Abstract Attenuation of ground‐motion amplitudes away from the seismic source is recognized as a significant issue by researchers. Of particular interest is the attenuation or propagation of seismic waves from long‐distance sources. Regions like Sri Lanka have experienced tremors from events as far as 1500 km. A recently identified diffusing plate boundary just around 300 km away from the southern tip of Sri Lanka poses significant seismic risk. However, a comprehensive study of the region with respect to the propagation or attenuation of seismic waves has generally been lacking. With the availability of new archival data of 71 events recorded at three digital broadband stations, we have estimated Q value for the northern Indian Ocean region surrounding Sri Lanka. Multiple linear regression analysis of recorded vertical‐component Fourier acceleration amplitudes yields a relatively higher Q 0 value of about 389±2.35 for the subject region. Furthermore, the combined effect of upper crustal amplification and attenuation has been assessed using the standard horizontal‐to‐vertical ratio method. The negligible upper crustal modifications obtained from the analysis imply the presence of an older crustal rock stratigraphy at near‐source depths around the subject region. Source spectra of recorded events have also been derived by correcting the observed amplitudes for geometric and anelastic attenuation. The source spectra analysis resulted in a typical stress‐drop value of about 50 bars, which is consistent with Brune's source spectra models. Stochastic modeling of a recent M w  8.6 event that occurred in the region was undertaken based on the parameters derived from the analysis and compared with the real recorded spectra. Results show a reliable match between the simulations and the recorded spectra, which supports the validity of the estimated parameters. Seismological parameters derived from this study can provide reliable estimates of seismic hazard of Sri Lanka.


ABSTRACT This study examined whether parental monitoring mediated the relationship between community violence exposure and a spectrum of behaviors such as recidivism, risky sex, and drug use among youth with a history of being detained. It also explored whether risk pathways differed by gender. Adolescents (n = 550) who were detained or previously detained were recruited from eight regional detention facilities in Georgia. Audio computer-assisted self-interviewing technology was used to assess demographic factors (i.e., age, race, and socioeconomic status), risky sex, drug use, and recidivism prior to being detained. Major findings indicated direct relationships between community violence exposures and risky sex and drug use in the 2 months prior to being detained. Findings also indicated that parental monitoring mediated these relationships for both adolescent males and females. These findings document that parental monitoring is an important element even for troubled youth across a broad spectrum of risk factors. Consequently, it is recommended that intervention programs examine the differential effects of monitoring behaviors by a variety of groups such as parental figures, teachers, and peer mentors.


This article seeks to explain the recent popularity of South Asian Anglophone literature (beginning in 1981 and peaking between 1998 and 2008) in light of the boom in Latin American literature of the 1960s. It argues that the phenomenon of regional literary "booms" shares features across both eras, and that a unified theory of booms is increasingly important to understanding the way contemporary literature circulates around the globe. Scholarship about both eras has tended to coalesce around three types of boom-driving agents: "creators," "contexts," and "curators." Within that broader agreement, however, scholarship about the South Asian boom has tended to overemphasize the political symbolism of recent South Asian Anglophone literature and its global popularity, while under-emphasizing the political realities that create the conditions under which that literature became popular. This line of criticism has come at the expense of attention to literature's other dimensions as a cultural object, as well as contextual explanations of popularity involving the role of governments, demographics, and market flows. The more diverse scholarship on the Latin American boom offers a corrective with insights for both the future of South Asian Anglophone literature and the field of World Literature.


Six quadrate bones, of which two almost certainly come from the Kem Kem beds (Cenomanian, Upper Cretaceous) of south-eastern Morocco, are determined to be from juvenile and adult individuals of Spinosaurinae based on phylogenetic, geometric morphometric, and phylogenetic morphometric analyses. Their morphology indicates two morphotypes evidencing the presence of two spinosaurine taxa ascribed to Spinosaurus aegyptiacus and? Sigilmassasaurus brevicollis in the Cenomanian of North Africa, casting doubt on the accuracy of some recent skeletal reconstructions which may be based on elements from several distinct species. Morphofunctional analysis of the mandibular articulation of the quadrate has shown that the jaw mechanics was peculiar in Spinosauridae. In mature spinosaurids, the posterior parts of the two mandibular rami displaced laterally when the jaw was depressed due to a lateromedially oriented intercondylar sulcus of the quadrate. Such lateral movement of the mandibular ramus was possible due to a movable mandibular symphysis in spinosaurids, allowing the pharynx to be widened. Similar jaw mechanics also occur in some pterosaurs and living pelecanids which are both adapted to capture and swallow large prey items. Spinosauridae, which were engaged, at least partially, in a piscivorous lifestyle, were able to consume large fish and may have occasionally fed on other prey such as pterosaurs and juvenile dinosaurs.


We report that a modified Z-scan method by nonlinear ellipse rotation (NER) can be used to discriminate true nonlinear refraction from thermal effect in the transient regime and steady state. The combination of Z-scan and NER allows us to measure the third-order nonlinear susceptibility component without the influence of thermal-optical nonlinearity. The experimental results of pure CS(2) and CS(2) solutions of nigrosine verify that the transient thermal effect can be successfully eliminated from the NER-modified Z-scan measurements. This method is also extended to the case in which thermal-optical nonlinearities depend on a high repetition rate of femtosecond laser pulses for the N,N-dimethylmethanamide solutions of graphene oxide.


What is real about city life? Real Cities shows why it is necessary to take seriously the more imaginary, fantastic and emotional aspects of city life.
Drawing inspiration from the work of Walter Benjamin, Sigmund Freud and Georg Simmel, Pile explores the dream-like and ghost-like experiences of the city. Such experiences are, he argues, best described as phantasmagorias. The phantasmagorias of city life, though commonplace, are far from self-evident and little understood. This book is a path-breaking exploration of urban phantasmagorias, grounded empirically in a series of unusual and exciting case studies.
In this study, four substantial phantasmagorias are identified: dreams, magic, vampires and ghosts. The investigation of each phantasmagoria is developed using a wide variety of clear examples. Thus, voodoo in New York and New Orleans shows how ideas about magic are forged within cities. Meanwhile vampires reveal how specific fears about sex and death are expressed within, and circulate between, cities such as London and Singapore. Taken together, such examples build a unique picture of the diverse roles of the imaginary, fantastic and the emotional in modern city life.
What is "real" about the city has radical consequences for how we think about improving city life, for all too often these are over-looked in utopian schemes for the city. Real Cities forcefully argues that an appreciation of urban phantasmagorias must be central to what is considered real about city life.


This paper reports on a study of final Year Education Studies Undergraduate Students' Perceptions of Blended Learning within a Higher Education course. Blended learning uses a mixture of online and face-to-face teaching which has the potential to meet the diverse learning needs of students. An online questionnaire, incorporating closed and open questions, was used to gain the views of students. Analysis of the data revealed that students viewed aspects of elearning in a positive light, but also felt that traditional style learning with face-to-face contact with the lecturer was important in some instances. The data did not uncover any significant gender differences due to the small sample size, and imbalance of male and female participants. Students revealed a positive attitude to ICT in general, and particularly value how it helps them with the university work. The effectiveness of this can, however, be affected by the level of lecturer engagement with the relevant technologies. The study reveals that students appreciate blended learning as it offers the greatest level of choice to them, particularly in allowing them to work form a location convenient to them and avoid travel costs.


Exploration activities with standard methods have already encountered many obstacles in the field. Geological survey is often difficult to find outcrop because they are covered by vegetation, alluvial layer or as a result of urban development and housing. Seismic method requires a large expense and licensing in the use of dynamite is complicated. Method of gravity requires the operator to go back (looping) to the starting point. Given some of these constraints, therefore it needs a solution in the form of new method that can work more efficiently with less cost. Several studies in various countries have shown a correlation between the presence of hydrocarbons and Radon gas concentration in the earth surface. By utilizing the properties of Radon that can migrate to the surface, the value of Radon concentration in the surface is suggested to provide information about the subsurface structure condition. Radon is the only radioactive substance that gas-phased at atmospheric temperature. It is very abundant in the earth mantle. The vast differences of temperatures and pressures between the mantle and the earth crust cause the convection flow toward earth surface. Radon in gas phase will be carried by convection flow to the surface. The quantity of convection currents depend on the porosity and permeability of rocks where Radon travels within, so that Radon concentration in the earth surface delineates the porosity and permeability of subsurface rock layers. Some measurements were carried out at several locations with various subsurface geological conditions, including proven oil fields, proven geothermal field, and frontier area as a comparison. These measurements show that the average and the background concentration threshold in the proven oil field (11,200 Bq/m3) and proven geothermal field (7,820 Bq/m3) is much higher than the quantity in frontier area (329 and 1,620 Bq/m3). Radon concentration in the earth surface is correlated with the presence of geological faults. Peak concentrations of Radon takes place along the fault.


Following the May 1857 uprising by sepoys in Meerut and Delhi, the whole future of the British Raj was in the balance. Nowhere was this better demonstrated than at Lucknow and Cawnpore. At the latter a garrison of 240 with 375 British women and children battled to survive a siege by 3,000 mutineers led by Nana Sahib. Unimaginable horrors of artillery and sniper fire coupled with the crippling heat of the Indian summer took their toll. An offer of safe passage was treacherously reneged on and the massacres which followed drew a terrible retribution when relief finally arrived, in the shape of Generals Havelock and Neil. At Lucknow, the 1800 British men, women and children supported by more than 1,000 loyal sepoys resisted assaults by 20,000 mutineers, despite heavy casualties and sickness. Sir Colin Campbell's force got through to relieve the garrison and evacuate civilians in November 1857 but the city was not restored to British control until March 1858.These dramatic events are brought to life in this first rate history.


