Extraordinary marine inundation scattered clasts southward on the island of Anegada, 120 km south of the Puerto Rico Trench, sometime between 1200 and 1480 calibrated years (cal yr) CE. Many of these clasts were likely derived from a fringing reef and from the sandy flat that separates the reef from the island's north shore. The scattered clasts include no fewer than 200 coral boulders, mapped herein for the first time and mainly found hundreds of meters inland. Many of these are complete colonies of the brain coral Diploria strigosa . Other coral species represented include Orbicella (formerly Montastraea ) annularis , Porites astreoides , and Acropora palmata . Associated bioclastic carbonate sand locally contains articulated cobble-size valves of the lucine Codakia orbicularis and entire conch shells of Strombus gigas , mollusks that still inhabit the sandy shallows between the island's north shore and a fringing reef beyond. Imbricated limestone slabs are clustered near some of the coral boulders. In addition, fields of scattered limestone boulders and cobbles near sea level extend mainly southward from limestone sources as much as 1 km inland. Radiocarbon ages have been obtained from 27 coral clasts, 8 lucine valves, and 3 conch shells. All these additional ages predate 1500 cal yr CE, all but 2 are in the range 1000–1500 cal yr CE, and 16 of 22 brain coral ages cluster in the range 1200–1480 cal yr CE. The event marked by these coral and mollusk clasts likely occurred in the last centuries before Columbus (before 1492 CE). The pre-Columbian deposits surpass Anegada's previously reported evidence for extreme waves in post-Columbian time. The coarsest of the modern storm deposits consist of coral rubble that lines the north shore and sandy fans on the south shore; neither of these storm deposits extends more than 50 m inland. More extensive overwash, perhaps by the 1755 Lisbon tsunami, is marked primarily by a sheet of sand and shells found mainly below sea level beneath the floors of modern salt ponds. This sheet extends more than 1 km southward from the north shore and dates to the interval 1650–1800 cal yr CE. Unlike the pre-Columbian deposits, it lacks coarse clasts from the reef or reef flat; its shell assemblage is instead dominated by cerithid gastropods that were merely stirred up from a marine pond in the island's interior. In their inland extent and clustered pre-Columbian ages, the coral clasts and associated deposits suggest extreme waves unrivaled in recent millennia at Anegada. Bioclastic sand coats limestone 4 m above sea level in areas 0.7 and 1.3 km from the north shore. A coral boulder of nearly 1 m 3 is 3 km from the north shore by way of an unvegetated path near sea level. As currently understood, the extreme flooding evidenced by these and other clasts represents either an extraordinary storm or a tsunami of nearby origin. The storm would need to have produced tsunami-like bores similar to those of 2013 Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines. Normal faults and a thrust fault provide nearby tsunami sources along the eastern Puerto Rico Trench.


As an alternative to label swapping, an all-optical label stripping scheme based on SOA-MZI is proposed. The stripping process is self-controlled without any synchronization process. Simulation results show that high-quality stripping can be achieved, with no more than 0.09 dB of power fluctuation and 0.05 dB of phase fluctuation in stripped and remaining label. A power contrast ratio of 28 dB between the remaining and residual stripped label, and 30-dB signal-to-noise ratio can be reached, respectively. Parameters tolerance analysis shows that the stripping performance deteriorates little when considering the devices' imperfection in practice. The multihop simulation results also show that our scheme is applicable to large-scale optical packet switching networks.


Optical data communication is increasingly interesting for many applications in industrial processes. Therefore mass production is required to meet the requested price and lot sizes. Polymer optical waveguides show great promises to comply with price requirements while providing sufficient optical quality for short range data transmission. A high efficient fabrication technology using polymer materials could be able to create the essential backbone for 3D-optical data transmission in the future. The approach for high efficient fabrication technology of micro optics described in this paper is based on a self-assembly effect of fluids on preconditioned 3D-thermoformed polymer foils. Adjusting the surface energy on certain areas on the flexible substrate by flexographic printing mechanism is presented in this paper. With this technique conditioning lines made of silicone containing UV-varnish are printed on top of the foils and create gaps with the exposed substrate material in between. Subsequent fabrication processes are selected whether the preconditioned foil is coated with acrylate containing waveguide material prior or after the thermoforming process. Due to the different surface energy this material tends to dewet from the conditioning lines. It acts like regional barriers and sets the width of the arising waveguides. With this fabrication technology it is possible to produce multiple waveguides with a single coating process. The relevant printing process parameters that affect the quality of the generated waveguides are discussed and results of the produced waveguides with width ranging from 10 to 300 μm are shown.


While the impacts of health information technology (HIT) are widely studied, prior research presents mixed findings. In this study, a granular examination of the impact of HIT systems on how resources are allocated to healthcare tasks and processes was undertaken. A longitudinal field study that combined interview, archival, observation, and survey data was conducted. The effects of telemedicine on the input allocative efficiency of the healthcare process through the reallocation of organizational resources was evaluated and an assessment of whether gains in allocative efficiency resulted in improvements in organizational outcomes, such as lower hospitalization rates and lower uncertainty in patient wait time, was conducted. Applying the theory of swift and even flow, our findings suggest that the gains in allocative efficiency for some processes are associated with improved organizational outcomes.


Arguments about discrimination based on sexual orientation generally rest on interpretations of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment or about rights to autonomy rooted in modern substantive due process doctrine. Such theories typically presuppose a government that remains neutral among competing moral claims. This Article, by contrast, develops an account of rights against sexual orientation discrimination - including recognition of same-sex marriage - that does not depend on a thin moral conception of the liberal state. Instead, I situate lesbian/gay rights within a Lockean political theory of consent. John Locke's theory of government, which was highly influential for the Founders of the United States, provides a positive moral basis for lesbian/gay equality. Locke's theory derives from the Bible, the observation that the Christian God did not establish governments among humans. Locke also rejected the account of original sin according to which humans need strong government to control their sinful natures. The only reasonable inference is that God intended for all humans to start out as equals, and to negotiate political solutions among themselves in keeping with the imperative to protect the natural rights to life, liberty, and property. Locke's theory depends on the capacity of individuals for moral reasoning. Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation entails denying the moral-reasoning capacity of lesbians and gay men. Why would any rational lesbian or gay man consent to a government that has the power to discriminate against them based on their sexual orientation? Conservative opposition to same-sex marriage in the twenty-first century is functionally equivalent to conservative support for absolute monarchy in the seventeenth century.


PURPOSE
To compare the global positioning system- and accelerometry-derived running demands, creatine kinase (CK), and self-reported wellness during an Olympic Games in international hockey.

METHODS
Data were collected across 5 games during the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. Global positioning system units (10 Hz) were used to assess the running demands, accelerations, and decelerations of outfield players in a men's hockey squad with matches 2 to 5 compared with match 1. CK was used as a marker of muscle damage, and self-reported psychometric questionnaires were used to assess wellness, with each of the 5 matches compared with precompetition assessments.

RESULTS
There were significant increases (P < .05) in either, or both, absolute and relative total distance, player load, high-speed running distance, sprint distance, and accelerations and decelerations, compared with baseline. There was a significant decrease (P < .05) in maximal velocity by match 5. CK significantly increased from match 1 to 5 and displayed significant correlations with total distance (r = .55) and player load (r = .41). Muscle soreness correlated with total distance and player load, with other wellness markers unchanged compared with baseline.

CONCLUSIONS
International hockey athletes may maintain or increase running activities over the course of an Olympic tournament; however, this may be impacted by situational (match score/outcome) and environmental (ambient temperature) factors. Despite CK and muscle soreness displaying relationships with running variables, further work is needed to establish their individual value in monitoring international hockey athletes.


Speaker verification is one of the pattern recognition task that authenticate a person by his or her voice. This thesis deals with a relatively new technique of classification
that is the self-organizing map (SOM). Self-organizing map, as an unsupervised learning artificial neural network, rarely used as final classification step in pattern
recognition task due to its relatively low accuracy. A two-stage self-organizing map design has been implemented in this thesis and showed improved results over conventional single stage design. For speech features extraction, this thesis does not introduce any new technique. A well study method that is the linear prediction analysis (LP A) has been used. Linear predictive analysis derived coefficients are extracted from segmented raw speech signal to train and test the front stage self-organizing map. Unlike other multistage or hierarchical self-organizing map designs, this thesis utilized residual vectors generated from front stage self-organizing map to train and test the second stage selforganizing map. The results showed that by breaking the classification tasks into two level or more detail resolution, an improvement of more than 5% can be obtained. Moreover, the computation time is also reduced greatly.


A Review of:
Tynan, M. & McCarney, E. (2014). "Click here to order this book": A case study of print and electronic patron-driven acquisition in University College Dublin. New Review of Academic Librarianship, 20(2), 233-250. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13614533.2014.906352

Abstract

Objective – To evaluate the effectiveness of the first patron-driven acquisitions program in the Republic of Ireland and determine the effects of this acquisitions strategy on circulation, budget, and collection development.

Design – Case study.

Setting – A large university on two campuses in the Republic of Ireland with a total of over 25,000 students.

Subjects – Patron-driven acquisitions including 1,128 electronic monographs and 1,044 print monographs.

Methods – The authors evaluated titles purchased during a five-month patron-driven acquisitions trial conducted in 2013. Patron-selected titles were compared to traditionally acquired (faculty and librarian-selected) titles acquired during the same time period based on subject area and circulation data. Results from the trial were also compared to a literature review of patron-driven acquisitions trials conducted at other institutions. Information on selectors was examined for patron-driven print acquisitions.

