This work presents TCPN-ThermalSim,a software tool for testing Real-Time Thermal-Aware Schedulers1. This framework consists of four main modules. The first one helps the user to define the problem: task set with periods, deadlines and worst case execution times in CPU cycles, along with the CPU characteristics, temperature and energy consumption.The second module is the Kernel simulation, which builds up a global simulation model according to the configuration module. In the third module, the user selects the scheduler algorithm. Finally the last module allows the execution of the simulation and present the results. The framework encompasses two modes: manual and automatic. In manual mode the simulator uses the task set data  provided in the first section. In automatic mode the task set is generated by parameterizing the integrated UUniFast algorithm.


A national pesticide-use survey from sorghum producers and a survey of entomologists and weed scientists were used to determine the impacts of pesticide use on sorghum. A market framework was employed to derive the short-run welfare impacts to consumers and producers (users and non-users) of the removal of pesticides currently registered for use on sorghum. It was projected that the loss of atrazine, the most widely used pesticide in sorghum production, would have the largest overall impact, with an estimated total welfare loss between $58 and $65 million.


The tumor suppressor p53 protein can be bound, degraded and inactivated by the human papillomavirus (HPV) E6 oncoprotein. The p53 protein's susceptibility to this oncoprotein may be influenced by the p53 codon 72 polymorphism, but the role of such a polymorphism in the development of HPV16-associated squamous cell carcinoma of the oropharynx (SCCOP) has not been established. To investigate the role of the p53 codon 72 polymorphism in the risk of HPV16-associated SCCOP, we conducted a hospital-based case-control study of 188 non-Hispanic white patients with newly diagnosed SCCOP and 342 cancer-free control subjects frequency matched by age (+/-5 years), sex, tobacco smoking status and alcohol drinking status. We found that HPV16 seropositivity was associated with an increased risk of SCCOP [adjusted odds ratio (OR), 5.7; 95% confidence interval (CI), 3.7-8.7], especially among never-smokers (adjusted OR, 14.1; 95% CI, 6.0-32.9) and among subjects with the p53 codon 72 variant genotypes [Arginine (Arg)/Proline (Pro) and Pro/Pro] (adjusted OR, 9.2; 95% CI, 4.7-17.7). A significant multiplicative interaction on the risk of SCCOP was also found between the p53 codon 72 polymorphism and HPV16 seropositivity (P = 0.05). Among never-smokers, the risk of SCCOP for those who had both HPV16 seropositivity and p53 codon 72 variant genotypes (Arg/Pro + Pro/Pro) was particularly high (adjusted OR, 22.5; 95% CI, 4.8-106.2). These findings suggest that p53 codon 72 variant genotypes modify the risk of HPV16-associated SCCOP and may be markers of genetic susceptibility to HPV16-associated SCCOP, especially among never-smokers.


We have conducted a numerical study of the dependence of nonvolatile data storage on the holographic parameter variation for a two‐center holographic recording (TCHR) process. Parameters of the photorefractive crystals and the experimental conditions such as the electron mobility in the conduction band, the level concentrations, the electron‐recombination coefficients, the bulk photovoltaic coefficient, the spatial period of modulation, the dielectric constant, and the modulation depth are studied numerically. The results of the numerical calculations showed that the significant parameters are the electron mobility in the conduction band, the electron‐recombination coefficient, and the concentrations of the dopant levels (levels created due to the dopants) in the TCHR process. It seems that the electron‐recombination coefficient for deep levels plays a more important role than the other parameters.


The ecology of habitats along the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) shelf-break has rarely been investigated. Thus, there is little understanding of how associated fishes interact with deeper environments. We examined relationships between deep-reef fish communities and benthic habitat structure. We sampled 48 sites over a large depth gradient (54–260 m) in the central GBR using Baited Remote Underwater Video Stations and multibeam sonar. Fish community composition differed both among multiple shelf-break reefs and habitats within reefs. Epibenthic cover decreased with depth. Deep epibenthic cover included sponges, corals, and macro-algae, with macro-algae present to 194 m. Structural complexity decreased with depth, with more calcified reef, boulders, and bedrock in shallower depths. Deeper sites were flatter and more homogeneous with softer substratum. Habitats were variable within depth strata and were reflected in different fish assemblages among sites and among locations. Overall, fish trophic groups changed with depth and included generalist and benthic carnivores, piscivores, and planktivores while herbivores were rare below 50 m. While depth influenced where trophic groups occurred, site orientation and habitat morphology determined the composition of trophic groups within depths. Future conservation strategies will need to consider the vulnerability of taxa with narrow distributions and habitat requirements in unique shelf-break environments.


We study asymptotic stability of solitary wave solutions in the one-dimensional Benney-Luke equation, a formally valid approximation for describing two-way water wave propagation. For this equation, as for the full water wave problem, the classic variational method for proving orbital stability of solitary waves fails dramatically due to the fact that the second variation of the energy-momentum functional is infinitely indefinite. We establish nonlinear stability in energy norm under the spectral stability hypothesis that the linearization admits no non-zero eigenvalues of non-negative real part. We also verify this hypothesis for waves of small energy.


In the wide range of Buddhist meditation and spirituality a very special place is held by the practice of calling on the name of Amitabha, or in Japanese Amida Buddha, using the simplest of formulas, the nenbutsu. Japanese masters such as Honen, Shinran and others made this the core of a profound spiritual experience which has fascinated numberless followers ever since. The deeper meaning of the nenbutsu has therefore become a major topic in Buddhist thought which has been reflected on by various thinkers and teachers to this day, especially in the context of Shin Buddhism. In this book, which draws on classic articles first published in The Eastern Buddhist, major historic proponents and masters of the nenbutsu are introduced, in particular Shinran, Shoku, Ippen and Rennyo. Further contributions, which set the work of these masters into the wider context of Buddhist tradition, are in fact some of the earliest Buddhist "voices" to emerge from modern Japan into global view. Yet the presentations of writers such as Sasaki Gessho, Yamabe Shugaku and Sugihira Shizutoshi have a freshness and an immediacy which speaks to us today.


Social (or folksonomic) tagging has become a very popular way to describe content within Web 2.0 websites. Unlike
taxonomies, which overimpose a hierarchical categorisation of content, folksonomies enable end-users to freely create and choose the categories (in this case, tags) that best
describe some content. However, as tags are informally de-
fined, continually changing, and ungoverned, social tagging
has often been criticised for lowering, rather than increasing, the efficiency of searching, due to the number of synonyms, homonyms, polysemy, as well as the heterogeneity of
users and the noise they introduce. To address this issue, a
variety of approaches have been proposed that recommend
users what tags to use, both when labelling and when looking for resources. As we illustrate in this paper, real world
folksonomies are characterized by power law distributions
of tags, over which commonly used similarity metrics, including the Jaccard coefficient and the cosine similarity, fail
to compute. We thus propose a novel metric, specifically
developed to capture similarity in large-scale folksonomies,
that is based on a mutual reinforcement principle: that is,
two tags are deemed similar if they have been associated to
similar resources, and vice-versa two resources are deemed
similar if they have been labelled by similar tags. We offer an efficient realisation of this similarity metric, and assess its quality experimentally, by comparing it against cosine similarity, on three large-scale datasets, namely Bibsonomy, MovieLens and CiteULike.


In this paper, I read Claude McKay's partaking in the English sonnet tradition in Harlem Shadows as being a fundamental part of—and not, as many commentators have suggested, counter to—the poet's and book's radical politics. Upon contextualizing my readings alongside critics including Houston A. Baker, Jr., Kamau Brathwaite, and Winston James, I perform close readings of McKay's poems "Subway Wind" and "Outcast." I specifically analyze how these poems imagine climatic 'currents' through images and metaphors of racially marked colonial spaces, which the poems, I suggest, also poetically perform through the actualization of the sonnet form as discursive currents redirected toward liberatory politics.


Microbubbles stabilized by a surfactant or polymer coating are already in clinical use as ultrasound imaging contrast agents. They have also been widely investigated as vehicles for drug delivery and gene therapy that can be tracked and triggered using ultrasound. Extensive studies have been made of the effects of the coating material and gas core on microbubble characteristics, but the influence of the fabrication method has received less attention. The aim of this study was to compare the behavior of microbubbles prepared using different techniques. Phospholipid-coated microbubbles were produced using sonication, electrospraying, or in a specially designed microfluidic device. The microbubbles were observed using optical, electron, and fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (FLIM) to interrogate their surface microstructure and stability over time. Their acoustic response was then determined in a flow chamber by detecting the pressure scattered from individual microbubbles as they passed through the focal region of a transducer (center frequencies 1, 2.25, and 3.5 MHz; peak negative pressures 50–300 kPa). The method of bubble generation was found to significantly affect the bubble surface characteristics, stability, and acoustic response. The results demonstrate that the processing method affects not only the bubble size distribution but other characteristics important for biomedical applications.


Y-shape outlet structures are used to release the turbine water into a reservoir. Classical design oftenuses a Y-shape over a certain length and with a specific opening angle. Depending on the geometry,especially in turbine mode, significant undesired flow separations may occur at the bifurcation.Investigations were performed with physical model tests using ultrasonic profilers at 1 and 2 MHzemission frequencies in order to assess an approach to control the design of an outlet structure bymeasuring the flow field and its fluctuations. The distribution and fluctuation of the flow velocities, bothat the exit section as well as along the tunnel axes for both outlet openings of the Y-shape geometryallow detecting potential flow detachment at the bifurcation.


