The federal tax laws have never been friendly territory for LGBT families. Before the enactment of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the federal tax laws turned a blind eye to the existence of LGBT families by tacitly embracing state law discrimination against same-sex couples. When it enacted DOMA in 1996, Congress ensured that it would be able to continue to turn a blind eye to LGBT families even if one or more states were to legally recognize families headed by same-sex couples. In a real sense, LGBT families have been, and continue to be, tax outlaws. This overt discrimination has not, however, proven to be an insurmountable hurdle for enterprising LBGT families wishing to obtain (at least in some measure) the same tax treatment as "traditional" families. The federal income tax laws provide tax benefits to relationships of dependency in many (though not all) of the same circumstances in which they afford benefits to married different-sex couples. These relationships of dependency are typically between the taxpayer, in the role of parent or caregiver, and a child or other person who cannot care for himself/herself. Often, the only means for same-sex couples to avoid otherwise discriminatory and burdensome tax consequences is for one spouse to qualify as the "dependent" of the other. Despite its inevitability, dependency is stigmatized in the United States. Take, for example, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's comments regarding the "47%" (i.e., those who, he claimed, pay no income tax and are dependent on government). Against this rhetorical background, the dependency provisions in the tax laws realign "lucky" LGBT families so that we do not see a family headed by two same-sex spouses working together to care and provide for their children, but only a taxpayer who has a number of dependents that he or she must support. From this perspective, no matter how great the actual contribution of the "dependent" same-sex spouse, that contribution counts for nothing. Thus, the price imposed upon LGBT families for obtaining tax benefits that "traditional" families take for granted is a reconfiguration of the family structure that paints an inaccurate picture of LGBT families and deprecates the "dependent" spouse's contribution to the family and society while simultaneously stigmatizing him or her. In contrast, the marriages of different-sex spouses are both legally recognized and valued for tax purposes. No matter how great or small the financial contribution of each spouse to the marriage, the tax laws are based on the assumption that both different-sex spouses are actively contributing to the relationship (and, in turn, to society) because, by definition, a taxpayer's different-sex spouse cannot qualify as his/her dependent. This treatment stands in stark contrast to that of LGBT families and highlights the privileging of the traditional family in and through the federal tax laws. It is worth noting that the repeal or invalidation of the portion of DOMA that applies to the federal tax laws would not redress this disparate treatment. It would have an effect only on a subset of LGBT families — those whose relationships would be legally recognized for federal tax purposes in the absence of DOMA, which is in no way a self-defining group but instead itself a complicated question with no clear answer. The repeal or invalidation of DOMA would be of no help either to the many same-sex couples whose relationships would still not be recognized for purposes of federal law or to those couples who choose not to seek legal sanction of their relationships. In other words, this is a problem that cannot be solved simply by eliminating DOMA; it is a problem that requires a more fundamental rethinking of how the tax laws approach questions of family status.


Abstract Anxiety is the most common intrapsychic component in male sexual dysfunction. Metacognition is considered to be the way of thinking about "thinking" which could be associated with anxiety. The aim of the study was to investigate the metacognition level of patients with premature ejaculation. Forty patients with premature ejaculation and 40 with erectile dysfunction, and a matched number of healthy people participated. Participants were asked to fill out Meta-cognitions Questionnaire-30, Beck Depression and Beck Anxiety Inventories. The total metacognition score was significantly higher in patients with premature ejaculation (p .05). The positive beliefs, negative beliefs scores were significantly higher in patients with sexual disorders (p Keywords: metacognition, premature ejaculation, erectile dysfunction, anxiety, worry Introduction In the last two decades, the majority of sexual problems including premature ejaculation (PE) and erectile dysfunction (ED) have been related to anxiety. PE is further believed to have psychological consequences (i.e., low selfesteem, shameful feelings, depression) in patients suffering from this condition (Corona et al., 2006). Anxiety was found to be the most common psychological component in PE (Corona et al., 2004). Thus, it has been classically associated with anxiety-induced excessive sympathetic outflow (Corona et al., 2004; Rowland, Strassberg, de Gouveia Brazao, & Slob, 2000). PE is reported to be an early symptom of ED because of high anxiety experiences and feeling of frustration due to soft erection (Waldinger, 2002). Thus, a bidirectional relationship has been proposed between dysfunctional sexual response and negative emotional states including depressive, anxiety or obsessive compulsive symptoms which may contribute to, or be the consequence (Corona et al., 2008). Metacognition is defined as "stable knowledge or beliefs about one's own cognitive system and knowledge about factors that affect the functioning of cognitive the system" (Marcantonio et al., 2010). In a metacognitive model, worry is viewed as an inflexible means of coping (Wells & King, 2006) and becomes a problem when negative beliefs concerning the uncontrollability and the dangers of worrying develop and lead to unhelpful control strategies. Patients with PE or ED have been described as preoccupied with thoughts about controlling their orgasm along with the anxious anticipation of a possible failure and thoughts about keeping their erection. We hypothesized that patients with PE or ED might endorse metacognitive thoughts such as "Worrying will help me get sexual problems sorted out in my mind" or "Ruminating will help me solve this sexual problem" . Thus, for the first time in the literature, we aimed to investigate the metacognitive characteristics of patients with PE and ED and to compare them with healthy controls, using a recently adapted form of the metacognition questionnaire (Wells & Cartwright-Hatton, 2004). Method Participants Forty eligible patients with primary PE and forty patients with ED who met the criteria according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Revised Text (DSM-IV, TR) participated in the study at the clinical settings of the University Hospital of Kahramanmaras Sutcu Imam, and Ergani State Hospital. …


In many applications, multiple interlinked sources of data are available and they cannot be represented by a single adjacency matrix, to which large scale factorization method could be applied. Collective matrix factorization is a simple yet powerful approach to jointly factorize multiple matrices, each of which represents a relation between two entity types. Existing algorithms to estimate parameters of collective matrix factorization models are based on non-convex formulations of the problem; in this paper, a convex formulation of this approach is proposed. This enables the derivation of large scale algorithms to estimate the parameters, including an iterative eigenvalue thresholding algorithm. Numerical experiments illustrate the benefits of this new approach.


