QUESTION UNDER STUDY
In most countries hypersensitivity to vitamin K antagonists (VKA) is considered to be a rare congenital bleeding diathesis. It occurs in patients with FIX propeptide mutations at locus -10. We present a Swiss family with two patients who suffered major bleedings under oral anticoagulant treatment in the presence of therapeutic or subtherapeutic INR levels and abnormally prolonged aPTT. In both patients a mutation in the propeptide of FIX at locus -10 with substitution of alanine by threonine (Ala-10Thr) was found. In one patient FIX clotting activity was found to be severely reduced (2%). The observed bleeding tendency is related to this--compared to the other vitamin K dependent factors (FII, FVII, FX)--excessively and disproportionately low level of FIX. Three generations of this family were tested for propeptide mutations, which are transmitted in an X-chromosomal recessive mode of inheritance. Apart from the two symptomatic male patients we found another male with the mutation who has not been exposed to VKA, six female carriers and four potential male carriers in the fourth generation who have not been tested. A founder effect for this mutation has been previously described for cases in Switzerland and Germany.

CONCLUSION
FIX propeptide mutation-associated hypersensitivity to VKA is a rare occurrence in Switzerland. The severity of associated bleeding complications and the reversible nature of the bleeding diathesis may nonetheless warrant increased awareness on the part of primary care physicians in Switzerland.


: Treatment strategies towards periodontal diseases have evolved to eliminate specific pathogens or suppress destructive host response. The inherent activity of the antibiotic against the target microorganism and various Pharmacokinetic parameters such as potency, permeability, intrinsic efficacy, and substantivity of the drug dictate the success of the therapeutic outcome. However selection of an appropriate delivery system is an important factor. Rapid advances in molecular biology have helped to overcome the disadvantages of systemic and topical applications, by direct placement of antimicrobial agent (s) into subgingival sites, thus minimizing antimicrobial impact on non-oral body sites. As periodontitis is a 'localized' disease condition it is amenable to localized drug treatments. By means of controlled local delivery from within the periodontal pocket, a single administration of a few milligram of an antibacterial agent can maintain therapeutic concentrations within the crevicular fluid for a longer period of time than any other mode of delivery. This paper shall review the different local delivery systems along with the commonly employed drugs through these delivery systems.


BACKGROUND
Expert guidelines advocate defibrillation within 2 minutes after an in-hospital cardiac arrest caused by ventricular arrhythmia. However, empirical data on the prevalence of delayed defibrillation in the United States and its effect on survival are limited.

METHODS
We identified 6789 patients who had cardiac arrest due to ventricular fibrillation or pulseless ventricular tachycardia at 369 hospitals participating in the National Registry of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation. Using multivariable logistic regression, we identified characteristics associated with delayed defibrillation. We then examined the association between delayed defibrillation (more than 2 minutes) and survival to discharge after adjusting for differences in patient and hospital characteristics.

RESULTS
The overall median time to defibrillation was 1 minute (interquartile range, <1 to 3 minutes); delayed defibrillation occurred in 2045 patients (30.1%). Characteristics associated with delayed defibrillation included black race, noncardiac admitting diagnosis, and occurrence of cardiac arrest at a hospital with fewer than 250 beds, in an unmonitored hospital unit, and during after-hours periods (5 p.m. to 8 a.m. or weekends). Delayed defibrillation was associated with a significantly lower probability of surviving to hospital discharge (22.2%, vs. 39.3% when defibrillation was not delayed; adjusted odds ratio, 0.48; 95% confidence interval, 0.42 to 0.54; P<0.001). In addition, a graded association was seen between increasing time to defibrillation and lower rates of survival to hospital discharge for each minute of delay (P for trend <0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
Delayed defibrillation is common and is associated with lower rates of survival after in-hospital cardiac arrest.


Abstract:This paper furthers my argument that the scribe was also the artist of the underdrawings of the miniatures in the Pearl-Gawain manuscript and includes a re-assessment of the role of the colorist/s. Previously the 12 miniatures framing Pearl, Cleanness, Patience, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in London, MS Cotton Nero A.x (art. 3), the only version of these poems extant, were largely dismissed. The miniatures do not convert the texts pictorially; rather, they place the poems within a larger icongraphic framework individually and as a whole. It is true that the painted layers, often unevenly applied, obscure many important details that are thematically significant, as shown in scientifically enhanced images that help to recover some of the outlines of the underdrawings. Taking into account the analysis of the pigments used, a closer look at the role of the colorists (likely more than one, judging from the overlays and differing levels of skills) it appears that the painted layers sometimes support the interpretations of the scribe-artist: at other times they appear to offer competing readings. The result is that the miniatures provide multilayered visual readings that interconnect and link motifs by repetition and contrast to unify the poems at various levels for engaged audiences. This is exemplified by a close look at the seascapes, landscapes, and courtly settings, as well as at preaching scenes and related sacramental issues, along with the presentation and role of women, all reconceptualized in line and color.


Energy-related occupant behaviour is crucial to design and operation of energy and control systems in buildings. Occupant behaviours are often oversimplified as static schedules or settings in building performance simulation ignoring their stochastic nature. The continuous and dynamic interaction between occupants and building systems motivates their simultaneous simulation in an efficient manner. In the past, simultaneous simulation has relied on co-simulation approaches or customized source code changes to building simulation programmes. This paper presents Buildings. Occupants, an open-source package implemented in Modelica, for the simulation of occupant behaviours of lighting, windows, blinds, heating and air conditioning systems in office and residential buildings. Examples were presented to illustrate how the models in the Occupants package are capable to simulate stochastic occupant behaviours. The major contribution of this work is to introduce the equation-based modelling approach to simulate occupant behaviours in buildings and to develop an open-source Occupants package in the Modelica language.


troops will be removed from Saudi Arabia represents a significant and welcome change in U.S. policy toward the Persian Gulf. This wise decision to shift U.S. forces out of the kingdom should be only the first of several steps to substantially reduce the American military presence in the region. In addition to the removal of troops from Saudi Arabia, U.S. forces should be withdrawn from other Gulf states, including Qatar, Kuwait, and Iraq, and the U.S. Navy should terminate its long-standing policy of deploying a carrier battle group in the Persian Gulf. The United States need not have troops stationed in the Persian Gulf in order to remain engaged in the region. The Gulf's energy resources are important to the global economy, but goods and services flow on the world market absent explicit "protection" by military forces. Further, the United States will continue to exert a stabilizing influence from a distance by drawing on its economic assets and its political standing. In the highly unlikely event that regional conditions threaten vital U.S. security interests, the United States can draw on the military's capacity for projecting force over great distances. The American troop presence is not merely unnecessary; it is also costly, both in dollars and in the hardships it imposes on the all-volunteer force. The presence of U.S. troops may have stabilized the Persian Gulf, but, as the recent terrorist incident in Saudi Arabia demonstrated, the troops have also been, and remain, a source of tension and instability. In keeping with the goal of minimizing the costs and risks of a continued military presence, American efforts in Iraq should be limited, focusing solely on the swift transitioning to an Iraqi interim government empowered to move toward self-government. Beyond that, the United States must be willing to accept the wishes of the Iraqi people and should not assume that a friendly government can or should be imposed at the barrel of a gun. Likewise, policymakers should not presume that an Iraqi government that does not possess all of the attributes of a liberal democracy would be hostile to the United States, much less threatening to U.S. vital security interests. After Victory Toward a New Military Posture in the Persian Gulf


This study investigates the toxicity of WGP 3-6, a yeast-derived beta-glucan ingredient, during single-dose acute and sub-chronic toxicity studies in rats. For the acute study, Fisher-344 rats were administered WGP 3-6 via gavage at a dose of 2000 mg/kg body weight, and any evidence of toxicity was monitored over a 14-day period. WGP 3-6 was well tolerated, indicating that the LD(50) value is greater than 2000 mg/kg body weight. For the sub-chronic study, Fisher-344 rats (10/sex/group) were randomly allocated to receive daily gavage treatment with WGP 3-6 at doses of 0, 2, 33.3, or 100 mg/kg body weight. Control and high-dose satellite recovery groups of each sex also were included. Full toxicological monitoring and endpoint investigations were performed throughout and upon completion of the study. No negative effects on animal weights or food consumption attributable to WGP 3-6 were evident at any dose. In addition, no mortality, clinical pathology, functional/behavioral, microscopic, or gross observations indicating toxicity were observed. Sporadic changes in some biochemical and hematological parameters were observed; however, since the effects were within the physiological ranges in historical controls, were not dose-responsive, or were not observed in both sexes, they were determined to be of no toxicological significance. In conclusion, no adverse or toxic effects were observed after subchronic oral administration of 2, 33.3, or 100mg/kg body weight/day of WGP 3-6 in Fisher-344 rats, and therefore, a no observed adverse effect level (NOAEL) of 100 mg/kg body weight/day, the highest dose tested, was determined.


The Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis states that pollution levels are increasing as a country develops, but will begin to decrease as rising incomes pass beyond a turning point. EKC analyses test the relationship between a measure of environmental quality and income (usually expressed in a quadratic equation). Other explanatory variables have been included in these models, but income regularly has had the most significant effect on indicators of environmental quality. One variable consistently omitted in these relationships is energy prices. This paper analyzes previous models to illustrate the importance of prices in these models and then includes prices in an econometric EKC framework testing energy/income and CO2/income relationships. These long-run price/income models find that income is no longer the most relevant indicator of environmental quality or energy demand. Indeed, we find no significant evidence for the existence of an EKC within the range of current incomes for energy in the presence of price and trade variables.