Human-carnivore coexistence is an oft-stated goal but assumptions about what constitutes coexistence can lead to goal misalignment and undermine policy and program efficacy. Questions about how to define coexistence remain and specific goals and methods for reaching coexistence require refining. Co-adaptation, where humans adapt to carnivores and vice versa, is a novel socioecological framework for operationalizing coexistence but has yet to be comprehensively examined. We explored co-adaptation and two additional coexistence criteria through analysis of three case studies involving large carnivores in the American West, each addressing differing approaches on how and what it means to coexist with carnivores: Mexican gray wolves (Canis lupus baileyi) in Arizona and New Mexico, grizzly bears (Ursus arctos horribilis) in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and coyotes (Canis latrans) throughout the American West. We used a multiple case study design that analyzed within and across cases to understand coexistence broadly. For each case, we asked (1) are landscapes shared in space and/or time, (2) is co-adaptation occurring and (3) do stakeholders consider risks tolerable? To identify whether coexistence criteria are met, we investigated peer-reviewed published articles and news media and conducted key informant interviews. We found clear evidence to support land-sharing between humans and coyotes and limited spatial overlap between humans and grizzly bears and Mexican gray wolves. Co-adaptation was variable for wolves, possible with bears and clearly evident with coyotes. Tolerable risk levels are likely achievable for bears and coyotes based on the available literature assessing risk perceptions and tolerance. But disagreement regarding risk management is a driver of conflict over wolves and persistent barrier to achieving coexistence among diverse stakeholders. Patterns in coexistence criteria did not emerge based on taxonomy or geography but may be influenced by body size and behavioral plasticity. The common key to coexistence with each considered carnivore may be in more equitable distribution of costs and benefits among highly diverse stakeholders. Better understanding of these three coexistence criteria and innovative tools to achieve them will improve coexistence capacity with controversial carnivores on public and private lands in diverse American West contexts and beyond.


The recurring poor performance and lack of collaborative culture in the UK construction industry has been a topic of debate for many years now. This has triggered an industry wide demand for performance improvement and innovation in the construction sector. Several studies over the years have reported and linked these concerns to fragmentation, deep-seated cultural resistance and negative commercial behaviours among project participants. Traditionally, Quantity Surveyors (QSs) within the UK system are popularly known for their commercial management functions i.e., contract advice and cost related roles. But, the lack of evidence on collaborative practice across the commercial roles often performed by the QSs in practice has revealed a separation within the construction model where QSs are formulated outside the core project production team (client, designers, and constructors). This continues with further practical implications like process waste, value loss, conflicts among others. However, recently, there were calls for industry-wide modernisation with an appeal specifically on QSs to create positive link within the value chain as against being a burden to it. Based on a literature review and a case study approach, the study further discovered other commercial factors deterring collaborative practice that is emanating from QSs position outside the production system. These factors among others are: commercial background &training, customer &safeguarding practice, excessive monthly reporting & commercial governance and balancing standards with innovation.


Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy can be applied in vivo to measure static or dynamic biochemical information, e.g., concentrations of metabolites and metabolic fluxes, using various nuclei such as 1H, 13C, 31P and 15N. The work of this thesis involves both 1H and 13C nuclei and focuses on improving 1H NMR detection methods for measuring metabolites in vivo in rat brain. 13C NMR spectroscopy can be used to monitor the flow of 13C label from a 13C enriched substrate, such as glucose or acetate, into different NMR detectable metabolites, e.g., glutamate (Glu) and glutamine (Gln), for the quantitative study of cerebral metabolism in vivo. 1H-observed 13C-edited (1H-[13C]) NMR spectroscopy is an alternative to direct 13C NMR detection of 13C labeled metabolites, allowing a higher spatial and temporal resolution, albeit at a lower spectral resolution. In this context, a hybrid full signal intensity 1H-[13C] NMR sequence, combining a 13C editing block based on an inversion B1 insensitive spectral editing pulse (BISEP) with a spin-echo based localization (SPECIAL), was developed and implemented at ultra-high magnetic field (14.1 T) to benefit from increased sensitivity and spectral resolution at high B0. As a result, high quality 1H-[13C] NMR spectra were obtained, leading to an improved quantification of 13C labeled metabolites, which allowed the measurement of time courses of Glu C4, Gln C4, as well as, for the first time, of Glu C3 and of Gln C3, with high temporal resolution from a small acquisition volume. Although at high magnetic field spectral resolution and sensitivity are improved, spectral overlap is still present, e.g., the N-acetylaspartate (NAA) C6 is easily obscured by the intensive labeling of Glu C3 and Gln C3 (Glx C3), due to their complex coupling patterns. To improve the detection of unresolved 13C labeled metabolites, we developed an alternative 1H-[13C] NMR editing sequence termed RACED-STEAM (selective Resonances suppression by Adiabatic Carbon Editing and Decoupling single-voxel STimulated Echo Acquisition Mode), which can selectively suppress 1H resonances bound to a specific 13C to uncover resonances that are difficult to resolve in the 1H-[13C] NMR spectrum. Results showed the efficient suppression of Glx C3 and Glu C4, allowing the detection of NAA C6 and Gln C4 at 9.4 T. The application of this method to measure the time course of NAA C6 demonstrated that NAA C6 turnover can be measured at very low levels of isotopic enrichment in a small volume, within a time frame of a few hours. The proposed scheme could also be extended to lower magnetic fields provided that the 13C chemical shifts remain sufficiently resolved. Similarly, due to limited spectral resolution and sensitivity, editing techniques for the in vivo detection of metabolites using 1H NMR spectroscopy are still in development. Many in vivo 1H NMR editing sequences are usually performed at moderate to long echo times (TE). Furthermore, several 1H NMR spectroscopy studies are performed at long TE to avoid the confounding effect of macromolecular signals on metabolite quantification. In such cases, proton T2 relaxation times of metabolites have to be taken into account for proper quantification of metabolite concentrations. While T2 relaxation times of singlets have been characterized in several studies, due to the relative experimental simplicity, similar information is lacking from coupled spin resonances of cerebral metabolites. In this thesis, spectral simulations based on the density matrix formalism were initially performed to predict the response of spin systems to the pulse sequence used. T2 relaxation times of coupled spin resonances and singlet resonances of cerebral metabolites were then measured in rat brain in vivo at 9.4 T. Data analysis was performed using LCModel combined with simulated TE-specific spectra. The aforementioned spectral simulations were further used to optimize pulse sequence parameters for the detection of metabolites, such as glycine, whose resonance signal is overlapped with the more intense myo-inositol resonances. A favorable short TE (i.e., 20 ms) was sufficient to reduce the signal intensity of myo-inositol, allowing the detection of glycine in vivo in rat brain at 9.4 T. This work suggests that at high magnetic fields, glycine can be measured at a relatively short TE without additional editing efforts. Moreover, glycine is present at a particularly high concentration in the medulla oblongata (MO). Therefore, we further measured regional distribution of glycine in the hippocampus, cortex, striatum and MO of the rat brain, as well as the highly specific neurochemical profile of the MO. In conclusion, dedicated approaches for 1H NMR detection developed and validated in this thesis lead to improved dynamic measurement of 13C labeling time courses such as the time courses of 13C labeling of Glu C3 and Gln C3, as well as the spectral resolved NAA C6, the direct in vivo detection of glycine in rat brain at 9.4 T and the measurement of T2 relaxation times of numerous J-coupled metabolites for the first time.


The merits of investing in private versus public equity have generated considerable debate, often fueled by concerns about data quality. In this paper, we use cash flow data derived from the holdings of almost 300 institutional investors to study over 1,800 North American buyout and venture capital funds. Buyout fund returns have consistently exceeded those from public markets; averaging about 3% to 4% annually. We find similar performance results for a sample of almost 300 European buyout funds. Venture capital performance has varied substantially over time. North American venture funds from the 1990s substantially outperformed public equities; those from the early 2000s have underperformed; and recent vintage years have seen a modest rebound. The variation in venture performance is significantly linked to capital flows: performance is lower for funds started when there are large aggregate inflows of capital to the sector. We also examine the variation in performance of funds started in the same year. We find marked differences between venture and buyout leading to a much more pronounced impact of accessing high performing funds in venture investing.


This thesis is concerned with the development of a
computer algorithm for determining the principal dimensions
of a container ship at the preliminary design stage. The
algorithm was devised to aid a Naval Architect to design the
most economical ship, given the ship owner's requirements.
The emphasis has been on developing an algorithm which acts
as an aid in the design process.
There are basically four models of the computer aided
ship design which can be used in stages. The first model or
algorithm is based on a deterministic approach with parametric
variation of principal dimensions to locate the optimum design
with minimum required freight rate. The second model incorporates
optimisation techniques to arrive at the optimum ship.
Though the optimisation technique is very powerful in the
search of an optimum both in computer time and computing cost,
the parametric method is preferred where a designer has little
faith in the optimisation process or as an aid to check the
answer arrived at in the optimisation process. The third
model of the computer aided design can be used once the
optimum has been found. A new approach to carry out sensitivity
analysis is introduced. This approach overcomes the
deficiencies of the past approach, in the sense that sensitivity
analysis is carried out for achievable variation in
variables rather than an arbitrary variation. The third
model of computer aided design may be used once the designer
has identified the variables, the variation of which,
influences the required freight rate most. The use of the
third model of the ship design may be adequate in identifying
the total risk of the project. Together with sensitivity
analysis, the designer can evaluate the total risk involved
in an investment since the third model also incorporates a
simple approach to risk analysis. However three estimates
are required in the third model compared to single estimates
of variables in the first and the second model. The fourth
model incorporates the risk analysis by Monte Carlo method
of simulation. In this model the designer can assess the
xvii
total risk of the project by generating the risk profile of
the Required Freight Rate. The designer must either subjectively
or objectively input the probability distribution of
each of the influencing variables before using the fourth
model.
The four computer aided design models form a complete
suite of computer programs, which can either be used in a
deterministic mode, (first and second model), or in a
probabilistic mode, (third and fourth model). Compared to
previous ship design algorithms developed solely to deal
with deterministic phase, this thesis incorporates ideas on
how to incorporate uncertainty and assess risk in capital
investment in a shipping venture.
The designer can either use these computer models in
stages, from deterministic phase to probabilistic phase
or the models can be used on their own.