Main Results – The most frequently acquired subject areas included business, politics, English, drama and film, medicine, psychology, history, and law. These frequently acquired subject areas were consistent across print and electronic patron-driven acquisitions, traditionally acquired titles at the institution, and data from the patron-driven acquisitions trials of other institutions. Patron-selected titles in art history and architecture subjects showed a significant print preference over electronic. Patron-selected electronic titles were used 8.45 times compared to 3.27 uses for traditionally selected electronic titles. Patron-selected print titles circulated 1.32 times compared to 1.04 circulations for faculty-selected titles and 0.63 circulations for librarian-selected titles. For patron-driven print acquisitions, 63% of selectors were students and 37% were faculty and staff.

Conclusion – The trial was considered successful in circulation and subject area diversity. Subject breakdown for patron-selected titles was consistent with expectations and mirrored traditional acquisitions strategies and expected demand. Patron-selected titles showed a circulation advantage over traditionally selected titles, though this advantage was more significant for electronic titles. The library intends to continue with patron-driven acquisitions. Considerations for future trials, including higher quality and more selective discovery records for print titles, more informative marketing, and better timing, could improve results.


Piezoelectric thin films have existing and promising new applications in microwave filter technologies. The final performance depends on many parameters, and very specifically on the materials properties of each involved material. In this article, materials and properties for thin-film bulk acoustic wave resonators are discussed on some selected issues: the piezoelectric coefficients and acoustic losses of AlN, the relation of the first one with microstructural parameters, the inclusion of parasitic elements, and the merits of and problems with ferroelectric materials.


Range imaging offers an inexpensive and accurate means for digitizing the shape of three-dimensional objects. Because most objects self occlude, no single range image suffices to describe the entire object. We present a method for combining a collection of range images into a single polygonal mesh that completely describes an object to the extent that it is visible from the outside. The steps in our method are: 1) align the meshes with each other using a modified iterated closest-point algorithm, 2) zipper together adjacent meshes to form a continuous surface that correctly captures the topology of the object, and 3) compute local weighted averages of surface positions on all meshes to form a consensus surface geometry. Our system differs from previous approaches in that it is incremental; scans are acquired and combined one at a time. This approach allows us to acquire and combine large numbers of scans with minimal storage overhead. Our largest models contain up to 360,000 triangles. All the steps needed to digitize an object that requires up to 10 range scans can be performed using our system with five minutes of user interaction and a few hours of compute time. We show two models created using our method with range data from a commercial rangefinder that employs laser stripe technology.


Over the past few years machine learning has seen a renewed explosion of interest, following a number of studies showing the effectiveness of neural networks in a range of tasks which had previously been considered incredibly hard. Neural networks' effectiveness in the fields of image recognition and natural language processing stems primarily from the vast amounts of data available to companies and researchers, coupled with the huge amounts of compute power available in modern accelerators such as GPUs, FPGAs and ASICs. There are a number of approaches available to developers for utilizing GPGPU technologies such as SYCL, OpenCL and CUDA, however many applications require the same low level mathematical routines. Libraries dedicated to accelerating these common routines allow developers to easily make full use of the available hardware without requiring low level knowledge of the hardware themselves, however such libraries are often provided by hardware manufacturers for specific hardware such as cuDNN [9] for Nvidia hardware or MIOpen [5] for AMD hardware. SYCL-DNN is a new open-source library dedicated to providing accelerated routines for neural network operations which are hardware and vendor agnostic. Built on top of the SYCL open standard and written entirely in standard C++, SYCL-DNN allows a user to easily accelerate neural network code for a wide range of hardware using a modern C++ interface. The library is tested on AMD's OpenCL for GPU, Intel's OpenCL for CPU and GPU, ARM's OpenCL for Mali GPUs as well as ComputeAorta's OpenCL for R-Car CV engine and host CPU. In this talk we will present performance figures for SYCL-DNN on this range of hardware, and discuss how high performance was achieved on such a varied set of accelerators with such different hardware features.


In this paper, we present the design, implementation and evaluation of a new distributed shared memory (DSM) coherence model called multiple-writer entry consistency (MEC). MEC combines the efficient communication mechanisms of Lazy Release Consistency (LRC) with the flexible data management of the Shared Regions and Entry Consistency (EC) models. This is achieved in MEC by decoupling synchronization from coherence (in contrast to the tight coupling of synchronization and coherence present in EC) while retaining the familiar synchronization structure found in Release Consistent (RC) programs. The advantage of MEC is that it allows region-based coherence protocols (those that manage data at the granularity of user-defined shared regions) to be used along side page-based protocols within an application and within the RC framework. Our experimental evaluation on an 8 processor system shows that using MEC reduces parallel execution times by margins ranging from 5% to 46% in five of the six applications that we study. However, the parallel execution time of the LRC version of the remaining application is lower than the MEC version by 48%. We conclude that offering both page-based and region-based models for coherence within the same system is not only practical but necessary.


Indonesia"s foreign policy based on national interest is confirmed in the opening of 1945 Constitution. In Joko Widodo"s government focus on protection of citizen becomes priority. In addition the government also focuses on maintaining Indonesia"s sovereignty and intensifying economic diplomacy.The Foreign Ministry translates of what concept of people-oriented foreign policy becomes pro people diplomacy and down to earth diplomacy. What is the meaning of this concept and what are implications of the policy are investigated in this research. In order to understand the policy this research looks at some cases of migrant worker particularly in Malaysia. The research uses qualitative approach with descriptive analytic in nature. Data collections for the research are interview, observation, documentation studies and focus group discussion. Source of data was collected from Indonesian Foreign Policy Ministry, Indonesia"s" diplomatic office in Kuala Lumpur and Johor, Malaysia. Data analysis for the research is also used qualitative approach. Research found that Foreign Ministry set up strategy to achieve people oriented foreign policy focus with concept of people"s diplomacy. Protection citizen set in priority with enlargement of organization and fund increased. It shows there is sense of urgency in application to protect Indonesia"s overseas particularly migrant worker. Benefit of the policy can be found from many cases in Kuala Lumpur and Johor where diplomats in charge of helping the worker actively find solution. However due the giant scale of the cases protecting people policy is not easy task for the government. Keywords: Foreign Policy, Indonesia, Oriented People, Pro People, Diplomacy, Migrant Worker, Malaysia, Johor.


Abstract Empirical evidence on the expectations hypothesis of the term structure is in-conclusive and its validity widely debated. Using a cointegrated VAR model of US treasury yields, this paper extends a common approach to test the theory. If, as we find, spreads between two yields are non-stationary, the expectations hypothesis fails. However, we present evidence that differences between two spreads are stationary. This suggests that the curvature of the yield curve may be a more meaningful indicator of expected future interest rates than the slope. Furthermore, we characterise level and slope by deriving the common trends inherent in the cointegrated VAR, and establish feedback patterns between them and the macroeconomy.


The emergence of new protein-coding genes in a specific lineage or species provides raw materials for evolutionary adaptations. Until recently, the biology of new genes emerging particularly from non-genic sequences remained unexplored. Although the new genes are subjected to variable selection pressure and face rapid deletion, some of them become functional and are retained in the gene pool. To acquire functional novelties, new genes often get integrated into the pre-existing ancestral networks. However, the mechanism by which young proteins acquire novel interactions remains unanswered till date. Since structural orientation contributes hugely to the mode of proteins' physical interactions, in this regard, we put forward an interesting question - Do new genes encode proteins with stable folds? Addressing the question, we demonstrated that the intrinsic disorder inversely correlates with the evolutionary gene ages - i.e. young proteins are richer in intrinsic disorder than the ancient ones. We further noted that young proteins, which are initially poorly connected hubs, prefer to be structurally more disordered than well-connected ancient proteins. The phenomenon strikingly defies the usual trend of well-connected proteins being highly disordered in structure. We justified that structural disorder might help poorly connected young proteins to undergo promiscuous interactions, which provides the foundation for novel protein interactions. The study focuses on the evolutionary perspectives of young proteins in the light of structural adaptations.


We present a new algorithm for probabilistic planning with no observability. Our algorithm, called Probabilistic-FF, extends the heuristic forward-searchmachinery of Conformant-FF to problems with probabilistic uncertainty about both the initial state and action effects. Specifically, Probabilistic-FF combines Conformant-FF's techniques with a powerful machinery for weighted model counting in (weighted) CNFs, serving to elegantly define both the search space and the heuristic function. Our evaluation of Probabilistic-FF shows its fine scalability in a range of probabilistic domains, constituting a several orders of magnitude improvement over previous results in this area. We use a problematic case to point out the main open issue to be addressed by further research.


High-throughput DNA sequencing has become a mainstay for the discovery of genomic variants that may cause disease or affect phenotype. A next-generation sequencing pipeline typically identifies thousands of variants in each sample. A particular challenge is the annotation of each variant in a way that is useful to downstream consumers of the data, such as clinical sequencing centers or researchers. These users may require that all data storage and analysis remain on secure local servers to protect patient confidentiality or intellectual property, may have unique and changing needs to draw on a variety of annotation data sets and may prefer not to rely on closed-source applications beyond their control. Here we describe scalable methods for using the plugin capability of the Ensembl Variant Effect Predictor to enrich its basic set of variant annotations with additional data on genes, function, conservation, expression, diseases, pathways and protein structure, and describe an extensible framework for easily adding additional custom data sets.