Much has been written about the failure of software development projects. The importance of good software to business cannot be underestimated. A major issue is quality of the software being written and produced. Over the years, the emphasis for improvement in software development has been to change the process. Unified Modeling Language is but one of a long line of changes in software development process starting with structured programming introduced in the seventies to object oriented programming in nineties. However, several software development experts have begun to assert that the problem may not be with the process employed but rather the human asset, namely the software developer. This paper discusses two extremes of software developer behaviors. These two ends of the spectrum are the cowboy, free of restrictions, and the Samurai, following a strict code of behavior. The paper first presents the characteristics of the cowboy and the Samurai then the paper compares the development environment within which each behavior is suitable. The paper concludes with a summary and industry observations.


Background: Availability of options other than aggressive medical treatment for persons with life-limiting illnesses has provided hospitals an opportunity to adopt formalized end-of-life care services. Objective: To describe hospital ownership types that have adopted formalized end-of-life services (who), the scope of end-of-life services offered (what), and the geographic location of service provision (where). Research Design: Nationally representative cross-sectional data for 3,939 hospitals (80% of respondent hospitals) obtained from the American Hospital Association Annual Survey of Hospitals was used for the year 1998. Measures: A scale was developed to measure hospital provision of general end-of-life, pain management, or hospice services. A multivariate ordinary least-squares regression model was used to test the association of ownership as a predictor of end-of-life service provision, while controlling for internal (organizational) and external (market location and size) characteristics. Results: Independent correlates of the number of end-of-life services provided include Catholic ownership, teaching status, number of staffed beds, and being located in a metropolitan statistical area or in New England. Forty-four percent of the sampled US hospitals provide none of the three end-of-life services included in this study. Another one third of hospitals provide only one of the three services. Conclusions: Given the attention paid by both the general public and health professionals to pain relief and providing appropriate care to dying persons, such services are slow to be institutionalized in the hospital setting. The authors' findings suggest strategies for research and policy.


DEVELOPMENT OF A QUALITY IMPROVEMENT METHOD FOR INTERNATIONAL MANUFACTURING Andrew J. Strong School of Technology Master of Science Many companies are entering the international manufacturing arena. The continued expansion of the global market suggests that international manufacturing will grow. Among other concerns, the difficulty of producing high quality in some countries suggests that it is critical that companies using international locations for manufacturing find methods to better monitor and improve quality. The purpose of this research was to develop and test a method for quality improvement in an offshore environment. This method would be specifically applicable to a third-party logistics company (3PL), where the 3PL is a United States company that brokers manufacturing in China, networks to multiple manufacturers for a variety of products within that country, and is responsible for the final quality of the products made in China. After designing a new quality method that focused on regular recording and reporting of data, it was implemented into a 3PL test-case company and tested and results reported. From the results salient points were identified that improve quality when working with a 3PL located in China with a parent company in the United States. These points include: structure for reporting quality, management involvement, employee dedication to quality, and cultural understanding and awareness. Recommendations for further research are also outlined. These include: extended time (beyond three months) to implement the method and test it, larger sample size to improve the quantitative analysis, cost benefit analysis for the implementation of the method, implementation in different nations, and implementation in a manufacturing company specific to a product.


Purpose: The purpose of this study was to assess and compare wettability, dimensional changes, flexibility and tear resistance of two recent elastomeric impression materials, vinyl polyether silicone (VPES) hybrid material and polyvinyl siloxane (PVS) containing nanofillers with conventional PVS and polyether (PE) impression materials. Materials and methods: The elastomeric impression materials are divided into four groups, two experimental: VPES (EXA'lence) and PVS containing nanofillers (Elite HD+) and two control groups: PVS (Imprint II) and PE (Impregum Soft). The properties that were investigated are wettability, dimensional changes%, flexibility and tear resistance. Ten specimens were made for each property of all groups. Results: The results indicated that VPES (EXA'lence) and PE (Impregum Soft) showed the highest wettability. PVS containing nanofillers (Elite HD+) showed the lowest dimensional changes%. The strain in compression % (flexibility) of PE, VPES and PVS were not significantly different from each other and they were significantly different from PVS containing nanofillers which showed the lowest strain in compression%. The tear resistance (N/mm) of PVS containing nanofillers (Elite HD+) and VPES (EXA'lence) were significantly higher than PE (Impregum Soft) and PVS (Imprint II) which were not significantly different from each other. Conclusion: All tested materials were hydrophilic specially VPES and PE which recorded the highest wettability. All tested mterials showed accepted dimensional changes according to ANSI/ADA No. 19 and PVS containing nanofillers showed the greatest dimensional stability. All materials recorded accepted flexibility according to ANSI/ADA No. 19. As related to flexibility; PE, VPES and PVS recorded higher flexibility than PVS containing nanofillers while PVS containing nanofillers and VPES showed the highest tear resistance.


Abstract Rockweeds dominate much of the New England and Canadian Maritime coasts and serve as food and habitat for numerous species. Cobscook Bay is unique in New England for its high tidal amplitude, wide intertidal expanse, diverse flora and fauna, and presumed high intertidal productivity, much of which is thought to be related to extensive intertidal fucoid populations. The goals of this study were: 1) to estimate intertidal rockweed biomass and productivity, 2) to quantify the variation in rockweed productivity over a range of temporal and spatial scales (high- vs low-flow sites at headlands and coves, respectively), and 3) to estimate the contribution of rockweeds to detrital pools. Net productivity was determined by separately weighing growth in the current year vs growth from preceding year classes. Sampling the same populations in both the fall and following spring allowed adjustment for winter mortality of thallus structures and productivity at two sites. Variation in the length of apical tips of canopy shoots was high, and differences among sites were not significant. However, growth of tips of sub-canopy and lateral shoots was site-specific. Standing crop at low-flow sites ranged from 11.4 kg wet weight m−2 at Bar Island to 28.9 kg wet weight m−2 at Bell Farm. Standing crop at high-flow sites ranged from 8.5 kg wet weight m−2 at Birch Point to 26.7 kg wet weight m−2 at Mahar Point. Adjusted productivity estimates ranged from 22 to 105% greater than unadjusted values. Highest productivity estimates for Ascophyllum (14.9 kg wet weight m−2 yr−1 or 894 g C m−2 yr−1) occurred at Mahar Pt., a high-flow site. This unadjusted estimate was 50% higher than the average value (594 g C m−2 yr−1) from the two sites adjusted for winter losses, Bell Farm and Bar Island. Turnover rates of Ascophyllum ranged from 29 to 71% (mean over all sites = 54%) indicating that the biomass of this alga turns over approximately every two years. About 60% of the standing biomass (3.96 × 106 g C yr−1) is added to detrital pools, contributing large amounts of energy for secondary consumers. Rockweeds in Cobscook Bay are among the most productive cold-water intertidal assemblages and contribute substantial amounts of carbon to this large embayment.


Background Road traffic accidents is the first killer to teens aged 15–17 worldwide. In China, the same trend happens on teens. They are the group walking independently on the one hand, they are the group with the highest increasing rate on web-surfacing through mobile phone on the other hand. This research presented the results through observation, group discussion and questionnaire on teens distracted walking by e-devices in Shanghai, which is the first of its kind in China. Methods 8250 observations of teens in 8 communities in fall 2014 and spring 2015 were recorded. Observers conducted two morning and afternoon sessions at cross roads, on different days but at the same time, on regular school days in good weather. Each observer focused on one crossing location. 8 focus group discussions were conducted among 176 teens and 1000 questionnaires were completed by teens in 8 communities. Results 50% of teens reported use of e-devices while walking in the questionnaire. Reported by observers at cross roads, 240 out of 8250 teens were observed distraction by e-devices while crossing in a quick traffic flow with a car passing by every 2.7 seconds. The distraction rate in the afternoon is 1.9 times vs morning. The most frequent forms of distraction were headphones 42.5%, texting 22.5%, game 15.8%, and talking on the phones (10.4%). During focus groups, 86.6% of teens perceived either senior or junior groups at greater risk. Safety talks on walking with e-devices with parents is in need among teens. Conclusions Teens represent a growing proportion of road traffic victims. Prevalance use of e-devices among teens proposed growing risk. Evidence-based intervention is strenuous in need.


Clues to a mystery with RAVE results An unknown interloper systematically picks off light from galactic sources, snatching at specific wavelengths ranging from the ultraviolet to the infrared. The cause of what astronomers term diffuse interstellar bands (DIBs) still evades identification. Kos et al. combined nearly 500,000 stellar spectra from the RAVE survey to make a telling map that may clue us in further. This pseudo–three-dimensional map shows the distribution of the carrier that absorbs light at 862 nm, and it closely follows a separate map of interstellar dust, but with a significantly larger scale height in the Galactic plane. Though this is only one DIB of many, this analysis sets a path for the future study of others. Science, this issue p. 791 The map of an absorption line with unknown origins correlates well with a map of extinction by interstellar dust. The diffuse interstellar bands (DIBs) are absorption lines observed in visual and near-infrared spectra of stars. Understanding their origin in the interstellar medium is one of the oldest problems in astronomical spectroscopy, as DIBs have been known since 1922. In a completely new approach to understanding DIBs, we combined information from nearly 500,000 stellar spectra obtained by the massive spectroscopic survey RAVE (Radial Velocity Experiment) to produce the first pseudo–three-dimensional map of the strength of the DIB at 8620 angstroms covering the nearest 3 kiloparsecs from the Sun, and show that it follows our independently constructed spatial distribution of extinction by interstellar dust along the Galactic plane. Despite having a similar distribution in the Galactic plane, the DIB 8620 carrier has a significantly larger vertical scale height than the dust. Even if one DIB may not represent the general DIB population, our observations outline the future direction of DIB research.