Image denoising is a classic low level vision problem that attempts to recover a noise-free image from a noisy observation. Recent advances in deep neural networks have outperformed traditional prior based methods for image denoising. However, the existing methods either require paired noisy and clean images for training or impose certain assumptions on the noise distribution and data types. In this paper, we present an end-to-end unpaired image denoising framework (UIDNet) that denoises images with only unpaired clean and noisy training images. The critical component of our model is a noise learning module based on a conditional Generative Adversarial Network (cGAN). The model learns the noise distribution from the input noisy images and uses it to transform the input clean images to noisy ones without any assumption on the noise distribution and data types. This process results in pairs of clean and pseudo-noisy images. Such pairs are then used to train another denoising network similar to the existing denoising methods based on paired images. The noise learning and denoising components are integrated together so that they can be trained end-to-end. Extensive experimental evaluation has been performed on both synthetic and real data including real photographs and computer tomography (CT) images. The results demonstrate that our model outperforms the previous models trained on unpaired images as well as the state-of-the-art methods based on paired training data when proper training pairs are unavailable.


In the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) area, a remarkable tendency is to use the Building Information Modeling (BIM) data to carry out analysis and calculation based on rules specified in regulations or standards so that the BIM applications with reasoning support (BIM-R applications) are necessary. The current way to develop BIM-R applications separately and represent rules by coding or in proprietary formats has the problems of both cost and efficiency. To solve the problems, a new way is proposed, i.e. to use a platform for rapid development of BIM-R applications (BIM-R platform) implemented based on ontology and freeware components. The research establishes 1) the functional requirements of the BIM-R platform, 2) the mechanism to transform BIM data into ontology data, and 3) the architecture of the BIM-R platform, and selects freeware components to be used. A platform is implemented accordingly and applied to develop a prototype BIM-R application for as-bid cost estimation of buildings for verification. The proposed platform can help reduce cost and improve efficiency for the development of BIM-R applications and can be used by both researchers and developers.


STAT 5351 Probability and Statistics I (3 semester credit hours) A mathematical treatment of probability theory. Random variables, distributions, conditioning, expectations, special distributions and the central limit theorem. The theory is illustrated by numerous examples. This is a basic course in probability and uses calculus extensively. Prerequisite: Calculus through multivariate calculus or instructor consent required. (3-0) T


The circadian clock plays a role in the physiology of plants in their responses to light-dark cycles and to changes in season. Michael et al. examined the genetic inheritance of the circadian clock. Circadian clock parameters varied among a group of Arabidopsis plants collected from diverse geographic origins. Circadian clock period length correlated with source latitude, which suggests that the clock period has functional importance in adaptation to the environment. One set of plants displayed no overt circadian rhythm in leaf movement and may represent a naturally occurring clock loss-of-function mutant. Two common laboratory forms of Arabidopsis display quite similar circadian parameters, probably as a result of the additive effects of multiple loci. The correlation of period length and latitude is consistent with a role for the clock in adaptation to the local environment. T. P. Michael, P. A. Salomé, H. J. Yu, T. R. Spencer, E. L. Sharp, M. A. McPeek, J. M. Alonso, J. R. Ecker, C. R. McClung, Enhanced fitness conferred by naturally occurring variation in the circadian clock. Science 302, 1049-1053 (2003). [Abstract] [Full Text]


Understanding light scattering by nonspherical particles is crucial in modeling the transport of light in realistic structures such as biological tissues. We report the application of novel analytical approaches based on modified Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin and equiphase-sphere methods that facilitate accurate characterization of light scattering by a wide range of irregularly shaped dielectric particles. We also demonstrate that these approaches have the potential to address the inverse-scattering problem by means of a spectral analysis of the total scattering cross section of arbitrarily shaped particles.


A limiting-dilution system is described that makes use of T cell growth factor T cell expansion and allows the determination of precursor frequencies for various regulatory and effector T cells in nonimmune, polyclonally, or specifically activated T cell populations. Two different sets, a frequent and a rare set, of T helper cell precursors with specificity for trinitrophenyl-group A streptococcal vaccine, could be identified: the frequent set is of the Lyt-123 phenotype, and is present at frequencies of from 1/1,000 to 1/6,000 splenic T cells. It is only active at low cell numbers, whereas it is completely inactivated at greater cell numbers, presumably by suppressor T cells of lower frequency but greater potency. The rare set is of the Lyt-1 phenotype, is present at frequencies of from 1/10,000 to 1/70,000, and is not sensitive to suppressor cells present within the tested cell numbers. We suggest that the frequent set contains primiary helper cell precursors, whereas the rare set contains helper T memory cells preselected by previous exposure to other antigens. The results are discussed with respect to other reports on the involvement of more than one set of helper cells in antibody production.


The relationship between the Christian and Muslim worlds has been a long and tortuous one. Over the course of the centuries the balance of power has swung in a pendulum motion - at times the initiative seems to have lain with the Muslim community, with the Christian world simply being compelled to react to developments outside itself, while at other points the opposite has been true and Muslims have found themselves having to respond to Christian challenges in different forms. Today Christians and Muslims comprise the world's two largest religious communities. Although they can co-exist fairly peacefully, there are times when they still engage in violent confrontation, such as in the recent conflicts in Bosnia and the Sudan. This book investigates the history of the relationships between Christians and Muslims over the centuries, from their initial encounters in the Medieval period when the Muslims were the dominant group, through to the modern period when the balance of power seems to have been reversed. This much-needed overview of the Christian-Muslim encounter places the emphasis on the context within which perceptions and attitudes were worked out and provides a depth of historical insight to the complexities of current Christian-Muslim interactions on different continents.


Current research points to race and ethnicity as predictive of disparities in access and quality of health care. A 2002 Institute of Medicine Study found that African-American patients tend not to receive the same type of care as White patients, even when controlling for socioeconomic status. Self-reported perceptions of racial bias within the patient provider relationship, from the patient's perspective, are analyzed to uncover the subtle ways perceptions of differential treatment based on racial bias work to create barriers or perpetuate disparities in health outcomes for African-American breast cancer survivors in Michigan. ABSTRACT Current research points to race and ethnicity as predictive of disparities in access and quality of health care. A 2002 Institute of Medicine Study found that African-American patients tend not to receive the same type of care as White patients, even when controlling for socioeconomic status. Self-reported perceptions of racial bias within the patient provider relationship, from the patient's perspective, are analyzed to uncover the subtle ways perceptions of differential treatment based on racial bias work to create barriers or perpetuate disparities in health outcomes for African-American breast cancer survivors in Michigan.


Moving to lighter and less expensive battery chemistries compared to contemporary lithium-ion requires the control of energy storage mechanisms based on chemical transformations rather than intercalation. Lithium–sulfur (Li/S) has tremendous theoretical specific energy, but contemporary approaches to control this solution-mediated, precipitation–dissolution chemistry require large excesses of electrolyte to fully solubilize the polysulfide intermediates. Achieving reversible electrochemistry under lean electrolyte operation is the most promising path for Li/S to move beyond niche applications to potentially transformational performance. An emerging Li/S research area is the use of sparingly solvating electrolytes and the creation of design rules for discovering new electrolyte systems that fundamentally decouple electrolyte volume from sulfur and polysulfide reaction mechanism. This Perspective presents an outlook for sparingly solvating electrolytes as a key path forward for long-lived, high energy densi...


ABSTRACT A study was conducted to clarify the prognostic factors related to recurrence of craniopharyngioma and to improve the quality of life of patients by the treatment with intentional partial removal and gamma knife radiosurgery. One hundred cases of craniopharyngioma have been treated at Komaki City Hospital since 1991. In a mean follow-up period of 65.5 months, the tumor control rate was 79.5%. The 5- and 10-year actuarial survival rates were 94.1% and 91%, respectively. However, the recurrence-free survival rates were 73.6% at 5 years and 60.2% at 10 years. Nine factors thought to be related to the recurrence were selected from past references and previous studies, including gender, age, pediatric (≤17 years) or adult patient, partial removal or recurrence, mean tumor diameter, tumor type (solid or cyst), pathological types (squamous cell or adamantinoma), number of previous treatments, and radiation dose. Statistical analysis was performed to determine which factors had a significant prognostic impact. Multivariate analysis showed that mean tumor diameter and radiation dose were independent predictors of outcome. To maximize the prognostic power of these factors, cut-off levels were determined using ROC analysis. These levels were 19 mm for tumor diameter and 13.2 Gy for marginal dose. Significant prognostic factors related to recurrence of craniopharyngioma are tumor diameter and radiation dose. A tumor diameter of <19 mm and a marginal dose of ≥13.2 Gy are favorable prognostic factors for gamma knife radiosurgery.


The performance of terrain-aided navigation of aircraft depends on the size of the terrain gradient in the area. The point-mass filter (PMF) described in this work yields an approximate Bayesian solution that is well suited for the unstructured nonlinear estimation problem in terrain navigation. It recursively propagates a density function of the aircraft position. The shape of the point-mass density reflects the estimate quality; this information is crucial in navigation applications, where estimates from different sources often are fused in a central filter. Monte Carlo simulations show that the approximation can reach the optimal performance, and realistic simulations show that the navigation performance is very high compared with other algorithms and that the point-mass filter solves the recursive estimation problem for all the types of terrain covered in the test. The main advantages of the PMF is that it works for many kinds of nonlinearities and many kinds of noise and prior distributions. The mesh support and resolution are automatically adjusted and controlled using a few intuitive design parameters. The main disadvantage is that it cannot solve estimation problems of very high dimension since the computational complexity of the algorithm increases drastically with the dimension of the state space. The implementation used in this work shows real-time performance for 2D and in some cases 3D models, but higher state dimensions are usually intractable.