We present a study of end-to-end web access failures in the Internet. Part of our characterization of failures is based on directly observable end-to-end information. We also present novel analyses that reveal aspects of end-to-end failures that would be hard to discern otherwise. First, we combine end-to-end failure observations across a large number of clients to classify failures as server-related or client-related. Second, we correlate failures attributed to a client or server with BGP churn for the corresponding IP address prefix(es), to shed light on the end-to-end impact of BGP instability.
 Our study is based on failure observations during a month-long experiment involving 134 client hosts (across Planet-Lab, commercial dialup and broadband ISPs, and a corporate network) repeatedly accessing 80 websites. We find that the median failure rate of web accesses is about 1.5%, which is non-negligible. About 34--42% of the web access failures are due to DNS problems, primarily due to the inability of the client to connect to its local DNS server. The majority of the remaining failures are due to TCP connection establishment failures. Also, by correlating failure observations across clients and servers, we find that server-side problems are the dominant cause of TCP connection failures.


Gross contracts appear to be the most common contract form for procured public transport in Sweden and elsewhere. This contract form, it has been argued, gives weak incentives for operators to deliver the desired quality level. Therefore many procuring public transport authorities amend contracts with quality incentives. This paper is probably one of the first studies to examine how such quality incentives influence quality outcomes with focus on cancelled departures and delays. The main findings are that the introduction of quality incentives are correlated with both increases and decreases in measured quality outcomes. We do not think, however, that the incentives in themselves have negative effects but hypothesize that the results are driven by underlying cost changes for achieving desired quality objectives that exceed the possible revenues from the incentives. In interviews with the Stockholm public transport authority (SL) and some operators, two central observations surface. The first is that there are causes for quality failures that are not solely the responsibility of operators and that these are therefore not fully reached by the incentives, and the second is that the operators believe that they have exhausted what they can do under the current contracts. * This research was financed by the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems (Vinnova) and by the Stockholm County Public Transport Authority Kjell Jansson and Roger Pyddoke 2


In this issue, Fortney and colleagues (1) open the next phase of research regarding organized depression care programs. The effectiveness of these collaborative care programs is now well established (2, 3). Essential ingredients include outreach and support by a care manager as well as specialty supervision or consultation for patients who do not respond to standard treatment (2, 3). Such programs were initially developed in settings where care managers and consulting specialists were locally available (4). Fortney et al. compared two strategies for providing these services in settings lacking local mental health resources. Five federally qualified health centers were randomly assigned to implement depression care management using either local primary care staff (with no specific supervision or quality control) or centralized care managers supported by an off-site consulting specialist. Patients in clinics using the centralized approach were approximately three times as likely to experience significant improvement or to achieve remission of depression. Fidelity to the care management protocol (goal setting, encouragement of positive activities, and systematic assessment of treatment adherence and outcomes) was markedly higher for the centralized program. Antidepressant treatment did not differ between the two groups, suggesting that benefits of the centralized program were due to the psychosocial aspects of care management, including both nonspecific support and specific behavior-change interventions.

This finding has important implications for the implementation of organized depression care programs. Care management or collaborative care programs can certainly work in settings lacking on-site or local mental health providers. In fact, the benefits of organized depression care programs are greatest where existing care is minimal (5–7). But the Fortney et al. trial suggests that organized depression care programs in resource-poor settings are more likely to work if care management is centralized, care managers are employed full-time in this capacity, and care is supervised by off-site specialists. While one trial involving five clinics and a few care managers does not definitively settle this question, the only high-quality evidence available strongly favors the centralized approach.

More important, these findings raise broader questions regarding the implementation of other empirically supported mental health treatments. Efforts to disseminate these complex interventions have typically focused on training and supervision to improve services delivered by local community therapists (8). The Fortney et al. trial suggests the possibility of an alternative approach: delivering empirically supported treatments from a central location using dedicated clinicians. To traditionally minded clinicians, centralized or "factory farmed" psychosocial treatments would seem oxymoronic. But this question should be settled by evidence rather than tradition.

In our daily lives as consumers, we frequently face choices between locally made and centrally made services. Our preference for one or the other depends on the specifics of the situation. For example, many of us would prefer to eat hand-made bread, but most would prefer not to drive automobiles that depend on hand-made brakes. We might prefer corn that's locally grown on a family farm, but most of us would be reluctant to fly in homemade airplanes. From those choices, we can infer our rules for choosing things that are either locally grown or factory-made. Some things (like fresh-baked bread and hand-picked sweet corn) just don't travel well; the locally grown option will usually taste better. And variability between loaves of bread or ears of corn is hardly a problem. Variation often adds to the appeal and may add to the flavor. In contrast, airplanes and automobile brakes hold their quality well over long distances. Both were made to travel. For both airplanes and auto brakes, standardization is a virtue. We don't mind that our brake parts were stamped out by machines that have made those same parts thousands of times. While sitting in an airplane about to take off, it's comforting to think, "Millions of people have flown billions of miles in planes exactly like this one."

Considering these examples, we might ask: Are mental health treatments more like sweet corn or automobile brakes? We would usually put medication treatments in the latter group, where we value uniform quality over one-of-a-kind craftsmanship. The recent meningitis outbreak traced to a compounding pharmacy only reinforces the argument for "factory-made" pharmaceuticals. A centralized and standardized production process for medication will generally improve both quality and safety. But we have traditionally considered psychosocial interventions (like care management or actual psychotherapy) to be more like artisan bread than auto brakes. We prefer our psychosocial interventions to be locally grown, hand-made, and one-of-a-kind.

Care managers with the same background and training delivered the same intervention through either a centralized or a localized model. The centralized model was clearly superior.

The robust findings in the Fortney et al. trial cause us to reconsider an automatic preference for locally grown psychosocial interventions. Recalling our rules for choosing locally grown sweet corn and factory-made auto brakes, we can ask two questions about any psychosocial treatment. First, does it travel well, or does the quality decline over distance? Second, is local variation beneficial, or does centralized and standardized production improve quality or effectiveness?

Consistent evidence indicates that psychosocial interventions can be provided at a distance—via telephone or videoconference—with only minimal loss of taste or freshness. While the original collaborative care programs emphasized in-person treatment, many subsequent versions have depended largely or entirely on telephone contact (9, 10). Several trials support the clinical effectiveness of psychotherapy for depression delivered entirely by telephone (11). Psychiatric assessment and treatment via videoconference appear to be as clinically effective as in-person services (12). In the most direct comparison of in-person and telephone psychotherapy, Mohr et al. (13) randomly assigned primary care patients to receive cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy for depression by telephone or face-to-face. The two treatments were delivered by the same therapists following the same treatment protocol, so this comparison isolates the specific question regarding loss of clinical effectiveness in telephonic treatment. Patients assigned to telephone psychotherapy were more likely to continue treatment and experienced similar short-term improvement, but they were somewhat more likely to experience a return of depression 6 months later.

We have limited data directly comparing the fidelity or quality of locally produced (and more variable) psychosocial interventions to that of centrally produced (and more uniform) treatments. The Fortney et al. trial addresses this question directly. Care managers with the same background and training delivered the same intervention through either a centralized or a localized model. The centralized model was clearly superior—in quality of the service delivered, patients' perceptions of helpfulness, and patients' clinical outcomes. Any benefit of local relationships with patients or providers was outweighed by the higher quality of the centralized program. This finding in favor of centralization and standardization might not apply to treatments that are more intensive and complex, such as true psychotherapy. We can certainly point to evidence that centralized psychotherapy programs have clinical benefit. But we have no high-quality evidence directly comparing the effectiveness of centralized and locally provided psychotherapy. We hope that Fortney and colleagues' provocative findings will provoke direct comparisons of centralized and locally produced approaches for a wider range of psychosocial or psychological treatments.

Healthy competition between centralized and localized options might improve them both—or lead to some optimal compromise. Mental health services delivered over a distance could develop a personal touch, and locally grown services could learn to systematically measure outcomes, monitor fidelity, and improve consistency. After all, modern statistics and experimental design began with traditional farmers trying to improve their harvests.


Pliocene rocks of the Imperial and Palm Spring Formations in southern California contain reworked Cretaceous pollen that helps determine the timing of erosion of Cretaceous rocks on the Colorado Plateau. The stratigraphic distribution of reworked pollen in the Imperial and Palm Spring Formations suggests that erosion of Cretaceous rocks in the southern part of the Colorado Plateau began by 4.5 Ma. Erosion of Cretaceous rocks in the northern part of the plateau began at 3.9 Ma. This erosional history indicates that rapid and extensive erosion of the Colorado Plateau occurred during the Pliocene and supports the hypothesis that much of the Grand Canyon was cut during the Pliocene, rather than earlier in the Tertiary. Rapid erosion and transport from the Colorado Plateau require the climate in that region during the Pliocene to have been significantly wetter than it is today.