The oil pipelines have a strategic importance in the energy supply of the European Union (EU), especially given the fact that in the next two decades the crude oil will continue to be a dominant energy source, accounting for approx. 30% of the primary energy consumption, along with a reduction in the petroleum product consumption and growth in renewables.
Europe has a widespread network of oil pipelines of approx. 22,5 thousand kilometres (without Russia), connecting refineries to import oil ports or to land-based crude oil sources. The refineries of the Central Eastern Europe are supplied mainly from the Druzhba oil pipeline. Recently, these refineries have diversified their crude oil supply routes and sources, by sea imports from the North Sea, the Middle East, Canada and others (Poland) or by the TAL – IKL oil pipelines (Czech Republic) and the JANAF oil pipeline (Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic). Given the insufficient diversification of crude oil supply precisely of the Central Eastern European region, particularly the landlocked countries (and refineries respectively), the EU has envisaged, among the projects of common interests, also six connection oil pipelines with terminals. At the same time, they are the only pipelines planned to be constructed in Europe and financed by the oil companies' funds.
The oil pipeline and storage companies, as well as other oil companies, have a social responsibility as regards the energy supply, yet also a responsibility as regards their successful performance and development, thus investing considerable funds into modernisations, upgrades, protection, safety and security, etc. The oil pipeline companies hastily modify their strategies by expanding business and becoming more and more transport-storage-energy oriented, and by investing in the flow reversal of oil pipelines and connection pipelines, storage capacities, as well as in enhancement of efficiency and flexibility of oil pipeline and storage infrastructures.


Abstract This article explores how the phenomenon of biblical gardens joins three bodies of scholarship: the social life of scriptures, the study of religion's media turn, and religious pedagogy. As a kind of religious attraction, the biblical garden is both devotional and pedagogical, with historic roots in nineteenth-century projects to connect botanical science with biblical literacy. I argue that the pedagogy of biblical gardens is anchored by an ideology of sensual indexicality and a strategy of metonymic immersion, which is differentiated from themed immersion. Analyses are drawn from observational and textual data, as well as comparative data from other forms of Holy Land replication, primarily in the USA. Ultimately, I argue that biblical gardens resist a modern ideology that elevates visual experience atop a sensory hierarchy.


Several well-known analytical techniques exist for the force profile analysis of permanent-magnet linear synchronous motors. These techniques, however, make significant simplifications in order to obtain the magnetic field distribution in the air gap. From the field distribution, the force profile can be found. These widely used techniques provide a reasonable approximation for force profile analysis, but fail to give really accurate results in the sense of the exact shape of the force profile caused by effects that due to simplification are not fully included. To obtain the exact shape for the force profile in these cases, the computationally expensive finite-element method (FEM) is often applied. In this paper, an elegant semianalytical approach is presented to acquire the force profile. First, the magnetic field distribution in the air gap is determined by means of Schwarz-Christoffel (SC) mapping. The SC mapping allows a slotted structure of the machine to be mapped to a geometrically simpler domain for which analytic solutions are available. Subsequently, the field solution in the slotted structure can be determined by applying the mapping function to the field distribution in the simplified domain. From the resulting field distribution, the force profile is calculated by means of the Maxwell stress tensor. The results are compared with those from the commonly used equivalent magnetic circuit modeling and 2-D FEM software to demonstrate the accuracy which can be reached by application of the SC method.


Over 75 practical recipes to confidently design an efficient virtual datacenter with VMware vSphere 6.xAbout This BookGet the first book on the market that helps you design a virtualized data center with VMware vSphere 6Achieve enhanced compute, storage, network, and management capabilities for your virtual data center Exciting and practical recipes help you to design a virtual data easily by leveraging the features of VMware vSphere 6Who This Book Is ForIf you are an administrator or consultant interested in designing virtualized datacenter environments using VMware vSphere 6.x or previous versions of vSphere and the supporting components, this book is for you. It will help both new and experienced architects deliver professional VMware vSphere virtual datacenter designs. What You Will LearnIdentify key factors related to a vSphere design and apply them to every step of the design process Mitigate security risks and meet compliance requirements in a vSphere design. Create a vSphere conceptual design by identifying technical and business requirementsDetermine the type of database to use based on the deployment size. Design for performance, availability, recoverability, manageability, and securityMap the logical resource design into the physical vSphere design Create professional vSphere design documentation to ensure a successful implementation of the vSphere design Leverage the latest vSphere 6.x features to ensure manageability, performance, availability, and security in a virtual datacenter design In Detail VMware is the industry leader in data center virtualization. The vSphere 6.x suite of products provides a robust and resilient platform to virtualize server and application workloads. With the release of 6.x a whole range of new features has come along such as ESXi Security enhancements, fault tolerance, high availability enhancements, and virtual volumes, thus simplifying the secure management of resources, the availability of applications, and performance enhancements of workloads deployed in the virtualized datacenter. This book provides recipes to create a virtual datacenter design using the features of vSphere 6.x by guiding you through the process of identifying the design factors and applying them to the logical and physical design process. You'll follow steps that walk you through the design process from beginning to end, right from the discovery process to creating the conceptual design; calculating the resource requirements of the logical storage, compute, and network design; mapping the logical requirements to a physical design; security design; and finally creating the design documentation. The recipes in this book provide guidance on making design decisions to ensure the successful creation, and ultimately the successful implementation, of a VMware vSphere 6.x virtual data center design. Style and Approach The book follows a recipe-based approach that consists of practical recipes to effectively design a virtual data center.


In model-based reinforcement learning, generative and temporal models of environments can be leveraged to boost agent performance, either by tuning the agent's representations during training or via use as part of an explicit planning mechanism. However, their application in practice has been limited to simplistic environments, due to the difficulty of training such models in larger, potentially partially-observed and 3D environments. In this work we introduce a novel action-conditioned generative model of such challenging environments. The model features a non-parametric spatial memory system in which we store learned, disentangled representations of the environment. Low-dimensional spatial updates are computed using a state-space model that makes use of knowledge on the prior dynamics of the moving agent, and high-dimensional visual observations are modelled with a Variational Auto-Encoder. The result is a scalable architecture capable of performing coherent predictions over hundreds of time steps across a range of partially observed 2D and 3D environments.


Maintaining a mixture of cool-and warm-season grasses under intensive management for season-long production is difficult, due to species shifts, especially to a dominance of cool-season grasses when heavy amounts of nitrogen(N) fertilizer are used. The objective of this study was to determine if high forage yields could be produced season long while maintaining a desirable balance of warm-and cool-season grasses. The study was conducted near Mead, Nebraska on a Sharpsburg silty clay loam (Typic Argiudoll). An irrigated mixture of 3 warmseason grasses and 1 cool-season grass, big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii Vitman), switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.), and hrdiangrass [Sorghtrum nutans (L.) Nash] and smooth brome (Bromu~ inermis Leyss.) was fertilized at low (150 kg/ha), medium (250 kg/ha) and high (350 kg/ha) rates of N in split applications. Three harvest schemes were designed to either produce high quality forage or to maximize yield. Herbage yields showed a quadratic response with N level. A late May/mid July harvest scheme for the first and second cuttings did not produce as much forage as late May/late August or early June/late August harvest schemes. Population of smooth brome and other cool-season grasses declined with the higher N rates. Populations of warm-season grasses were not greatly affected by N level. Density of smooth brome increased under all harvest scheme treatments and the highest increase for other cool-season grasses was with a May 24/July 13 harvest scheme. Warm-season grasses maintained a steady density over the 3 years. Forage was produced from early May until late summer with an irrigated cool- and warm-season mixture. Fall production of smooth brome was minimal, although stand was generally maintained. Nitrate N accumulated in the soil under the medium and high N treatments.


Whilst much current research on Middle Schooling suggests that the most effective learning environment for young adolescents is created through a combination of teaching teams and integrated curriculum, many students continue to be educated in secondary schools organised in faculties dominated by subject discreet curricula. This paper presents insights from a case study of a group of secondary school teachers who, over a period of ten years, created integrated curricula and year-level teams within a school organisational structure characterised by a discreet subject environment. The group was led by a specialist teacher (the first author) who, in the role of teacher-researcher, investigated their profound journey of curriculum transformation. This doctoral thesis research adopts an historic structure and employs narrative inquiry to present the stories and voices of both the facilitator and teachers as they struggled to establish an innovative culture of integration and negotiation. We discuss a number of emergent issues and critical incidents that appeared instrumental in shaping the teachers' journey towards a shared understanding of what constitutes an effective learning environment. In order to facilitate the full realisation of this ideal, we propose a model of team leadership for expediting the school's continuing transformation towards a fully integrated curriculum.


The object of this study is to assess the role of trade in the transmission of currency shocks across geographically close countries. The analysis will focus on identifying and comparing the degree of vulnerability of new EU member states from the Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs) to currency shocks. We interpret the interactions that a centre-periphery model identifies for periphery countries as a possible description of existing interdependencies among CEECs. According to the centre periphery model discussed by Corsetti et al. (1998b), "if there is no pass-through, then direct bilateral trade links may play a more important role than competition in the third market in determining the transmission of exchange rate shocks in the periphery. If there is full pass-through, a high share of bilateral trade within a region can actually limit the extent of beggar-thy-neighbour effects." These effects are emphasised by a high degree of export similarity among the countries in the periphery. As a result of the heterogeneity in pass-through and trade structures, it is very difficult to derive a unitary policy implication on the potential sustainability of the exchange rate mechanism (ERM) II. Yet it is possible to single out the country pairs in which the likelihood of transmitting currency shocks is higher. Preliminary results point out that (other things being equal and given the contained intra-periphery trade) the transmission of currency disturbances is lower if the disturbance originates in countries with low a pass-through rate (the Slovak and Czech Republics, Estonia and Latvia) and higher if it originates in countries with a high pass-through rate (Poland, Hungary and Slovenia).