Letter investigates the impact of the present in early historical fictions and how that present is manifested in the elaborate allegorical structures of the first popular novels to emerge after the War of 1812. Specifically, the figure of the suffering Revolutionary soldier, central to both James Fenimore Cooper's The Spy and John Neal's Seventy-Six, serves as a contemporary allegorical expression of historical change, a figure best explained by Walter Benjamin's definition of the allegorical ruin. The suffering soldier complicates national origins and resists narrative closure. As a literary figuration, this soldier represents a disruptive discourse in the early nation, one that contradicts master narratives of progress and national destiny. Thus, the suffering soldier complicates criticisms of early popular novels by suggesting a highly complex cultural function for the genre. Presentism as an early national orientation suggests an alternative to historical progressivism and antiquarianism, both of which depend on linear approaches to the study of early U.S. culture and literary history. Cooper, when read alongside his contemporary Neal, reveals a deeply conflicted temporal sensibility, one as much concerned with past losses as it is hopeful of future gain. Historical allegories, because they articulate between past and present, offer an important discursive frame for studying the emerging significance of novels in early national culture.


Nitrous oxide (N 2 O) can be emitted during wastewater treatment contributing to the global warming due to its high global warming potential,. During the last ten years, several efforts have been provided to improve knowledge on: key mechanisms, operating factors and influent features affecting the N 2 O production/emission. However, the knowledge on the investigated issues is not completely mature. Indeed, in terms of mathematical modelling, literature shows that a reliable model has not yet been established due to the huge data set required and the complexity of the mechanistic models indicated as the most accurate. In this work, the first attempt to perform a multiregression analysis is presented with the final aim to get a simple and easy tool for N 2 O estimation from wastewater treatment plant. The multiregression analysis has been performed by testing both simple and complex equations by means of Monte Carlo simulations. Data acquired from an University Cape Town moving bed membrane bioreactor pilot plant have been adopted. The pilot plant has been operated at different sludge retention times. Results of the simple linear regression analysis show that such approaches are suitable to predict N 2 O flux emitted from each tank of the plant and dissolved in the permeate. For some tested cases, a high efficiency (obtained comparing simulated and measured data) was obtained (e.g., 0.96 for N 2 O-N dissolved in the effluent). The results show that the dependence with the available measured data changes with the operational conditions. Conversely, results related to the complex multiregression analysis reveal that no unique equation valid for different operational conditions can be established.


Background: A number of noninvasive tests have been developed to establish the presence of Helicobacter pylori infection. However, thus far these tests have only been capable of detecting its presence. An increasing number of antibiotic-resistant H. pylori infections have been reported and they are known to be correlated with 23S rRNA single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). We hypothesized that genomic analysis of H. pylori recovered from gastric washes could not only be less invasive, but also useful as a screening test and for assessing the outcome of eradication therapy. Methods: Biopsy specimens and gastric washes were collected from 100 patients during endoscopic examination. Then we analyzed 23S rRNA, ureA, and cagA genes using PCR and high-throughput pyrosequencing analysis. Results: Forty-five percent (44/97) of patients tested positive for ureA and 42.3% (41/97) tested positive by a rapid urease test. One hundred percent (35/35) of patients who tested positive by both methods were observed to have the cagA gene. Among these 35 patients, 23S rRNA SNPs were present in 34.3% (12/35). Conclusions: Gastric wash-based PCR and a pyrosequencing assay were used to rapidly detect and estimate the number of 23S rRNA SNPs in clinical isolates of H. pylori. Not only is this a less invasive technique, but it can also diagnose drug resistance.


Afghanistan should be in no rush to join the World Trade Organisation. Rapid accession would have few benefits and could undermine efforts to reduce poverty. Careful planning and negotiation is the only way to avoid onerous commitments that have been forced on other very poor countries and to make the best of the potential benefits that membership of the multilateral system can offer. Given the country's severe poverty, massive reconstruction effort and ongoing security concerns, all parties involved in the process should promote an appropriate, pro-development accession package for Afghanistan that is in line with its least developed country (LDC) status.


Statelessness has been described as the result of unintentional gaps between citizenship policies excluding individuals who move, form relationships and reproduce across international borders. But what if the rise in statelessness is not a technicality, but a strategy of slippery statecraft meant to design the citizenry a given state is willing to protect? This paper places statelessness within the context of neoliberal globalisation and international migration and provides a critical global governance view of contemporary causes of statelessness, key actors working on it and their framing of the issue within global governance frameworks. I argue that the dominant framing of statelessness as a technical issue obviates the politics behind statelessness as slippery statecraft, leading proposed solutions to fall short. Critical research may help advocates make the case for inclusion, appealing to broader state interests and networks, without abandoning attendant human rights obligations.


The author studies a simple dynamic general equilibrium monetary model to interpret key macroeconomic developments in the U.S. economy both before and after the Great Recession. In normal times, when the Federal Reserve's policy rate is above the interest paid on reserves, countercyclical monetary policy works in a textbook manner. When a shock drives the policy rate to the zero lower bound, the economy enters a liquidity-trap scenario in which open market purchases of government securities have no real or nominal effects, apart from expanding the supply of excess reserves in the banking sector. In a liquidity trap, the Fed loses all control of inflation, which is now determined entirely by the fiscal authority. In normal times, raising the interest paid on reserves stimulates economic activity, but in a liquidity trap, raising the interest paid on reserves retards economic activity.


The power sector in South Africa is dominated by the state-owned, vertically integrated utility, Eskom. An Energy Policy White Paper and subsequent Cabinet decisions laid out a path of managed liberalisation. However, government still experiences ambivalence and doubts around restructuring. The "standard" model of power sector reform of the past decade – vertical and horizontal unbundling, wholesale and retail competition and privatisation – has, in effect, been abandoned by South Africa, and increasingly by many other developing countries. This does not mean that governments will accept inefficient utilities. There is a still a commitment to ensure improved performance by state-owned enterprises through appropriate governance and regulation. Capital constrained countries will also open up space for private investments – mostly within the framework of a "hybrid market" where the state utility remains dominant. What remains to be seen is whether the investment mistakes of the past can be obviated and whether security of supply can be achieved at an acceptable price.


During early development of the mammalian cerebral cortex, young neurons migrate outward from the site of their final mitosis in the ventricular zone into the cortical plate, where they form the adult cortex. Time-lapse confocal microscopy was used to observe directly the dynamic behaviors of migrating cells in living slices of developing cortex. The majority of cells migrated along a radial pathway, consistent with the view that cortical neurons migrate along radial glial fibers. A fraction of cells, however, turned within the intermediate zone and migrated orthogonal to the radial fibers. This orthogonal migration may contribute to the tangential dispersion of clonally related cortical neurons.


This intellectual history of hospitality from Vitoria to Vattel provides an alternative story to the prevailing narrative of migration control. Although migration control is frequently heralded as falling within the domestic jurisdiction of states, the movement of persons across borders is a permanent feature of history that has been framed by international law for ages. The early doctrine of the law of nations reminds us that migration was at the heart of the first reflections about international law through the enduring dialectic between sovereignty and hospitality. This long-standing debate was framed by early scholars following three main trends, which constitute the focus of this article. The free movement of persons was first acknowledged by Vitoria and Grotius as a rule of international law through the right of communication between peoples. By contrast, Pufendorf and Wolff insisted on the state's discretion to refuse admission of aliens as a consequence of its territorial sovereignty. Yet, in-between these two different poles – sovereignty versus hospitality – Vattel counterbalanced the sovereign power of the state by a right of entry based on necessity. As exemplified by the founding fathers of international law, the dialectic between sovereignty and hospitality offers innovative ways for rethinking migration.


Background and Objectives: Red beet extract concentrate can be used as a natural colorant in food products; however, destructive effects of thermal methods to produce juice concentrate decrease nutritional value in the final product. Materials and Methods: In this study, red beet extract was concentrated using osmotic distillation method, and the best pretreatment was evaluated to increase the efficiency of the concentration process. Also changes in some physicochemical properties such as betacyanins and betaxanthins contents, total phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity of red beet juice were evaluated by both the membrane and thermal concentration methods. Results: The results showed that the best concentration efficiency was obtained after pretreatment of the fresh juice with centrifugation at 1699 G for 17 min. Evaluation of the effect of both the membrane and thermal concentration processes on the physicochemical properties of juice showed that the membrane method did not change betacyanin and betaxanthin contents, total phenolic compounds, and antioxidant activity of the red beet extract. However, these properties decreased with the thermal concentration method by 26, 15, 11 and 13%, respectively. Conclusions: According to the results, osmotic distillation can produce red beet concentrate with more nutritional value than the concentrate produced with thermal method.


The transport of the cholestatic steroid glucuronide, 3H-estradiol-17 beta-(beta-D-glucuronide) (E2 17G), was examined in isolated female rat hepatocytes over a broad substrate concentration range (0.1-100 microM). Two different carrier systems were identified with the following kinetic parameters: Km1 = 4.54 microM; Vmax1 = 0.149 nmol/min/mg protein; Km2 = 149 microM; Vmax2 = 0.641 nmol/min/mg protein. Taurocholate and testosterone glucuronide selectively and competitively inhibited [3H]-E2 17G uptake at the high affinity site. Ki values calculated for taurocholate (43 microM) and testosterone glucuronide (28 microM) indicated that these two inhibitors were relatively weak competitors for this E2 17G transport site. Conversely, E2 17G inhibited [3H]taurocholate uptake into isolated hepatocytes (Ki = 43 microM). Bromosulfophthalein (10 microM) inhibited uptake of 0.5-50 microM [3H]-E2 17G by 55-85%, whereas morphine glucuronide (100 microM) had no significant effect on uptake of [3H]-E2 17G at these concentrations. The effects of taurocholate, testosterone glucuronide, bromosulfophthalein, and morphine glucuronide on [3H]-E2 17G uptake into isolated rat hepatocytes correlated with the ability of these agents to inhibit binding of [3H]-E2 17G to specific sites in rat liver plasma membranes. These data support the postulate that the two [3H]-E2 17G binding sites identified in female rat liver plasma membranes represent two distinct organic anion carriers and indicate that the high affinity site for [3H]-E2 17G represents a carrier that is shared by organic anions and bile acids.