We demonstrate a PPLN based pump-enhanced, singly-resonant optical parametric oscillator configured in a traveling wave geometry and pumped by a Ti:sapphire laser. The inclusion of a low finesse etalon within the OPO cavity stabilizes the signal frequency, and rotation of the etalon allows this frequency to be systematically hopped from axial mode to nearest neighbor axial mode over the entire free spectral range of the etalon (83GHz). Tuning of the pump frequency allows the signal frequency to be smoothly tuned over a cavity free spectral range. More than 35mW of single frequency idler power was generated in the spectral range 2800-3000nm for 600mW pump power. The superiority of traveling wave over standing wave geometries in these regards is discussed.


The Gram-Charlier expansion, where skewness and kurtosi directly appear as parameters, has become popular in Finance as a generalization of the normal density. We show how positivity constraints can be numerically implemented, thereby guaranteeing that the expansion defines a density. The constrained expansion can be referred to as a Gram-Charlier density. First, we apply our method to the estimation of risk neutral densities. Then, we assess the statistical properties of maximum-likelihood estimates of Gram-Charlier densities. Lastly, we apply the framework to the estimation of a GARCH model where the conditional density is a Gram-Charlier density.


Charles Duelfer is one of the most senior intelligence officers with on-the-ground experience to have worked in Iraq before, during, and after the Gulf War. His 2004 CIA report is widely renowned as the most authoritative account on how the world was led to believe that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction. But until now, Duelfer has never publicly shared his unrivaled expertise on just how the U. S. -Iraq relationship spiraled into a second war, and ultimately into chaos. Hide and Seek is his account-based on unparalleled access to Iraqi leadership, the White House, and the CIA-of the long and tragic unraveling of the U. S. relationship with Iraq. This book sees beyond the propaganda and deceits of both sides to tell the story of the miscalculations in assessing Iraq as a threat, why Saddam responded as he did to U. S. demands, and precisely how the U. S. implemented its decision to topple Saddams regime. No one is better able than Duelfer to see inside the mindsets of the two administrations, with their mismatched priorities, wounded pride, and dangerous ability to bluff and counterbluff.


In desktop publishing, fonts are essential components in each document design. With the development of font design software and tools, there are thousands of digital fonts. Increasing the number of available fonts makes selecting an appropriate font, which best serves the objective of a design, not an intuitive issue. Designers can search for a font like any other file types by using general information such as name and file format. But for document design purposes, the design features or visual characteristics of fonts are more meaningful for designers than font file information. Therefore, representing fonts' design features by searchable and comparable data would facilitate searching and selecting a desirable font. One solution is to represent a font's design features by a code composed of several digits. This solution has been implemented as a computerized system called PANOSE-1 for Latin script fonts. PANOSE-1 is a system for classifying and matching typefaces based on design features. It is composed of 10 digits, where each digit represents a specific design feature. It is used within several font management tools as an option for ordering and searching fonts based on their design features. It is also used in font replacement processes when an application or an operating system detects a missing font in an immigrant document or website. Currently, PANOSE-1 is only defined for fonts that have Latin characters. Therefore there is a need for providing a model that describes and classifies fonts with Arabic characters.
In this research, a new model PANOSE-A is defined to extend PANOSE-1 coverage to support Arabic characters. The model defines eight digits in addition to the first digit of PANOSE-1which indicates the font script and family type. Each digit describes a visual or a design feature and takes value between 0-15. The meaning of 0 and 1 values is similar to what is defined for PANOSE-1. Each of the remaining values indicates a specific variation of its represented feature. Weight and contrast are two essential features in any font design. Two digits of the models describe the common variations of the weight and contrast features for text fonts. Another four digits describe the shape of some strokes that usually vary in their design between fonts. One digit describes the end shape of terminal strokes using three letters with different terminal strokes. Another digit describes the shape of the bowl stroke while the third digit describes the shape of curved stroke. The thresholds that used to define each shape class are taken from Naskh calligraphy guidelines. The fourth digit describes the shape of rounded strokes with enclosed counter. The shape classes of this digit are based on how the counter shape is similar to one of five geometric shapes. These basic geometric shapes are triangle, square, rectangular, oval and circle. The last two digits describe the characteristics of two important vertical references of the Arabic font design which are tooth and loop heights. The reliability of the model was evaluated by conducting two clustering processes on 30 fonts of Naskh style. The proposed PANOSE-A model was used to construct a similarity matrix for one the clustering processes while the other clustering process used a similarity matrix that was produced by using a font matching tool. The result clusters of the two clustering processes have been evaluated by silhouette coefficient. Silhouette is a method to measure data consistency validation within clusters. It indicates how objects are similar in their own cluster compared to other clusters. Clustering result based on the similarity matrix produced by font matching tool got 97.04 while using clustering result based on the similarity measured by PANOSE-A model got 98.24.The similarity between the results of the two clustering processes has been estimated, indicating that the model succeeded in classifying 85% of the fonts as a font matching tool.


Large amounts of data are typically generated in applications such as surveillance of power lines and railways, inspection of gas pipes, and security surveillance. In the latter application it is a necessity that the data is transmitted to the control centre \on-the-y" for analysis. Also missions related to other applications would greatly benet from near real-time analysis and operator interaction based on captured data. This is the motivation behind this paper on coarse oine motion- and communication-planning for cooperating Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). A Mixed-Integer Linear Programming (MILP) problem is dened in order to solve the surveillance mission. To eciently transmit the data back to the base station the vehicles are allowed to store data for later transmission and transmit via other vehicles, in addition to direct transmission. The paths obtained by solving the optimization problem are analyzed using a realistic radio propagation path loss simulator. If the radio propagation path loss exceeds the maximum design criterion the optimization problem is solved again with a stricter communication constraint, and the procedure is continued in an iterative manner until the criterion is met. The proposed algorithm is supported by simulations showing the resulting paths and communication topologies for dierent choices of delay tolerance.


This paper studies V-fold cross-validation for model selection in least-squares density estimation. The goal is to provide theoretical grounds for choosing V in order to minimize the least-squares loss of the selected estimator. We first prove a non-asymptotic oracle inequality for V-fold cross-validation and its bias-corrected version (V-fold penalization). In particular, this result implies that V-fold penalization is asymptotically optimal in the nonparametric case. Then, we compute the variance of V-fold cross-validation and related criteria, as well as the variance of key quantities for model selection performance. We show that these variances depend on V like 1 + 4/(V - 1), at least in some particular cases, suggesting that the performance increases much from V = 2 to V = 5 or 10, and then is almost constant. Overall, this can explain the common advice to take V = 5--at least in our setting and when the computational power is limited--, as supported by some simulation experiments. An oracle inequality and exact formulas for the variance are also proved for Monte-Carlo cross-validation, also known as repeated cross-validation, where the parameter V is replaced by the number B of random splits of the data.


This study investigates the relationship between mortgage markets and house prices. It also looks at how these are associated with the macroeconomy, particularly the external dimension of the economy (i.e. current account balances) as well as institutions. The study utilises a three-essay approach in which econometric analyses are conducted to examine various dimensions of the relationship between the aforementioned variables in the context of the European Union (EU).
The first essay explores the dynamic relationship between credit supply and house prices at both the cross-country and country level by classifying the EU countries. To this end, vector autoregressive (VAR) model is applied. The findings of the study show that there is a dynamic causal relationship between house prices and credit; monetary policy may affect the size and direction of this relationship, but also, this relationship can be different at cross-country and country level even if they are subject to the same monetary policy. Thus, one suggestion is that besides monetary policy, other factors can affect the relationship between mortgage markets and house prices, such as the economic structure, type of housing finance systems and the institutional environment etc.
Considering the findings of the first essay, the second essay examines the institutional characteristics of the mortgage credit markets of the EU member countries. The findings of empirical analysis convey there are notable differences between the institutional characteristics of mortgage markets in North and South European countries as well as Central and East European countries and indicate that the institutional environment in the mortgage markets are heterogeneous in nature.
In the third essay, the relationship between house prices and current account imbalances is examined and the role of institutions in this relationship also is investigated. For this aim, simultaneous equations modelling is used. The findings of the empirical analysis demonstrate there is a strong positive relationship between house prices and current account imbalances; and credit channel contributes to strength this relationship and that institutional features can affect the relationship between house prices and current account balance and result in different outcome for different countries.


Background:
Sexual health and wellbeing is a central focus of public health policy and service development in England (Department of Health (DH) 2013a, 2013b, Public Health England (PHE) 2015). Historically, services in the UK have been delivered through Family Planning clinics for contraceptive services or Genito-Urinary (GUM) clinics for sexual health issues. Current NHS Service Specifications for sexual health services emphasise an integrated service, delivered by a single health professional (DH 2013b), which has significant implications for the sexual health workforce. Within the South West, there was a disparity of sexual health education provision with little emphasis on the practical competence element. In order to equip sexual health nurses with the appropriate knowledge and skills to deliver an integrated sexual health service, the University of the West of England (UWE) entered a formal agreement with a partner university who had developed an educational package. UWE commenced delivery of two new sexual health modules in September 2013, incorporating both a newly developed classroom delivered Foundations of Sexual Health module and an established Integrated Sexual Health Education module which incorporated a practice placement, mentor support and blended learning approaches to deliver the theory element. This package had previously been successfully delivered in the North of England (McNall and Kain 2010). Aims This research, conducted between 2013 and 2015, explored the transferability of the model to the South West region and the degree to which the educational delivery met service demands in relation to integrated sexual health provision.