The nineteenth century is known for its many journalistic innovations. This new journalism was an international trend that affected many countries in different ways. The Dutch variant of new journalism has mainly been studied from an institutional and professional perspective. The transformation of the news content however has seldom been the primary topic for research. Also, existing studies have focused on the development of the newspaper press, mostly ignoring another important news medium of that time: the pamphlet. Since the renaissance the pamphlet served as the primary news medium in the Netherlands. Sometime in the nineteenth century, however, its importance dwindled. And near the end of the century, the pamphlet had lost its former significance. The prominence of the pamphlet as the primary news medium of the Netherlands had been taken over by the flourishing newspaper. Exactly how and when this development took place has remained in the dark for a long time. This study aims to resolve the issue. Using quantitative content analysis De Graaf looks at the topics, genres and functions of the pamphlet and the newspaper to explain how and when these changes occurred. With a sample of over 1.900 pamphlets and 30.000 newspaper articles 'Journalism in motion' is the largest content analysis of Dutch historical news media. The comparison is not only made between pamhlets and newspapers, special attention is also given to the possibility of regional differences. That is why two very different cities have been studied: 's-Hertogenbosch as an example of a southern, mostly catholic city and Groningen as a nortern, mostly protestant city. Despite popular assumption, there turned out to be little to no difference between the southern and northern regions. The results furthermore show large differences between the development of the pamphlet and newspaper. In the early nineteenth century the pamphlet brought a great variety of topics, genres and functions. The newspaper in comparison was quite monothematic and uniform. In the 1830's the newspaper started changing. Journalists adopted style elements, topics and genres that were typical of the pamphlet. At the same time the pamphlet began losing many of its traditional characteristics. In the following years while the newspaper content became more diverse due to the increase of press freedom and the abolishment of heavy newspaper taxes, the pamphlet lost its charastertistic variety.


The recently introduced planar strip array (PSA) can significantly reduce scan times in parallel MRI by enabling the utilization of a large number of RF strip detectors that are inherently decoupled, and are tuned by adjusting the strip length to integer multiples of a quarter‐wavelength (λ/4) in the presence of a ground plane and dielectric substrate. In addition, the more explicit spatial information embedded in the phase of the signals from the strip array is advantageous (compared to loop arrays) for limiting aliasing artifacts in parallel MRI. However, losses in the detector as its natural resonance frequency approaches the Larmor frequency (where the wavelength is long at 1.5 T) may limit the signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR) of the PSA. Moreover, the PSA's inherent λ/4 structure severely limits our ability to adjust detector geometry to optimize the performance for a specific organ system, as is done with loop coils. In this study we replaced the dielectric substrate with discrete capacitors, which resulted in both SNR improvement and a tunable lumped‐element PSA (LPSA) whose dimensions can be optimized within broad constraints, for a given region of interest (ROI) and MRI frequency. A detailed theoretical analysis of the LPSA is presented, including its equivalent circuit, electromagnetic fields, SNR, and g‐factor maps for parallel MRI. Two different decoupling schemes for the LPSA are described. A four‐element LPSA prototype was built to test the theory with quantitative measurements on images obtained with parallel and conventional acquisition schemes. Magn Reson Med 51:172–183, 2004. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


PURPOSE
Mesenchymal stem/stromal cells (MSCs) facilitate the regeneration of injured tissue. Our group has previously shown that human MSCs (hMSCs) or hMSC-derived factors suppress excessive inflammatory response in the cornea following chemical injury in vivo. We here investigated direct effects of hMSC-derived factors on cultures of chemically injured human corneal epithelial progenitor cells (hCEP), independent of systemic anti-inflammatory effects that hMSCs have been shown to have in vivo.

METHODS
We injured hCEP by incubation in 20% ethanol for 30 seconds, and cultured the cells in fresh medium or in medium derived from cultures of human dermal fibroblasts (hFbs), hMSCs, or TNF-α-activated hMSCs. After 24 hours, we evaluated the survival, proliferation, and apoptosis of the cells.

RESULTS
The hMSC-conditioned medium enhanced survival and proliferation and inhibited apoptosis of chemically injured hCEP. In addition, the conditioned medium accelerated the wound healing of corneal epithelium in tissue cultures of rabbit corneas following injury. The effects of the hMSC-conditioned medium were increased by preincubating hMSCs with TNF-α. The increased effectiveness of the medium from the preactivated hMSCs was in part explained by increased concentration of the multifunctional protein stanniocalcin-1 that inhibits apoptosis and promotes survival of cells.

CONCLUSIONS
Together, the data account for beneficial effects of hMSCs on tissue-endogenous stem cells involving hCEP, and provide a basis for using MSCs or MSC-derived factors to treat diseases of the cornea and other tissues.


Although privacy concerns in smart metering have been widely studied, relatively little attention has been given to privacy in bi-directional communication between consumers and service providers. Full bi-directional communication is necessary for incentive-based demand response (DR) protocols, such as demand bidding, in which consumers bid to reduce their energy consumption. However, this can reveal private information about consumers. Existing proposals for privacy-enhancing protocols do not support bi-directional communication. To address this challenge, we present a privacy-enhancing communication architecture that incorporates all three major information flows (network monitoring, billing and bi-directional DR) using a combination of spatial and temporal aggregation and differential privacy. The key element of our architecture is the Trustworthy Remote Entity (TRE), a node that is singularly trusted by mutually distrusting entities. The TRE differs from a trusted third party in that it uses Trusted Computing approaches and techniques to provide a technical foundation for its trustworthiness. A automated formal analysis of our communication architecture shows that it achieves its security and privacy objectives with respect to a previouslydefined adversary model. This is therefore the first application of privacy-enhancing techniques to bi-directional smart grid communication between mutually distrusting agents.