ABSTRACT Thirty-five percent of Canadians over the age of 85 have dementia, and up to 90% of their home care is provided by family and friends. The purpose of this study was to explore the use and satisfaction with home and community-based services for persons with dementia from the perspectives of family caregivers. The study was conducted using an interpretive, descriptive, qualitative approach. Six focus groups (N = 36) and three personal interviews were conducted with rural and urban caregivers in Ontario, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan, Canada. Using Lubrosky's (1994) thematic analysis, the overarching themes identified were availability and acceptability of services. The findings suggest a need for an integrated continuing care model that includes the person living with dementia and their family caregivers as partners in care, addresses all of the determinants of health, and embraces sensitivity, diversity, flexibility, and supportive services to enhance the availability and acceptability of Canadian home and community-based services.


INTRODUCTION
Hydrogen peroxide (30%) is a commonly used "in office" bleaching agent. Deleterious effects of hydrogen peroxide on the pulp have been observed.

AIM
The present study was conducted with the aim to evaluate the penetration of 30% hydrogen peroxide into the pulp chamber through intact teeth and through the surface of teeth, restored with either hybrid composite or Resin Modified Glass Ionomer Cement (RMGIC).

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Sixty extracted human maxillary central incisors were selected and divided into six groups. Two groups were restored with hybrid composite resin and two with RMGIC, while two groups were left intact. The teeth with acetate buffer solution in their pulp cavity were then immersed in either 30% hydrogen peroxide or distilled water depending upon the group, for 60 minutes at 37°C. Then horseradish peroxidase and leucocrystal violet were added to the acetate buffer solution present in the pulp chamber after it was transferred to a test tube and the optical density of the resultant blue solution obtained was measured spectrophotometrically.

STATISTICAL ANALYSIS
The data obtained were analyzed using one way ANOVA and Student's t-test.

RESULTS
The data obtained established that hydrogen peroxide penetrated into the pulp from the bleaching agent used. Hydrogen peroxide (30%) showed the highest pulpal peroxide level in teeth restored with RMGIC followed by teeth restored with hybrid composite resin and the least amount of penetration was observed in intact teeth.

CONCLUSION
The amount of peroxide penetration into the tooth is more through restored tooth than intact tooth and is also dependant on the type of restorative materials used.


Libraries library play an important role for students in their academic programme, Distance Learning students in University of Ibadan were studied to investigate their library habits and factors affecting use of libraries. Purposive sampling technique was adopted for this study to select 100 library registered distance learners from Faculties of Education and Social Sciences. Questionnaire, interview and observation were the instruments employed for the study. Findings revealed that 67.9% of the respondents from Education and 62.5% from Social Sciences had access to available library resources, while 36(46.2%) from Education and 8(50%) Social Sciences used the library twice in a week when they were in session. The major library habits were searching for materials through the shelf, catalogue and using the libraries alone. Respondents from Education and Social Sciences (80.7% and 93.7%) respectively searched through the shelf, The major factors affecting their use of the library were inadequate reading materials 77% from Education; 62.5% from social Sciences) and their inability to borrow library materials. The maximum use of the library can only be obtained when these students are allowed to borrow library materials and given library use instructions as their full time counterpart.


Abstract : Thermal emission, exhibiting antenna-like directivity, has been generated by a wide variety of both simple and complex micro-structures. The basic demonstrations of directional emission, and specific device performance evaluations, have been conducted at elevated temperatures, typically several hundred degrees Celsius. The most common applications for these high-temperature designs are thermal photo-voltaic and spectroscopic sources. A wide range of lower temperature applications, such as spacecraft thermal management and mid- to far-infrared optical train stray light management, are precluded by the cost and complexity of the fabrication processes employed. In this work, a novel fabrication and physical surface optimization of a seminal directionally emitting structure is conducted in metalized plastic. The fabrication method is derived from the high-throughput compact disc manufacturing process and exploits the advantageous surface electromagnetic properties of aluminium, at the expense of forgoing high-temperature operation. Then, a novel directionally emitting structure, exhibiting a broader angular response, is design and fabricated by the same methods. The performance of both structures is evaluated through reflectance and self-emission measurements, and compared to rigorous modeling results. The necessity of conducting low-temperature emission and reflectance measurements, on instruments designed for radiometry rather than scatterometry, requires consideration of the longitudinal spatial coherence of field incidence on the surface. To this end, a well-developed modeling method was extended to include finite longitudinal spatial coherence excitation.


Abstract : The author explores the concept of victory in the war in terrorism, but he does so by placing it within the larger currents of change that are sweeping the global security environment. He contends that the time-tested idea of decisive victory is still an important one, but must be designed very carefully in this dangerous new world. To do so correctly can provide the foundation for an effective strategy. To fail to do so could be the first step toward strategic defeat.


Spatial Analysis of Functional Enrichment (SAFE) is a systematic quantitative approach for annotating large biological networks. SAFE detects network regions that are statistically overrepresented for functional groups or quantitative phenotypes of interest, and provides an intuitive visual representation of their relative positioning within the network. In doing so, SAFE determines which functions are represented in a network, which parts of the network they are associated with and how they are potentially related to one another. Here, I provide a detailed stepwise description of how to perform a SAFE analysis. As an example, I use SAFE to annotate the genome-scale genetic interaction similarity network from Saccharomyces cerevisiae with Gene Ontology (GO) biological process terms. In addition, I show how integrating GO with chemical genomic data in SAFE can recapitulate known modes-of-action of chemical compounds and potentially identify novel drug mechanisms.


Cashewnut sheath, an agricultural waste discarded largely in India is identified for the preparation of an effective sorbent for fluoride removal. Experiments were conducted for the sorption of fluoride from aqueous solution using activated carbon from cashewnut sheath (CSC) in two phases, namely, batch studies and column studies. The influence of pH, adsorbent dose, particle size and contact time was investigated in batch studies. The adsorption process follows Freundlich adsorption isotherm. Continuous flow experiments in fixed bed columns packed with activated carbon were carried out in order to assess the feasibility of this for field applications. The carbon bed after exhaustion was regenerated with 0.1 N hydrochloric acid. The influence of initial concentration of fluoride ion, flow rate, particle size and concentration of the regenerant on the performance of the column was studied. Comparative study was conducted with commercially available carbon impregnated with 2% aluminium sulphate solution. The results revealed that CSC is found to be active and efficient for fluoride removal.


ABSTRACT Snow and ice thermodynamics of Bear Lake (Alaska) are investigated with a simple freshwater lake model (FLake) and a more complex snow and ice thermodynamic model (HIGHTSI). A number of sensitivity experiments have been carried out to investigate the influence of snow and ice parameters and of different complexity on the results. Simulation results are compared with observations from the Alaska Lake Ice and Snow Observatory Network. Adaptations of snow thermal and optical properties in FLake can largely improve accuracy of the results. Snow-to-ice transformation is important for HIGHTSI to calculate the total ice mass balance. The seasonal maximum ice depth is simulated in FLake with a bias of −0.04 m and in HIGHTSI with no bias. Correlation coefficients between ice depth measurements and simulations are high (0.74 for FLake and 0.9 for HIGHTSI). The snow depth simulation can be improved by taking into account a variable snow density. Correlation coefficients for surface temperature are 0.72 for FLake and 0.81 for HIGHTSI. Overall, HIGHTSI gives slightly more accurate surface temperature than FLake probably due to the consideration of multiple snow and ice layers and the expensive iteration calculation procedure.


Part I This study settled the dispute and proved beyond doubt that excess lead today is 300-fold instead of the 5-fold, as proposed by other investigators, greater than prehistoric time. And, virtually all of the present-day excess of lead above natural levels was shown to be caused by industrial lead emissions to the atmosphere. Concentrations of lead and potassium were determined in a series of ice samples taken in sequence from the outside to the interior of several >2000 year old ice cores drilled from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Concentrations of lead and potassium were observed to decrease continuously in going from the exterior to the interior of the cores, which indicated that surface contamination had penetrated to the interior of the core, making it impossible to determine the original concentration of lead in the ice. Concentrations measured at the centers of these cores must therefore represent upper limits of lead concentration originally present in the ice. There are l.6 ng Pb/kg ice in 5000 year old Greenland ice and l.4 ng Pb/kg in 2000 year old Antarctic ice. These data verified the earlier findings reported by Murozumi et al. (1969) of Potassium concentrations at the center of the ice core are 2 x 103 ng K/kg ice in 5000 year old Greenland ice and 9 x 102 ng K/kg ice in the 2000 year old Antarctic ice. The decrease in potassium concentrations within the central third of the core was, unlike that for lead, relatively small, indicating the potassium contamination effects were not large within the central portions of the cores. Part II This study documented the chronological changes of lead and barium fluxes from the Los Angeles Urban Complex to adjacent San Nicolas, Santa Barbara, Santa Monica, and San Pedro coastal basins; and identified industry as the sources of the excess lead and barium. The natural deposition fluxes of acid leachable lead in Santa Barbara, Santa Monica, and San Pedro basins were about 0.7, 0.1 and 0.2 µg Pb/cm2 respectively. A model, using clay as a major transport vehicle for soluble lead, was proposed to explain the large lead flux within the Santa Barbara basin compared to the other basins. Sedimentation fluxes of industrial and natural leachable lead within these three basins today are 3- to l0-fold greater, being about 2.1, 1.1 and 1.8 µg Pb/cm2 yr respectively. Directly deposited large sewage particles account for 0%, 66%, and 75% of the industrial lead deposition fluxes respectively. Isotopic compositions of the excess leachable lead change in accordance with corresponding known changes of isotopic compositions of industrial lead in the Los Angeles atmosphere. Lead remaining in the acid leached sediment residues originates from igneous and clay minerals, exhibing no changes in concentration or isotopic composition since pre-industrial times. Deposition fluxes of total barium among the three basins were proportional to mass deposition fluxes before 1950. Afterwards, there are barium concentration maxima with time in both Santa Monica and San Pedro basin sediments that are attributable to industrial sewage rather than to erosion from barium-rich sedimentary evaporite strata exposed locally along the shore. A slight increase of barium concentration in present-day Santa Barbara basin sediments may reflect dispersal of barium rich drilling mud from local drilling operations.


