentatively assuming a value of 10 PBq for the net 137Cs input during the first weeks after the Fukushima incident, the simulation suggests a rapid dilution of peak radioactivity values to about 10 Bq m−3 during the first two years, followed by a gradual decline to 1–2 Bq m−3 over the next 4–7 years. The total peak radioactivity levels would then still be about twice the pre-Fukushima values.


Two-dimensional information on the kinematics and spatial distribution of gas in spiral galaxies is encoded in radio observations of their one-dimensional 21-cm neutral hydrogen (HI) line profiles. More than ten thousand HI profiles have been published and are publicly available. In order to explore the parameter space mapped out by the 21-cm neutral hydrogen line profile, we have modified and run a FORTRAN-based computer simulation code. We have identified 7 control parameters that define the morphology of the modelled galaxy: they describe the neutral hydrogen gas distribution (density and spatial location of the gas), characteristics of its rotation curve, warps, asymmetries, and finally, the viewing angle. All except the last of these parameters tell us significant physical information about the galaxy but a determination of them is not immediately apparent from the two-dimensional 21-cm line profile. Hence, the goal of this exploration is to find meaningful correlations between the observed 21-cm line profile features and the underlying physical parameters.


The memorial to the Victorian naturalist-explorer John Gilbert (1812-45) in Saint James's Church, Sydney, bears the Latin inscription Dulce et decorum est pro scientia mori, which translates into English as "it is sweet and fitting to die for science." Gilbert was killed in 1845 during a night attack by Aboriginal people on members of the first Leichhardt Expedition at a remote camp in Western Cape York. He was the only salaried collector in Australia for the nineteenth-century English ornithologist and publisher, John Gould. Two of Gould's other primary collectors, Johnston Drummond (1820-45) and Frederick Strange (1810-54), were also "martyred" to science (Angus 5) while on collecting activities for Gould. This article examines the contemporary and later historical remembrance of the lives and achievements of these three "men of science" (Barton 73). Using an historical and contextual approach, I consider the factors that shaped the construction and commemoration of their historical legacies in both textual and material forms. While there were similarities in the manner of their deaths there are clear differences in how their personal and scientific reputations have been remembered and recounted. I contend that the subsequent scientific and historical status of each individual was determined by a range of factors, the most significant being the different ways in which their legacies were championed by others after their deaths.


This thesis explores the implications of power in relation to the psychological contract. The majority of the psychological contract literature, because of its underpinning assumptions of mutuality and reciprocity, largely downplays the dynamics of power in the employment relationship. The key objective of the current study therefore is to make further empirical and theoretical developments in relation to the psychological contract by exploring these power dynamics in the relationship between employees and employer. Concerning power, the complex interdependencies and the associated workplace struggles characterizing the employment relationship between employees and the different representatives of the organization are investigated.

From an empirical perspective, the research contributes in a twofold manner as the results not only highlight the complex interdependencies and the workplace struggles in the employment relationship but also offer new knowledge about work and management in Pakistan. This context of employment relations based on underlying power dynamics that are embedded into the complex and interdependent relationships between employees and organizational representatives is globally significant in terms of workplace research, yet generally neglected in the relevant studies.

The current study has a qualitative orientation and follows a critical realist research philosophy. Using data collected from 43 interviewees in three call centre organizations, the research additionally makes a theoretical contribution to the psychological contract from the perspectives of mutuality, reciprocity and agency. The results illustrate that, in comparison to mutuality and reciprocity, interdependence and negotiation play a critical role in the psychological contracts of employees. Largely acknowledging the implications of power dynamics, these concepts highlight that employees, based on their perceptions of interdependence (rather than mutuality) in the employment relationships, tend to focus primarily on negotiation (rather than reciprocation) in their psychological contracts with employers.

Concerning agency, different classifications of human agents are highlighted (i.e. primary agents, secondary agents, multiple agents, incumbent agents). The current research extends the concept of agency beyond the boundary of human agents into the domain of the electronic agents of the organization. The results highlight that it is not only the perceived capability to reward or punish but also the perceived tendency to actively use that capability which significantly influences employees' assumptions to consider particular organizational members as the agents of the organization. From the viewpoint of relational interdependence in the employment relationship, the efforts made by employees to decrease their dependence on employers and increase the employer's dependence on them are illustrated. The research findings demonstrate that these efforts are largely motivated by the employees' objective of promoting their bargaining power in employment relationship.