Background: The pattern of diabetes incidence is related to the geographical distribution of diabetes, rough estimates show that the prevalence of diabetes in rural population is one-quarter that of urban population for India and Indian subcontinent countries. Socioeconomic status (SES) determinants of health status refer to an individual's position within a hierarchical social structure. Objective: The 6 months prospective observational cross-sectional study in a sample of 100 diabetic's performed in a secondary referral health-care setting of India aimed at assessing the association of SES of an individual based on three variables of Kuppuswamy scale. Materials and Methods: Study included participants diagnosed with diabetes mellitus (DM) of age above 18 years who showed willingness to participate in the study, whereas pregnant women, children below 18 years of age and participants diagnosed with diabetes but showed no willingness was excluded from the study. Results: The prevalence of DM was found to be 0.0713 with period prevalence of 0.0571. In our study, 29% of the study population was under age group of 51-60 years, illiteracy was 71%, and marital status was 92%. Based on Kuppuswamy scale the score of SES in our study, 42% of individuals were documented under Class IV, which shows a study relationship of household income, occupation, and education with diabetes between age group of 30 and 70 years. Conclusion: These findings concluded an inequality of health according to SES in the younger population.


There is growing international interest in carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology to reduce carbon dioxide emissions linked to global climate change. CCS is especially attractive for electric power plants burning coal and other fossil fuels, which are a major source of global CO2 emissions. This paper describes the performance and cost of CO2 capture technologies for large-scale electric power plants including pulverized coal (PC), natural gas combined cycle (NGCC), and integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) plants. Different types of capture technologies, including pre-combustion, post-combustion, and oxyfuel combustion capture systems are discussed, along with the outlook for new or improved technology. Future cost for power plants with CO2 capture are estimated using both a "bottom-up" approach based on engineering analysis and a "top-down" approach based on historical experience curves. The limitations of such projections are discussed along with needs for future research, development and demonstration of CCS technology. The most urgent need at this time is financing for several full-scale demonstrations of CCS at coal-based power plants.


We consider network coded cooperation for cognitive relay networks. The primary system comprises multiple sources and multiple destinations, whereas the secondary system comprises multiple sources, multiple relays and a single destination. We derive a closed form expression for the end-to-end outage probability for the secondary system while assuming the presence of interference constraints between the two sub-systems. Based on the diversity order analysis, we propose a framework for adaptive network coding. The proposed scheme involves using a small encoding set size for low link quality and a large encoding set for good link quality. Having a small set size increases the probability of having relay cooperation, which comes at the expense of some loss in coding gain, whereas using a large encoding set size decreases the probability of having relay cooperation, but achieves some network coding gains. Therefore, there is a fundamental trade-off between the probability of relay cooperation and the achievable network coding gains. Using numerical results, we show that the proposed adaptive network coding achieves up to 5 dB gain at target outage 10-3 as compared to conventional fixed network coding schemes.


Learning by demonstration is a natural and interactive way of learning which can be used by non-experts to teach behaviors to robots. In this paper we study two learning by demon- stration strategies which give different an- swers about how to encode information and when to learn. The first strategy is based on artificial Neural Networks and focuses on reactive on-line learning. The second one uses Gaussian Mixture Models built on statistical features extracted off-line from several training datasets. A simple navigation experiment is used to compare the developmental possibilities of each strategy. Finally, they appear to be complementary and we will highlight that each one can be related to a specific memory structure in brain.


The purpose of this study is to measure the linguistic benefits of learning a foreign language in a study abroad immersion program through Western Michigan University's (WMU) Spanish department. The participants in this study were all participants of the Santander, Spain program of the Summer II semester of 2017. Nineteen students in total went to Spain and eleven of them agreed to participate in this study. During the Spring 2017 semester the eleven participants were given a pre-departure questionnaire and oral interview where they were asked demographic questions as well as program-specific information. During the last week in Santander, Spain each student was given a post-trip questionnaire and interview where they were asked about their experience in Spain, including travel experiences, budget and what they learned about the culture. The preand post-interviews were analyzed to see what lexical and grammatical mistakes were made and then compared to see how much each participant improved linguistically over the two-month duration of the Santander, Spain study abroad program. Various non-linguistic factors were also analyzed using the information collected in the questionnaires in order to determine if they had an effect on linguistic growth. The statistical software SPSS was used to analyze multiple values to determine their significance and thus their relation to the linguistic changes seen. The results show that both the increase in fluency and decrease in the number of lexical and vocabulary errors were significant and that the analyzed non-linguistic factors were not found to have a significant effect on these linguistic changes. Approval to complete this study was received before any of the pre-trip interviews began from the Human Subjects Institutional Review Board (See Appendix A).


RDA Resource Description and Access are guidelines for description and access to resources designed for digital environment and released, in its first version, in 2010. RDA is based on FRBR and its derived models, that focus on users' needs and on resources of any kind of content, medium and carrier.  The paper discusses relevance of main features of RDA for the future role of libraries in the context of semantic web and metadata creation and exchange. The paper aims to highlight many consequences deriving from RDA being a content standard, and in particular the change from record management to data management, differences among the two functions realized by RDA (to identify and to relate entities) and functions realized by other standard such as MARC21 (to archive data) and ISB (to visualize data) and show how, as all these functions are necessary for the catalog, RDA needs to be integrated by other rules and standard and that these tools allow the fulfilment of the variation principle defined by S.R. Ranganathan.


Proxy records from the Miocene epoch (∼23‐5 Ma) indicate a warmer climate than today in spite of lower atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations in the range of preindustrial levels. As yet the simulation of a warm Miocene climate with these low CO2 values has proven to be a challenge. In this study we present climate simulations of the Late Miocene (11‐7 Ma) with a preindustrial CO2 level, using a coupled atmosphere‐ocean general circulation model (AOGCM). The simulated global mean surface temperature of ∼17.8 °C represents a significantly warmer climate than today. We have analyzed the relative importance of tectonic and vegetation changes as forcing factors. We find that the strongest temperature increase is due to the Late Miocene vegetation distribution, which is more than three times stronger than the impact induced by tectonic alterations. Furthermore, a combination of both forcing factors results in a global temperature increase which is lower than the sum of the individual forcing effects. Energy balance estimates suggest that a reduction in the planetary albedo and a positive water vapor feedback in a warmer atmosphere are the dominating mechanisms to explain the temperature increase. Each of these factors contributes about one half to the global temperature rise of ∼3 K. Our results suggest that a much warmer climate during the Late Miocene can be reconciled with CO2 concentrations similar to preindustrial values.