Spring bloom composition in the Baltic Sea, a partially ice‐covered brackish coastal waterbody, is shaped by winter‐spring weather conditions affecting the relative dominance of diatoms and a heterogeneous assemblage of cold‐water dinoflagellates, dominated by the chain‐forming Peridiniella catenata and a complex of at least three medium‐sized, single‐celled species: Biecheleria baltica, Gymnodinium corollarium, and Scrippsiella hangoei. During the last decades, the bloom community has dramatically changed in several basins. We analyze here a 30 yr time series of quantitative phytoplankton data, as predicted by hindcast modeled ice thickness and storminess for three distinct Baltic Sea localities, to verify climate‐driven mechanisms affecting the spring bloom composition. Thick (> 30 cm) and long‐lasting ice cover favored diatom‐dominated spring blooms, and mild winters, with storms and thin ice cover (10 to 20 cm), supported blooms of the B. baltica complex. Dispersal limitation plays an important role in the spatial extent of blooms of the B. baltica complex, caused by intricate interplay of local hydrodynamics and the dinoflagellate life cycle. Proportion peaks of key phytoplankton groups have shifted about 10 d earlier in the northwestern Baltic Sea (P. catenata and diatoms) and in the Gulf of Riga (P. catenata). The significant weather effects imply future shifts in spring bloom composition and consequent biogeochemical cycles, driven by the predicted changes in winter storminess and decrease in ice cover extent and duration in climate change models.


Abstract. The recent thinning and shrinking of the Arctic sea ice cover has increased the interest in seasonal sea ice forecasts. Typical tools for such forecasts are numerical models of the coupled ocean sea ice system such as the North Atlantic/Arctic Ocean Sea Ice Model (NAOSIM). The model uses as input the initial state of the system and the atmospheric boundary condition over the forecasting period. This study investigates the potential of remotely sensed ice thickness observations in constraining the initial model state. For this purpose it employs a variational assimilation system around NAOSIM and the Alfred Wegener Institute's CryoSat-2 ice thickness product in conjunction with the University of Bremen's snow depth product and the OSI SAF ice concentration and sea surface temperature products. We investigate the skill of predictions of the summer ice conditions starting in March for three different years. Straightforward assimilation of the above combination of data streams results in slight improvements over some regions (especially in the Beaufort Sea) but degrades the over-all fit to independent observations. A considerable enhancement of forecast skill is demonstrated for a bias correction scheme for the CryoSat-2 ice thickness product that uses a spatially varying scaling factor.


Abstract Autophagy, a homeostatic process involved in nutrient regeneration and immune responses, may be involved in intracellular killing of M. tuberculosis. Several studies linked variation in autophagy genes with susceptibility to pulmonary tuberculosis, but others did not confirm these findings. We genotyped single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the ATG5 (rs2245214, c.574-12777G>C) and NOD2 (rs2066844, c.2104C>T) genes for 256 pulmonary tuberculosis patients and 330 unrelated healthy controls in Romania. Both SNPs have been reported as relevant for the autophagy process and potentially for susceptibility to active pulmonary tuberculosis. In our study, the polymorphisms in ATG5 and NOD2 were not associated with tuberculosis. This suggests that the two genetic variants we focused on are not related to the risk for developing active TB in a Romanian population.


Downscaling seasonal rainfall predictions to daily time-scale, for crop yield simulation for instance, can be performed using stochastic generators (SGs). The spatial interpolation of the SG parameters is required to generate rainfall time-series at ungauged places. A methodology is defined which makes use of topography to interpolate these parameters, in a region with a rugged terrain covering Kenya and north-eastern Tanzania. A first-order Markov chain was used to model rainfall occurrence, and a gamma distribution was used to model amounts. The 2 para meters of the Markov models, p01 and p11, and the 2 parameters of the gamma distribution are computed at 121 stations. The Kolmogorov −Smirnov test for goodness-of-fit shows that 88% (99%) of the stations and months have their dry (wet) spell frequencies successfully reproduced by first-order Markov chains, and two-third of the stations have their daily amounts satisfactorily fitted by the gamma distribution. Local regression, using elevation as the predictor and weighting stations according to distance from the target pixel and to environmental variables, is used to interpolate the 4 SG para meters. Cross-validation indicates that distance-weighted regression provides good estimates, but the inclusion of topographical variables (aspect in particular) improves the results further. The final maps show a strong orographic control of both the Markov and gamma parameters. However, while elevation has an effect on rainfall occurrence, rainfall intensity is more strongly related to local slope aspect, with eastward to southeastward oriented foothills and coastlines displaying the highest gamma scale values. These results suggest that a statistical disaggregation of daily rainfall is improved by taking explicitly into account topography through its effect on the spatial distribution of SG parameters.


New insights and successful use of computational catalysis are highlighted. This is within the context of remaining issues that prevent theoretical catalysis to be fully predictive of catalyst performance. A major challenge is to include in modelling studies the transient initiation as well as deactivation processes of the catalyst. We will illustrate this using as an example for solid acid catalysis, the alkylation process, and for transition metal catalysis, the Fischer-Tropsch reaction. For the alkylation reaction of isobutane and alkene, an important reaction for high octane gasoline, we will present a deactivation model. For the Fischer-Tropsch reaction, which converts synthesis gas into gasoline grade molecules, we discuss structural reorganization of the catalyst induced by reaction.

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Cutting edge technologies are one of the main areas in which private schools compete so they can showcase themselves as pioneers In Jordan, as it is in other education contexts worldwide. The Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) is becoming one of the rapidly adopted educational technologies everywhere. However, while moving too fast to adopt new technologies, often decision is made without taking teachers' perceptions into account. The current study focuses on teachers' perspectives on two main aspects of the integration of IWBs in four Jordanian private schools: First, teachers' perceptions of IWBs as instructional tools, and second, the presence of various supporting factors identified by the literature for the success of integrating IWB into schools. The study used a 26-item Likert scale which was administered to 200 teachers in the participating schools. The results showed that the participating schools spend extensive efforts and resources in integrating IWBs into their contexts; however, some supporting factors for the effective implementation might have been overlooked. In addition, in contrast to what some professionals might expect and some vendors might try to promote, IWBs did not make teachers' job "easier" in terms of relieving teachers' workloads, despite their values as reported by teachers.


Causal inference and discovery from observational data has been extensively studied across multiple fields. However, most prior work has focused on independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) data. In this paper, we propose a formalization for causal inference between pairs of event variables in multivariate recurrent event streams by extending Rubin's framework for the average treatment effect (ATE) and propensity scores to multivariate point processes. Analogous to a joint probability distribution representing i.i.d. data, a multivariate point process represents data involving asynchronous and irregularly spaced occurrences of various types of events over a common timeline. We theoretically justify our point process causal framework and show how to obtain unbiased estimates of the proposed measure. We conduct an experimental investigation using synthetic and real-world event datasets, where our proposed causal inference framework is shown to exhibit superior performance against a set of baseline pairwise causal association scores.


Measurements of solid aerosol concentrations are important tools to monitor air conditions at the workplace. In particular, the requirement for the workplace air quality management is necessary to prevent health damage and occupational diseases in exposed jobs. In this case, exceeded limit values for the concentration of solid aerosols were measured for all exposed workers. If such concentrations persist, workers' health may be at risk and occupational diseases may occur after prolonged exposure.


We introduce an efficient approach for optimization over orthogonal groups on highly parallel computation units such as GPUs or TPUs. As in earlier work, we parametrize an orthogonal matrix as a product of Householder reflections. However, to overcome low parallelization capabilities of computing Householder reflections sequentially, we propose employing an accumulation scheme called the compact WY (or CWY) transform -- a compact parallelization-friendly matrix representation for the series of Householder reflections. We further develop a novel Truncated CWY (or T-CWY) approach for Stiefel manifold parametrization which has a competitive complexity and, again, yields benefits when computed on GPUs and TPUs. We prove that our CWY and T-CWY methods lead to convergence to a stationary point of the training objective when coupled with stochastic gradient descent. We apply our methods to train recurrent neural network architectures in the tasks of neural machine translation and video prediction, and demonstrate superiority compared to earlier methods.


In this dissertation, I propose a theoretic foundation to compute earnings per share (EPS) for firms with both common shares and dilutive securities outstanding. I derive a new EPS measure, market EPS, which is defined as the expectation of the future earnings per share. From the view of investors, market EPS naturally captures EPS information in stock prices. It is compared to basic EPS and diluted EPS, which are suggested in the dual presentation under the current U.S. rule. The comparisons show that market EPS is below the range defined by basic EPS and diluted EPS as long as the expected future abnormal earnings is zero. This indicates a weakness behind the thinking of the current rule.
I also find that the diluted EPS by the treasury stock method overstates market EPS more than that by the if-converted method. In addition, given all conditions the same, the upward bias of diluted EPS of growth firms is smaller than that of non-growth firms.
To support the proposed theory, I conduct an empirical study using a dataset containing 3130 firm-year employee stock option plans from 1997 to 2006. The results show that diluted EPS under the rule is, on average, larger than market EPS by 1%. Furthermore, the bias is larger for firms that are heavy users of employee stock options and for firms that have higher earnings volatility.