Background Deficiency of the enzyme lysosomal acid lipase (LAL) presents in infancy with hepatosplenomegaly, adrenal calcification and failure to thrive – Wolman Disease (WD). Cholesterol Ester Storage Disease (CESD) is the more common and milder form and presents later with hepatomegaly and hyperlipidaemia. Until recently there was no recognised method for the measurement of LAL in dried blood spots (DBS). Aim To develop a simple method for the measurement of lysosomal acid lipase in DBS and validate the technique using samples from patients with CESD. Methods LAL was extracted from DBS with water and incubated with 4mU-palmitate in acetate buffer and cardiolipin as an activator of LAL. Lalistat 2 is used as an inhibitor of LAL and activity is estimated by measuring total lipase activity and activity in the presence of Lalistat 2. LAL was determined by subtracting activity measured in the inhibited reaction from that in the uninhibited reaction. The assay was performed using 96-well plates and read at 355nm/460nm. Results LAL activity in normal controls was 0.37 – 2.30 nmol/punch/hr. Samples from CESD patients and WD have significantly reduced LAL activity : <0.04 nmol/punch/hr (n = 32). Activity in samples from obligate carriers is in the range 0.15 – 0.40 nmol/punch/hr (n = 15). Conclusions Until now, methods for the measurement of LAL required the use of leucocytes and fibroblasts. These are difficult samples to prepare and methods for the measurement of LAL using these sample types are time consuming and expensive. Measurement of LAL in DBS is made difficult by the presence of other lipases in whole blood. Lalistat 2 is a specific inhibitor of LAL which allows the reliable determination of LAL in DBS. Results show the method differentiates clearly between normal controls, carriers and affected cases. The DBS sample is simple to prepare and transport. By performing the assay using 96-well plates, samples can be processed efficiently in batches, previously not possible. Therefore it is now practical to screen for WD and CESD in patients with a lower index of suspicion of the disorder.


Distributed sensor networks have been the focus of considerable research during the past few years. Current research on wireless sensor networks can involve a number of issues, including hardware constraints, communication and routing issues, data management problems, and software engineering principles. To clearly understand their characteristics, we require development environments to design them, explore architectural alternatives, and simulate their performance. MagicWeaver is an agent-based simulation framework for wireless sensor networks. It provides abstract models for sensor tasking and communication, device constraints, network topologies and the physical environment. It also supports a special class of applications characterized by streaming data-feeds. MagicWeaver illustrates ways in which agents paradigm extends it`s flexibility to incorporate teamwork and coordination between sensor agents. In this paper we discuss MagicWeaver`s underlying design rationale and provide it`s current implementation status. We also report on results obtained while performing scalability tests using the JADE agent platform.


We use light detection and ranging (LIDAR) imagery and optical stimulation luminescence dating to show that stable parabolic dunes on the Canadian prairies originated from active barchan dunes ~200 years ago. Residual dune ridges, marking former lower stoss slope positions of migrating dunes, record the transformation of barchan dunes to parabolic dunes between A.D. 1810 and 1880. Parabolic dunes stabilized by ca. A.D. 1910, with a few larger dunes and blowouts still active today. A dry, cool climate permitted sand transport to out-compete vegetation stabilization and, with lowered water tables, maintain desert-like barchan dunes with bare interdune sand sheets. These findings explain why dune fields of the southern Canadian prairies are currently more active than those of the United States Great Plains and the observation that dunes have stabilized under twentieth century warming. Our results emphasize the importance of viewing dune field responses to short-term disturbances in the context of longer-term system response, particularly when relatively modest climatic changes can cause major shifts in dune activity.


A number of studies have revealed that perceived emotional stress can produce various transient cardiovascular responses. The reactions may include changes in heart rate and cardiac output. They may include abnormalities in heart rhythm, changes in blood pressure, peripheral resistance, blood viscosity, blood clotting time, and serum cholesterol levels. A hypothesis suggested by the findings which requires further research follows: If these cardiovascular responses were sustained for a period of time, they would ultimately influence the onset or course of coronary artery disease. These studies also suggest that emotional tension at one's work may place an additional strain on an already diseased heart.In patients whose cardiovascular system is already impaired, investigators have traced the sequence from emotional upset to heart disease. Since the reported evidence has been based on cardiac subjects, it is still possible that "gradual increase in tension" is perceived only after illness occurs, but not necessarily perceived as stressful before beart disease. Owing to the lack of prospective studies in which the life stress factors are studied prior to heart disease, emotion as a cause or contributory factor to heart disease has not been fully accepted. These studies suggest that certain personality traits may be common to certain forms of heart disease. Most of this evidence has been observed from time-consuming, detailed personality analysis, and the evidence depends on studies of relatively few patients and poor or no controls.It is important to note that these studies on personality type and heart disease were conducted after heart disorders developed. This raises the question of whether the reported personality characteristics preceded or followed the heart disease. The investigations to date assume that the personality structure occurred before the appearance of the heart disease, but before we can answer this question, a longitudinal study of the personality of individuals prior to cardiovascular disease would be necessary.


This research aims to show the interest of nudges as a communication tool for organizations involved in an agile innovation approach. It describes how the flexibility, adaptability and low cost of nudges strengthen the ability of the organizations that use them to improve their agility. From a literature review on the nudges and agile innovation concepts, we propose a typology of nudges with a managerial orientation. Based on this typology we show in a last section how nudges represent a tool that is perfectly suited to innovative organizations wishing to develop their agility, whether in the context of their communications to their employees or their customers. Lastly, research perspectives are envisaged around the concept of agile communication.
 JEL Codes: M37, M15, M14


Australia stands at the crossroads in industrial relations. There is a need for a policy debate on new structures rather than recycle the arguments of individualism versus collectivism. There may well be more productivity to unlock from the Australian economic system and the workforce but the question remains what is the best way to do this and preserve Australia's cultural values of fairness, equity, fi erce independence, competition and a sense of fraternity. These values are much more complex than simply freedom of choice and are fundamental to a rich and coherent society. We propose a new consensus corporate model which will deliver these values and beliefs and deliver a high fi rm performance. The way forward is to build on these three core beliefs. The new model is called the Corporate Partnership Model which is a partnership of employees, management and shareholders separated in different corporate structures. The implications for industrial relations reform of the Corporate Partnership Model are signifi cant. The enterprise level bargaining arrangements and a decentralised labor market are an ideal context in which to introduce such an approach. It provides for workplace representation at the highest and lowest level of the fi rm and delivers on workplace reform and higher performance and employment creation breathing new life into the individualism and collectivism debates and IR reform more generally. While trade Unions may feel a degree of anxiety over the blurring of the capital and labour relationship, the corporate partnership model could deliver benefi ts that they aspire to for their members such as job security, superannuation and employment conditions as well as equality, justice and opportunity. Further there is no evidence of a decreased desire for union representation in employee ownership fi rms. This paper discusses the Corporate Partnership Model using empirical evidence and IR theory and then plots the implications for public policy and trade unions.


Ovigerous mole crabs Emerita talpoida (Say) were monitored in the laboratory to determine if the time of larval release is synchronous and under endogenous control. To determine the time of larval release, ovigerous females were placed under a 14:10 light/dark cycle simulating the ambient photoperiod. Hatching was rhythmic, occurring as a quick burst lasting about 5–15 min shortly after the onset of darkness. An individual mole crab will release batches of larvae for up to three successive nights, suggesting that the rhythm is under endogenous control. Mole crabs monitored under constant low-level red light displayed the same release pattern with hatching occurring near the time of expected sunset, indicating the presence of a circadian rhythm in larval release. To investigate whether the female or the embryos control hatching, a portion of the egg mass (50–100 embryos) was separated from the female. The time of hatching of the detached embryos subjected to either a still or shaken treatment was compared with the hatching time of embryos still attached to the female. Detached eggs in both treatments hatched within 1.5–2 h of the time of the female-attached eggs, which suggests that embryos control the timing of hatching.