Abstract In 1997, China resumed sovereignty over Hong Kong, promising in the latter's mini-constitution the eventual election of its top executive post and legislature by universal suffrage. Yet, two decades on, Hong Kong's election system is still a long way from meeting that promise. The sluggish pace of democratic reform prompted the 2014 Umbrella Movement and has even spawned calls for the territory's independence. This article evaluates Hong Kong's 2014–2015 attempt at democratic reform. It will make two main points. First, while the reform package proposed in that period would have widened the franchise for the chief executive (CE) election, its acceptance would have made it harder for Hong Kong to negotiate for a genuinely equal and universal system in the future. Hence, it was right for the legislature to veto it. Second, the Hong Kong government, being a key institutional player, should have, but failed to, fully utilize the constitutional space available to it for reform.


Thousands of black people sought refuge in Canada before the U.S. Civil War. While most refugees encountered at least some racism among Canadian citizens, many of those same refugees also thrived under the auspices of the Canadian government, which worked to protect blacks from the U.S. slaveowners who sought to re-enslave them. This work brings to light the life stories of several nineteenth-century black refugees who managed to survive in their new country by gaining work as barbers, postal carriers, washerwomen, waiters, cab owners, ministers, newspaper editors, and physicians. The book begins with a short historical account of blacks in Canada from 1629 until the early 1800s, when the first groups of escaped slaves began to enter the country.


Bayesian networks are a powerful framework for studying the dependency structure of variables in a complex system. The problem of learning Bayesian networks is tightly associated with the given data type. Ordinal data, such as stages of cancer, rating scale survey questions, and letter grades for exams, are ubiquitous in applied research. However, existing solutions are mainly for continuous and nominal data. In this work, we propose an iterative score-and-search method - called the Ordinal Structural EM (OSEM) algorithm - for learning Bayesian networks from ordinal data. Unlike traditional approaches designed for nominal data, we explicitly respect the ordering amongst the categories. More precisely, we assume that the ordinal variables originate from marginally discretizing a set of Gaussian variables, whose structural dependence in the latent space follows a directed acyclic graph. Then, we adopt the Structural EM algorithm and derive closed-form scoring functions for efficient graph searching. Through simulation studies, we illustrate the superior performance of the OSEM algorithm compared to the alternatives and analyze various factors that may influence the learning accuracy. Finally, we demonstrate the practicality of our method with a real-world application on psychological survey data from 408 patients with co-morbid symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder and depression.


Lasers are widely used throughout medicine, from diagnostic imaging and clinical testing to surgical treatments and the latest aesthetic procedures. For therapeutic medical procedures, in particular, diode lasers have now become the dominant laser type in use. This is because these workhorse devices provide lower cost of ownership, a wider choice of output wavelength and power, compact, rugged packaging, and superior (semiconductor) reliability as compared to other laser types. In this article, we briefly examine the main features and advantages of typical diode laser types and then survey some of the leading therapeutic applications that currently rely on them.


In this paper we present the CAJ project of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (FSU). The project's aim is the development of an overall accounting system that can be used for the electronic payment of services delivered on any FSU campus. Currently, the focus is on the FSU library system. Component technology is utilized to achieve a flexible, generalized system architecture that provides for future extensions and ease of maintenance.


The development of very-large format infrared detector arrays has challenged the IR scene projector community to develop larger-format infrared emitter arrays. Many scene projector applications also require much higher simulated temperatures than can be generated with current technology. This paper will present an overview of resistive emitterbased (broadband) IR scene projector system development, as well as describe recent progress in emitter materials and pixel designs applicable for legacy MIRAGE XL Systems to achieve apparent temperatures >1000K in the MWIR. These new high temperature MIRAGE XL (LFRA) Digital Emitter Engines (DEE) will be "plug and play" equivalent with legacy MIRAGE XL DEEs, the rest of the system is reusable. Under the High Temperature Dynamic Resistive Array (HDRA) development program, Santa Barbara Infrared Inc. (SBIR) is developing a new infrared scene projector architecture capable of producing both very large format (>2k x 2k) resistive emitter arrays and improved emitter pixel technology capable of simulating very high apparent temperatures. During earlier phases of the program, SBIR demonstrated materials with MWIR apparent temperatures in excess of 1500 K. These new emitter materials can be utilized with legacy RIICs to produce pixels that can achieve 7X the radiance of the legacy systems with low cost and low risk. A 'scalable' Read-In Integrated Circuit (RIIC) is also being developed under the same HDRA program to drive the high temperature pixels. This RIIC will utilize through-silicon via (TSV) and Quilt Packaging (QP) technologies to allow seamless tiling of multiple chips to fabricate very large arrays, and thus overcome the yield limitations inherent in large-scale integrated circuits. These quilted arrays can be fabricated in any N x M size in 512 steps.


Disruption of the gene encoding protein tyrosine kinase 6 (PTK6) leads to increased growth, impaired enterocyte differentiation and higher levels of nuclear β-catenin in the mouse small intestine. Here, we demonstrate that PTK6 associates with nuclear and cytoplasmic β-catenin and inhibits β-catenin- and T-cell factor (TCF)-mediated transcription. PTK6 directly phosphorylates β-catenin on Tyr64, Tyr142, Tyr331 and/or Tyr333, with the predominant site being Tyr64. However, mutation of these sites does not abrogate the ability of PTK6 to inhibit β-catenin transcriptional activity. Outcomes of PTK6-mediated regulation appear to be dependent on its intracellular localization. In the SW620 colorectal adenocarcinoma cell line, nuclear-targeted PTK6 negatively regulates endogenous β-catenin/TCF transcriptional activity, whereas membrane-targeted PTK6 enhances β-catenin/TCF regulated transcription. Levels of TCF4 and the transcriptional co-repressor TLE/Groucho increase in SW620 cells expressing nuclear-targeted PTK6. Knockdown of PTK6 in SW620 cells leads to increased β-catenin/TCF transcriptional activity and increased expression of β-catenin/TCF target genes Myc and Survivin. Ptk6-null BAT-GAL mice, containing a β-catenin-activated LacZ reporter transgene, have increased levels of β-galactosidase expression in the gastrointestinal tract. The ability of PTK6 to negatively regulate β-catenin/TCF transcription by modulating levels of TCF4 and TLE/Groucho could contribute to its growth-inhibitory activities in vivo.