What are hallucinogenic plants? How do they affect mind and body? Who uses them and why? This unique Golden Guide surveys the role of psychoactive plants in primitive and civilized societies from early times to the present. The first nontechnical guide to both the cultural significance and physiological effects of hallucinogens, HALLUCINOGENIC PLANTS will fascinate general readers and students of anthropology and history as well as botanists and other specialists. All of the wild and cultivated species considered are illustrated in brilliant full color. ISBN-0-307-24362-1


The health needs of a population derive from the prevalence of diseases, i.e. the numbers of people suffering from different types of illness. Looking only at the numbers of patients currently being treated for a disease does not show the true prevalence and impact on the population's health. At any given time there are many people who have a disease but are not aware of it because they have not yet been diagnosed. A robust and well-researched disease prevalence model can help commissioners to assess the true needs of their community, calculate the level of services needed and invest the appropriate level of resources for prevention, early detection, treatment and care. Prevalence models provide estimates of underlying prevalence derived from population statistics and scientific research on the risk factors for each disease. The models can also be used to support case-finding by identifying those areas where detection rates are low and targeting enhanced diagnostic activity on them. The models also feature in the PHOs' National General Practice Profiles, which also include the ratio of the measured prevalence from GP QOF disease register to the expected prevalence from the models. This indicator helps to identify under-diagnosis and supports measures for detection (case finding). Prevalence models and observed vs expected ratios are also included in NHS comparators, which is available to registered users with an NHS email address. Several of the disease prevalence models were initially developed by the Association of Public Health Observatories using funding from the Informing Healthier Choices programme.


Close interpersonal contact likely drives spatial clustering of cases of cholera and diarrhea, but spatial clustering of risk factors may also drive this pattern. Few studies have focused specifically on how exposures for disease cluster at small spatial scales. Improving our understanding of the micro-scale clustering of risk factors for cholera may help to target interventions and power studies with cluster designs. We selected sets of spatially matched households (matched-sets) near cholera case households between April and October 2013 in a cholera endemic urban neighborhood of Tongi Township in Bangladesh. We collected data on exposures to suspected cholera risk factors at the household and individual level. We used intra-class correlation coefficients (ICCs) to characterize clustering of exposures within matched-sets and households, and assessed if clustering depended on the geographical extent of the matched-sets. Clustering over larger spatial scales was explored by assessing the relationship between matched-sets. We also explored whether different exposures tended to appear together in individuals, households, and matched-sets. Household level exposures, including: drinking municipal supplied water (ICC = 0.97, 95%CI = 0.96, 0.98), type of latrine (ICC = 0.88, 95%CI = 0.71, 1.00), and intermittent access to drinking water (ICC = 0.96, 95%CI = 0.87, 1.00) exhibited strong clustering within matched-sets. As the geographic extent of matched-sets increased, the concordance of exposures within matched-sets decreased. Concordance between matched-sets of exposures related to water supply was elevated at distances of up to approximately 400 meters. Household level hygiene practices were correlated with infrastructure shown to increase cholera risk. Co-occurrence of different individual level exposures appeared to mostly reflect the differing domestic roles of study participants. Strong spatial clustering of exposures at a small spatial scale in a cholera endemic population suggests a possible role for highly targeted interventions. Studies with cluster designs in areas with strong spatial clustering of exposures should increase sample size to account for the correlation of these exposures.


A comprehensive study on fatty acid, phospholipid and phytosterol compositions of breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis) and wonderful kola (Buchholzia coriacea) seeds flour were determined using standard analytical techniques. The most concentrated fatty acid (%) was oleic acid in Artocarpus altilis seed (56.775) while linoleic acid (42.644) was the most concentrated acid in Buchholzia coriacea seeds. The increasing order of the concentrated fatty acids in Artocarpus altilis seeds were: stearic acid (4.723) < palmitic acid (11.412) < linoleic acid (25.710) < oleic acid (56.775) < while that of Buchholzia coriacea seeds were: linolenic acid (2.197) < stearic acid (6.734) < palmitic acid (11.241) < oleic acid (35.719) < linoleic acid (42.644), respectively. Arachidinic, linolenic, erucic, palmitoleic, behemic, lignoceric, arachidonic, margaric, myristic, lauric, capric, caprilic and caproic acids were present in small quantities with none of them recording up to 1.0% in both the two plant seeds. The results also showed high concentration of monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA) (57.071%) in Artocarpus altilis and 36.739% in Buchholzia coriacea, and values of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) were 0.125 and 2.212% for the two plant seeds, respectively. The respective phospholipids composition of phosphatidylserine (204.75 mg/100g) and phosphatidylinositol (29.35 mg/100g) showed a highest concentration in Artocarpus altilis and Buchholzia coriacea while diphosphatidylglycerol was the least phospholipid with concentrations of 0.11 and 0.01 mg/100 g for both samples. The concentrations of phytosterols were of low values except in sitosterol with values of 90.81 and 31.24 mg/100 g in Artocarpus altilis and Buchholzia coriacea respectively. This study provides an informative oil profile that will serve as a basis for further chemical investigations and nutritional evaluation of the Artocarpus altilis and Buchholzia coriacea seed oils.


The weak equivalence principle for quantum systems states that particles with the same velocity wavefunction behave identically in free fall implying that the TOA distribution of different particles should be identical regardless of mass as long as they have the same initial momentum p0. This leads us to study the distribution of the first time of arrival for spinless particles fired upward using the theory of quantum time of arrival operators. We start by constructing an appropriate time of arrival operator that is conjugate with the system Hamiltonian using Weyl quantization. The time of arrival distribution was then constructed and shown to be mass-dependent, implying violation of the weak equivalence principle.


This paper presents a linear complexity iterative rake detector for the recently proposed orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) modulation scheme. The basic idea is to extract and coherently combine the received multipath components of the transmitted symbols in the delay-Doppler grid using maximal ratio combining (MRC) to improve the SNR of the combined signal. We reformulate the OTFS input-output relation in simple vector form by placing guard null symbols or zero padding (ZP) in the delay-Doppler grid and exploiting the resulting circulant property of the blocks of the channel matrix. Using this vector input-output relation we propose a low complexity iterative decision feedback equalizer (DFE) based on MRC. The performance and complexity of the proposed detector favorably compares with the state of the art message passing detector. An alternative time domain MRC based detector is also proposed for even faster detection. We further propose a Gauss-Seidel based over-relaxation parameter in the rake detector to improve the performance and the convergence speed of the iterative detection. We also show how the MRC detector can be combined with outer error-correcting codes to operate as a turbo DFE scheme to further improve the error performance. All results are compared with a baseline orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) scheme employing a single tap minimum mean square error (MMSE) equalizer.


The balancing of competing interests and goals will have momentous consequences for Japan—and the United States—in their quest for economic growth, social harmony, and international clout. Japan and the United States face difficult choices in charting their paths ahead as trading nations. Tokyo has long aimed for greater decisiveness, which would allow it to move away from a fragmented policymaking system favoring the status quo in order to enable meaningful internal reforms and acquire a larger voice in trade negotiations. And Washington confronts an uphill battle in rebuilding a fraying domestic consensus in favor of internationalism essential to sustain its leadership role as a champion of free trade. In Dilemmas of a Trading Nation, Mireya Solís describes how accomplishing these tasks will require the skillful navigation of vexing tradeoffs that emerge from pursuing desirable, but to some extent contradictory goals: economic competitiveness, social legitimacy, and political viability. Trade policy has catapulted front and center to the national conversations taking place in each country about their desired future direction—economic renewal, a relaunched social compact, and projected international influence. Dilemmas of a Trading Nation underscores the global consequences of these defining trade dilemmas for Japan and the United States: decisiveness, reform, internationalism. At stake is the ability of these leading economies to upgrade international economic rules and create incentives for emerging economies to converge toward these higher standards. At play is the reaffirmation of a rules-based international order that has been a source of postwar stability, the deepening of a bilateral alliance at the core of America's diplomacy in Asia, and the ability to reassure friends and rivals of the staying power of the United States. In the execution of trade policy today, we are witnessing an international leadership test dominated by domestic governance dilemmas.... Download ebook, read file pdf Japan and the United States in the Evolving Asia-Pacific Order


A significant new law was passed by Egyptian legislators in 2004 introducing family courts to arbitrate family conflict in an effort to promote non-adversarial legal mechanisms. The aim of this paper is to examine how this new legal system is working for female plaintiffs. Through an analysis of court practices in a number of divorce and maintenance cases, this essay will make two central arguments: First, I will argue that the benefits family courts are currently providing to female plaintiffs are limited due to a number of gaps and shortcomings in the legislation, mechanisms of implementation, resources, and the capacity and the training of court personnel. In addition, the legal process in the new courts as well as the substantive family laws that are being implemented continue to reflect gender inequality and biases against women. Secondly, I will argue that the shortcomings of the new court system also result from the approach of addressing gender inequalities through the piecemeal approach of fragmented procedural reforms as well as the contradictions arising from the divergent agendas of the alliances built between different reform actors (e.g. women's rights organizations, government bodies, and legal institution).