Vision scientists standardly assume that the goal of vision is to recover properties of the external world. Lehar's "miniature, virtual-reality replica of the external world inside our head" (target article, sect. 10) is an example of this assumption. I propose instead, on evolutionary grounds, that the goal of vision is simply to provide a useful user interface to the external world.


Asbestos minerals which can be divided into two classes as serpentine and amphibole, can be found in mafic (less siliceous) and ultramafic (abundant siliceous) rocks in the form of vein sand network. While fibrous chrysotile belongs to serpentine group, anthopyllite, tremolite, actinolite, amosite and crocidolite minerals belong to amphibole group. It is known that lung diseases due to inhalation of fibers and powders of asbestos minerals are an important health problem in Turkey. It has been demonstrated with medical researches that asbestos fibers cause peritoneal cancer as well as calcification, thickening, water collection and malignant mesothelioma in pleural plaquesas a result of their inhalation through internal and external environment. Especially, it is pointed out that fibers of actinolite, tremolite, anthopyllite, and crocidolite from amphibole group minerals are much more carcinogenic than chrysotile asbestos fibers are. Asbestos in environmental sense was used in theroofs, plasters and lime washes of the houses, and in 3.000 different materials in industry between 1930 and 1980. Each white ground is not as supposed asbestos. The rocks and soils in most places of Turkey are chalky and white. Asbestos occurrences and beds are found in total of 203 villages in 87 counties in total of 45 cities of Turkey. Most of them take place in mountains, hills and creeks far away from human settlements. Among the settlements, numbers of risky villages, towns and town centers are 63, 2, respectively. The total population under environmental asbestos risk in Turkey is about 72.000.


Postoperative complications within the biliary tract remain a significant problem after liver transplantation despite advances in operative techniques.
A significant cause for these complications appear to be hydrophobic bile salts, which remain in the bile ducts after organ harvest. These are believed to exert membrane damaging effects on the bile duct tissue. Hydrophilic bile salts, in contrast, have tissue protective properties.
Earlier studies have shown that perioperative infusion of the hydrophilic bile acid Tauroursodeoxycholate (TUDC) positively influences liver function parameters and the histologic appearance of bile ducts. This is believed to be due to TUDC's own membrane stabilizing effects, as well as to a displacement of hydrophobic bile salts from the bile fluid.
Until now, there had been no studies into how bile fluid composition changes after perioperative infusion of TUDC in liver transplantations. This knowledge would allow conclusions regarding how TUDC acts and would aid with the development of therapeutic options for the prevention of bile duct complications.

To investigate postoperative concentrations of hydrophilic and hydrophobic bile acids in the bile fluid, the livers of 12 pigs were transplanted. Before explantation and after reperfusion, animals of the experimental group (n=6) received TUDC iv, animals of the control group (n=6) received infusions of Normal Saline of equal length and rate. Bile samples were analyzed using High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC).

Postoperative concentrations of TUDC were significantly higher in the experimental group, while there were no significant differences in the concentrations of the other investigated hydrophilic bile salts.
In contrast, the concentrations of hydrophobic bile salts were markedly reduced in the experimental group, in two cases significantly (Taurochenodeoxycholate, Glycochenodeoxycholate).

The results show both a shift in bile fluid composition away from the hydrophobic bile salts, and an increase in TUDC concentrations, which would support the membrane-stabilizing effect of TUDC.
These results can be applied in the development of new techniques to reduce bile duct damage after liver transplantation. Further research will be required before clinical application.


STUDY QUESTION
Is the pain associated with levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system (LNG-IUS) insertion reduced by intracervical anesthesia in women without previous vaginal birth?

SUMMARY ANSWER
Intracervical anesthesia was not associated with reduced pain in women without previous vaginal birth.