In his essay Land und Meer from 1942 on the evolution of world history, the political philosopher Carl Schmitt is making a fundamental distinction between the rough ("gekerbtes") and smooth ("glatte") areas of the globe, i.e. between Land and Sea. While according to Schmitt the simple roughness ("Einkerbungen") of the land also promotes and sustains political stability and continuity, the open sea, on the other hand, represents and supports a distribution and flexibility of power ("Entortung des Absoluten"). From the great discoveries, and onwards, there is a continous drift in the political history of the world, from landto sea-domination. The continentally based concept of statesouvereignty was gradually overcome by the forces of trade and shipping, which revolutionized the dimension of space. According to Schmitt power and domination can emanate from other sources than the brute military force traditionally connected to territorial domination. In his essay Carl Schmitt links sea-domination to a specific type of power expansion which is anarchic in character, and which, in turn, he connects with two highly questionable analytical or rather philosophical categories which he labels "ateleological" and "a-historical being".


The purposes of this mixed methods study were to examine adopted college students' adoption-related experiences, family communication processes, topic avoidance, and reasons for topic avoidance. The study utilized qualitative findings from a previous study to inform the creation of a new web-based survey instrument comprised of Likert-type, dichotomous, and open-ended response questions. A census sampling was used to collect data from all adult college students (N=25,526) enrolled in a midwestern public university. Descriptive statistics, exploratory factor analyses, and a MANOVA were used to analyze quantitative data and inductive analysis with open coding was employed to explore qualitative responses. Results suggest (a) many participants have engaged in adoption-related topic avoidance with their parents, (b) unexplored themes emerged related to the types of topics that adopted college students avoid discussing with their parents, (c) adoptees' reasons for adoption-related topic avoidance with their parents are similar to reasons for topic avoidance in other types of relationships, (d) participants engaged in more adoption-related topic avoidance with their fathers than with their mothers, and (e) there were no differences between the frequencies of topic avoidance displayed by adopted females when compared to adopted males. Implications for practitioners, policymakers, adoptive families, and future research are recommended.


This report deals with shape optimization. Curved beams and thin shells are optimized with respect to internal bending moments. The shape optimization focuses solely on the shape of centroidal axes and middle surfaces, i.e. cross sections and shell thicknesses remain constant. The main part of the report is a presentation of three different cases, each with their own objectives. The scenarios are simplified and the criteria for success is internal bending moments alone; however, the methodology and the lessons learned are transferable also to other cases. 1. Curved beams in general. Optimum shapes are derived analytically for a variety of load cases and methods for estimating continuous optimum shapes are exhibited. Software which optimizes structures based on variations in the values of parameters is then applied. A brief study is done to get familiarized with approaches to the use of the software. Some of the shapes found analytically work as benchmarks. 2. An axisymmetric shell, the dome. Classical theories are studied for determining the internal bending moments of different dome shapes. After establishing the bending moments for a selection of shapes, the software is applied to accommodate the calculations and help determine what is the optimum one. An objective is to get familiarized with the assembling of 3 dimensional models within the software interface. 3. A double curvature shell. With the aid of the software, different suggestions are made to a hypothetical architect regarding the shape of the shell. The author derives an effective method for estimating optimum shapes for curved beams. He comes to the perception that analytical approaches might not outweigh the constructive benefits of alternative methods when the complexity of the cases increases. The software proves itself an invaluable tool for form finding; however, it does not offer the same accuracy and possibilities to intervene with the algorithm of the FEA solver as other software. The general understanding of the approaches tested is that independent points and points defined by an interpolation curve are successful and that parameters assigned some level of interdependence is less successful. Some suggestions for further work and possible improvements with regards to the process of structural optimization are presented at the end. These include mainly topology optimization, implementation of constructive measures (discrete) and how to best benefit from a conjunction of methods and types of software.


This article examines the origins of psychology's adoption of a standardized style and format for its publications and the controversies that this decision engendered. The present account draws on perspectives derived from the history of reading and the sociology of professions to explain the historical appeal of such standards. Archival documents are used to trace the events that led to the drafting of the first set of publication standards in 1929. Where previous historical accounts of the publication manual have stressed the influence of behaviorism, the discipline's leaders embraced these instructions because of the perception of information overload resulting from the rapid expansion and professionalization of psychology following World War I. Under the auspices of the National Research Council, a committee on publication practices surveyed scientists, editors, and publishers in the hopes of making more efficient the communication of psychological knowledge within an increasingly large and anonymous discipline. Archival documents also reveal an animated debate over whether the progress of psychology as a science required the adoption of universally followed rules trusted by all or the cultivation of the scientist's creativity and individuality of expression.


Online learning environments are technology-based learning environments which allow learners to develop themselves on their own pace independently of time and place through the instructional content presented via computers and which present interactive learning experiences. The visual design as well as the content of the instructional material prepared for effective learning in online learning environments is important. The present study investigated the influence of an online learning environment prepared as appropriate to the elements and principles of visual design on students" academic achievement and tried to determine the participants" views about the online learning environment in question. Depending on the findings obtained in the study and on the observations during the application process, it could be stated that the online learning environment prepared in line with the design elements and principles was considered by the students as quite effective; that it increased learning; and that the students had positive views about the learning environment in question.