Research Methodology:
Data were collected using quantitative and qualitative methods, specifically longitudinal baseline and follow-up survey data from students (n=49) using two validated self-efficacy scales, focus groups with students (n=22) and semi-structured interviews with students (n=7) and strategic managers (n=6). Quantitative analysis of questionnaire data was conducted on baseline and follow-up data using SPSS version 2.2. The data exploring self-efficacy were analysed using Wilcoxon tests and Friedman's tests. Descriptive statistics and frequencies were used to examine the characteristics of the study population. Qualitative analysis was conducted through thematic analysis and constant comparative methods (Braun and Clarke 2006).

Key Findings:
The results indicated that students who undertook the modules demonstrated significant increases in self-efficacy when using the evidence base in sexual health practice and when communicating in difficult situations. The highest percentage point increase in self-efficacy occurred when the students completed both modules rather than one in isolation. Service manager and student expectation regarding the instructional immediacy and technological specification of the e-learning package were not always met but the electronic mode of delivery was praised for its flexibility, especially important given the large geographical spread of students. Service managers and students were aware of the move to integrated service delivery but were often frustrated by structural restraints that impeded innovation and practice development, such as fragmented commissioning arrangements or lack of collocated services. Although these restraints limited the impact that new learning could have on the service that was offered to patients, there was some evidence that the students were using their professional autonomy to manipulate the system, in line with Lipsky's (1980) concept of street level bureaucracy.

Recommendations:
Consideration should be given to the balance of e-learning and face-to-face contact within modules, to enhance instructional immediacy and increase student satisfaction. E-learning packages should be reviewed to meet student expectation by incorporating interactive technology and opportunities for collaborative learning. In addition, where service delivery is in a state of flux, modules should incorporate elements of leadership development to enable practitioners to initiate and manage change in practice.


This study compares mother and father reports of fathers' involvement, including frequency of involvement and emotional involvement, with their child and examines demographic and social factors that predict the discrepancy in father and mother reports. Using matched pairs of parents (n = 2,058) from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing data, this study finds that father and mother reports of fathers' involvement differ significantly. For example, fathers report spending 17.6% more time engaged in 11 activities with their young children than mothers report. How parental disagreement is measured yields starkly different results given the underlying distribution of these data. The paper also provides insight into what data issues should concern researchers studying fathers' involvement and contributes to the growing literature on fathers' involvement.


Raphael (1483-1520), the Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance, was a genius in and ahead of his time. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he formed the classical trinity of this era and elaborated a rich style of harmony and geometry. As one of the great masters of the Renaissance and artist to European royalty and the Papal court in Rome, his works comprise various themes of theology and philosophy, including but not limited to famous illustrations of the Madonna. His surroundings and experience gave rise to his propensity to combine the ideals of humanism with those of religion, and firmly established in him a conviction that art is a necessary medium to reveal the beauty of nature.


Cyclooxygenase metabolites stimulate or sensitize group III and IV muscle afferents, which comprise the sensory arm of the exercise pressor reflex. The thromboxane (TP) receptor binds several of these metabolites, whose concentrations in the muscle interstitium are increased by exercise under freely perfused conditions and even more so under ischemic conditions, which occur in peripheral artery disease. We showed that the exercise pressor reflex is greater in rats with simulated peripheral artery disease than in rats with freely perfused limbs. These findings prompted us to test the hypothesis that the TP receptor contributes to the exaggerated exercise pressor reflex occurring in a rat model of peripheral artery disease. We compared the cardiovascular responses to static contraction and stretch before and after femoral arterial injections of daltroban (80 μg), a TP receptor antagonist. We performed these experiments in decerebrate rats whose femoral arteries were ligated 72 h before the experiment (a model of simulated peripheral artery disease) and in control rats whose hindlimbs were freely perfused. Daltroban reduced the pressor response to static contraction in both freely perfused (n = 6; before: Δ12 ± 2 mmHg, after: Δ6 ± 2 mmHg, P = 0.024) and 72-h-ligated rats (n = 10; before: Δ25 ± 3 mmHg, after: Δ7 ± 4 mmHg, P = 0.001). Likewise, daltroban reduced the pressor response to stretch in the freely perfused group (n = 9; before: Δ30 ± 3 mmHg, after: Δ17 ± 3 mmHg, P < 0.0001) and in the ligated group (n = 11; before: Δ37 ± 5 mmHg, after: Δ23 ± 3 mmHg, P = 0.016). Intravenous injections of daltroban had no effect on the pressor response to contraction. We conclude that the TP receptor contributes to the pressor responses evoked by contraction and stretch in both freely perfused rats and rats with simulated peripheral artery disease.


Human trafficking in persons is a serious crime and a grave violation of human rights. Every year, thousands of men, women and children fall into the hands of traffickers, in their own countries and abroad. Almost every country in the world is affected by trafficking, whether as a country of origin, transit or destination for victims. UNODC, as guardian of the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC) and the Protocols thereto, assists States in their efforts to implement the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons (Trafficking in Persons Protocol). The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons defines Trafficking in Persons as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation..


The introduction of glyphosate-resistant (GR) crops revolutionized weed management; however, the improper use of this technology has selected for a wide range of weeds resistant to glyphosate, referred to as superweeds. We characterized the high glyphosate resistance level of an Amaranthus hybridus population (GRH)—a superweed collected in a GR-soybean field from Cordoba, Argentina—as well as the resistance mechanisms that govern it in comparison to a susceptible population (GSH). The GRH population was 100.6 times more resistant than the GSH population. Reduced absorption and metabolism of glyphosate, as well as gene duplication of 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase (EPSPS) or its overexpression did not contribute to this resistance. However, GSH plants translocated at least 10% more 14C-glyphosate to the rest of the plant and roots than GRH plants at 9 h after treatment. In addition, a novel triple amino acid substitution from TAP (wild type, GSH) to IVS (triple mutant, GRH) was identified in the EPSPS gene of the GRH. The nucleotide substitutions consisted of ATA102, GTC103 and TCA106 instead of ACA102, GCG103, and CCA106, respectively. The hydrogen bond distances between Gly-101 and Arg-105 positions increased from 2.89 Å (wild type) to 2.93 Å (triple-mutant) according to the EPSPS structural modeling. These results support that the high level of glyphosate resistance of the GRH A. hybridus population was mainly governed by the triple mutation TAP-IVS found of the EPSPS target site, but the impaired translocation of herbicide also contributed in this resistance.


Knowledge on the factors that determine the composition of bacterial communities in the vicinity of roots (rhizosphere) is essential to understand plant-soil interactions. Plant species identity, plant growth stage and soil properties have been indicated as major determinants of rhizosphere bacterial community composition. Here we show that the presence of saprotrophic fungi can be an additional factor steering rhizosphere bacterial community composition and functioning. We studied the impact of presence of two common fungal rhizosphere inhabitants (Mucor hiemalis and Trichoderma harzianum) on the composition of cultivable bacterial communities developing in the rhizosphere of Carex arenaria (sand sedge) in sand microcosms. Identification and phenotypic characterization of bacterial isolates revealed clear shifts in the rhizosphere bacterial community composition by the presence of two fungal strains (M. hiemalis BHB1 and T. harzianum PvdG2), whereas another M. hiemalis strain did not show this effect. Presence of both M. hiemalis BHB1 and T. harzianum PvdG2 resulted in a significant increase of chitinolytic and (in vitro) antifungal bacteria. The latter was most pronounced for M. hiemalis BHB1, an isolate from Carex roots, which stimulated the development of the bacterial genera Achromobacter and Stenotrophomonas. In vitro tests showed that these genera were strongly antagonistic against M. hiemalis but also against the plant-pathogenic fungus Rhizoctonia solani. The most likely explanation for fungal-induced shifts in the composition of rhizosphere bacteria is that bacteria are being selected which are successful in competing with fungi for root exudates. Based on the results we propose that measures increasing saprotrophic fungi in agricultural soils should be explored as an alternative approach to enhance natural biocontrol against soil-borne plant-pathogenic fungi, namely by stimulating indigenous antifungal rhizosphere bacteria.


Odors are powerful stimuli that can evoke emotional states, and support learning and memory. Decades of research have indicated that the neural basis for this strong "odor-emotional memory" connection is due to the uniqueness of the anatomy of the olfactory pathways. Indeed, unlike the other sensory systems, the sense of smell does not pass through the thalamus to be routed to the cortex. Rather, odor information is relayed directly to the limbic system, a brain region typically associated with memory and emotional processes. This provides olfaction with a unique and potent power to influence mood, acquisition of new information, and use of information in many different contexts including social interactions. Indeed, olfaction is crucially involved in behaviors essential for survival of the individual and species, including identification of predators, recognition of individuals for procreation or social hierarchy, location of food, as well as attachment between mating pairs and infant-caretaker dyads. Importantly, odors are sampled through sniffing behavior. This active sensing plays an important role in exploratory behaviors observed in the different contexts mentioned above. Odors are also critical for learning and memory about events and places and constitute efficient retrieval cues for the recall of emotional episodic memories.

This broad role for odors appears highly preserved across species. In addition, the consistent early developmental emergence of olfactory function across diverse species also provides a unique window of opportunity for analysis of myriad behavioral systems from rodents to nonhuman primates and humans. This, when combined with the relatively conserved organization of the olfactory system in mammals, provides a powerful framework to explore how complex behaviors can be modulated by odors to produce adaptive responses, and to investigate the underlying neural networks.