In 2003, long standing chat show host Michael Parkinson interviewed actor Meg Ryan. Parkinson has since described the interview as his 'most difficult television moment', while Ryan is reported to have described Parkinson as 'a nut'. Equally observers are split over whether the blame for the notoriously bad interview lay with interviewer or interviewee. Adopting a conversation analytic approach, this paper examines the organisation of preference and repair in this semi-institutional setting with a view to understanding the sequential properties of the emerging disaffiliation in the interview and providing insight into the highly contested audience perceptions of the interview participants. It is suggested that it is the complex interplay between the sequential organisation of the production of dispreferred responses, the forms of initiation of repair and orientation to expansion relevant sequences that fosters such contested evaluations of the interview participants' roles in the disalignment. The analysis also reveals that both participants orient to and adhere to the institutional constraints on the interaction and their institutional roles but fail to achieve the interactional goals of the talk show. This single case analysis of a failed talk show interview shows the subtle interactional and co-produced nature of disalignment and underlines the need to engage in micro-level turn-by-turn examination of situated interaction to understand macro issues of communication.


Application of manure is used to increase the N and C status of arid and semiarid agricultural soils. Organic N contained in animal manures must be mineralized before crop use, a process which is affected by soil water status either by the direct influence of soil moisture and/or salt interactions on the N dynamics. The objectives of this work were: i) to examine the influences of soil osmotic and matric water potentials on N mineralization, ii) to determine the extent of N mineralization over a range of total soil water potentials, and iii) to study the effect of manure addition on N dynamics in an agricultural desert soil. Gila fine sandy loam soil was treated with varying amounts of water, sodium chloride, and composted dairy manure and incubated at a depth of 20 cm in Ziploc® bags. Inorganic N, soil moisture content, and total soil water potential were measured for 14 weeks. N mineralization was maximal at total soil water potentials of −2.3 to −0.35 MPa and decreased rapidly as potentials declined below −5.5 MPa. Regression analysis indicated that matric potential had twice the inhibitory affect on N mineralization compared with osmotic potential. Manure addition resulted in net N immobilization especially during the early part of the study. Net N immobilization also occurred in unamended soil, but this generally lasted only a few weeks. Immobilization was prolonged in soils with lower water potentials. Net N mineralization in the manure-amended soils was higher than in the unamended soils when soil moisture content was at field capacity.


The philosophy underpinning federal securities regulation in the United States is one of disclosure. This has been the case since the inception of federal securities regulation in 1933,2 and continues to be the case with Congress's most recent enactments on the subject, contained in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010.3 In the wake of the financial industry's collapse in 2008, and the recession it helped spark, some have questioned whether this paradigm remains advisable.4 They have suggested the introduction of merit regulation into the U.S. securities law regime, whereby the government would not merely mandate certain issuer disclosures, but would also prevent the offering of securities deemed too risky.5 Although not revolutionary (as several American states, and nations such as China, have a merit component to their securities laws), the concept of merit regulation is indeed largely alien to the scheme of U.S. federal securities regulation.6 As such, it would be a transformative development. There is, however, a far more modest way of approximating the same result. And it builds upon our existing regulatory infrastructure: suitability rules. Via enhancements to the suitability rules, policymakers can achieve much of what merit regulation promises, without the significant, accompanying drawbacks. Properly enhanced, such rules could provide a system that safeguards investors from unsuitably risky investments on a case-by-case basis, thereby depriving neither corporations, nor investors, of mutually beneficial opportunities that might be fully appropriate for them despite their inappropriateness for others. It could also furnish an additional tool by which authorities could regulate systemic risk. Like Caesar's Gaul, this Article is divided into three parts. Part I will describe the disclosure-based federal securities regulatory regime that prevails in the United States today. It will highlight the limitations of this regime, as underscored by merit-regulation proponents seeking its reform. Part II will describe merit regulation, both in theory and in practice. It too will end with an articulation of the drawbacks associated with such an approach. Part III will describe the "suitability rules" component of U.S. securities law, as they are currently formulated. Part III will also demonstrate how the suitability rules can be utilized to essentially achieve the desideratum of merit regulation without the costs associated therewith.


The successfulness of health development determine the effort of the increasing
of the human resource quality, the most important aspect is the quality and the reachable-
ness of health services. The hospital not only maintains its excellence competence such
as; product, price, place, and promotion factors, but also develops its services which give
the satisfaction of the hospital consumer, and maintains its loyalty. The consumer
satisfaction can be in the form of the frequency of service usage and the forwarding
information to the others which is able to profit the hospital.
The Semarang Bhayangkara hospital is one of the POLRI hospitals in Semarang,
which try to give the health services, especially for the POLRI members and for the
public in general. For the reason, the hospital is necessary to pay attention on some
factors, such as; reliability, responsive, confidence, empathy, and tangible. The aims of
the research of the Bhayangkara hospital are to know the patient expectation of its
services, to know its service performance, and to know the mount of the patient
satisfaction of its services seen from the service dimension.
The methodology used in the research is the Explanatory Research using
questioner as the technique of collecting data. The responder sample is taken by the
Proportional Stratified Random Sampling technique, which is counted its amount of 98
patients taken from the amount of patient data in 2004. The questioner distribution to the
responders uses the Accidental Sampling technique which is given to the stay overnight
patient installation in the Semarang Bhayangkara hospital.
From the calculation result of the patient satisfaction level, it can be explained
that the patient compatibility level on the reliability dimension is 85.34, which means
very satisfied, on the responsive dimension is 91.00, which means very satisfied, then the
confidence dimension with the patient compatibility level is 104.45, which also means
very satisfied and the empathy dimension with the patient compatibility level is100.6 and
the tangible dimension is 74.63, which means quite satisfied.
From the research result about some variable services, it can be concluded that
the patient is satisfied with the service performance obtained from the hospital. It is
suggested to the hospital to keep improve its services especially on the tangible
dimension in the form of facilities and supporter medium for patient satisfaction.


Sexual selection is proposed to be an important driver of diversification in animal systems, yet previous tests of this hypothesis have produced mixed results and the mechanisms involved remain unclear. Here, we use a novel phylogenetic approach to assess the influence of sexual selection on patterns of evolutionary change during 84 recent speciation events across 23 passerine bird families. We show that elevated levels of sexual selection are associated with more rapid phenotypic divergence between related lineages, and that this effect is restricted to male plumage traits proposed to function in mate choice and species recognition. Conversely, we found no evidence that sexual selection promoted divergence in female plumage traits, or in male traits related to foraging and locomotion. These results provide strong evidence that female choice and male–male competition are dominant mechanisms driving divergence during speciation in birds, potentially linking sexual selection to the accelerated evolution of pre-mating reproductive isolation.


PDGF isoforms have been postulated to serve as mediators of fibroblast proliferation and chemotaxis during lung fibrogenesis induced by asbestos inhalation. We have studied the interaction of chrysotile asbestos fibers with rat lung fibroblasts (RLF) in vitro and the consequent changes in PDGF receptor mRNA expression, PDGF binding, and mitogenic activity of PDGF isoforms. Northern blot analysis revealed that mRNA for the PDGF-receptor alpha subtype (PDGF-R alpha) on RLF was upregulated after a 24-h exposure to asbestos in culture (0.5-15 micrograms fibers/cm2). [125I]PDGF-BB receptor assays showed that normal RLF possess mainly PDGF-R beta and a paucity of PDGF-R alpha. In agreement with the Northern data, saturation binding of [125I]PDGF-BB to RLF exposed to asbestos demonstrated an approximately 40% increase in binding sites accompanied by a twofold decrease in receptor affinity. Treating asbestos-exposed RLF with PDGF-AA, which binds only PDGF-R alpha, blocked the PDGF binding sites that were upregulated by fiber exposure. PDGF-AA had increased mitogenic potency for fiber-exposed RLF, but PDGF-BB was a less potent mitogen for these RLF. Nonfibrogenic carbonyl iron spheres induced similar changes in PDGF growth responses. These data show that inorganic particulates alter the PDGF-R alpha population on RLF without significant change in PDGF-R beta.


Abstract In the southwestern Mediterranean Basin, cork oaks (Quercus suber L.) are periodically harvested for their cork. This natural product is valued by its homogeneity which heightens the importance of characterizing cork tissue discontinuities, or cork pores. Cork porosity profile in natural cork planks has been reported to be affected by forest management practices but, so far, has been scarcely addressed. We characterize the cork porosity profile in two contrasting cork oak woodland; at a mountain forest, in Western Algeria (absence of forest management) and at a peneplain "montado," in southern Portugal (intensively managed toward the optimization of cork production). Image analysis techniques were applied on transverse sections of more than 40 cork samples from both woodland, and a stepwise discriminant analysis was used to discriminate between the cork pore features data-sets. Cork porosity profiles were similar between regions but; in the cork samples from Algeria, cork pores were having higher values for linear dimensions of pores (length and perimeter) and contrasting shape values (roundness) which depreciate cork quality, when compared to the cork samples from Portugal. However, improved woodland management strategies at Algeria should ensure adequate cork homogeneity and suitability for more valuable cork products.


Contact constraints, such as those between a foot and the ground or a hand and an object, are inherent in many robotic tasks. These constraints define a manifold of feasible states; while well understood mathematically, they pose numerical challenges to many algorithms for planning and controlling whole-body dynamic motions. In this paper, we present an approach to the synthesis and stabilization of complex trajectories for both fully-actuated and underactuated robots subject to contact constraints. We introduce a trajectory optimization algorithm (DIRCON) that extends the direct collocation method, naturally incorporating manifold constraints to produce a nominal trajectory with third-order integration accuracy-a critical feature for achieving reliable tracking control. We adapt the classical time-varying linear quadratic regulator to produce a local cost-to-go in the manifold tangent plane. Finally, we descend the cost-to-go using a quadratic program that incorporates unilateral friction and torque constraints. This approach is demonstrated on three complex walking and climbing locomotion examples in simulation.