We study the problem of efficient identification of particular classes of ptime languages, called uniform. We require the learner to identify each language of such a class by constantly guessing, after a small number of examples, the same index for it. We present three identification paradigms based on different kind of examples: identification on informant (positive and negative information), measure identification (positive information in a probabilistic setting), identification with probability (positive and negative information in a probabilistic setting). In each case we introduce two efficient identification paradigms, called efficient and very efficient identification respectively. We characterize efficient identification on informant and with probability and, as a corollary, we show that the two identification paradigms are equivalent. A necessary condition is shown for very efficient identification on informant, which becomes sufficient if and only if P = NP . The same condition is sufficient for very efficient identification with probability if and only if NP=RP . We show that (very) efficient identification on informant and with probability are strictly stronger than (very) efficient measure identification.


Current conventional wisdom holds that patent exhaustion and copyright first sale—which allow you to buy a patented smartphone or a copyrighted book and use or resell it for any purpose—have longstanding common law bases first referenced in U.S. courts by Chief Justice Taney in the mid-nineteenth century: "when the machine passes to the hands of the purchaser, it is no longer within the limits of the [patent]. It passes outside of it." The doctrines are at the heart of the modern technology-based economy and have been repeatedly in front of the Supreme Court: first sale in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; and exhaustion now on appeal in Lexmark International, Inc. v. Impression Products, Inc. Without them, consumers would need to ensure they have all intellectual property permissions needed to use or resell purchased goods, much like the confusion around rights to digital content obtained through the internet. This Article, however, shows the conventional account to be mistaken. Taney's statement was likely politically driven dicta in a case involving only patent licensees holding franchises to build and operate proprietary retail businesses. There were no sales of goods. But its compelling spatial metaphor was repeated in other opinions until taking on the veneer of longstanding law. Nonetheless it took twenty years for the Court to hold an implied use-only right upon sale of patented goods, and forty years to find a resale right. This Article unpacks the context of Taney's bootstrapped quote and traces its incremental transformation to show that even when fully formed by 1900 it was simply a default presumption for unconditional sales in which full title in the good passed to the buyer with no right of reversion. Sales subject to express, mutually assented conditions allowed the patentee to pursue patent property-type remedies in appropriate situations, and not just contract remedies. The unifying principle was to enforce the basis of the bargain, especially to protect licensees and purchasers from patentee "gotcha" tactics. Accordingly, the Article advocates a flexible approach to exhaustion rather than a mandatory rule, while giving enhanced scrutiny to consumer transactions, to allow fair, innovative transactions at different price points in the new sharing, goods-as-services, and digital economies.


In the autumn of 2006, when the leadership team of India's second largest provider of IT products, services and consulting Wipro Technologies Ltd, gathered to consider the future of its burgeoning consulting business. What started as a strategic initiative 5 years ago in the backdrop of 2001 IT slowdown, had now matured into a thriving business. But to become a business leader in technology consulting, Wipro needed to go further. It needed a strategic focus that can only come with a dedicated organization, and a structure that would give it the scale and kind of push required to fully take advantage of the opportunities this sector had to offer. Wipro's strategic reorientation of its consulting business was also essential if it was to counter moves by its main rivals, Tata Consultancy Service (TCS), and Infosys. Infosys was busy establishing Infosys Consulting Services as a stand along business, and TCS had integrated its consulting initiative within the firm's vertical structure and looked towards consulting as key strategic initiative in becoming engaged in transformation projects and establishing itself as an end-to-end technology enabled services provider. Wipro, however, was having difficulties taking its consulting business to the next level. Fragmented organizational structure prevented the management to accurately assessing both scale as well as the real worth of its consulting capabilities. It was not clear how the company should align consulting capabilities with industry verticals and global business accounts. On top of this, Wipro's leadership was also concerned about internal friction. The high profit margin in consulting was leading several Wipro units to develop consulting services alongside their other business lines. This improved business unit bottom-line directly, and Wipro's revenues indirectly, but it also gave momentum to unhealthy internal competition. How far could the leadership have allowed these fragmented business units to live in their own silos was necessary to be addressed urgently. It was important for the leadership to tackle the issue of cross coupling among the organizational units along with their own cohesion for a better management oversight and sense of direction. Wipro's leadership had their plates overflowing in that meeting and everyone knew that the time was running out and they needed to act and act fast!!


Money makes the world go round. The growth of the now 370 trillion dollar derivatives market, according to a Bank of International Settlements estimate for the first half of 2006, serves to remind us that the financial sector is the compass from which both companies and countries take their direction. Yet as news about climate chaos, persistent poverty and intensifying inequality continues to percolate our pleasant lives in the West, we have to ask whether money is now causing the downfall of the world. In recent years more people have been choosing to engage in global finance to solve problems of the environment and international development. Their efforts herald a new paradigm for ethical finance, which no longer focuses on personal ethical dilemmas within existing professional frameworks but on how to use opportunities as a financial services professional to transform those frameworks so the world's most powerful motor - money - makes the world work around barriers to a more sustainable, just and healthy future. Our paper outlines how this is happening both in professions and in academia. It identifies urgent interconnected challenges of climate change, unemployment, local enterprise and poverty reduction, and suggests that a new approach to socially responsible investing is required to create new frameworks for the innovative financing of sustainable enterprise in the global South. Investors can make money while contributing to low-carbon high-employment societies, if they help support the development of appropriate risk adjusting mechanisms. This focus on creating new financial frameworks is one of the highest embodiments of a commitment to our common humanity and ecology, which is the ground of all subsequent ethical discourse and philosophy.


Statutory interpretation scholarship generally imagines a sharp divide between statutory text and legislative history. This Article shows that scholars have failed to consider the implications of a hybrid type of text that is enacted by Congress and signed by the president, but which looks like legislative history. This text commonly appears at the beginning of a bill under headings such as "Findings" and "Purposes." This enacted text often provides a detailed rationale for legislation and sets out Congress's intent and purposes. Notably, it is drafted in plain language by political congressional staff rather than technical drafters, so it may be the portion of the enacted text that is most accessible to members of Congress and their high-level staff. Despite enacted findings and purposes' apparent importance to interpretation, courts infrequently reference them and lack a coherent theory of how they should be used in statutory interpretation. In most cases in which courts have referenced them, they have relegated them to a status similar to that of unenacted legislative history despite the fact that they are less subject to formalist and pragmatic objections. Perhaps because courts have infrequently and inconsistently relied on enacted findings and purposes, scholars have also failed to consider them, so their relevance to statutory interpretation has gone mostly unrecognized and untheorized in the legal literature.

This Article argues that all of the enacted text of a statute must be read together and with equal weight, as part of the whole law Congress enacted, to come up with an interpretation that the entire text can bear. This is more likely to generate an interpretation in line with Congress's intent than a mode of interpretation that focuses on the specific meaning of isolated terms based on dictionaries, canons, unenacted legislative history, or other unenacted tools. This Article shows that, when textualists' formalist arguments against legislative history are taken off the table, there may be less that divides textualists from purposivists. Enacted findings and purposes may offer a text-based, and therefore more constrained and defensible, path forward for purposivism, which has been in retreat in recent decades in the face of strong textualist attacks.


After a long preparatory process, a Directive harmonizing certain national rules on private enforcement of competition law has been adopted by the European Parliament. In this contribution it is investigated whether harmonization of these rules was desirable and whether the main objectives of the directive, the improvement of the possibilities for victims to obtain damages and of the interaction between public and private competition, are likely to be achieved. With regard to the aim of increasing the possibilities for victims of antitrust infringements to obtain compensation, we can conclude that the Directive indeed increases this possibility, although various obstacles to private action are likely to remain. This includes obstacles in relation to (lacking) possibilities for collective action, the requirement to prove negligence or intent, and rules on disclosure of evidence. With regard to the interaction of public and private enforcement of competition law a crucial issue is finding the right balance between using the leniency program (which the European Commission needs in order to be able to effectively trace cartels) in the public enforcement of competition law and compensating victims via enforcement of private law. Whether the Directive has chosen the most desirable option to achieve this balance is debatable.


Firearms account for a substantial proportion of external causes of death, injury, and disability across the world. Legislation to regulate firearms has often been passed with the intent of reducing problems related to their use. However, lack of clarity around which interventions are effective remains a major challenge for policy development. Aiming to meet this challenge, we systematically reviewed studies exploring the associations between firearm-related laws and firearm homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries/deaths. We restricted our search to studies published from 1950 to 2014. Evidence from 130 studies in 10 countries suggests that in certain nations the simultaneous implementation of laws targeting multiple firearms restrictions is associated with reductions in firearm deaths. Laws restricting the purchase of (e.g., background checks) and access to (e.g., safer storage) firearms are also associated with lower rates of intimate partner homicides and firearm unintentional deaths in children, respectively. Limitations of studies include challenges inherent to their ecological design, their execution, and the lack of robustness of findings to model specifications. High quality research on the association between the implementation or repeal of firearm legislation (rather than the evaluation of existing laws) and firearm injuries would lead to a better understanding of what interventions are likely to work given local contexts. This information is key to move this field forward and for the development of effective policies that may counteract the burden that firearm injuries pose on populations.