WHAT IS KNOWN ALREADY
The pain associated with the insertion of intrauterine contraceptives (IUCs) is a limiting factor for the use of these contraceptives by some women. No prophylactic pharmacological intervention has proven efficacy in relieving pain during or after the insertion of IUCs. However, previous studies included women with previous vaginal delivery, and injectable intracervical anesthesia was not evaluated in any of these studies.

STUDY DESIGN, SIZE, DURATION
This was a randomized, open, parallel-group clinical trial that evaluated 100 women without previous vaginal delivery who wished to use the LNG-IUS for the first time. These women were evaluated immediately after LNG-IUS insertion and then 2 h and 6 h later.

PARTICIPANTS/MATERIALS, SETTING, METHODS
The 100 women were randomized into two groups: (i) use of a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) (ibuprofen, 400 mg) 1 h prior to LNG-IUS insertion; or (ii) 2% lidocaine intracervical injection 5 min prior to LNG-IUS insertion. The women were evaluated immediately after LNG-IUS insertion and then 2 h and 6 h after insertion. Two pain scales were used (the visual analogue scale and the facial pain scale) in addition to assessing the ease of insertion (as rated by the provider) and the level of discomfort during the procedure (as rated by the patient). Multivariate logistic regression was performed to analyze the predictors associated with moderate/severe pain.

MAIN RESULTS AND THE ROLE OF CHANCE
The pain and discomfort associated with LNG-IUS insertion, and the ease of insertion of the LNG-IUS did not differ between the groups. Nulliparity was more associated with moderate/severe pain [adjusted odds ratio (OR): 3.1 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.3-7.80]. Injectable intracervical anesthesia use reduced the risk of moderate/severe pain by 40% [adjusted OR: 0.6 (95% CI: 0.2-1.4)]. The difference between the mean pain score in the intracervical anesthesia group and the NSAID group was <10%; thus, the effect size of the intervention was not significant.

LIMITATIONS, REASONS FOR CAUTION
Intracervical anesthesia was compared with an oral medication in this study. Intracervical injection of a saline solution or even a dry needling as the placebo for a double-blind study could be a more adequate control; however, this approach was not a protocol approved by the institutional review board. Considering that the majority of the insertions were easy (>80% in both groups), the results may not be extrapolated to difficult insertions with moderate/severe pain where local anesthesia may have a role.

WIDER IMPLICATIONS OF THE FINDINGS
The findings can be generalized to most insertions in nulliparous women or in those without a previous vaginal delivery. There is currently no evidence to recommend the routine use of prophylactic intracervical anesthesia prior to LNG-IUS insertion; there is no evidence that this treatment reduces insertion-related pain.

STUDY FUNDING/COMPETING INTERESTS
RAF and CSV give occasional lectures for Bayer Healthcare. This study received funding from the National Institute of Hormones and Women's Health, National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).

TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER
NCT02155166.


The authors have carried out a literature review of targeted relevant research with a focus on two countries of the African Great Lakes Region, i.e. Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The aim was to find a common thread between nulliparity and timely caesarean section through external clinical pelvimetry. Higher rates of nulliparity and caesarean section were found with poor outcome in terms of foeto-maternal prognosis. External clinical pelvimetry presented in Rwandan and Congolese nulliparae the same characteristics during pregnancy and at delivery: lower average values in comparison with multiparae who never experienced caesarean section; average values significantly lower in women who underwent caesarean than in those who delivered naturally; and a gradual and significant decrease in caesarean section rate as pelvic sizes increased. Cephalopelvic disproportion, the main cause of mechanical dystocia, was associated with significantly lower pelvic average values. On the basis of an appropriate tool to predict cephalopelvic disproportion and taking as an illustration of com-plication the case of obstetrical fistulas, the authors finally advocate the use of the pelvimeter to screen in time pelvises at higher risk for cephalopelvic disproportion in resource-constrained environment.