The present research topic brings together cutting edge research on diverse species and developmental stages, highlighting convergence and divergence between humans and animals to facilitate translational research. It is composed of 25 articles and encompasses 5 sections: human olfaction, odor preferences and aversions, odors and social behavior, olfaction and sniffing, and olfactory memory.


The question of preemption arises because the Constitution establishes a federal system with two governments (one federal and one state) that have overlapping power to regulate the same matters involving the same parties in the same territory. To succeed, such a system requires a means of deciding when federal law displaces state law. The Founders chose the Supremacy Clause (reinforced by Article III) to perform this function. Although seemingly one-sided, the Clause actually incorporates several important political and procedural safeguards designed to preserve the proper balance between the governance prerogatives of the federal government and the states. It does this by recognizing only three sources of law as "the supreme Law of the Land" – the "Constitution," "Laws," and "Treaties" of the United States. Elsewhere, the Constitution prescribes precise and cumbersome procedures to govern the adoption of each source of supreme federal law. These procedures establish the exclusive means of adopting "the supreme Law of the Land." By requiring the participation and assent of multiple actors subject to the political safeguards of federalism, these procedures make supreme federal law relatively difficult to adopt. More importantly, these procedures suggest exclusivity because the Constitution guarantees states (regardless of size or population) equal suffrage in the Senate and gives the Senate (or the states) an absolute veto over the adoption of each and every source of law recognized by the Supremacy Clause. This means that courts must identify an applicable provision of the "Constitution," "Laws," and "Treaties" of the United States adopted pursuant to specified procedures before they may preempt state law. By operation of the Supremacy Clause, these three sources override contrary state law. The negative implication of the Clause, however, is that state law continues to govern in the absence of "the supreme Law of the Land."This process-based understanding of preemption has potential implications for two related federalism doctrines: the presumption against preemption and the more controversial clear statement requirement. The traditional presumption against preemption maintains "that the historic police powers of the States [are] not to be superseded by [a] Federal Act unless that was the clear and manifest purpose of Congress." A clear statement rule is similar in function but requires that Congress make its intent to preempt state law clear on the face of the statute. In addition, some formulations go farther by suggesting that "if Congress intends to alter the usual constitutional balance between the States and the Federal Government, it must make its intention to do so unmistakably clear in the language of the statute." Critics of these doctrines argue that the presumption against preemption contradicts the Supremacy Clause, and that clear statement rules "amount to a 'backdoor' version of the constitutional activism." Although certainly subject to abuse, this paper suggests that both doctrines – if properly limited – may play a useful role in implementing the Constitution's political and procedural safeguards of federalism.


From 'audet IX to Zytchin III, this book covers it all. This is the ultimate reference book for all "Star Trek" fans! Added to this edition are 128 new pages. This addendum highlights the latest episodes of "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine(R), Star Trek: Voyager(R)" and the newest feature film, "Star Trek: Insurrection(TM)." The thousands of photos and hundreds of illustrations place the "Star Trek" universe at your fingertips. Planets and stars, weapons and ships, people and places are just part of the meticulous research and countless cross-reference that fill this book.


Abstract The discovery of the first electromagnetic counterpart to a gravitational wave signal has generated follow-up observations by over 50 facilities world-wide, ushering in the new era of multi-messenger astronomy. In this paper, we present follow-up observations of the gravitational wave event GW170817 and its electromagnetic counterpart SSS17a/DLT17ck (IAU label AT2017gfo) by 14 Australian telescopes and partner observatories as part of Australian-based and Australian-led research programs. We report early- to late-time multi-wavelength observations, including optical imaging and spectroscopy, mid-infrared imaging, radio imaging, and searches for fast radio bursts. Our optical spectra reveal that the transient source emission cooled from approximately 6 400 K to 2 100 K over a 7-d period and produced no significant optical emission lines. The spectral profiles, cooling rate, and photometric light curves are consistent with the expected outburst and subsequent processes of a binary neutron star merger. Star formation in the host galaxy probably ceased at least a Gyr ago, although there is evidence for a galaxy merger. Binary pulsars with short (100 Myr) decay times are therefore unlikely progenitors, but pulsars like PSR B1534+12 with its 2.7 Gyr coalescence time could produce such a merger. The displacement (~2.2 kpc) of the binary star system from the centre of the main galaxy is not unusual for stars in the host galaxy or stars originating in the merging galaxy, and therefore any constraints on the kick velocity imparted to the progenitor are poor.


Numerous industries have been using chloroethenes (CEs), mainly tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene, as non-flammable solvents since the beginning of the 20th century. Massive usage, along with careless handling and storage, made CEs one of the most abundant classes of aquifer contaminants. Porous aquifers are dynamic ecosystems showing complex interactions between physical, chemical and biotic components. These environments are inherently extremely heterogeneous in their structure and composition, even at very small scale, in terms of lithological composition, grain size distribution and chemical composition, and thus provide a large variety of living conditions. However, to date only few studies have been focusing on the influence of the aquifer properties on the total bacterial communities in such habitats. Here, we assessed the influence of environmental factors on the microbial communities present in a CE-contaminated aquifer. Both grain size distribution and geochemical composition showed low correlations with the bacterial community structures. In this aquifer, a very slow groundwater flow combined with a restricted aquifer recharge probably limited the nutrients availability. These limitations were hypothesized to be the main factors driving the apparent structures observed for the communities involved in the reductive dechlorination of the contaminants.


Romantic Moderns: English Writers, Artists and the Imagination from Virginia Woolf to John Piper. Alexandra Harris (London: Thames and Hudson 2010) 320pp. Virginia Woolf. Alexandra Harris (London: Thames and Hudson 2011) 191pp. Alexandra Harris's Romantic Moderns is a study of what she calls "experimental antiquarians" (15). In her densely populated and broad-ranging book, Harris argues convincingly that in 1930s and 1940s England newness and modernity were not incompatible with tradition. Following earlier work like Jed Esty's A Shrinking Island: Modernism and National Culture in England, which she acknowledges as a book important to her own work, Harris shows writers, artists and musicians turning back to ancient English traditions. We see W. H. Auden collecting light verse, John Betjeman touring churches and teashops, and John Piper, a major figure in the book along with his wife Myfanwy Evans, gaining inspiration and perspective on modern art as he contemplates medieval stained glass. Unlike Esty's more strictly scholarly book, Harris's volume is clearly meant to reach a broader audience. The fact that the book was awarded the Guardian First Book Award is testament to her success and to the appeal that this period of English history still has for today's readers. Harris's uncluttered prose makes the book read as a jaunt through the English countryside. Reflecting the kind of writing Harris is doing in Romantic Moderns and the breadth she was aiming at, she has listed in an interview as inspiration for her work Peter Conrad's Modern Times, Modern Places, and Simon Schama's Landscape and Memory as well as Hermione Lee's biography of Virginia Woolf and Jenny Uglow's of William Hogarth. As in Conrad's and Schama's books, there's a cultural-historical range to Harris's work that allows her to consider architecture and village life alongside food and climate, to name just a few of the topics she includes. What is particularly appealing about this book is the fact that here we find Woolf in the company of contemporaries such as Ralph Vaughan Williams, Benjamin Britten, Adolf Loos, Evelyn Waugh and Flora Thompson--names that are not typically seen alongside Woolf's. A discussion of Orlando sits in a chapter about Georgian revival in which Harris discusses Edith Sitwell's wardrobe and Piper, Evans, Betjeman and Geoffrey Grigson's "church crawls" (66); Between the Acts is read in terms of the turn away from Fry's formalist ideas about art; and Woolf's "Reading at Random" appears in a chapter about the weather beside analysis of work by Stevie Smith, Paul Nash, Fry and Herbert Read. Central to Harris's book is the discussion of magazines such as Myfanwy Evans's Axis; this serves as a good reminder of some of the debates that were going on in the art world as Woolf wrote. Harris also shows how series such as Hilda Matheson's "Britain in Pictures," involvement with which Woolf declined, saw writers and artists generating nationalist propaganda on the eve of and during World War II. Appropriate to its subject matter, Romantic Moderns is beautifully illustrated with color reproductions and attractively packaged by Thames and Hudson. Piper's work figures prominently alongside paintings and photographs of houses and artwork by Edward Bawden and Eric Ravilious among many others. One finds a similarly paced prose, but less density in Harris's biography of Woolf. Short chapters are interspersed with captioned photographs, book illustrations and paintings, some that will be very familiar to Woolfians, others less so. Harris mixes some of the best-known photographs of Woolf and family and friends with paintings and illustrations by Vanessa Bell, Mark Gertler, Dora Carrington and Roger Fry and Hogarth Press covers and announcements. …


Poly(p-phenylene-2,6-benzobisoxazole) (PBO) fiber has a high strength, a high modulus, and is light weight, which makes it a leading candidate for soft body armor and fiber reinforced plastic composites. The use of PBO fiber in protective applications is limited by its mechanical degradation during service. Battelle has developed a supercritical (sc)CO2 chemical diffusion post processing method to treat PBO fiber that decreases the rate of mechanical properties degradation and increases its useable service life. The tensile data show that this treatment yields a 14 % increase for tenacity over untreated fibers after 120 days of accelerated aging (70 oC, 90 %RH) when using 3- glycidoxypropyldimethoxymethylsilane (GPDMS) epoxy silane as the chemical infused into PBO fibers. The epoxy silane chosen demonstrated an incremental increase in fiber life; with optimization, greater gains could be realized. Additionally, fluorescent spectroscopy was performed on methanol rinses of aged PBO fibers as an analytical method for determining extent of fiber degradation. Initial testing has indicated that the intensity of fluorescence peak emission have a correlation to the degradation level of the PBO fiber. There is potential for an analytical technique to be developed to test fibers from deployed soft armor to determine if the material still possesses ballistic protection, or if it should be removed from service.