Background : Teenage pregnancies, human immuno deficiency virus and other sexually transmitted diseases infection, are an important public health issue because they are associated with maternal, fetal, neonatal and other adverse outcomes. Adolescent girls who get pregnant are likely to drop out from school and adolescent parents are unlikely to have the social and economic means to raise children. Objective: The study was conducted to assess contraceptive knowledge, perceptions and use among adolescents in selected Senior High Schools in the Central Region of Ghana. Method: A cross-sectional study was carried out in the Cosmopolitan city of Cape Coast of the Central Region of Ghana. Three mixed, one female and one male senior high school were conveniently identified for the study.  A self-administered questionnaire was given to 350 students in the schools out of which 300 were retrieved and used, representing a response rate of 85.7%. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) programme software (version 15.0) was used for data entry, and descriptive statistics tests were conducted for the items which were summarised by frequencies and percentages. Results : Results showed that almost 21% of 244 students with knowledge of contraception are users, 82% of sexually active respondents were non-users while condom is the most common contraceptive method used. Also, 60% and 30% of respondents obtained knowledge about contraception from the media (TV/Radio) and peers (friends) respectively. However, almost 32% of the study participants thought contraceptives are for only adult married persons. Conclusion : We believe that there is a need for aggressive advocacy and dissemination of information on Adolescent Reproductive Health (ARH) and family planning methods before initiation of sexual activity among the adolescent population in Ghana. Key words : Ghana, Contraceptive knowledge, perceptions, sexual behaviour, adolescent


Objective To examine biological and social risk factors for meningococcal disease in adolescents. Design Prospective, population based, matched cohort study with controls matched for age and sex in 1:1 matching. Controls were sought from the general practitioner. Setting Six contiguous regions of England, which represent some 65% of the country's population. Participants 15-19 year olds with meningococcal disease recruited at hospital admission in six regions (representing 65% of the population of England) from January 1999 to June 2000, and their matched controls. Methods Blood samples and pernasal and throat swabs were taken from case patients at admission to hospital and from cases and matched controls at interview. Data on potential risk factors were gathered by confidential interview. Data were analysed by using univariate and multivariate conditional logistic regression. Results 144 case control pairs were recruited (74 male (51%); median age 17.6). 114 cases (79%) were confirmed microbiologically. Significant independent risk factors for meningococcal disease were history of preceding illness (matched odds ratio 2.9, 95% confidence interval 1.4 to 5.9), intimate kissing with multiple partners (3.7, 1.7 to 8.1), being a university student (3.4, 1.2 to 10) and preterm birth (3.7, 1.0 to 13.5). Religious observance (0.09, 0.02 to 0.6) and meningococcal vaccination (0.12, 0.04 to 0.4) were associated with protection. Conclusions Activities and events increasing risk for meningococcal disease in adolescence are different from in childhood. Students are at higher risk. Altering personal behaviours could moderate the risk. However, the development of further effective meningococcal vaccines remains a key public health priority.


Cerebrovascular endothelial cells (CECs) are integral components of both the blood brain barrier (BBB) and the neurovascular unit (NVU). As the primary cell type of the BBB, CECs are responsible for the tight regulation of molecular transport between the brain parenchyma and the periphery. Additionally, CECs are essential in neurovascular coupling where they help regulate cerebral blood flow in response to regional increases in cellular demand in the NVU. CEC dysfunction occurs during both normative ageing and in cerebrovascular disease, which leads to increased BBB permeability and neurovascular uncoupling. This MiniReview compiles what is known about the molecular changes underlying CEC dysfunction, many of which are reminiscent of cells that have become senescent. In general, cellular senescence is defined as an irreversible growth arrest characterized by the acquisition of a pro-inflammatory secretory phenotype in response to DNA damage or other cellular stresses. We discuss evidence for endothelial cell senescence in ageing and cardiovascular disease, and how CEC senescence may contribute to age-related cerebrovascular dysfunction.


Mankind's prospects both for finding new types of resources and for ensuring efficiency in resource utilization and substitution depend upon our success or failure in solving the problems of organizing and managing technological systems. A generalized scheme describing interaction among the basic elements of the management of national science and technology (ST) activity is outlined, and one particular element isolated for detailed examination: the system analysis and systematic assessment of new technology (SANT). The role of SANT in the context of decision-making in the management of ST progress is described, together with the methodological arsenal available. No one technique is universally good; the problem is to find systematic means of using a selection of methods which mutually compensate for each other's weaknesses. Further difficulties are encountered over the non-comparability or absence of initial data, and a framework for viewing the various classes of data available and making use of them is outlined. Examples are given of the practical application of SANT to problems such as the development of a macro-model., for the planning of national ST policy, ad a model of technological change in the area of the science, technology, and exploitation of computers. A system is described which handles the data stores and information flows necessary for performing SANT routines.


Abstract The data-processing system CONSYST/ABBN coupled with the ABBN-93 nuclear data library (NDL) was used in the analysis of BFS-62 and ZPPR JUPITER experiment series fast reactor mixed oxide cores, applying the Japan Nuclear Cycle Development Institute (JNC), Japan, core calculation code CITATION-FBR. The FFCP cell code was used to take into account the spatial cell heterogeneity and resonance effects based on the subgroup approach. The NDL effect has been studied by comparing the results calculated using the ABBN-93 nuclear data with the former ones obtained at JNC based on the JENDL-3.2 NDL. Calculation analysis results for the keff parameter for four BFS-62 cores as well as for three ZPPR JUPITER experiment series cores (ZPPR-9, ZPPR-13A, and ZPPR-17A) have been obtained. The estimated uncertainty in the keff values caused by possible errors in calculation of the applied corrections was estimated to be ˜0.3% in the case of the ZPPR cores and 0.2% for the BFS-62 cores. The NDL effect determined by applying the ABBN-93 nuclear data in the JNC calculation route for the keff parameter appeared to be ˜0.3% for the ZPPR and BFS-62 cores with plutonium. As for BFS-62 uranium-loaded cores, the NDL effect was ˜0.1%. Sensitivity analysis was applied, and it has shown that the main contributors to the NDL effect are uranium, plutonium, and iron cross sections. This work is closely related to the JNC-Institute of Physics and Power Engineering, Russian Federation, collaboration on experimental investigation of excess weapon plutonium disposition in the BN-600 reactor using the BFS facility.