......................................................................................................................ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................. iii NOMENCLATURE .......................................................................................................... iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................... v LIST OF FIGURES ..........................................................................................................vii LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ ix


The paper estimates the correlates of student performance across countries using student-level data from the PISA-2000 study. There is a substantial relationship of international student performance in math, science, and reading with institutional features. In particular, there are positive associations with accountability through external exit exams, school autonomy in personnel-management and process decisions, and private operation of schools. By contrast, there is no positive association with private school funding, and a negative association with autonomy in areas with scope for decentralized opportunistic behavior. Student performance shows a positive relationship with school autonomy particularly where external exit exams are in place, highlighting the role of external exams as "currency" of school systems. Positive associations of student performance with resource endowments of schools are mainly related to resource quality. While there is a strong association with family background, computer availability at home shows even a negative relationship with student performance on basic skills, after holding other effects constant. The explanatory power of the model between countries is remarkable.


Introduction Home oxygen costs the NHS approximately £120 million a year, with £13 million spent on oxygen that is never used.1 Home oxygen teams require integration into the wider respiratory care pathway to ensure appropriate assessment of clinical need and risk, education and follow-up.2 In Derbyshire, prescriptions initiated in the community had appropriate assessments in 90% of cases. In contrast, home oxygen initiated in secondary care at discharge was often prescribed on day of discharge, by junior doctors with no specialist training, without appropriate assessment and education, frequently necessitating early community input. Following two serious incidents post discharge, a study was implemented to evaluate the impact of a different approach to home oxygen prescription following acute hospital stay. The new service included an in-reach oxygen nurse and bespoke risk assessment for hospital discharges. Methods A before and after study was performed recording key outcomes, including number of prescriptions, cost, and input required post-discharge. This was carried out over a period of 12 months before and 12 months after implementation of the new service, assessing impact on compliance with guidelines and patient safety. Results In the pre-intervention period there were 278 home oxygen prescriptions resulting from the acute care setting, all performed by junior doctors, with 155 urgent (same day) prescriptions totalling £32,815. In the 12 months post-intervention there were 145 home oxygen prescriptions, 88 by in-reach nurses, including 56 urgent orders totalling £11,655. The previous need for 2 month post discharge visit for assessment and education reduced significantly, with associated dramatic reduction in phone-calls from patients with queries. Conclusion This study, though limited to single centre, shows significant cost and potential safety benefits. Introducing greater rigour to the in-hospital assessment process was thought to account for the overall fall in oxygen prescription, particularly high-cost urgent orders. With reduction in need for post-discharge intervention also reducing the burden in the community and suggesting greater patient understanding. References Directorate, N.M., COPD Commissioning toolkit. 2012. Hardinge M, et al. Guideline update: The British Thoracic Society Guidelines on home oxygen use in adults. Thorax 2015;70(6):589–91. Abstract P205 Figure 1 Trend in total oxygen prescriptions and cost of urgent prescriptions throughout the trial period


We report a rare case of benign bronchoesophageal fistula (BEF) of the main left lung lower lobe bronchus associated with granulomatous disease. A 30-year-old male was repeatedly seen over a period of three years at our institution for vague abdominal and respiratory symptoms. He underwent chest radiograph, CT scan of the neck, modified barium swallow study, and multiple endoscopies and laryngoscopies without a definitive diagnosis. A diagnosis of bronchoesophageal fistula was made by single contrast esophagram when a fistulous tract was demonstrated between the esophagus and left lower lobe bronchus. Chest computed tomography scanning demonstrated the fistulous tract, but also showed multiple calcified mediastinal lymph nodes adjacent to the site of fistula, which were thought to be consistent with prior granulomatous disease, likely histoplasmosis which is endemic to our area. The patient was treated surgically, and the fistula, adhesions, and adherent calcified lymph node were all removed at the time of the procedure. The presence of histoplasmosis could not be confirmed, but is most likely the cause of this uncommon BEF presentation. In conclusion, this is a rare presentation of a benign, acquired broncho-esophageal fistula associated with fungal infection. doi:10.4021/jmc138w


Since the conception of the George R. Wallace Jr. Astrophysical Observatory (WAO) at MIT in 1971 we have had a focus on applying cutting-edge technology to astronomical equipment and enabling automated or remote observing for scientists and students alike. A key strength of our program has been including undergraduates in the research, design, and construction of systems. These experiences have led to breakthroughs that have been invaluable for both the observatory and the observers. Wallace Observatory was also the site of the first robotic telescope conference (1975), "Telescope Automation," which set stringent goals to which we compare our observatory today. Forty-five years later, looking back on the days of punch cards and tape reels at WAO, we must now ask, did we achieve the goals set out for us in the 1970's? Here, we discuss this question and examine our more recent efforts to automate our modern educational telescopes while looking forward to an exciting upgrade to one of our original telescope domes.