Shearography and active thermography have received considerable industrial acceptance for nondestructive testing & evaluation (NDT&E). They are applicable to all materials: metal, non-metal, composites materials and even biological tissues. The principles and the methods of testing of these two techniques are reviewed, and their advantages and limitations are being compared. Both are optical techniques enjoying the advantages of full-field, non-contact and hence very high inspection speed. A fundamental difference between them is the mechanism of detecting flaws. Shearography is an interference optical technique which measures surface deformation and reveals flaws by looking for flaw-induced deformation anomalies. Active thermography is a surface thermal radiation measuring technique; it used thermal radiation properties to measure the distribution of surface temperature of the object. It detects flaws by the flaw's anomalous heat transfer response. The methods of testing are also different. While shearography requires application of stresses to produce deformation, active thermography needs a controllable thermal radiation excitation to change the surface temperature. Both shearography and active thermography can detect surface and sub-surface flaws, unless the flaw is too remote from the surface. Different excitation methods, such as sonic, induction, flash heating, for the techniques are demonstrated together with some NDT&E applications such as detection of cracks, debonds and other type of flaws.


We have studied depth distributions of the electrical parameters in MBE grown InN films with two types of AlN and GaN buffers. Using independently determined Hall effect electron concentration and mobility profiles, as well as electron concentration profile by photoluminescence measurements, we model the real depth profile of carrier mobility, assuming graded inhomogeneity of the sample. The obtained profiles follow power dependences of the same order for layers grown on the two buffers with a small difference in the function coefficients attributed to a contribution of the interface charge in layers grown on AlN buffers. (© 2006 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)


Aim Climate change has the potential to have significant impacts on the distribution of species and on the composition of habitats. This paper identifies the potential changes in the future distribution of species under the UKCIP98 climate change scenarios, in order that such changes can be taken into account in conservation management.

Location The model was applied to Britain and Ireland.

Methods A model based on an artificial neural network was used to predict the changing bioclimate envelopes of species in Britain and Ireland. Fifty-four species representing 15 habitats were modelled.

Results The modelled species could be placed into three categories: those losing suitable climate space, those gaining it, and those showing little or no change. When the species were associated with habitats it was found that Arctic–Alpine/montane heath communities were the most sensitive to climate change, followed by pine woodland and beech woodland in southern England. In lowland heath, wet heath, cereal field margins, coastal grazing marsh, drought-prone acid grassland and calcareous grassland, the species either showed little change or an increase in suitable climate space. The other eight habitats showed a mixed response.

Conclusions The species show a variety of responses to climate change and thus their current habitat associations may alter. The uncertain future of some species and habitats is highlighted. Conservation policy and practice will need to be revised in the face of climate change.


Organic matter decomposition is the main process by which carbon (C) is lost from terrestrial ecosystems, and mycorrhizal associations of plants (i.e. arbuscular mycorrhizas (AM) and ectomycorrhizas (ECM)) may have different indirect effects on this loss pathway. AM and ECM plants differ in the soil decomposers they promote and the quality of litter they produce, which may result in different patterns of organic matter decomposition, and hence, soil C loss. To determine how mycorrhizal associations indirectly affect decomposer activity, we collected soils and litters from four AM and four ECM tree species from a mixed‐deciduous temperate forest for a field and laboratory study. We first characterized in situ patterns in soil chemistry and soil microbial biomass among these eight tree species. We then conducted a microcosm experiment with mineral soils, leaf litter and fine roots originating from these tree species, where we reciprocally crossed litters and soils, and quantified the rate of heterotrophic respiration over a 140‐day laboratory incubation. In natural forest conditions, AM tree soils contained lower total C and microbial biomass C:N relative to ECM tree soils. In our microcosm experiment, AM soils supported greater heterotrophic respiration than did ECM soils. The addition of AM litter stimulated respiration more than did ECM litter, owing to the lower C:N of AM litter. Matching the mycorrhizal identity of litter and soil resulted in a difference in total respiration, such that combinations of AM litters with AM soils lost more C than did combinations of ECM litters with ECM soils. Synthesis. Our findings demonstrate that AM and ECM trees have differing indirect effects on soil decomposer activity through the decomposers they cultivate and/or the quality of organic matter they produce. Mycorrhizal differences in litter quality accentuate these effects on soil C loss and may explain patterns in soil C dynamics in terrestrial ecosystems.


As a basic specialized course for the major of Sports, "Sports Statistics" is featured by strong theoretical foundation and practical operations. However, there are some problems among students in the teaching of this course, such as insufficient learning motivation, low interest in learning, difficulties in understanding theoretical knowledge, and difficulties in mastering practical operations. Therefore, using the ARCS motivation model as the framework and combining the exploratory learning theory, a systematic ARCS (Attention, Relevance, Confidence, Satisfaction) Motivation Teaching Mode was proposed from the perspectives of Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction. The ARCS Motivation Teaching Mode was constructed from the aspects of system architecture, teaching methods, teaching approaches, effect evaluation, etc. and practically applied in the multimedia teaching of "Sports Statistics" in the four steps including Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction. The results show that the ARCS Motivation Teaching Mode can effectively promote students' learning motivation, correct their learning attitude, and thereby achieve a positive teaching effect. It is an effective teaching mode for specialized course of Sports.


The unwillingness of a gatekeeper to let go of a fruitless new product development (NPD) project wastes valuable resources and hampers NPD performance. The onset of such escalation of commitment is likely to occur already in the front end of NPD, where high ambiguity and complexity make it hard to distinguish fruitless from potentially successful projects. This study investigates if a gatekeeper's thinking style-whether they think rationally or whether they follow their intuition-can prevent escalation of commitment in the front end. Theory on cognition provides arguments for and against either thinking style's influence on escalation of commitment, but empirical evidence on this matter is lacking. Our study demonstrates that gatekeepers who think rationally are less likely to escalate their commitment than those who follow their intuition. This result holds both in a correlational study of dispositional thinking styles, as well as in an individual-level randomized experiment in which the thinking style of experienced practitioners before they take gate decisions is induced. Our findings provide ample opportunities for improving existing front end gate review practices, such as allocating candidates for gatekeeper positions based on their thinking style, training gatekeepers to think rationally, and increasing the use of gate-decision rules and templates.


Drill-strings are slender structures used to drill the oil-well in searching for oil and
gas. Failures of drill-strings cause the loss of time and money and therefore predicting
fatigue damage induced by vibrations is of benefit. In this thesis, fatigue calculation
of drill-strings is conducted in both time domain and frequency domain, considering
axial and torsional vibrations.
In time domain analysis, the stress time histories at any specific location of the drillstring
are obtained from a finite element model. Both deterministic and random
excitations are taken into account. Then using a rainflow counting method, the damaging
stress cycles are extracted. Based on the linear cumulative damage law, fatigue
damage is then calculated and fatigue life of the drill-string is therefore predicted.
Results under both deterministic and random excitations are compared against each
other.
Time domain fatigue analysis gives accurate predictions at the cost of long calculating
time. For the sake of time-saving, a method in frequency domain is developed.
The drill-string vibration model is built using continuous parameter method. Power
spectral densities (PSD) of the random excitation are assumed. In the process to gain
expected damage, equivalent stress spectra are calculated based on Mocha's random fatigue failure criterion. Then the expected fatigue damage and predicted life are
estimated by a spectral method: Dirlik's method.
Further, the drill-pipe threaded connection, which is used to connect numerous drillpipes
collars to form a drill-string, is investigated. With the help of ANSYS workbench
15.0, a standard 4.5" API line pipe threaded connection model is built. Random
excitation is considered mainly due to the unevenness of rock formation being drilled.
Firstly, a static stress analysis is conducted considering "make-up" and "tensile load"
steps. Then modal analysis and random vibration analysis are conducted, assuming
acceleration PSD as input. Finally, based on three-band technique, the fatigue damage
is calculated.
Computer simulations are run and results are given by the above three fatigue damage
calculation methods. Results show the critical positions of both the drill-string and
the threaded connection, where attention should be paid to by the manufacturers and
the drilling operators.
Although some limitations exist, this thesis proposed two ways to evaluate fatigue
damage of a drill-string. The threaded pipe connection, which is a complex structure,
is also analyzed. Further research work will aim at the validation of the simulations.


In our experiment the reaction of six sunflower hybrids of different genotypes (NK Oktava, ES Biba, ES Diagora, ES Ballistic, EGH 8925, PR 64 H 42) towards plant density has been investigated by different fungicide treatments in the crop-year of 2011 on a chernozem soil. In the crop-year of 2011 sunflower populations were infected by a significant Diaporthe helianthi disease. The extent of this infection was significantly enhanced by the increment of plant density. However, regarding the average of the hybrids and plant densities the two times executed fungicide treatment has decreased the infection rate by 22%. The most susceptible hybrid was the ES Biba. Contrarily, the hybrid ECH8925 proved to be the most resistant hybrid towards thisdisease according to our results. According to the results of the Pearson's correlation analysis it has been revealed that stalk breakage and Diaporthe infection stand in a very close (r=0.782**) and middle close (r=0.523**) correlation resp. with plant density. The relationship between fungucude treatments and stalk breakage, just as Diaporthe infection showed to be middle and close respectively. Our results demonstrate the role of stalk and plate diseases (among them Diaporthe) in causing stalk breakage, for we have found a close positive correlation between stalk breakage and Diaporthe infection (r=0.624**) in our analysis.From the aspect of yield amount the optimal plant density varied between 45 000 and 55 000 plants per hectare. Fungucude treatments enabled not only the use of higher plants densities, but they had a yield increasing effect as well. In the crop-year of 2011 the highest yield (4 559 kg ha-1) on a chernozem soil has been measured in case of the hybrid ECH8925.