The assessment of the efficacy of low level laser therapy (LLLT) for pain attenuation varies among institutions, all having their own method of assessment with no common standards. At the author's institution in the beginning, the patients were asked how they assessed their pain relief immediately after the treatment. They were to choose from excellent, good, fair, no change and poor. The overall efficacy rate was calculated by the numbers of patients scoring excellent and good, expressed as a percentage of the total number of patients. However, a large number of institutions have utilized the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) or the Pain Relief Score (PRS) for the assessment of treatment; but even then, the evaluation could not be considered uniform. Therefore, the standardization of the efficacy rate was continuously discussed among the practitioners of LLLT, dating back to the 9(th) annual meeting of the Japan Laser Therapy Association (JaLTA) in 1997. It took four years (including the 1997 meeting) until finally an agreement was reached and a new standard of efficacy was presented at the 12(th) JaLTA meeting in 2000, based on the PRS. The new standard defined excellent as pain reduction in any treatment session from 10 to 0 or 1, good as reduction from 10 to 2∼5, fair as reduction from 10 to 6∼8, no change as a reduction from 10 to 9∼10 and poor was defined as exacerbation of pain from 10 to 11 or greater. Efficacy rate was calculated by the number of patients scoring excellent and good expressed as a percentage of the total number of patients. For the purpose of reference, the VAS was to be used for patients receiving the treatment for the first time.


East Coast Fever (ECF) is a livestock disease caused by Theileria parva, a protozoan transmitted by the vector tick Rhipicephalus appendiculatus. This disease causes high mortality in cattle populations of Central and Eastern Africa, especially in exotic breeds. Here, we highlight genomic regions likely involved into tolerance/resistance mechanisms against ECF, and we introduce the estimation of their Spatial Area of Genotype Probability (SPAG) to delimit areas where the concerned genotypes are predicted to be present. During the NEXTGEN project, 803 Ugandan cattle were geo-referenced and genotyped (54K SNPs), while 532 tick occurrences were retrieved from a published database. To get a proxy of the parasite selective pressure, we used WorldClim bioclimatic variables to model vector ecological niche. Landscape genomics models were then used to detect cattle genotypes associated with vector probability of presence, and to estimate their SPAGs. Finally, climate change scenarios for 2070 were considered to compare the predicted shift in the vector niche with the estimated current SPAG. The analysis revealed two main areas of presence of possibly resistance-related genotypes, one South and one East of Lake Victoria. Climate change will probably shift tick niche southwards in the Eastern regions of Lake Victoria, inducing a critical area that currently does not show the candidate genotypes, but where disease will likely spread in the future. The combined use of SPAGs and niche maps could therefore facilitate the identification of regions of concern and to direct future targeted breeding schemes.


Celebrity advocacy for environmental causes has grown dramatically in recent decades. An examination of this expansion and the rise of causes such as climate change reveals the shifting politics and organization of advocacy. We address these changes to the construction and interpretation of celebrity advocacy and detail how they have produced a rich variety of environmental celebrity advocates. We also account for differences between legacy (e.g., radio, TV, newspapers) and online celebrities and their practices (e.g., hashtag publics, brandjacking, online communities). Environmental celebrity advocates' performances can be divided into nine tropes, each characterized in part by the particular varieties of environmentalism that they promote. We present the tropes and discuss their five cross-cutting themes. We conclude with a set of questions for future research on celebrity environmentalism.


Risk-only investment strategies have been growing in popularity as traditional in- vestment strategies have fallen short of return targets over the last decade. However, risk-based investors should be aware of four things. First, theoretical considerations and empirical studies show that apparently dictinct risk-based investment strategies are manifestations of a single effect. Second, turnover and associated transaction costs can be a substantial drag on return. Third, capital diversification benefits may be reduced. Fourth, there is an apparent connection between performance and risk diversification. To analyze risk diversification benefits in a consistent way, we introduce the Risk Diversification Index (RDI) which measures risk concentrations and complements the Herfindahl-Herschman Index (HHI) for capital concentrations.


London's bus network is one of the largest and most comprehensive urban transport systems in the world. The contribution of buses is recognised by implementing a series of initiatives including bus priority at traffic signals. London has a long history of the implementation of bus priority at traffic signals. It has kept pace with the development of new technologies by updating its bus priority system. Now, London is moving towards a bus management system based on global positioning system (GPS), which will also be used to provide bus priority at traffic signals. The authors describe theoretical work carried out by TRG on behalf of Transport for London Bus Priority Team to tackle the challenge posed by locational error associated with GPS where a traffic signal is close to a bus stop.


A rising tide in federalism scholarship and political discourse accords unmitigated praise to the notion of partnership between states and federal agencies. This Article reveals a more complicated picture. It begins by analyzing the penetrating but usually invisible role of "state interest groups" — lobbying associations of state officials — in shaping federal regulation. These groups have become the core vehicle for state involvement in federal administration, but surprisingly, their pervasive and critical role is rarely noted in the legal literature.The Article shows that the pathologies of state interest groups reflect broader, latent tensions within the emerging project of administrative federalism. To develop this claim, the Article disaggregates a trio of benefits thought to flow from state involvement in federal administration — protecting state power, enhancing agency expertise, and maintaining a democratically accountable process — and shows that these benefits are unlikely to coincide. Instead, mechanisms designed to pursue state power as an end in itself thrive at the expense of expertise and accountability. The project of affording states a voice in the federal regulatory process must therefore begin to take account of tradeoffs among key goals, not just benefits. The Article closes by sketching best practices to help agencies, courts, and states balance the competing goals of administrative federalism.


Are language and culture inseparable, or are they separable? Neither of these positions is tenable, and in order to find a solution to this seeming paradox, it is useful to develop a theoretical understanding of the concept of languaculture. The point of departure should be a sociolinguistic one, seeing language primarily as linguistic practice going on in - small and large - social networks of various ranges, incl. the global range. Languages, i.e. language users, spread all over the world by various kinds of migration, and each language carries languaculture with it. The languaculture of each specific language is seen as encompassing three interrelated dimensions: a semantic and pragmatic potential, a poetic potential and an identity potential. Languages and their languacultures spread across cultural contexts and discourse communities. This view has a range of far-reaching implications for the content and identity of language teaching and learning.