Kinases and phosphatases are key regulatory proteins in the cell. The disruption of their activities leads ultimately to the abolishment of the homeostasis of the cell, and is frequently correlated with cancer. EphB1 is a member of the largest family of receptor tyrosine kinases. It is associated with neurogenesis, angiogenesis, and cancer. The cytosolic part of the human EphB1 receptor is composed of two domains. Successful generation of soluble constructs, using a novel random construct screening approach, led to the structure determination of the kinase domain of this receptor. The native structure and the complex structure with an ATP analogue revealed novel features in the regulation of the Eph family of kinases. The structure of PTPA, an activator of protein phosphatase 2 A, a tumor suppressor and a key phosphatase in the cell was solved. The structure revealed a novel fold containing a conserved cleft predicted to be involved in interaction with PP2A. Finally, the structure of YegS, an Escherichia coli protein annotated as a putative diacylglycerol kinase, has been determined. Beside the elucidation of its atomic structure, a phosphatidylglycerol (PG) kinase activity, never seen before, has been assigned to YegS based on biochemical studies. The YegS structure shows resemblance to the fold previously seen in NAD kinases. The structure also revealed the existence of a novel metal site that could potentially play a regulatory role. The YegS structure has important implications for understanding related proteins in pathogenic organisms and is the first homologue of a human lipid kinase for which the structure has been elucidated.


Upper Triassic strata exposed in the Four Corners region belong to the Chinle Group of late
Carnian-Rhaetian age. Chinle Group strata can be divided into eight lithostratigraphic intervals: (1)
mottled stratalTemple Mountain Formation-as much as 31 m of mostly color mottled, deeply pedoturbated
siltstone, sandstone and conglomerate; (2) Shinarump Formation-up to 76 m of trough-crossbedded
sandstone and siliceous extrabasinal conglomerate; (3) Monitor Butte/Cameron/Bluewater Creek Formations-
up to 84 m of varied lithofacies ranging from green bentonitic mudstones (Monitor Butte) to
sandstones (Cameron) to red-bed mudstones (Bluewater Creek); (4) Blue Mesa Member of Petrified Forest
Formation-up to 100 m of blue, gray, purple and red variegated bentonitic mudstone; (5) Moss Back
Formation/Sonsela Member of Petrified Forest Formation-up to 50 m of trough-cross bedded sandstone
and intrabasinal conglomerate; (6) Painted Desert Member of Petrified Forest Formation-up to 150 m of
mostly red-bed bentonitic mudstone and siltstone; (7) Owl Rock Formation-up to 150 m of pale red and
orange siltstone interbedded with ledges of pedogenic calcrete limestone; (8) Rock Point Formation-up
to 300 m of reddish brown, cyclically-bedded sandstone and non-bentonitic siltstone. In southwestern
Colorado, the base of the Chinle Group is the Moss Back Formation resting on Lower Permian strata. We
abandon the term Dolores Formation and correlate its informal members as follows: (1) lower member =
Moss Back Formation; (2) middle member = Painted Desert Member of Petrified Forest Formation; and (3)
upper member = Rock Point Formation. The informal term "Kane Springs strata," applied to some Chinle
Group coarse-grained strata in southeastern Utah, is also abandoned. Church Rock Member (Formation)
is a synonym of Rock Point Formation, and the term Church Rock should not be applied to nearly all the
Chinle Group section in southeastern Utah. Palynomorphs, megafossil plants and fossil vertebrates support
the following age assignments for Chinle Group strata in the Four Corners region: late Carnian = mottled
strata/Temple Mountain Formation, Shinarump Formation, Monitor Butte/Cameron/Bluewater Creek Formations
and Blue Mesa Member of Petrified Forest Formation; early-middle Norian Moss Back Formation/
Sonsela Member of Petrified Forest Formation, Painted Desert Member of Petrified Forest Formation
and Owl Rock Formation; and Rhaetian = Rock Point Formation. The Chinle Group consists of three
unconformity-bounded sequences: Shinarump-Blue Mesa sequence of late Carnian age; Moss Back-Owl
Rock sequence of early-middle Norian age; and Rock Point sequence of Rhaetian age. Facies architecture
and biostratigraphy support 'a genetic relationship between Chinle Group strata on the Colorado Plateau
and shallow marine strata of the Mesozoic marine province of western Nevada. This relationship suggests
that eustasy was the primary allochthonous control on Chinle Group sedimentation. At Big Indian Rock in
the Lisbon Valley of southeastern Utah, a skull of the phytosaur Redondasaurus is in a thin, discontinuous
mud-pebble conglomerate near the base of the Wingate Sandstone. Redondasaurus is an index fossil of the
Late Triassic Apachean (Rhaetian) land-vertebrate faunachron. Unabraded surface texture, large size and
preservation of thin, fragile bone suggest that the phytosaur skull is not reworked, so the Triassic-Jurassic
boundary is stratigraphically above it. No unconformity surface is present in the lower Wingate Sandstone
above the skull. Thus, at Big Indian Rock, the J-O unconformity is not at the base of the Wingate Sandstone.
If the basal Wingate is of Late Triassic age, then the Moenave Formation, with which it intertongues
laterally, must also include Triassic strata. This suggests the Triassic-Jurassic boundary on the Colorado
Plateau is relatively transitional-not a profound unconformity-within the Wingate-Moenave lithosome.


The West Tamar District of northern Tasmania is a region of diverse geology and
complex structure. The area comprises an allochthonous block of Precambrian basement,
the Badger Head Block, a Lower Palaeozoic thrust belt, and a large Tertiary graben, the
Tamar Graben. A gravity survey was carried out in the area in order to model the
subsurface geology and structure.
The residual Bouguer anomaly reveals some large and small scale trends. To the east
steep symmetrical west and east directed gradients mark the down thrown block that is
the Tamar Graben, whilst to the west a long, N-S trending, east-directed gradient marks
the western boundary of the Badger Head Block and is considered to mark a major
structure. An ultramafic complex near the centre of the study area causes a large negative
anomaly due to its level of serpentinisation, whilst positive anomalies over the low
density Badger Head Block suggest denser lithologies at depth.
Gridding and re-interpretation of pre-existing aeromagnetic data sets has enabled the
complex faulting structure of the area to be outlined. Comparisons of faults inferred from
the magnetics with a digital elevation model and local geology reveals that much of the
present topography and outcrop geology is controlled by northwest and northeast trending
faults. The northwest trending faults form the major structures in the region. The
ultramafic complex is comprised of two main bodies, with a third inferred to branch west
from the main body beneath the Badger Head Block.
Three structural cross sections have been created using forward modelling of gravity and
magnetics. Two of the sections model east-dipping, thrust-bound packages of Lower
Palaeozoic strata along the eastern part of their sections. The western sections are best
modelled with Cambrian ultramafics and sedimentary rocks dipping west beneath the
Neoproterozoic Badger Head Block.
The tectonic implications of the outcome of structural modelling are that a NE-directed
thrusting event is inferred to have occurred during the Cambrian or Early-Middle
Devonian prior to SW -directed thrusting in the Middle Devonian, which emplaced
Palaeozoic strata in the Beaconsfield area into thrust fault-bound packages.


Growing bioenergy crops on degraded and underutilized land is a promising solution to meet the requirement for energy security, food security, and land restoration. This paper assesses the socioeconomic and environmental benefits of agroforestry systems based on nyamplung (tamanu) (Calophyllum inophyllum L.) in the Wonogiri district of Central Java, Indonesia. Data were collected through field observations and focus group discussions involving 20 farmers who intercrop nyamplung with maize, rice, and peanuts and utilize the species in honey production. Calculating each crop's net present value (NPV) demonstrates that when grown as monocultures, staple crops rice and peanuts lead to negative profitability, while maize generates only a marginal profit; yet honey production utilizing nyamplung produces a NPV nearly 300 times greater than maize. However, when utilizing nyamplung, honey is also the commodity most sensitive to decreases in production, followed by nyamplung–peanut and nyamplung–rice combinations. While decreases in production have little effect on the NPVs of rice, peanuts, and maize, these annual crops can only be cultivated for a maximum of 6 years within the nyamplung's 35-year cycle, due to canopy closure after this time. Nyamplung-based agroforestry systems can provide economic, social, and environmental gains on different scales. However, when considering the high profit potential of nyamplung combined with honey production, further research is needed to improve and develop bee husbandry practices so this becomes a viable option for local farmers.


Employees leave managers, not organisations. That is the growing consensus amongst theorists and practitioners in the United States and Europe. But what causes this behaviour? And to what extent is this phenomenon apparent in emerging markets such as China? This study aims to provide some of the answers. In doing so it examines the antecedents and consequences of employees' commitment to line manager in the Peoples' Republic of China. Trust in a line manager was found to be a key factor associated with employee commitment. More specifically, trust in line manager mediates the relationships between interactional justice and commitment to a line manager. Benefits for organisations are also identified, in that commitment to a line manager is also associated with both employees' performance and organisational citizenship behaviour. The paper concludes with some practical tips for managers and organisations wishing to improve relationships between employees and managers in the Peoples' Republic of China (PRC).


This paper explores contemporary issues facing Non-Status Indians in Canada, and their struggles to politically organize in particular. Using James Scott's theoretical position that political states attempt to create legible populations in order to administer them more easily, this paper examines the category of "Non-Status Indians" and the impacts of federal policy making on their ability to organize. The National Indian Council (NIC), established in 1961, originally articulated the concept of Non-Status Indians as a category of Aboriginal people. Internal pressures led the NIC to split into two groups in 1968: the National Indian Brotherhood, representing status and Treaty Indians; and the Native Council of Canada (NCC), representing Metis and Non-Status Indians. A second severance occurred in 1983 when the Metis National Council split from the NCC, after which the Council for Aboriginal Peoples (CAP) emerged to represent Non-Status Indians and urban Aboriginal peoples. During this period, public policy makers, Status Indians, and Metis literally abandoned the Non-Status label. During the opening decade of the twenty-first century, Non-Status Indian organizations have emerged as new players on the Aboriginal policy landscape. This paper explores this phenomenon, based upon key informant interviews with Non-Status Indian leaders conducted specifically for this project.