A centralized network control and management plane, such as the one based on a path computation element (PCE), is highly beneficial in terms of resource optimization in wavelength division multiplexing optical networks. Benefits of centralized provisioning are even more evident when connection requests are provisioned in batches, i.e., they allow a better use of network resources via concurrent optimization. In this study, a dynamic bulk provisioning framework is presented with the objective of optimizing the use of network resources that also presents, as an additional benefit, the ability to yield a reduction of the control plane overhead. The rationale behind the proposed framework is based on a mechanism in which the PCE client is allowed to bundle and simultaneously send multiple labeled switch path (LSP) requests to the PCE where, in turn, several bundles can be concurrently processed together as a single bulk. From the network deployment perspective, a PCE-based network architecture is proposed to practically realize this approach. For dynamic bulk provisioning of optical LSP requests, a time-efficient integer linear programming (ILP) model (LSP_ BP_ ILP) is presented to minimize the request blocking, the network resource consumption, and the network congestion. In addition, a heuristic based on a greedy randomized adaptive search procedure (GRASP), namely LSP_BP_GRASP, is also proposed as a scalable alternative. The presented results demonstrate significant advantages of the proposed PCE bulk provisioning framework based on concurrent optimization in terms of reduced blocking probability and control overhead when compared with conventional dynamic connection provisioning approaches processing a single connection request at a time.


Supervisor: Fernando A. Wilson, Ph.D. The main goal of this dissertation was to estimate national-level inpatient readmissions and statelevel hospital-based emergency department (ED) visits with behavioral health (BH) conditions in the states of Nebraska and New York. The dissertation aims to assess the impact of the policy mandates under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on these state and national estimates. The Nationwide Readmissions Database and the State Emergency Department databases maintained by the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project were used for this dissertation. US Adult population with high-risk of readmissions in the inpatient departments for alcohol-related disorders (ARD) and of visiting ED for BH conditions were identified. Prediction of economic burden due to 30-day readmissions, specifically for recurrences of ARD, patient and hospital-level rates, costs, and predictors of 30-day readmissions were derived at the nationallevel. Region-level data on ED facilities and BH workforce in Nebraska were obtained from the Health Professionals Tracking Services. In addition, the location of substance abuse treatment centers and ED facilities in New York were procured from the National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment Services and the National Emergency Department Inventory, respectively. To identify BH conditions, International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification codes were used. Estimates of total charges for ED visits in Nebraska and New York were performed along with an assessment of the availability of substance abuse treatment centers, BH workforce, and EDs. The dissertation underlines the need for integrated behavioral health services at primary level and development of preventative health programs tailored specifically for high-risk populations.


ASSESSING THE VALIDITY OF THE COMMUNALISM SCALE USING CULTURAL GROUPS by LaShawn Thompson May 2011 Communalism has become a very important variable for research investigation recently because the field of cultural psychology has been searching for new models to foster a clear understanding of culture or for ways to improve current models. This study investigated the validity of using The Communalism Scale to assess the communal (group focus rather than individual focus) aspect of culture in specific ethnic groups. Until now, the scale was used only with African Americans; however, the current study assessed the validity of the scale with several cultural groups. Results from previous studies have demonstrated clear internal consistency for The Communalism Scale; however, there appeared to be a need for further validation of the scale. Research hypotheses included predictions about The Communalism Scale with regards to specific ethnic groups and geographical location of these groups. This study found that the communalism construct was endorsed by several ethnic groups, including Asian/Pacific Islander, African American, European American, and multiracial ethnic populations. Results also indicated significant differences between ethnic groups and some of these differences were noted regardless of geographical location. Understanding the value of using The Communalism Scale with cultural groups adds to the current cultural model and has the ability to influence the effectiveness of measuring communalistic aspects of culture.