The formation of neuronal networks depends on the proper development and targeting of the neurons within the network. One key challenge during the development of such networks is the correct cross linking of axons and dendrites. Only correct synapse formation between dendrites and axons will allow neurons to contribute to the entire network. Therefore further insights into axon targeting mechanisms will help to understand the underlying developmental processes and contribute to future cures for a number of related diseases.
Generally, once a neuron forms an axon, it starts growing towards a certain "target zone". The underlying axon targeting mechanisms are controlled by a large number of extracellular cues provided by the extracellular matrix and neighboring cells. Depending on the neuron type, axons travel different distances towards their future synaptic partner. During that journey the neurons, more specifically the growth cone, constantly comes into contact with guidance cues. The growth cone symbolizes the forefront of an axon and is responsible to integrate different guidance signals. Depending on their nature, they trigger the local assembly or disassembly of the cytoskeleton and ultimately force the axon to turn into a certain direction. Although different guidance cues activate different signaling pathways, all of these cascades will eventually converge down on the cytoskeleton. These cytoskeletal rearrangements and changes in actin dynamics within the growth cone will promote the turning of the entire axon. In a series of events different guidance cues, attractive and repulsive, will guide the growth cone to its respective target.
In this study I used the olfactory system, more specifically the olfactory receptor neurons (ORNs), of Drosophila melanogaster to investigate the mechanisms of axon targeting. The olfactory system of the fruit fly proved to be a very powerful model organism for a number of reasons: First, the number of genetic tools available for Drosophila allows the manipulation of many cellular aspects. Second, ORNs have an extremely stereotyped targeting pattern that proved to be a good system to investigate axon targeting mechanisms.
The work presented in this thesis studied the role of the highly conserved actin binding protein Psidin during the development and targeting of ORNs. Herein, I was able to demonstrate that Psidin uses two independent molecular mechanisms to control ORN targeting and survival. To elucidate Psidin's role in the aforementioned processes, I analyzed two predicted null alleles psidin1 (Brennan et al., 2007) and psidin55D4 (Kim et al., 2011), and one hypomorphic allele psidinIG978 (this study). The new hypomorphic allele psidinIG978 was mapped during this study and found to have a single point mutation within Psidin's coding region (E320K).
The data shown in this study demonstrate that Psidin is required at two different time points during the development of the olfactory system. During ORN development, Psidin is required as non-catalytic part of the N-acetyltransferase complex (NatB) to ensure ORN survival. At later stages during development, Psidin functions as an actin binding protein to regulate actin dynamics to ultimately ensure proper ORN axon targeting. I was able to show for the first time that Psidin's previously reported function as actin binding protein in oocytes (Kim et al., 2011), is also true for neurons. The loss of Psidin leads to significantly reduced lamellipodia in growth cones of primary neurons in vitro. In agreement with Psidin's role in actin dynamics is the finding that the parallel removal of the actin stabilizer Tropomyosin rescues the lamellipodia defect in psidin1 primary neurons. This strongly argues for Psidin being an actin destabilizing protein and antagonist of Tropomyosin.
In general, psidin1 and psidin55D4 mutant axons showed severe mistargeting defects in vivo – e.g. defasciculation in Or59c and Or42a neurons or ectopic synapse formation in Or47a neurons. However, axons mutant for psidinIG978 displayed a less severe phenotype compared to the null alleles. In agreement with in vitro data, the parallel removal of Tropomyosin rescued the targeting defect in Or59c neurons in vivo. The growth cone and the lamellipodia are both important structures that keep axons responsive towards guidance cues. Therefore the lamellipodia reduction in psidin mutants is likely the cause for the observed targeting defects. Nevertheless, Psidin is required differentially among the ORN classes – the ones that project to dorsolateral or ventromedial glomeruli within the antennal lobe (AL) are more affected than centrally projecting classes. ORN classes that are more affected in psidin mutants have to turn upon entry of the AL. Therefore those classes (dorsolateral and ventromedial) have a higher requirement of Psidin, which has to maintain the lamellipodium, so that the axon can respond to cues in the first place.
In addition, I overexpressed different isoforms of LimK and Cofilin to artificially create conditions that favor actin stabilization or destabilization. More generally, conditions that promoted actin destabilization and actin stabilization were able to rescue and aggravate the psidin1 phenotype, respectively. In addition to the targeting defect, psidin1 and psidin55D4 mutants showed a strong reduction in ORN cell numbers. In contrast, cell numbers were not affected in psidinIG978 mutant flies. Again, ORN classes were affected differently – e.g. Or42a neuron number was reduced by 83%, but Or59c number was only reduced by 46%. Indicating Psidin's function in ORN survival, the expression of the anti-apoptotic protein p35 in psidin mutant neurons selectively rescued the cell number, but failed to rescue the targeting defects. Interestingly, the Psidin/Tropomyosin double mutant showed the opposite effect; here the targeting was rescued, but not the cell number. These findings gave strong indications that Psidin has two independent functions during ORN targeting and development.
Psidin is predicted to be the non-catalytic part of the N-acteyltransferase complex B (NatB) in Drosophila (Brennan et al., 2007). Here, Psidin (non-catalytic) forms the
NatB-complex together with dNAA20 (catalytic). This complex is thought to acetylate nascent protein chains N-terminally. In this study I demonstrated for the first time that both proteins interact in vivo and in vitro. Indicating that the NatB-complex is involved in ORN survival, the knock-down of dNAA20 in psidinIG978 mutants led to a reduction of ORN cell number that is reminiscent of the cell number in psidin1 or psidin55D4 background. At the same time, the knock-down of dNAA20 had no effect on the targeting of ORNs. Furthermore I was able to show that wild type Psidin and PsidinIG978 interact with dNAA20 at comparable levels in vitro. This is in agreement with the finding that the psidinIG978 allele selectively affects ORN targeting, but not ORN survival.
In addition, I was able to map the interaction domain between Psidin and dNAA20. This revealed that the point mutation found in psidinIG978 is just outside of the minimal interaction domain. Deletion of the entire interaction domain led to a complete abolishment of the Psidin/dNAA20 interaction. Furthermore I was able to demonstrate that the interaction of Psidin and dNAA20 is regulated by the phosphorylation of a highly conserved serine residue (S678). Expression of the non-phosphorylatable Psidin isoform (S678A) rescued the targeting and cell number phenotype in vivo. Contrary expression of the phosphomimetic isoform (S678D) only rescued the targeting phenotype, but failed to restore ORN cell number in vivo. In line with this observation is the finding that the S678D isoform is unable to bind dNAA20 in vitro. At the same time the S678A isoform binds dNAA20 at normal levels in vitro.
Taken together, the data presented in this work demonstrate that Psidin has two functions during the development and targeting of ORNs using two independent molecular mechanisms: First, during axon targeting Psidin is required as an actin destabilizing molecule and antagonist of Tropomyosin. Psidin maintains the lamellipodia size in growth cones and keeps the cytoskeleton in a dynamic and responsive state. This ensures that growing axons can respond properly to various guidance cues. Second, to ensure ORN survival, Psidin is required as non-catalytic part of the NatB-complex. Here, Psidin interacts with the catalytic subunit dNAA20. The formation of the NatB-complex is regulated by phosphorylation of a conserved serine. In its unphosphorylated state Psidin binds dNAA20 and ensures ORN survival, whereas phosphorylation causes the abolishment of this interaction which results in a reduction of ORN cell number.
Concluding, this thesis unambiguously shows that Psidin is required at different time points during the formation of the olfactory system of Drosophila. It utilizes two different pathways to ensure (i) ORN survival as part of the NatB-complex and (ii) ORN targeting as actin binding protein. Due to its strong conservation in higher organisms, the here presented data provide important insights into the function of Psidin's mammalian homologues.


A major concern for the navigator during a voyage is collision avoidance. The IBS (Integrated Bridge System) has a large quantity of marine traffic data available. Complicated and congested traffic may challenge the navigational safety. It is of vital importance that the navigator is equipped with the necessary tools to be able to do a fast assessment of the situation. Visual observation, ARPA and AIS are the main information sources today. The introduction of a collision avoidance display that focus on real-time presentation of danger areas in true motion enables the navigator to judge collision risk for any acquired target and simultaneously identify suitable evasive manoeuvres. The simulator study focused on evaluating two collision avoidance displays, CDP (Collision Danger Presentation) and RTM (Room To Manoeuvre) versus standard ARPA. In addition CDP versus RTM was evaluated. The subjects consisted of experienced navigators from the Royal Norwegian Navy and final year marine cadets from the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy. The study was conducted on a full mission bridge simulator by three trial scenarios with increasing difficulty level. The evaluation was based on descriptive methods and parametric tests. A reflection on making decisions in collision avoidance is given in the thesis. The excellence of both collision avoidance displays was proven, where the major benefit was reduction in reaction time. Between the populations it was found that the cadets benefitted from the collision avoidance displays in both the simple and the congested scenario, whilst the experienced navigators mainly improved their performance in the congested scenario. The evaluation of CDP versus RTM indicated that the CDP display was preferred. As for the collision avoidance tools existing today, the CDP does not take into account the COLREGs. This aspect is, and will in the nearest future, be the navigator's task to incorporate in his choice of evasive manoeuvres. Proposals for improvement of the beta version the collision avoidance display are given in the end of the document.


Vietnam is a major pork producing country in Asia, but the pig farmers' livelihood is threatened by Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS). Although vaccination is the most practical method of choice for PRRS control, the vaccination percentage is very low. To help inform PRRS vaccine development and policy, our research employed the choice experiment (CE) method to assess pig farmers' attitudes toward and willingness to pay (WTP) for a PRRS vaccine. The results showed a high positive WTP value for the PRRS vaccination program in Vietnam. This study provides insight into the possibility of increasing the PRRS vaccination percentage.


In a survey of 15 representatives of the Asplenioid ferns for the pinnae flavonoids, kaempferol was found in 80 %,
quercetin 53% and proanthocyanidin 13% of the species studied. Kaempferol3 O-methyl ether was found in A.
marinum only. Acacetin and genkwanin have been previously found in the fern, Notholaena bryopoda
(Polypodiaceae), but for the first time in A. normale. This is the second report of the occurrence of this type off lavoneinferns. Hispidulin and pectolinangenin were detected inA. glaucophyllum in trace amounts due to the small sample
and at a relatively low concentration. Scutellarein was detected inA. belangeri. To our knowledge, this is the first report
of the existence of hispidulin, pectolinangenin and scutellrein in ferns.


A survey was undertaken to determine the relative incidence of fungal biodeteriogens in contaminated in—service samples of synthetic and oil emulsion metal working fluids, and a list of isolates is submitted.
A technique for assessing the concentration of surface—active components of both synthetic and oil emulsion metal working fluids is described. Results obtained using this technique provided evidence of surfactant depletion in oil emulsion fluids as a
result of growth of a mixed fungal inoculum, but this effect was not recorded when these isolates were grown in synthetic fluids.
Synthetic metal working fluds of known composition were formulated and the ability of selected fungal isolates to utilise both these fluids and the individual components thereof as sole sources of carbon and nitrogen was assessed. The metal working fluid components triethanolamine and diethanolamine borate were found to be readily available nutrient sources for growth of the isolates, the extent of growth being limited by the availability of carbon rather than nitrogen. Varying the initial pH of the medium was found to have no significant effect upon the extent of growth recorded at initial pH values of 7.0, 8.0 and 9.0. The use of respirometric techniques provided evidence to suggest that some of the enzymes involved in the fungal degradation of synthetic metal working fluid components might be inducible.
The effect of fungal growth upon the composition of the complete synthetic metal working fluids was determined using the techniques of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and gas—liquid chromatography linked mass spectrometry. Results obtained using these techniques also provided evidence of the depletion of the triethanolamine and diethanolamine borate components of the complete fluids as a result of fungal growth.


Metadata creation practices for digital library projects vary widely amongst libraries. Digital library projects often have to deal with multiple metadata creators, new formats and resources, and dynamic metadata standards for different communities (Park & Tosaka, 2010). As a result while accuracy and consistency in metadata are prioritized by field practitioners, metadata records created for specific digital projects may lack the quality needed to support successful end-user resource discovery and access. Park and Tosaka's survey of metadata quality control in digital repositories and collections reveal that digital repositories often rely on periodic sampling or peer review of original metadata records as mechanisms for quality assurance (Park & Tosaka, 2010).This poster proposal presents another means of running quality checks on metadata created for digital projects based on Hunter Library's experience with the WorldCat Digital Collection Gateway tool used for harvesting metadata for digital collections into WorldCat. Hunter Library's digital collections are described using Dublin Core in Contentdm and the Library has recently started harvesting its collections into WorldCat using Gateway. During harvesting the Gateway, by default, places the names of "creators" and "contributors" recorded in separate fields in the local metadata environment into one broad "Author" field for WorldCat users. A cursory review of this "Author" field in WorldCat for several harvested items from one of the library's collections revealed an unexpected presence of corporate body names alongside personal names. Consequently this led to an evaluation of how the "creator" and "contributor" fields had been used in that collection. The "Frequency Analysis" feature in Gateway proved to be particularly useful in this evaluation since it provided a breakdown of each field in a particular collection by the values used in that field and the number of times they had been used. For example, a high frequency usage of a particular name indicated that the usage had not been a random mistake but had been consistent. A subsequent analysis of the library's digital collections' metadata using "Frequency Analysis" revealed that for some collections, the "contributor" field had been used to record entities whose roles, in relation to the item described, spanned from publisher, printer, editor, or recipient of letter. However, the library's then current metadata schema had limited the definition of the "contributor" field to entities who had a direct but secondary role in the creation of an item like editors or illustrators. This discrepancy between the library's metadata schema and the usage of the "contributor" field led to a redefinition of the role of the "contributor." The schema now incorporates the plethora of roles that "contributors" could have in relation to an item and recommends that the role of each "contributor" be explained in the "description" field to account for the diversity of roles. Updating of the schema has thus promoted consistency in recording the "contributor" field across the library's digital collections while also possibly benefitting users searching for an item by the various names associated with it.