In this last issue for 2013, the current Editorial team is very pleased to welcome into this role next year two new Editors for what has been "our journal" for the last few years. Joce Nuttall and Suzy Edwards bring an exciting new Editorial perspective to the work of the Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education (APJTE), and in welcoming them we are pleased to note the strengths of their own research in teacher education and their commitment to our field as a research field. Our journal is a major factor in this work, we believe, and we take time here to look back over our tenure as Editors, to highlight the stance we have taken as an Editorial team attempting to build capacity among teacher educators in our region. We are pleased to see this journal reporting research that speaks directly to our field, enriching it with the knowledge, theory, and practice that new generations of teacher educators are producing. We have highlighted in our Editorials over the past few years the importance of thinking about teacher education research as an issue that needs continuous review and rethinking. In Editorials on ethical research and reporting practices, we have reminded our readers about the sorts of writing that stands out as "good," high-quality educational research; we have stressed the importance and need for rigorous critique in and of our field, and we have provided commentary and reflection on the forms of professional learning, teacher learning, and teacher education in contemporary contexts and standards frameworks. Most importantly though, and with the strong support of our Editorial Assistant Kathryn Bown, we are pleased to note the success of our work in maintaining the strong history of the APJTE in attempting to build capacity within our field, in two important ways.


The purpose of the paper is to demonstrate the beneficial impact of advanced manufacturing technologies (AMT) on firms' environmental performance. Drawing on interviews conducted with 16 Hungarian manufacturing subsidiaries on their experience with AMT, we find three functional areas, where industry 4.0 solutions can not only enhance operational excellence and cost-efficiency, but they can also improve eco-efficiency, but they can also improve eco-efficiency, namely in the field of quality management (through smart production control, data analytics and predictive modelling solutions); process optimization (through capacity planning and production scheduling solutions); and product and process engineering (through advanced virtual technologies). We also find that AMT adoption facilitated subsidiary upgrading along various dimensions. The main managerial implication is that subsidiaries need to be proactive, and emphasize also the benefits stemming from energy and resource efficiency improvement when lobbying for investment in AMT.


Health inequalities: differences in health status or in the distribution of health determinants between different population groups. Some health inequalities are attributable to biological variations or free choice and others are attributable to the external environment and conditions mainly outside the control of the individuals concerned. 347 million people worldwide have diabetes. In 2012 an estimated 1.5 million deaths were directly caused by diabetes. More than 80% of diabetes deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries. WHO projects that diabetes will be the 7th leading cause of death in 2030. Healthy diet, regular physical activity and maintaining a normal body weight can prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes. Risk factors: 1. Age- the prevalence of diabetes rises steeply with age: *one in twenty people over the age of 65 have diabetes, *and this rises to one in five people over the age of 85 years. The diagnosis of diabetes may be delayed in older people, with symptoms of diabetes being wrongly attributed to ageing. 2. Ethnic: type 2 diabetes is up to six times more common in people of South Asian descent and up to three times more common in those of African and African-Caribbean descent then in the white population. It is also more common in people of Chinese descent and other non-Caucasian groups. 3. Gender: the frequency of diabetes usually is higher in men than in women. This may be because gender compounds other aspects of inequality- women often bear the brunt of poverty, and socio-economic differences in the prevalence of diabetes are more marked for women, probably because of differences in smoking rates, food choices and the prevalence of obesity. 4. Overweight/Obesity: every 1 kg/m2 more causes increase risk: cardiovascular diseases 2%, coronary artery disease- 3% , myocardial infarction- 5% , heart failure- 5% , peripheral vascular disease- 5%. Health inqualities important in diabetes -- modifiable:  social-economics (wellbeing, nutrition, education, physical activity, environmental…), health service (access to services for prevention and treatment diabetes) . Keyword: Inequalities, diabetes, risk factors


In addition to the two surgeons Hans Killian and Helmut Schmidt the pharmacologist Hellmut Weese was elected honorary member of the German Association of Anaesthesiology at the organisation's founding congress in 1953. Especially the younger colleagues are quite unfamiliar with his name, although a "Hellmut Weese commemorative" lecture is annually held at our national association's gathering. While it is widely known that his name is intimately connected with the introduction of evipan anaesthesia during the early thirties, only few people know about his extensive research on the therapy of shock that lead to the development of the plasma-expanding substance "Periston"". Moreover, his pharmacological investigations on sympathomimetic amines and long-term studies on cardiac glycosides which he published in a well recognised monograph in 1936 have fallen into oblivion. Since he had not collaborated with Nazi regime he was able to start teaching at the University of Cologne again in the fall of 1945. One year later he became head of the Department of Pharmacology at the Medical Academy of Düsseldorf. There he started--together with colleagues of similar ideas and opinions--holding lectures on clinical anaesthesia at the beginning of the winter term 1948/49. People who attended his lectures later claimed that these were the "best lesson ever". At the same time the call for specialists for anaesthesiology that was commonly heard in Anglo-American countries could not be ignored in Germany any longer. Weese, who was already an honorary member of the International Anesthesia Research Society at the Association's congress in New York in 1938, realised the lack of trained physicians. Thus he fought enthusiastically for the idea of producing specialists and as a member of a committee for questions concerning anaesthesia played in important part in founding the "Deutsche Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Anästhesiologie". He lived to see the association's name being changed to "Deutsche Gesellschaft für Anaesthesiologie" in 1953 but died before the textbook of anaesthesia (Die Narkose) he had written together with Hans Killian was published in 1954. The following text reports on Weese's medical career and on some of his most important contributions to the knowledge of anaesthesia.


We review the theories on how liquidity affects the required returns of capital assets and the empirical studies that test these theories. The theory predicts that both the level of liquidity and liquidity risk are priced, and empirical studies find the effects of liquidity on asset prices to be statistically significant and economically important, controlling for traditional risk measures and asset characteristics. Liquidity-based asset pricing empirically helps explain (1) the cross-section of stock returns, (2) how a reduction in stock liquidity result in a reduction in stock prices and an increase in expected stock returns, (3) the yield differential between on- and off-the-run Treasuries, (4) the yield spreads on corporate bonds, (5) the returns on hedge funds, (6) the valuation of closed-end funds, and (7) the low price of certain hard-to-trade securities relative to more liquid counterparts with identical cash flows, such as restricted stocks or illiquid derivatives. Liquidity can thus play a role in resolving a number of asset pricing puzzles such as the small-firm effect, the equity premium puzzle, and the risk-free rate puzzle.


MicroRNAs fine tune the expression of target genes needed for homeostasis. Our pilot study showed that nicotine altered 17% miRNAs in C. elegans larvae. Here, we investigated the role of microRNAs in mediating nicotine-induced adolescent and adult-onset phenotypes: larval pharyngeal pumping, adult germ line apoptosis, and survival. Worms were treated with nicotine during the postembryonic stages with either 20µM or 20mM. For the pharyngeal pumping assay, videos were recorded for at least 15 worms/group to compute the mean pumps/sec. For adult apoptosis and lifespan assays, worms were washed off treatment before gametogenesis and allowed to grow till adulthood on nicotine-free media. Day 1 adults were stained with SYTO12 or acridine orange and apoptotic cells were counted for at least 50 gonads per treatment group. The remaining 200 worms were counted and transferred every 1-2 days until all worms died. Kaplan-Meier curves were used to compare the survival curves across treatment groups. Our data suggests that post-embryonic nicotine exposure inhibited pharyngeal pumping and increased germ cell apoptosis in WT, but not mutant worms. Due to the conservation of those signaling pathways, our results provide insights for miRNA-based treatment strategies for nicotine disorders in early and late stages.


Cohesion and structural equivalence are two competing social network models to explain diffusion of innovation. While considerable work has been done on these models, the question of which network model explains diffusion has not been resolved. This paper examines diffusion of Caller Ring Back Tones in a cellular telephone network. Since these societal scale networks are very large (e.g., our call detail record data set has more than one million customers and one billion calls over a three months period from a large cellular service provider in India), the study of diffusion in these settings require the development of methods to extract connected subpopulations from the network. We develop a novel technique to detect densely connected and self-contained components of the network and demonstrate through random restarts that the technique can enumerate distinct connected components in the network. Using a standard network auto-correlation model, we study the competing effects of cohesion and role equivalence on each of the distinct connected components detected using our sampling technique. The comparison of the results from the two models shows cohesion is more statistically significant than role equivalence. The results have consistent pattern across different sizes of subpopulation. We also conducted meta-analysis to summarize the size for both network effects. We find a significant summarized effect and its size changes as E/I index changes.


The Left Behind novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have become a major publishing phenomenon in recent years. The novels have succeeded in part because they address the anxieties of their readers, using apocalyptic language to depict a future world in which evildoers are punished, and the faithful reverse the tables on their cultural marginality. The novels, however, also speak to the "here and now," articulating in narrative form the beliefs and actions that place one among either the saved or the damned. The novels accom- plish this through the issuance of marks. Both believers and the fol- lowers of Antichrist have distinctive marks, which prove less than reli- able. At stake, ultimately, is an evangelicalism open to the ambiguity and uncertainty of contemporary life, and a reactive fundamentalism that insists, metaphorically, on the rigidity of marks—a quest for cer- tainty ill-advised in a world characterized by relentless change.*