Welfare states' redistribution of resources across classes, occupations, and genders is the subject of intensive scholarly analysis. Yet we know very little about how and why welfare states treat different age groups differently. This article demonstrates that seniors' demand for welfare does not determine ageorientation. Rather, the "age of welfare" is a largely unintended consequence of the interaction between the structure of social policies and the way that politicians use these programs to compete for votes. An implication for the policy feedback literature is that constituency demand may be less important than the unintended consequences of welfare state institutions.


Data protection authorities formulate policies and rules which the service providers have to comply with to ensure security and privacy when they perform Big Data analytics using users Personally Identifiable Information (PII). The knowledge contained in the data regulations and organizational privacy policies are typically maintained as short unstructured text in HTML or PDF formats. Hence it is an open challenge to determine the specific regulation rules that are being addressed by a provider's privacy policies. We have developed a semantically rich framework, using techniques from Semantic Web and Natural Language Processing, to extract and compare the context of a short text in real-time. This framework allows automated incremental text comparison and identifying context from short text policy documents by determining the semantic similarity score and extracting semantically similar key terms. Additionally, we also created a knowledge graph to store the semantically similar comparison results while evaluating our framework across EU GDPR and privacy policies of 20 organizations complying with this regulation associated with various categories apply to Big Data stored in the cloud. Our approach can be utilized by Big Data practitioners to update their referential documents regularly based on the authority documents.


[1] Magnesium/calcium ratios in benthic foraminifera (Cibicidoides pachyderma) from a sediment core on the Laurentian Slope (1854 m) exhibit strong millennial-scale fluctuations during the past 4000 years. We convert these data to seawater paleotemperatures using a new monospecific linear equation. Results suggest that the temperature of upper North Atlantic Deep Water (dominated by Labrador Seawater today) has varied by at least 2 C during the late Holocene. Millennial scale coolings coincide with previously identified periods of increased drift ice and regional glacier advances, including the Little Ice Age. Paired oxygen isotope measurements indicate that salinity and perhaps density were reduced during the cold periods. We discuss possible mechanisms for transmitting this cold, fresh signal from surface waters to intermediate depths. Our reconstructed late Holocene ranges in upper North Atlantic Deep Water properties greatly exceed those of the instrumental record and imply that large changes may be yet to come.


Central Asian countries are examined pre- and postindependence to identify the impact of economic and financial development policies. The theoretical background to financial flows and the relation between the development of the financial system and economic growth in transition economies is analyzed using regression, correlation and Granger causality. Data from twenty-seven transition economies in eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics for 1992 to 2008 are used. The results indicate that the transition reform indicator of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development appears to have a negative growth impact, and the results for the indicator of credit to the private sector show no significant effect on growth. Moreover, the difference between lending and borrowing rates appears to have a negative growth impact, as expected.


The Ethiopian national bean program traditionally followed conventional approaches in bean improvement for smallholder farmers. The relative effectiveness and efficiency of Participatory Plant Breeding (PPB) compared to conventional approaches is not fully understood. The study was initiated to evaluate participatory plant breeding in bean improvement to disseminate more acceptable and productive bean varieties for poor farmers. The study was conducted in eastern Ethiopia. Breeders and farmer selectors evaluated and then selected lines on-station from a diverse germplasm pool. The breeders followed a conventional approach, while farmers evaluated their selected lines on their farm. The germplasms included bush and climbing beans in its selections. The selection demonstrated that farmers were capable of making significant contributions in identification of superior cultivars within a relatively short period. They effectively evaluated and selected from large numbers of fixed lines. They applied up to 40 distinct selection criteria indicating the complexity of the user needs and production conditions. However, yield tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses, drought, earliness, marketability, cooking characteristics, seed colour and size and growth habit were considered key criteria. Involving farmers in the selection process had several impacts, not only on farmer perceptions and skill building but also on the formal breeding process, farmer acceptance, farmer production and income, farmer-held diversity, farmer breeding and seed processes, farmer empowerment and costs. A new formal-led breeding scheme incorporating farmer participation is also developed. Lack of an effective seed delivery system and supporting policy is likely to constrain release and rapid dissemination of PPB varieties.


Background: Worldwide, including Norway, overweight and obesity present some of the greatest health challenges. Since the 1980s, the incidence has tripled, leading to a subsequent high prevalence of chronic lifestyle diseases or non-communicable diseases (NCDs), such as cardiovascular disorder, diabetes type 2, some types of cancer, muscle and skeleton disorders and mental health challenges. This has led to an increased focus on lifestyle interventions that emphasise self-management of the condition, as well as the need for users to be readily involved and participating. Therefore, self-management support (SMS) and user involvement have become two important concepts in health services in today's society. The Norwegian Directorate of Health recommended the establishment of Healthy Life Centres (HLCs) in all municipalities to help facilitate and empower people to obtain a greater mastery of the health challenges they face. HLCs assist persons at risk of NCDs or those in need of support for health behaviour changes or weight management. Behaviour change refers to efforts to change people's personal habits to prevent disease. The purpose of these self-management interventions is mainly to promote and improve people's physical activity and diets. There is no clear way of addressing overweight and obesity in primary care; knowledge regarding lifestyle interventions in HLCs and what works is still sparse and needs further investigation.
Aim: The overall aim of this PhD-study was to contribute to a deeper understanding of service users' needs, beneficial SMS and user involvement in lifestyle interventions in Norwegian primary care HLCs. The study explored adult service users' and healthcare professionals' (HPs) experiences and perceptions of these phenomena. Three sub-studies were conducted. The aim of the first study was to explore HLC service users' experiences of living with overweight or obesity and their perceptions of seeking help to change dietary and activity habits. The second study aimed to explore service users' experiences of beneficial SMS and user involvement. The aim of the third study was to explore how HPs provide SMS and what user involvement implies for HPs in HLCs.
Methods: This study involved a qualitative, explorative and interpretative design grounded in hermeneutic methodology and tradition. Semi-structured in-depth interviews with service users participating in lifestyle interventions in HLCs were conducted and analysed using qualitative content analysis. A total of 13 service users (five men and eight women), aged 30-69, from five different HLCs, participated (Papers I and II). Focus groups were used to collect data from healthcare professionals working in HLCs and this was analysed using thematic analysis. 10 healthcare professionals from eight different HLCs participated in two focus group interviews (Paper III).
Results: The analysis of the first study (Paper I) resulted in one main theme: Searching for dignity, which could be split into two themes: 1) Needing to justify avoidance of personal responsibility and 2) A desire to change. In the second study (Paper II), one main theme was identified: Regaining self-esteem and dignity through active involvement and long-term self-worth support in partnership with others. This main theme comprised four themes: 1) Self- efficacy through active involvement and better perceived health, 2) Valued through HPs acknowledgement, equality and individualised support, 3) Increased motivation and self-belief through fellowship and peer support and
4) Maintenance of lifestyle change through accessibility and long-term support. The analysis in the third study (Paper III) resulted in one overall theme: A partnership based on ethical awareness, a non-judgemental attitude, dialogue and shared responsibility, comprising four interrelated themes: 1) Supporting self-efficacy, self-worth and dignity through an attitude of respect, acknowledgement and generosity, 2) Promoting self-belief and self-perceived health, 3) Collaborating and sharing responsibility and 4) Being flexible, adjusting and sharing time.
Conclusion and implications for practice: A synthesis of the findings in the three papers can provide a deeper understanding of service users' needs, beneficial SMS and user involvement by means of three new themes. The first theme, The dual face of responsibility in health – the burden and the value is based on the service user's search for dignity and the emotional alternation between shame, guilt and pride. This duality can be understood as a burden of shame and weight stigma that influence the user's capability to assume personal responsibility. The value can be understood as a perception of dignity, pride, active involvement and assuming responsibility. HPs need to address self-conscious feelings like guilt, shame and internalised stigma, as well as responsibility related to dilemmas about right and wrong lifestyles. The second theme, The art of acting ethically seems to be an integrated attitude of beneficence in HPs' practice and is demonstrated by their capability to engage in a person-centred approach and to see the service users' existential needs in a vulnerable situation. HPs' self-worth support is based on ethical awareness, a non-judgemental attitude, dialogue and shared responsibility. This may help the service users to increase their self-efficacy and self-management and regain their integrity, self-respect and dignity. The last theme, The challenges and possibilities in sharing responsibility, is built on the findings related to HPs treating service users as equal partners in a collaborative partnership based on shared responsibility. The challenges are related to the need for long-term follow-up, emotional and social support, personal responsibility in an obesity- promoting environment and structural and political responsibility. An important therapeutic mechanism in beneficial SMS and user involvement may lie in the possibility of sharing responsibility, which may reduce the burden of personal responsibility, shame, guilt and weight stigma. This may also increase self-efficacy and help service users live a healthier life and experience a better quality of life and wellbeing. Accordingly, there is a possibility of sharing responsibility at a relational level and to highlight collective approaches from a socio-ecological perspective.