A revised method is proposed for the testing of binder distributors for uniformity of transverse distribution of binder: it uses a light fuel oil with physical properties at low temperatures equivalent to those of surface dressing binders at normal elevated spraying temperatures. The temperature of test is reduced from around 150 degrees C to 40 degrees C and efficiency of testing is improved because the operatives carrying out the tests work in a less dangerous environment. A simple empirical test is proposed for assessing the point at which the test material becomes unsuitable for further use by reason of contamination by bituminous residues in the binder distributors. (Author/TRRL)


Although the pathogenesis of pulmonary fibrosis is incompletely understood, an accepted underlying molecular mechanism is the dysregulation of soluble mediators which regulate fibroblast function in the lung. One such mediator is prostaglandin E2 (PGE2), which is a potent inhibitor of fibroblast proliferation, collagen production, chemotaxis and myofibroblast differentiation. Levels of PGE2 have been shown to be decreased in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and lung fibroblasts from patients with pulmonary fibrosis. In lung fibroblasts this has been shown to be due to limited expression of the rate limiting enzyme in its biosynthesis, cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2). However, there is currently no direct proof that limited expression of COX-2 and PGE2 contribute to the pathogenesis of pulmonary fibrosis. This thesis has used pharmacological and genetic inhibition of COX-2 to address the hypothesis that limited expression of COX-2 and PGE2 potentiates bleomycin-induced pulmonary fibrosis. Through the use of the highly selective COX-2 inhibitor NS398, this thesis demonstrates that bleomycin-induced PGE2 production in the lung is COX-2 mediated for at least 14 days following injury. However, administration of NS398 had no effect on the development of bleomycin-induced lung fibrosis in wild type (WT) mice. Unexpectedly, COX-2-/- mice showed a compensatory upregulation in PGE2 biosynthesis following bleomycin injury compared with both WT and COX-2-/- animals, which is evident in macrophage/monocytes but not fibroblasts derived from these mice. Lung homogenates showed increased expression of COX-1 in COX-2-/- mice compared with WT controls suggesting the compensatory synthesis is via increased expression of COX-1. COX-2-/- mice show an enhanced and persistent inflammatory response to bleomycin, however the fibrotic response to injury was unaltered compared with WT animals. In contrast, COX-2+/- mice showed reduced expression of COX-2 and subsequently limited induction of PGE2 following bleomycin injury. This resulted in an enhanced fibrotic response at day 28 with increased total lung collagen content compared with both WT and COX-2-/- mice (WT, 2.6 0.22; COX-2+/-, 3.77 0.12; COX-2-/-, 2.51 0.26 mg collagen/lung, p 0.001).


This article was presented at a conference, and is part of a symposium, on "The Freedom of the Church in the Modern Era." The article argues that the liberty of the Church, libertas Ecclesiae, is not a mere metaphor, pace the views of some other contributions to the conference and symposium and of the mentality mostly prevailing over the last five hundred years. The argument is that the Church and her directly God-given rights are ontologically irreducible in a way that the rights of, say, the state of California or even of the United States are not. Based on a careful reading of, among other sources, the Second Vatican Council's Declaration on Religious Liberty, Dignitatis Humanae (1965), the article articulates and defends the Church's self-understanding as a divine institution possessed of supernatural authority that has rightful consequences for the ordering of society and polity. Catholic doctrine upholds a rich concept of individual freedom of conscience and defends a regime of broad toleration, but it does so respectful of the demands of the common goods, natural and supernatural, both of which the Church serves in the exercise of her liberty. The Church anticipates that her claims on her own behalf will be a scandal to the world. This article complements and, to a limited extent, overlaps the analysis in my recent article "Resisting the Grand Coalition in Favor of the Status Quo By Giving Full Scope to the Libertas Ecclesiae."


The main objectives of this project were to adapt existing analytical techniques, for the examination of lipids extracted from subject-worn contact lenses and tear samples. A great amount of research has been done in the area of meibomian gland lipid analysis; however, there has been little research investigating ex vivo lens deposits and more importantly the effect of lens wear on the lipid layer. Since the development of silicone hydrogel contact lenses, lipid deposition and problems that relate to lipid deposition have increased. Discontinuation of lens wear is often related to discomfort, particularly symptoms of dryness.This research was therefore based on the analysis of changes in lipidstructure as a result of contact lens wear. The development of an array of techniques enabled different aspects of lipid structure to be examined Chromatographic techniques such as thin layer chromatography (TLC), high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and gas chromatography (GC) were utilised to separate individual lipid species and provide structural information. GC analysis of ex vivo lens extracts showed significant differences in lipid profiles between daily wear and continuous wear lens extracts. As well as assessment of lipid conformational changes, the presence of lipid oxidative products in the ocular environment were investigated. Malondialdehyde (MDA), a secondary lipid oxidative end product has previously been linked with contact lens intolerance and discomfort. This research showed that oxidative products were building-up within the contact lens matrix.


The following qualitative study examined how Reading First Literacy Coaches refined their literacy coaching to meet the cultural and linguistic needs of Hispanic English language learners (ELLs) in 30 elementary schools located along the US Mexico Border. Data were gathered from the coaches through written surveys and a focus group. Findings from the coaches' practices identified three themes: 1) Coaches understood bilingual programs and the theory underlying such instruction; 2) Coaches supported teachers of ELLs by sharing their knowledge and experiences about ELLs; and 3) Coaches faced challenges in meeting the needs of teachers of Hispanic ELLs. This study is an addition to the literature that describes and contextualizes the work of instructional coaches. It has practical implications for schools seeking to build the capacity of teachers of ELLs. Guidance is suggested related to hiring coaches with special dispositions and the professional development of existing coaches.


In recent years, the US, UK and Australia have lowered tax rates on high incomes and expanded tax credits and family transfer payments that are withdrawn on the joint income of a couple. These reforms result in significant changes in the structure of marginal and average income tax rates. In this paper we present a case study that examines the impact of reforms of this kind on the structure of tax rates on incomes in Australia. We find that the reforms have led to high effective marginal rates across a wide middle band of earnings and to a shift towards joint taxation. As is well known, joint taxation results in high tax rates on secondary earners, with in consequence undesirable effects on both work incentive and fairness of the income distribution. A lifecycle analysis of time use and saving decisions indicates strong negative effects on female labour supply and household saving.


This paper is engaged with the politics of belonging among Kurdish youth. It aims to discuss how Kurdish identity and subjectivity can be understood following Antonio Gramsci within practices of hegemony and the ways the subalternity of Kurds as a stateless people are produced in everyday life. I will use narrative accounts of young Kurdish men and women to discuss experiences of denial by dominant subjects and the jettisoned position they occupy as a stateless nation in the world of unequal nation-states and hierarchical citizenship.


This article examines the issue of democratic deterioration by revisiting the Venezuelan case (1974–1998). Using sequence elaboration and alternative case-focused theories, it tests and confirms the hypothesis that presidential partyarchy was the main contextual explanatory factor behind the crisis that led to Venezuela's democratic deterioration. Building on elite conflict theory, it also aims to integrate previous studies' insights and better explain the timing of factors to illustrate how economic presidentialism (the highly autonomous executive control of a state-controlled economy) was the main mechanism leading to democratic deterioration.


Using an in-vehicle interactive display, such as a touch screen, typically entails undertaking a freehand pointing gesture and dedicating a considerable amount of attention, that can be otherwise available for driving, with potential safety implications. Due to road and driving conditions, the user's input can also be subject to high levels of perturbations resulting in erroneous selections. In this article, we give an overview of the novel concept of an intelligent predictive display in vehicles. It can infer, notably early in the pointing task and with high confidence, the item the user intends to select on the display from the tracked freehand pointing gesture and possibly other available sensory data. Accordingly, it simplifies and expedites the target acquisition (pointing and selection), thereby substantially reducing the time and effort required to interact with an in-vehicle display. As well as briefly addressing the various signal processing and human factor challenges posed by predictive displays in the automotive environment, the fundamental problem of intent inference is discussed, and a Bayesian formulation is introduced. Empirical evidence from data collected in instrumented cars is shown to demonstrate the usefulness and effectiveness of this solution.