Bitou bush (Chrysanthemoides monilifera sub-species rotundata), a native of South Africa, has the ability to outcompete and smother native coastal dune vegetation. Infestations in Queensland have been dramatically reduced since the 1980s, with only isolated plants being found in the field today. Ground surveillance is currently carried out twice yearly involving teams of field staff surveying densely vegetated areas in an emu parade to maximise detection of both mature plants and seedlings. Some of the coastal vegetation has become too dense making it nearly impenetrable for ground surveillance. The risk of not detecting plants in this area has become high due to lack of visibility. Another technique of monitoring and detection is required to ensure eradication. This project aimed to develop a surveillance protocol and strategy using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) also commonly known as drones to become a permanent component of the Bitou bush eradication project. An innovative company, Aspect UAV Imaging, worked with Biosecurity Queensland to develop suitable UAV technology. Test flights were carried out to determine the required camera resolution, the flight height which provided proper resolution and the amount of overlap using a systematic pattern over the test area. Images were processed and enhanced post-flight to aid in the detection of Bitou bush. Ortho-images were georeferenced with colour enhancement and trialled with a series of programs to determine the best application and usability. Images processed by researchers from the Queensland University of Technology using automated classification algorithms gave promising results. With improvements in technology, the regular use of UAVs for surveillance will soon complement many aspects of weed monitoring.


The Concise Encyclopedia of Statistics presents the essential information about statistical tests, concepts, and analytical methods in language that is accessible to practitioners and students of the vast community using statistics in medicine, engineering, physical science, life science, social science, and business/economics. The reference is alphabetically arranged to provide quick access to the fundamental tools of statistical methodology and biographies of famous statisticians. The more than 500 entries include definitions, history, mathematical details, limitations, examples, references, and further readings. All entries include cross-references as well as the key citations. The back matter includes a timeline of statistical inventions. This reference will be an enduring resource for locating convenient overviews about this essential field of study.


A mashup is a Web application that integrates data, computation and GUI provided by several systems into a unique tool. The concept originated from the understanding that the number of applications available on the Web and the need for combining them to meet user requirements, are growing very rapidly. This demo presents MatchUp, a system that supports rapid, on-demand, intuitive development of mashups, based on a novel autocompletion mechanism. The key observation guiding the development of MatchUp is that mashups developed by different users typically share common characteristics; they use similar classes of mashup components and glue them together in a similar manner. MatchUp exploits these similarities to predict, given a user's partial mashup specification, what are the most likely potential completions (missing components and connection between them) for the specification. Using a novel ranking algorithm, users are then offered top-k completions from which they choose and refine according to their needs.


The issue of the Tokamak fusion reactor is its large area occupied by its power supply, which is about half of the total building area for the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), together with the compatibility between the site grid and Tokamak loads during the plasma operation period. ITER is now implemented with Tokamak, which requires about 1 GVar reactive power to compensate its power system for superconducting magnets where about 0.2 GVar is transferred from France Electrical Power Network, the other 0.75 GVar is generated by the system of reactive power compensation and harmonic filtering, the standard VSC configuration. ITER can experimentally generate 500-MW fusion thermal power in 400 s long pulse mode. It could only generate about 500 MW/3 = 167 MWe active electric power if it is to be configured with pressured water reactor due to the fact that it is only about 1/3 conversion efficiency from thermal energy to electric energy. For such fusion machine, the requirement for reactive power is much larger than the active power it generates. Based on this requirement, one efficiency and compact pulsed synchronous generator is suggested for this purpose. It can generate not only the fundamental reactive power to compensate and stabilize the power network with low internal impedance but also the active power for outputting power to the network with exciting controller of the generator. Due to its two purposes in one device configuration, it becomes compact and reliable by being implemented in the design of future fusion power plant for demonstration. Some consideration has been done to the special low impedance synchronous generator, which is intended for the concept design of Chinese Fusion Engineering Testing Reactor, targeting the compact electric power system for superconducting Tokamak fusion reactor.


A substantial proportion of the world's population remains rural, despite decades of urbanisation. Further, most of this rural population lies south of the equator. Therefore, it is incumbent on the emerging fields of rural criminology and global southern criminology to mutually reinforce each other's scholarly development. To this end, this article engages three selected issues associated with agriculture and food – agricultural victimisation, food security, and farmworker abuse and trafficking – and discusses them in terms of the advancement of a global southern criminology. The article concludes with acknowledgement of many more rural crime issues that have particular salience to the global South and warns of new dangers in the development of hegemonic binaries (Carrington, Hogg and Sozzo 2016) and homogenous categories of knowledge (Connell 2007) if they fail to inform each other.


The main question explored is: What is actually the relationship between human thought, its structure and exercise, and the idea of human rights, which is surely among the most important products of human thinking?
The first question will be: Why does the theory of mind matter for ethics and law? Second, the concept or idea of a human right as a subclass of moral and legal subjective rights used will be outlined and clarified to answer the question: What precisely are we talking about? Third, the question Where do rights come from? will occupy the attention just long enough to substantially understand why an answer to one of the two currently particularly interesting fundamental forms of human rights' revisionism, the historical, genealogical attack on human rights, leads necessarily beyond the limits of human rights history in the deep waters of the epistemology and ontology of human rights and thus to those kinds of problems these remarks intend to explore. Fourth, the question Why are rights justified? will be considered. Fifth, after having sufficiently prepared the ground by the preceding remarks, the core issue of these reflections can be addressed: What is, after all, the importance of the theory of mind for the project of human rights? Here the second fundamental challenge to the idea of human rights will be discussed. This attack stems from the quarters of today's neuroscientific neo-emotivism, which is interesting in itself and has the advantage that the critique of this form of human rights revisionism has considerable heuristic merits for a constructive account of the theory of mind and the foundations of human rights. How a theory of human rights could draw from the theory of mind, and more concretely from a mentalist account of ethics and law, to provide such a constructive account is the final perspective to be explored.


This Article identifies logical and due process errors in HIV-related aggravated assault cases, which usually involve an HIV-positive individual having unprotected sex without disclosing his or her HIV status. While this behavior should not be encouraged, this Article suggests that punishing this conduct through a charge of aggravated assault - which requires a showing that the defendant's actions were a means likely to cause grievous bodily harm or death - is fraught with fallacies in reasoning and runs afoul of due process. Specifically, some courts use the "rule of thumb" that HIV can possibly be transmitted through bodily fluids as sufficient evidence for finding that a particular HIV-positive defendant who had unprotected sex did so in a manner likely to cause substantial harm. This leads to two due process errors: (1) the conflation of what is theoretically possible for what is likely, and (2) the use of data about a hypothetical, average, HIV-positive individual as proof of the effects of a particular HIV-positive individual's behavior. By relying on the rule of thumb that HIV can be transmitted through bodily fluids rather than investigating the unique features of the particular defendant on trial, these jurisdictions violate the Due Process Clause's requirement of "personal guilt." Aristotle's "Fallacy of Accident" is then committed when this generalization is applied to an HIV-positive defendant whose viral load is undetectable, making him an exception to the general rule. After explaining these concepts, this Article identifies various cases from the states and the military that commit these errors. These cases are then compared to similar aggravated assault cases from Canada that do not make the same mistakes and use the kind of particularized proof that is required by both common logic and the Due Process Clause.


Decision making in a lot of resources supply and resources allocation problems is related to sophisticated multiobjective analysis. The concept of a man-computer simulation system was suggested as a tool for decision making in problems of this kind, especially in the case of water resources (Moiseev et al. 1980). Within the framework of such a system the analyst and the expert employ a full range of operational research methods (simulation, optimization, multiobjective, informal and game-theoretical ones) to address multiobjective problems by means of the hierarchical system of mathematical models of the system under study. Various forms of mathematical models can be studied by means of simulation experiments. To establish control variables (to formulate scenarios) in a simulation study the expert may use optimization techniques applied to models simpler than the simulation ones. It is reasonable to study the problem of criteria formulation in optimization problems (the objectives convolution problem) by means of multiobjective techniques and simple (screening) models. The multiobjective study is the most important part of investigation based on the simulation system, because it is the multiobjective investigation that gives a general understanding of the system under study.

This paper treats a new approach to multiobjective problems investigation. This approach is called the Generalized Reachable Sets (GRS) approach and belongs to generating multiobjective methods (Cohon 1978). It employs an explicit representation of a set of all reachable objective values. In contrast to different generating multiobjective methods, the mathematical background of the GRS approach is the linear inequalities techniques.

This approach is used now at the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences in various tasks.

The structure of the paper is as follows: first the mathematical background of the approach is outlined, and then possible applications of the approach to the Skane water resources management are discussed.


This article aims to analyze the practices of exception in contemporaneity. We are interested in examining the scenario in which the biopolitic life is arrested in the frame of law, in the transversality of powers, constituting ultimately the bare life. We will take the early organization of asylums in Brazil and the Nazi concentration camps as emblems of this issue, in order to analyze the formation of these fascist practices of exception in modernity and its ruptures as well as its continuity in contemporaneity. Microfascism in us - practices of exception in contemporaneity - refers to our current attitudes that may lead to situations in which the other, as difference, is seen as a threat and therefore avoided. We do not enclosure the other within limiting walls, but we disregard him and do not let our daily lives be affected by him. Using the concept of an immanent life can help us overcome the microfascist transcendences of today's fragmentary states of exception, and discuss the field of human rights, not to dissolve it, but to open it to the indeterminacy of events.