—Cloud computing provides promising platforms for executing large applications with enormous computational resources to offer on demand. In a Cloud model, users are charged based on their usage of resources and the required Quality of Service (QoS) specifications. Although there are many existing workflow scheduling algorithms in traditional distributed or heterogeneous computing environments, they have difficulties in being directly applied to the Cloud environments since Cloud differs from traditional heterogeneous environments by its service-based resource managing method and pay-per-use pricing strategies. In this paper, we highlight such difficulties, and model the workflow scheduling problem which optimizes both makespan and cost as a Multi-objective Optimization Problem (MOP) for the Cloud environments. We propose an Evolutionary Multi-objective Optimization (EMO)-based algorithm to solve this workflow scheduling problem on an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) platform. Novel schemes for problem-specific encoding and population initialization, fitness evaluation and genetic operators are proposed in this algorithm. Extensive experiments on real world workflows and randomly generated workflows show that the schedules produced by our evolutionary algorithm present more stability on most of the workflows with the instance-based IaaS computing and pricing models. The results also show that our algorithm can achieve significantly better solutions than existing state-of-the-art QoS optimization scheduling algorithms in most cases. The conducted experiments are based on the on-demand instance types of Amazon EC2; however, the proposed algorithm are easy to be extended to the resources and pricing models of other IaaS services.


Supervised learning methods have been widely applied to activity recognition. The prevalent success of existing methods, however, has two crucial prerequisites: proper feature extraction and sufficient labeled training data. The former is important to differentiate activities, while the latter is crucial to build a precise learning model. These two prerequisites have become bottlenecks to make existing methods more practical. Most existing feature extraction methods highly depend on domain knowledge, while labeled data requires intensive human annotation effort. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a novel method, named Distribution-based Semi-Supervised Learning, to tackle the aforementioned limitations. The proposed method is capable of automatically extracting powerful features with no domain knowledge required, meanwhile, alleviating the heavy annotation effort through semi-supervised learning. Specifically, we treat data stream of sensor readings received in a period as a distribution, and map all training distributions, including labeled and unlabeled, into a reproducing kernel Hilbert space (RKHS) using the kernel mean embedding technique. The RKHS is further altered by exploiting the underlying geometry structure of the unlabeled distributions. Finally, in the altered RKHS, a classifier is trained with the labeled distributions. We conduct extensive experiments on three public datasets to verify the effectiveness of our method compared with state-of-the-art baselines.


We present an alternative way to fabricate a N-doped carbon matrix via a room temperature solution plasma process. The type of C–N bonding states was controlled by choosing the structure of the original precursor and additive. In this research, pyridine and acrylonitrile were employed as the heterocyclic and linear structure precursor respectively. A small amount of anthracene (7 mM) was introduced as an additive to further promote the graphitic structure in the carbon matrix. The effects of the structure of the CN precursor on the chemical bonding states and electrocatalytic activities were investigated. The most pronounced peak was pyridinic-N when pyridine was applied as the precursor, whereas the dominant peak shifted to amino-N when the precursor changed to acrylonitrile. Furthermore, graphitic-N increased 30–40% when anthracene was added to the original precursors. From the results of electrochemical measurements, the current density was proportional to the content of graphitic-N, while a higher percentage of amino-N shifted the ORR onset potential to more positive values. N-doped carbon with the highest graphitic-N content showed the highest electron transfer number of 3.7 and the lowest peroxide yield of 30%. In contrast, N-doped carbon consisting of dominant pyridinic-N resulted in the lowest current density, ORR onset and peak potentials. The results indicated that the presence of graphitic-N encouraged a direct four electron transfer pathway for ORR. Herein, our research showed a room temperature solution method to control the chemical bonding states of nitrogen through designing the original precursors for the first time, as well as reports the synergic effect of amino-N and graphitic-N towards advanced ORR activity.


Research on 1, 3, 4-oxadiazole and their synthetic analogs have revealed a variety of pharmacological activities including anti-microbial, anti-tubercular and insecticidal agents. Some of these compounds have also analgesic, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, anti-HIV agent, anti-parkinsonian and anti-proliferative agent. It was our interest to make novel derivatives of the titled compounds and evaluate the anti-bacterial and anti-fungal activities. 1, 3, 4-oxadiazole and its derivatives were obtained from 6-phenyl-2-substituted quinoline-4- carbohydrazide and a mixture of carbon disulphide and potassium hydroxide. Elemental analysis, IR, 1H-NMR, and mass spectral data established identification of the compounds. Products were evaluated for their antimicrobial activity using cup plate method1. Some of the obtained compounds showed the interesting antimicrobial activity.


Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been used to study the boundary layer flow around three different bottom-fixed offshore wind turbine foundation designs. Two of the designs are gravity-based foundations, where one has a hexagonal bottom slab and one a circular bottom slab (bottom part). The third design is a monopile. Three-dimensional analyses have been performed with Spalart-Allmaras Delayed Detached Eddy Simulation using a Reynolds number 4 × 10 based on the free stream velocity and the diameter of the monopile, D. The boundary layer size is D in all the analyses. Time averaged results for velocities, pressure and bed shear stress were obtained. The dependence of the results on the mesh resolution was investigated and comparisons with published data were made. The results were found to be reasonably accurate. A distinct horseshoe vortex was found in front (upstream side) of the monopile foundation. Vortex shedding was present in the wake of all the foundations. Two smaller horseshoe vorticies were found in front of the hexagonal gravity-based foundation, were one was on the top of the bottom slab and one was near the seabed in front of the bottom slab. Three horseshoe vortices in total were found in front of the circular gravity-based foundation, due to the presence of two horseshoe vortices near the seabed in front of the bottom slab. A large region of downflow exists in front of the monopile, reaching all the way down to the seabed. This causes a backflow in front of the foundation near the seabed due to conservation of mass. The gravity-based foundations were found to have two main regions of downflow, one in front of the cylindrical shaft (upper part) on top of the bottom slab and a smaller region in front of the bottom slab near the seabed. The gravity-based designs are found to limit the downflow near the seabed. Pressure distributions around the foundations were studied. A positive vertical pressure gradient was found in front of the monopile foundation. It was also found in front of the cylindrical shaft and in front of the bottom slab near the seabed on the gravity-based foundations. A larger volume of increased pressure exists in front of the monopile foundation than in front of the gravity-based foundations due to its geometry. The bed shear stress in the flow direction along the upstream symmetryline on the seabed was investigated. The horseshoe vortex size, measured as the distance from the separation point to the foundation surface along this line, was found to be 0.40D for the monopile foundation, 0.125D for the hexagonal and 0.22D for the circular gravity-based foundation. Bed shear stress distributions near the foundations were obtained. The magnitude of the bed shear stress, normalized by the far field bed shear stress, was used. A maximum value of 4.89 was found near the surface of the monopile foundation at φ = ±66.5 degrees, where φ is the angle measured from the stagnation point in front of the foundation. Similarly, 2.86 at φ = ±60.1 was found for the hexagonal gravity-based foundation. The larger values of the hexagonal foundation are concentrated around the corners at φ = ±60 degrees, and the rest of the seabed has shear stresses close to the far field shear stress. The results of the circular foundations were found to be slightly asymmetric, with a maximum value of 2.59 at φ = 68.9 degrees for the upper distribution (for positive φ) and 2.72 at φ = −85.4 degrees for the lower (for negative φ).


In light of emobility, the development of efficiency improved drivetrain components will also have a high priority. Whereas for conventional vehicle propulsion systems (i.e. combustion type engines) the avoidance of CO2 penalty was in strong focus, for electrified vehicles it is the impact on vehicle range. For GKN Driveline as the world's leading supplier of driveline components and systems, the prediction of energy savings is of particular importance in order to quantify the benefit of efficiency optimizations on the energy consumption of the vehicles. This paper gives an introduction to a simplified and transparent method of modelling to provide a basic understanding of the impact of efficiency improvements. Hereby it is shown, that with the increasing electrification of the drivetrain, the optimization of the efficiency in the mechanical path of power transmission will become even more important.


The wealth of beautiful combinatorics that arise in the representation theory of the symmetric group is well-known. In this paper, we analyze the representations of a related algebraic structure called the rook monoid from a combinatorial angle. In particular, we give a combinatorial construction of the irreducible representations of the rook monoid. Since the rook monoid contains the symmetric group, it is perhaps not surprising that the construction outlined in this paper is very similar to the classic combinatorial construction of the irreducible $S_n$-representations: namely, the Specht modules.


Damaraland mole-rats Fukomys damarensis are eusocial subterranean rodents that exhibit an extreme reproductive skew with one female and one or two males breeding. The non-reproductive individuals in the colony are reproductively suppressed, and yet show a rapid initiation of copulatory behaviour (within 1 h) when taken out of the colony and exposed to non-kin. Little is known about how these individuals can quickly become sexually active if the causes of suppression are removed. This study investigated circulating gonadotrophin concentrations [follicle stimulating hormone (FSH)] and testicular morphology and function in reproductive and non-reproductive male Damaraland mole-rats taken directly from their natal colonies and non-reproductive males that had been introduced to non-kin females outside their colony for 10 or 60 min. The main findings were that 60-min exposure males had a significantly heavier body mass-corrected testicular mass than reproductive males. In addition, the external seminiferous tubule diameter was significantly larger in reproductive males than in non-reproductive males, and the tubule lumen area was significantly greater in reproductive, 10 and 60-min exposure males than in non-reproductive males. Plasma concentrations of FSH were not different between the groups; however, the reproductive status significantly affected the area of testicular tissue stained immunopositive for the FSH receptor (FSH-R). Reproductive males had almost six times more FSH-R compared with non-reproductive males, and 60-min exposure males had eight times more FSH-R compared with non-reproductive males. In conclusion, the increase in the seminiferous tubular lumen area and the testicular FSH receptor content when non-reproductive male mole-rats come into contact with non-kin females indicates a rapid activation of testicular spermatogenic pathways to accompany the onset of copulatory behaviour, and is likely to be adaptive in allowing pairs formed of dispersing individuals from different colonies to rapidly bond and become fertile.