The field of numismatics has long been a critical component to the field of archaeology. Within this field, there is a particular interest in the coinage of the Sasanian Empire. Moreover, as a sub field, the existence of a particular type of coinage that was created using a Sasanian model, but with the inclusion of Georgian letters. This series of coins has long been under studied, often only being looked at by scholars from the former Soviet Union, particularly Georgia, and therefore has never truly been analysed. The type is often seen in a very nationalistic tone, as being the first real attempts at Georgian independence. This begs the question, is the existence of a particular group of Georgian-Sasanian coins an indicator of a Georgian strive for independence within the Sasanian Empire? It is the intension to show how the Sassanian Empire used coins in order to better control the regions under their control, more specifically that of the region of Georgia. What this research will attempt to understand is the unique style of Sasanian coinage known as Georgian or Georgio-Sasanian that appears around the 6th century AD. In researching this unique issue of coinage, it will become much more evident what meaning the tool of coinage had in the greater scheme of the empire. A major part to this will involve creating a catalogue of the known examples of this coinage, there are around forty known types, from the Georgian National Museum, The American Numismatic Society, The Bode Museum, The Hermitage, and the National Museum in Prague. Creating this catalogue will allow for me to analyse the data in the next part, with literature used as a source to add substance to the claims associated with the coins in question. This analyses will involve studying past interpretations and typologies, such as those of Yevgeni Pakhomov and Medea Tsotselia. With this data, it is the intent to then compare this material culture to what is known from literary sources and other known material culture from the region, in order to formulate a working theory as to the true intention of the coins in question, so whether they truly were an attempt at Georgian independence, or whether they were in fact simply a propaganda tool, used by the Sasanian state to help in their constant warfare against outside forces, such as the Roman Empire. By gaining access to and studying these collections, I will be able to create a new dataset of knowledge about Sasanian coins that in the past has not been accessed properly and in the English language and therefore never studied. This will also involve the inclusion of coins, known as Arab-Sasanian, from the collection of the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha. This inclusion of the coins dating from the early Islamic era will be included in order to show the continued importance of minting and the role it played in establishing and legitimizing rule and community. Adding this, much like the work of Album & Goodwin, Tsotselia, Gobl, and Pakhomov once a clear dataset has been made and complied, it is the intention to include work like pXRF, which would help to highlight issues in the actual minting and metallurgical process, which also were not available to earlier scholars like Gobl and Pakhomov, and arguably has been under used by other scholars in the field. This will also be important to highlight the use that techniques like pXRF have to the field of archaeology and numismatics, since it is a relatively new technique that is still being developed, especially in Qatar. It is important to highlight what additional research in the field of Sasanian numismatics will do. The Sasanian Empire and the time period in which they reigned was a critical point in the history of the Middle East, in part because of their constant warfare with the Roman Empire, and their presence at the coming of Islam. The coinage produced by the Sasanians, and the imitative coins produced by the Caliphs after their emergence, were a central part to the administration and life of people in the periods relevant to them. Without an understanding of coins, it makes the job of understanding the social, economic, and cultural world difficult, as coins were crucial to these aspects of life. Additionally, there is a large gap in the area of expertise in the field of Sasanian Studies and Numismatics as a whole, and by completing this work, I can add to a field that is in desperate need of help. Adding to this is the importance that numismatics has to the field of archaeology, since coinage is a critical aspect to material culture that can help in dating sites. It is also important to note what the issue of Sasanian control over Georgia and the Caucasus region means for the study of archaeology and history. It has importance in a number of reasons, thereby making the coinage a relevant item to study. For political reasons, the area was a key buffer state as seen in the constant flux of control in two ways, political and religious. In the political sense the region was a buffer state that prevented one power from taking complete control, and from outside powers such as the Huns and Turks from entering the heartlands of the Iranian and Roman Empires. As well as the resource of manpower, which for both the Romans and the Iranians was something greatly needed, especially when one looks at the religious creation of a commonwealth. This effected the area even after the area was divided between the two powers in 591 AD. One must also take into account why this region is so important in our understanding of late antiquity. Roman-Iranian relations were one of a few key events in the late ancient world, others being things like the relations between the Eastern and Western Roman Empires as well as the emergence of the non-Roman states of the west and incursions of the steppe peoples in the East. In other words it is a key component of understanding the history of the known world in this period.


Article history Received 1 Aug 2016 Accepted 3 Oct 2016 Introduction: One of the most popular methods for evaluating old people's health condition is to assess their functional practice. The aim of this study was to assess the status of daily living activities among the older people of Maku, Iran. Methods: The present cross-sectional study was accomplished among 216 older people in Maku via simple random sampling. Participant's subjective and demographic information were gathered and their daily living activities status was measured by the Katz index. Results: The participants' mean age was 70.09 ± 7.98. Most of the elderlies were men (59.3%) and illiterate (38.4%). Of them, 10.6% were dependent, 6% needed help or were partially dependent, and 82.9% were independent in their daily living activities. Significant associations were observed between daily living activities and age, education level, marital status and living condition (p < 0.001). Married old adults were more dependent than other ones living alone (p < 0.001). Conclusion: Although most of the participants were independent, they needed assistance for few of their daily living activities. Also, since age was significantly correlated with daily living activities, it is necessary to implement educational health living programsfor older people suffering from functional restrictions. Also, providing suitable facilities, convenience and human resources should be taken into consideration.


A highly original account of the evolution of the family unit Current debates about the future of the family are often based on serious misconceptions about its past. Arguing that there is no biologically mandated or universally functional family form, Stephanie Coontz traces the complexity and variety of family arrangements in American history, from Native American kin groups to the emergence of the dominant middle-class family ideal in the 1890s. Surveying and synthesizing a vast range of previous scholarship, as well as engaging more particular studies of family life from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, Coontz offers a highly original account of the shifting structure and function of American families. Her account challenges standard interpretations of the early hegemony of middle-class privacy and affective individualism, pointing to the rich tradition of alternative family behaviors among various ethnic and socioeconomic groups in America, and arguing that even middle-class families went through several transformations in the course of the nineteenth centure. The present dominant family form, grounded in close interpersonal relations and premised on domestic consumption of mass-produced household goods has arisen, Coontz argues, from a long and complex series of changing political and economic conjunctures, as well as from the destruction or incorporation of several alternative family systems. A clear conception of American capitalism s combined and uneven development is therefore essential if we are to understand the history of the family as a key social and economic unit. Lucid and detailed, "The Social Origins of Private Life"is likely to become the standard history of its subject."