Consider a discrete-time martingale, and let V-2 be its normalized quadratic variation. As V-2 approaches 1, and provided that some Lindeberg condition is satisfied, the distribution of the rescaled martingale approaches the Gaussian distribution. For any p >= 1, (Ann. Probab. 16 (1988) 275-299) gave a bound on the rate of convergence in this central limit theorem that is the sum of two terms, say A(p) + B-p, where up to a constant, A(p) = parallel to V-2 - 1 parallel to(p/(2p+1))(p). Here we discuss the optimality of this term, focusing on the restricted class of martingales with bounded increments. In this context, (Ann. Probab. 10 (1982) 672-688) sketched a strategy to prove optimality for p = 1. Here we extend this strategy to any p >= 1, thereby justifying the optimality of the term A(p). As a necessary step, we also provide a new bound on the rate of convergence in the central limit theorem for martingales with bounded increments that improves on the term B-p, generalizing another result of (Ann. Probab. 10 (1982) 672-688).


Data collected by social media platforms have been introduced as new sources for indicators to help measure the impact of scholarly research in ways that are complementary to traditional citation analysis. Data generated from social media activities can be used to reflect broad types of impact. This article aims to provide systematic evidence about how often Twitter is used to disseminate information about journal articles in the biomedical sciences. The analysis is based on 1.4 million documents covered by both PubMed and Web of Science and published between 2010 and 2012. The number of tweets containing links to these documents was analyzed and compared to citations to evaluate the degree to which certain journals, disciplines, and specialties were represented on Twitter and how far tweets correlate with citation impact. With less than 10% of PubMed articles mentioned on Twitter, its uptake is low in general but differs between journals and specialties. Correlations between tweets and citations are low, implying that impact metrics based on tweets are different from those based on citations. A framework using the coverage of articles and the correlation between Twitter mentions and citations is proposed to facilitate the evaluation of novel social‐media‐based metrics.


The gender gap in inter-firm mobility is an important contributor to the gender pay gap but is as yet unexplained. In a structural model of workplace choice, I show that the gender mobility gap can be understood as a consequence of women's typical roles as secondary earners in most households which induces households to put more weight on the non-pay dimensions of women's workplaces. I provide direct empirical evidence for this explanation by documenting that the sensitivity of quits to wages is weaker the less an individual contributes to household earnings. Furthermore, gender differences are small once differences in earner roles are accounted for. My quantitative model evaluations show that ignoring the influence of earner roles on inter-firm mobility leads to substantial biases in wage-gap decompositions and predicted policy effects.


Extracted from text ... 21 FORUM
Barb's Bubble
Barbara Raftesath
President, SAAHIP
The past PSSA AGM and Conference
recently held in Johannesburg highlighted
for me the critical need for our
profession to act positively to recruit
potential young entrants into our
profession.
The plight of an under-resourced
healthcare system, especially in the
public sector is well known to extend to
all categories of healthcare professionals
in South Africa, pharmacy
being no exception. In addition, the
recent unsatisfactory situation regarding
the issue of pricing of pharmaceuticals
has damaged the view of the
pharmacy profession in the eyes of the
public, thereby adding to the HR ..


Introductory Papers.- Pacific Fjords - A Review of their Water Characteristics.- Why Biologists are Interested in Fjords.- Physical Processes.- The Fluid Mechanical Problem of Fjord Circulations.- Topographic Effects in Stratified Fluids.- Barotropic and Baroclinic Response of a Semi-Enclosed Basin to Barotropic Forcing from the Sea.- A Linear Model of Internal Tides in Sill Fjords.- Tidaily-Forced Stratified Flow over Sills.- Geostrophic Fronts.- Modelling of Mixing Processes in the Surface Layers of the Ocean.- Experimental Simulation of the 'Retreat' of the Seasonal Thermocline by Surface Heating.- Turbulent Entrainment at a Buoyancy Interface due to Convective Turbulence.- Energetics of Mixing Processes in Fjords.- Mixing and Exchange Processes in a Small Greenland Sill-Fjord.- Mixing Experiments in Fjords.- Tracer Measurement of Mixing in the Deep Water of a Small, Stratified Sill-Fjord.- Estimation of Vertical Mixing Rates in Fjords Using Naturally Occurring Radon-222 and Salinity as Tracers.- Recent Observations in Knight Inlet.- Mixing Induced by Internal Hydraulic Disturbances in the Vicinity of Sills.- Generation of Lee Waves over the Sill in Knight Inlet.- The Hydrography of Knight Inlet, B.C., in the Light of Long's Model of Fjord Circulation.- Turbulence Measurements through a Train of Breaking Internal Waves in Knight Inlet, B.C..- Finite Element Computation of the Barotropic Tides in Knight Inlet, British Columbia.- The Distribution of Zooplankton Communities in a Glacial Run-Off Fjord and Exchanges with the Open Sea.- Circulation Studies.- An Unusual Polynya in an Arctic Fjord.- Seasonal Observations of Low Frequency Atmospheric Forcing in th Strait of Juan de Fuca.- Vertical Structure of Fluctuating Currents in the Strait of Juan de Fuca.- Physical Oceanography of the New Zealand Fjords.- A Way to Measure the Residual Flow in the Limfjord - Denmark.- Controlling Impact of Changes in Fjord Hydrology.- Water Movements Traced by Metals Dissolved from Mine Tailings Deposited in a Fjord in North-West Greenland.- Exchange Processes above Sill Level between Fjords and Coastal Water.- Particulate Matter Exchange Processes between the Saint Lawrence Estuary and the Saguenay Fjord.- Zooplankton Variability in Skjomen, Northern Norway and Exchanges with the Outer Fjord..- Mean Field Distributions of a Dissolved Substance in the Vicinity of Branches in a Fjord System.- Pelagic Ecology.- Pelagic Productivity and Food Chains in Fjord Systems.- How the Zooplankton Community may vary within a Single Fjord System.- A Preliminary Examination of Zooplankton Species Groupings and Associated Oceanographically Defined Regions along the British Columbia Mainland Coast.- Gadoid Populations of Western Scottish Sea-Lochs and their Exchanges with West Coast Stocks.- Phytoplankton Biology of Saanich Inlet, B.C..- Echo-Sounding and Ecology.- Variability in Sea-Loch Phytoplankton.- Amino Acid Fluxes in Marine Plankton Communities Contained in CEPEX Bags.- Biochemical Components as Indicators of Seasonal Condition of Deep-Water Zooplankton.- Deep-Water Exchange and its Effects.- Deep-Water Renewal in Fjords.- The Tidal Jet in Rupert-Holberg Inlet.- Effect of Oxygen Deficiency on Benthic Macrofauna in Fjords.- Benthic Biology of a Dissolved Oxygen Deficiency Event in Howe Sound, B.C..- Renewal and Entrainroent in Loch Eil: A Periodically Ventilated Scottish Fjord.- Deep-Water Renewals in the Frierfjord - An Intermittently Anoxic Basin.- A Radiotracer Study of Water Renewal and Sedimentation in a Scottish Fjord.- Description of Water Renewal Processes in the Gros Mecatina Estuary.- Characteristics of Flow over a Sill during Deep-Water Renewal.- Benthic Ecology.- The Meiobenthos of Fjords: A Review and Prospectus.- The Macrobenthos of Fjords.- The Effect of Sedimentation on Rocky Bottom Organisms in Balsfjord, Northern Norway.- Suprabenthic Gammaridean Amphipoda (Crustacea) in the Plankton of the Saguenay Fjord, Quebec.- Sedimentation.- Flocculation, Agglomeration and Zooplankton Pelletization of Suspended Sediment in a Fjord Receiving Glacial Meltwater.- Depositional Processes in an Anoxic, High Sedimentation Regime in the Saguenay Fjord.- Observations of the Sedimentary Environments of Fjords on Cumberland Peninsula, Baffin Island.- Volume of Water Pumped and Particulate Matter Deposited by the Iceland Scallop (Chlamys Islandica) in Balsfjord, Northern Norway.- Fjord Chemistry.- Sediment Surface Reactions in Fjord Basins.- Redox Dependent Processes in the Transition from Oxic to Anoxic Conditions: An in situ Study Concerning Remineralization, Nutrient Release and Heavy Metal Solubilization.- Reaction and Flux of Manganese within the Oxic Sediment and Basin Water of an Alaskan Fjord.- Sediment-Seawater Exchanges of Nutrients and Transition Metals in an Alaskan Fjord.- Redox Species in a Reducing Fjord: The Oxidation Rate of Manganese II.- Cr Species in Saanich and Jervis Inlets.- The Chemistry of Suspended Particulate Matter from Two Oxygen Deficient Norwegian Fjords - with Special Reference to Manganese.- Fluorescence Measurements of Humic Substances and Lignin Sulfonates in a Fjord System.- Index of Geographic Names.- Index of Taxonomic Names.


PURPOSE
Acute doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity can be prevented in adults by continuous infusion of the drug, but mechanisms of cardiotoxicity are different in children. We compared cardiac outcomes in children receiving bolus or continuous infusion of doxorubicin.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
In a randomized study, children with high-risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia received doxorubicin 360 mg/m(2) in 30-mg/m(2) doses every 3 weeks either by bolus (within 1 hour, n = 57) or by continuous infusion (over 48 hours, n = 64). Echocardiograms obtained before doxorubicin and at longest follow-up times were centrally remeasured, and z scores of cardiac measurements were calculated based on a healthy population.