Legacies, Logics, Logistics brings together a set of essays, written both before and after the financial crisis of 2007–08, by eminent Africanist and economic anthropologist Jane I. Guyer. Each was written initially for a conference on a defined theme. When they are brought together and interpreted as a whole by Guyer, these varied essays show how an anthropological and socio-historical approach to economic practices—both in the West and elsewhere—can illuminate deep facets of economic life that the big theories and models may fail to capture. Focusing on economic actors—whether ordinary consumers or financial experts—Guyer traces how people and institutions hold together past experiences (legacies), imagined scenarios and models (logics), and situational challenges (logistics) in a way that makes the performance of economic life (on platforms made of these legacies, logics, and logistics) work in practice. Individual essays explore a number of topics—including time frames and the future, the use of percentages in observations and judgments, the explanation of prices, the coexistence of different world currencies, the reapplication of longtime economic theories in new settings, and, crucially, how we talk about the economy, how we use stable terms to describe a turbulent system. Valuable as standalone pieces, the essays build into a cogent method of economic anthropology.


Small gas bubbles embedded near the surface of submerged sand affect physical, chemical, and biological processes, and so their detection and characterization is important. So far, a noninvasive method for the detection of such bubbles has not been available. We developed a portable acoustic detection technique that offers high spatial and temporal resolution. The measuring system consists of a hand‐held ultrasonic transmitterreceiver that we operated with transducers generating 1 MHz and 2.27 MHz pulses. Bubble detection was based on changes in amplitude and travel time of backscatter data collected from bubbles that were either manually injected into sediment or created by sedimentary microalgal photosynthesis. Laboratory experiments showed that individual bubbles of 6 mm diameter can be detected as deep as 60 mm beneath the sediment‐water interface. Vertical and horizontal resolutions of 0.4–1 mm and 8–13 mm were achieved, depending on the transducer used. Measurements in a coastal bay demonstrated that our technique discriminates between sands with and without bubbles and locates embedded gas. We found that gas accumulations develop in the upper 10 mm of shallow sandy sediment in shallow water during daytime, revealing that the combination of photosynthetic oxygen production and porewater transport in permeable sands can lead to bubble generation below the photosynthetically active layer.


Repair and regeneration of the injured peripheral nerve (PN) is a challenging issue in clinics. Although the regeneration outcome of large PN defects is currently unsatisfactory, recently, the study of PN repair has considerably progressed. In particular, biomaterials for repairing PNs, such as nerve guidance conduits and nerve repair membranes, have been well developed. Herein, we summarize the anatomy of the PN, the pathophysiological features of the nerve injury, and the repair process post injury. Then, we highlight the progress in the development of natural and synthetic biomaterials and summarize the applications, advantages, and disadvantages of these materials. These materials can be used as nerve repair membranes and nerve conduits in the field of PN repair. Finally, we discuss the challenges encountered and development strategies for PN repair in the future.


Following ocular surgery, dressings are commonly applied to the surgical wound. These dressings need to combine medical properties with ease of use while maintaining comfort for the patient. For the ocular area, this means that the dressings need to act as a microbial barrier, allow good conformability to the contours of the eye, and provide evaporative cooling to the inflamed area. Furthermore, the dressings should be transparent to allow for the inspection of the wound site by healthcare professionals without the need for removal. In this paper, we investigate a blend of native agarose (NA) and carboxylated agarose (CA) for producing elastic hydrogels with high water content that can be supplemented with antibiotics. It was found that in comparison to pure agarose hydrogels, the NA hydrogels blended with CA had a reduced Young's modulus, reduced evaporation rate when exposed to air, and accelerated release rate of antimicrobial agents, whilst maintaining the same degree of transparency. By altering the formulation from 2 wt.% pure NA to 1 wt.% NA blended with 1 wt.% CA, we were able to observe an approximately 55% reduction in Young's modulus, 25% reduction in evaporation rate, as well as a significant acceleration in the release rate of cefazolin and doxycycline, making this hydrogel blend a potential material for topical treatment applications.


Omitting the dry period (DP) generally reduces milk production in the subsequent lactation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of dietary energy source-glucogenic (G) or lipogenic (L)-and energy level-standard (std) or low-on milk production; energy balance (EB); lactogenic hormones insulin, insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), and growth hormone (GH); and lactation curve characteristics between wk 1 and 44 postpartum in cows after a 0-d or 30-d DP. Cows (n = 110) were assigned randomly to 3 transition treatments: a 30-d DP with a standard energy level required for expected milk yield [30-d DP(std)], a 0-d DP with the same energy level as cows with a 30-d DP [0-d DP(std)], and a 0-d DP with a low energy level [0-d DP(low)]. In wk 1 to 7, cows were fed the same basal ration but the level of concentrate increased to 6.7 kg/d for cows fed the low energy level and to 8.5 kg/d for cows fed the standard energy level in wk 4. From wk 8 postpartum onward, cows received a G ration (mainly consisting of corn silage and grass silage) or an L ration (mainly consisting of grass silage and sugar beet pulp) with the same energy level contrast (low or std) as in early lactation. Cows fed the G ration had greater milk, lactose, and protein yields, lower milk fat percentage, greater dry matter and energy intakes, and greater plasma IGF-1 concentration compared with cows fed the L ration. Dietary energy source did not affect EB or lactation curve characteristics. In cows with a 0-d DP, the reduced energy level decreased energy intake, EB, and weekly body weight gain, but did not affect milk production or lactation curve characteristics. A 30-d DP resulted in a greater total predicted lactation yield, initial milk yield after calving, peak milk yield, energy intake, energy output in milk, days to conception [only when compared with 0-d DP(low)], plasma GH concentration [only when compared with 0-d DP(std)], and decreased weekly body weight gain compared with a 0-d DP. A 30-d DP decreased both the increasing and the declining slope parameters of the lactation curve and the relative rate of decline in milk yield (indicating greater lactation persistency) compared with a 0-d DP, and decreased plasma insulin and IGF-1 concentration, and EB. In conclusion, feeding a G ration after wk 7 in milk improved energy intake and milk production, but did not affect EB compared with an L ration. For cows without a DP, a reduced dietary energy level did not affect milk production and lactation curve characteristics, but did decrease EB and weekly body weight gain. A 30-d DP increased milk yield and lactation persistency, but decreased milk fat and protein content, EB, and plasma insulin and IGF-1, compared with a 0-d DP.


I. INTRODUCTION On June 11, 1990, President George Bush and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari issued a joint communique indicating that they had directed their respective trade negotiators to enter into exploratory discussions to lay the groundwork for negotiations on a bilateral free trade agreement.(1) Five years earlier President Ronald Reagan and Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney made a similar declaration(2) that ultimately led to the implementation, on January 1, 1989, of the United States-Canada Free Trade Agreement.(3) In the fall of 1990, President Salinas formally proposed the commencement of negotiations.(4) As required under the fast-track procedure for trade negotiations,(5) President Bush notified Congress of his intent to enter into negotiations with Mexico on September 25, 1990.(6) Four months later, the potential for a trilateral agreement for a North American free trade zone was announced by President Bush, President Salinas, and Canadian Prime Minister Mulroney.(7) The addition of Mexico to the existing United States-Canada partnership would incorporate significant trade flows, as U.S. exports to Mexico amounted to $28.4 billion in 1990, nearly double the total exports in 1987 and a two hundred percent increase over 1983 exports.(8) This made Mexico the United States' third largest export market in 1990.(9) For the same period, the United States imported $30.2 billion of Mexican industrial, agricultural, and natural resource products, up from $20.3 billion just three years earlier.(10) The contemplated agreement would eliminate most of the tariff and non-tariff barriers between the three countries whose combined population is about 350 million,(11) rivalling the scale of the European Community's plans for finalizing its common market.(12) During the closing months of 1990, while intransigence over farm subsidies seemed to toll the death knell for hopes of significant advances from the Uruguay Round of GATT(13) talks, some commentators and trade pundits bemoaned the perceptible shift countries seemed to be making toward regional trade groups.(14) While the European Community appeared to be circling the wagons around "Fortress Europe," Japan was displaying an interest in an East Asian economic group,(15) and the North American countries began to consider their own regional trade consortium, causing experts to fuss over the effectiveness of GATT. Free trade agreements are not antithetical to the purposes of GATT.(16) Although an FTA is inconsistent with the Most-Favored Nation (MFN) principle of GATT,(17) GATT does permit the establishment of FTAs so long as tariff and non-tariff barriers are eliminated on substantially all the trade between or among the FTA participants within a "reasonable" period.(18) Also, FTA signatories may not increase their tariff and non-tariff defenses against other trading parties to a point exceeding the defenses in place prior to the implementation of the FTA.(19) Although the United States has separate free trade agreements with Israel and Canada,(20) it is principally the latter that will offer the guiding structure for an agreement to include Mexico. For a trilateral pact to be negotiated among the United States, Canada, and Mexico, it would be most expedient to begin from the framework created by the existing United States-Canada FTA and make adjustments for Mexico as necessary.(21) Having labored for two years to create a framework around which bilateral negotiations could be based, the United States and Canada are unlikely to view renegotiation with enthusiasm. The agreement between the United States and Canada incorporates provisions that are common to similar agreements and those that reflect specific bilateral concerns of the parties.(22) The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) may nevertheless chart new ground on issues such as environmental regulations and health, safety, and labor standards, which were not major concerns in negotiating the FTA but have been mentioned as possible topics for inclusion in NAFTA. …