RESULTS
The groups were similar in age, sex distribution, doxorubicin dose, and duration of follow-up. Before treatment, measures of left ventricular (LV) structure and function did not reveal dilated cardiomyopathy and were not statistically different between bolus and continuous-infusion groups. The follow-up echocardiograms demonstrated no significant difference between the two groups for any cardiac characteristic, but both groups showed significant abnormalities of LV structure and function compared with normal and with baseline. For example, the mean LV fractional shortening fell by approximately two SD in both groups between the two echocardiograms. LV contractility was depressed in both groups (for bolus patients, median z score = -0.70 SD, P =.006; for continuous-infusion patients, median z score = -0.765, P =.005). Dilated cardiomyopathy and inadequate LV hypertrophy were noted in both groups. Clinical cardiac manifestations and event-free survival did not differ.

CONCLUSION
Continuous doxorubicin infusion over 48 hours for childhood leukemia did not offer a cardioprotective advantage over bolus infusion. Both regimens were associated with progressive subclinical cardiotoxicity. Other cardioprotective strategies should be explored.


Several extensions of the Standard Model predict the production of dark matter particles at the LHC. A search for dark matter particles produced in association with a dark Higgs boson decaying into $W^{+}W^{-}$ in the $\ell^\pm\nu q \bar q'$ final states with $\ell=e,\mu$ is presented. This analysis uses 139 fb$^{-1}$ of $pp$ collisions recorded by the ATLAS detector at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. The $W^\pm \to q\bar q'$ decays are reconstructed from pairs of calorimeter-measured jets or from track-assisted reclustered jets, a technique aimed at resolving the dense topology from a pair of boosted quarks using jets in the calorimeter and tracking information. The observed data are found to agree with Standard Model predictions. Scenarios with dark Higgs boson masses ranging between 140 and 390 GeV are excluded.


Abstract Motivation Gene–environment (GxE) interactions are one of the least studied aspects of the genetic architecture of human traits and diseases. The environment of an individual is inherently high dimensional, evolves through time and can be expensive and time consuming to measure. The UK Biobank study, with all 500 000 participants having undergone an extensive baseline questionnaire, represents a unique opportunity to assess GxE heritability for many traits and diseases in a well powered setting. Results We have developed a randomized Haseman–Elston non-linear regression method applicable when many environmental variables have been measured on each individual. The method (GPLEMMA) simultaneously estimates a linear environmental score (ES) and its GxE heritability. We compare the method via simulation to a whole-genome regression approach (LEMMA) for estimating GxE heritability. We show that GPLEMMA is more computationally efficient than LEMMA on large datasets, and produces results highly correlated with those from LEMMA when applied to simulated data and real data from the UK Biobank. Availability and implementation Software implementing the GPLEMMA method is available from https://jmarchini.org/gplemma/. Supplementary information Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.


Background: This article describes the evidence review and guideline development method developed for the Clinical Preventive Guidelines for Immigrants and Refugees in Canada by the Canadian Collaboration for Immigrant and Refugee Health Guideline Committee. Methods: The Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (AGREE) best-practice framework was combined with the recently developed Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach to produce evidence-based clinical guidelines for immigrants and refugees in Canada. Results: A systematic approach was designed to produce the evidence reviews and apply the GRADE approach, including building on evidence from previous systematic reviews, searching for and comparing evidence between general and specific immigrant populations, and applying the GRADE criteria for making recommendations. This method was used for priority health conditions that had been selected by practitioners caring for immigrants and refugees in Canada. Interpretation: This article outlines the 14-step method that was defined to standardize the guideline development process for each priority health condition.


The conversion of tropical field corn genotypes into sweet corn could broaden the genetic base and improve yield and adaptation of sweet corn varieties. In this study, the performance of shrunken-2 (sh2) super-sweet corn populations derived from crosses between a sh2 population and tropical field corn genotypes were evaluated in Ibadan. Experiments were conducted using randomised complete block design with three replicates. Data were collected on agronomic and fresh ear yield traits, and then subjected to analysis of variance. Significant genotypic differences were observed among the populations with most of the derived populations significantly superior to the donor population for most of the traits. Yield of marketable cobs ranged from 5.80 to 7.63 t/ha (mean = 6.84 t/ha). Six derived populations had significantly higher yield of marketable cobs than the donor population. On the average, 83.1% of the number of cobs harvested was marketable. Husk cover scores ranged from 2.8 to 6.8, with all the derived populations having significantly lower husk cover scores than the donor population. The results indicated that the conversion of the field corn genotypes into super-sweet corn was effective in the development of new super-sweet corn populations. The observed genetic differences could be exploited in further breeding programmes.

 Key words: Fresh ear yield, husk cover, shrunken-2 super-sweet corn, yield of marketable cobs


The water industry as a whole consumes a considerable amount of energy in the treatment and distribution of water and wastewater. Like all sectors of society today, the industry is focusing efforts on reducing its CO2 emissions and improving the sustainability of its systems and practices. One way of achieving this is through the use of micro-hydropower (MHP) installations in water infrastructure for energy recovery purposes. This paper presents a review of energy use and CO2 emissions in the water industry as well as highlighting the opportunities and challenges for MHP energy recovery. The results indicate that significant potential exists for energy recovery in the water industry. However, many previous investigations have not considered key complexities such as variations in flows or turbine efficiency. Similarly, accurate costing and return on investment data are often absent or lacking sensitivity analysis. Further research is required to address the risks and long-term reliability of installations, alongside the development of firm policy to direct and incentivise sustainability gains in this area.


Background: The best way to run the economy is usually to let people produce and
consume goods without restrictions or government intervention. This interaction of
supply and demand in the market leads to an equilibrium at the point where marginal
benefits equal marginal costs. The power of market prices arising from this perfect
competition organizes production and consumption in a way that maximizes welfare,
so-called as Pareto-optimality. Yet, conditions are not always "perfect". There are things
that only government can do. This paper discusses the presence of public goods in
the health sector as an example where market fails to perform efficiently.
Subject and methods: This policy paper reviews micro-economic theories that
address public goods and private goods in the health sector. Empirical evidence is
presented to support (or to refute) the theories.
Results: A pure public good is a good or service, such as information that warns the
hazard of tobacco use, but the consumption of which by one person does not reduce
its availability to others in society, It is not possible to charge for a public good because
no one can be excluded from using them. and no one wants to charge for because it
does not cost anything to accommodate additional users. As such the public good
must be subsidized or provided by government if it is to be produced efficiently. The
government production of a public good also is advantageous because government
can assess taxes to pay for it.
Conclusions: This paper has discussed the policy issues concerning the provision
of public goods and regulation of private goods by the government. Firstly,the definitions
of public good and private good were explained, by citing relevant examples in the
health sector. The efficient level of provision of a public good, market failure due to
public goods, the rationale for government intervention. and privatization of public
goods. were then discussed along the remaining of the paper.
Keywords: perfect competition, public good, private good, government intervention,
health sector


After a partial deactivation, g-alumina (g-Al2O3) is a good catalyst for selective methylation of 1,2-benzenediol at 260-310 Deg. The main products are the desired 3-methyl-1,2-benzenediol and 2-methoxyphenol, which may be converted in another step into 3-methyl-1,2-benzenediol, giving an overall selectivity for the desired products of 80 to 90%. The catechol forms a strongly chemisorbed surface species on g-alumina and its steric-adsorption model correlates with the kinetic data. [on SciFinder (R)]


In the UK, paediatricians, in common with other doctors, are required to learn and develop as professionals, or "do CPD". There are probably as many approaches to this as there are people who maintain professional status. To briefly summarise for those not in the UK, or who are in a training job where things are done a little differently: Our regulatory body, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, describes the range of things we can legitimately describe as CPD. We—mostly—fill out a diary of our activities, which is scrutinised at our yearly appraisal, the record of which is used by our Responsible Officer to recommend to the General Medical Council that we revalidate—that we maintain our licence to practice. Whether this process is meaningful depends on the person filling out the diary, and to a lesser extent the appraiser. The diary asks us to identify our learning needs, and, I'll be honest, this is the bit where I fall pretty short. I can spend an hour in a fascinating X-ray meeting, and learn all sorts of amazing things— and even think, and record, that I need to find out a little more about, say, the significance of an incidental finding of an arachnoid cyst on an MRI scan of the brain. But it is very rare that I get the chance to actually answer that question, because there is always something new to look for, think about, find out about. Although I would hope that I'm learning all the time, the completion of the cycle—where I identify my need and address it—is weak for me. At least, it is most of the time. But sometimes I get really lucky. I have the advantage of working with some great folk, and being able to represent a journal, and therefore I can commission an article on precisely that—what do I do about the incidental arachnoid cyst? In this issue my Editor's Choice is a paper by Chirag Patel and Desi Rodrigues, Fifteen minute consultation: Incidental findings on brain and spine imaging (see page 208). It unpicks one of one of the heartsink features of modern medicine, where you've done a test for a perfectly good reason, and have thrown up a seemingly random finding. I often warn families of this very possibility: "The thing is, our tests are sometimes too good, and sometimes turn up with information that we need to share with you, but that actually has nothing to do with why we did the test in the first place." It's a compelling reason to minimise testing wherever possible—I'm sure that on many occasions my own well meaning but over-eager investigation has resulted in what will turn out to be a lifetime of higher insurance payments. The complexity of brain imaging—and the complexity of the brain—means that these incidental findings can be perplexing, and set in a chain a series of medical consequences. The "cut out and keep" aspect of the paper is table 1, which at the very least will help you share care with neurosurgeons. Education & Practice is the CPD journal in the Archives of Disease in Childhood stable. I'd like to hear what things you'd like to learn about, or would like to write about. So, do me a favour—if you write a question to yourself in your own CPD diary, and it looks like a good one, but like me you know you're unlikely to get around to answering it, pop it in an email to me. Oh, and finally. Change is afoot. Much more in the next edition, in February...