We investigate the conditional performance of a sample of German equity mutual funds over the period from 1994 to 2003 using both the beta-pricing approach and the stochastic discount factor (SDF) framework. On average, mutual funds cannot generate excess returns relative to their benchmark that are large enough to cover their total expenses. Compared to unconditional alphas, fund performance sharply deteriorates when we measure conditional alphas. Given that stock returns are to some extent predictable based on publicly available information, conditional performance evaluation raises the benchmark for active fund managers because it gives them no credit for exploiting readily available information. Underperformance is more pronounced in the SDF framework than in beta-pricing models. The fund performance measures derived from alternative model specifications differ depending on the number of primitive assets taken to calibrate the SDF as well as the number of instrument variables used to scale assets and/or factors.


La-doped bismuth titanate (Bi4-xLaxTi3O12: BLT) and pure Bi4Ti3O12 (BIT) thin films with random orientation were fabricated on Pt/Ti/SiO2/Si substrates by rf magnetron sputtering technique. These samples had polycrystalline Bi-layered perovskite structure without preferred orientation, and consisted of well developed rod-like grains with random orientation. La-doping into BIT caused a large shift of the Curie temperature ( TC ) from 675°C to lower temperature and a improvement in dielectric property. The experimental results indicated that La doping into BIT also result in a remarkable improvement in ferroelectric property. The Pr and the Ec values of the BLT film with x=0.75 were 20 μC/cm2 and 82kV/cm, respectively.


It is well known that vision classification models suffer from poor calibration in the face of data distribution shifts. In this paper, we take a geometric approach to this problem. We propose Geometric Sensitivity Decomposition (GSD) which decomposes the norm of a sample feature embedding and the angular similarity to a target classifier into an instance-dependent and an instance-independent component. The instance-dependent component captures the sensitive information about changes in the input while the instance-independent component represents the insensitive information serving solely to minimize the loss on the training dataset. Inspired by the decomposition, we analytically derive a simple extension to current softmax-linear models, which learns to disentangle the two components during training. On several common vision models, the disentangled model outperforms other calibration methods on standard calibration metrics in the face of out-of-distribution (OOD) data and corruption with significantly less complexity. Specifically, we surpass the current state of the art by 30.8% relative improvement on corrupted CIFAR100 in Expected Calibration Error. Code available at https://github.com/GT-RIPL/Geometric-Sensitivity-Decomposition.git.


This study was undertaken to investigate mechanisms of mineral transformations associated with microbial reduction of structural Fe(III) in smectite. Shewanella oneidensis strain MR-1 cells were inoculated with lactate as the electron donor and Fe(III) in smectite as the electron acceptor. The extent of Fe(III) reduction was observed to reach up to 26%. Reduction proceeded via association of live bacterial cells with smectite. At the end of incubation, a large fraction of starting smectite was transformed to euhedral flakes of biogenic smectite with different morphology, structure, and composition. Lattice-fringe images obtained from environmental cell transmission electron microscope displayed a decrease of layer spacing from 1.5±0.1 nm for the unreduced smectite to 1.1±0.1 nm for the reduced smectite. The biogenic smectite contained more abundant interlayer cations, apparently as a result of charge compensation for the reduced oxidation state of Fe in the octahedral site. To capture the dynamics of smectite reduction, a separate experiment was designed. The experiment consisted of several systems, where various combinations of carbon source (lactate) and different concentrations of AQDS, an electron shuttle, were used. Selected area electron diffraction patterns of smectite showed progressive change from single-crystal patterns for the control experiment (oxidized, unaltered smectite), to diffuse ring patterns for the no-carbon experiment (oxidized, but altered smectite), to well-ordered single crystal pattern for the experiment amended with 1 mM AQDS (well crystalline, biogenic smectite). Large crystals of vivianite and finegrained silica of biogenic origin were also detected in the bioreduced sample. These data collectively demonstrate that microbial reduction of Fe(III) in smectite was achieved via dissolution of smectite and formation of biogenic minerals. The microbially mediated mineral dissolution-precipitation mechanism has important implications for mineral reactions in natural environments, where the reaction rates may be substantially enhanced by the presence of bacteria.


The objective of this study was evaluating the factors related to attitudes of primary school teachers in first and second grade of public and private schools on abuse of students in City of Dorud in year 1394. The studied population was comprised of 350 teachers in elementary schools for girls and boys in first and second grades. The research samples were selected randomly and includes 160 teachers with minimum 1 year job experience. For data collection, a questionnaire was used that includes three sections of demographic questions, 20 questions on attitude, and 20 questions regarding factors related to attitudes on abuse. The collected data was analyzed using Pearson correlation, independent t-test, and analysis of variance. Our results showed that various factors such as unfavorable economic conditions, lack of school amenities, dissatisfaction with the administrative processes, and low income are among the most significant factors affecting the teachers' attitude on abuse of students.


The novel coronavirus COVID-19 has profoundly disrupted life in the United States. Among other challenges, jurisdictions are unlikely to be able to administer the July 2020 bar exam in the usual manner. It is essential, however, to continue licensing new lawyers. Those lawyers are necessary to meet current needs in the legal system. Equally important, the demand for legal services will skyrocket during and after this pandemic. We cannot close doors to the profession at a time when client demand will reach an all-time high.

In this brief policy paper, we outline six licensing options for jurisdictions to consider for the Class of 2020. Circumstances will vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but we hope that these options will help courts and regulators make this complex decision. These are unprecedented times: We must work together to ensure we do not leave the talented members of Class of 2020 on the sidelines when we need every qualified professional on the field to keep our justice system moving.


Organic carbonates have the potential to be used as fuels and because of this their production through non-phosgene routes is a thrust area of research. Di-ethyl carbonate (DEC) synthesis from propylene carbonate (PC) in the presence of alcohol is a green route. In this study, use of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) based metal oxide catalysts [rGO-MO, where M = Ce] with different amount of graphene oxide (0.2%, 0.5%, 1% and 2%) has been investigated for the synthesis of DEC by using PC and ethanol as reactants. The GO sheets were synthesized by an electrochemical process and the catalysts were synthesized using an in situ method. Theoretical study of thermodynamics of the reaction was done, which revealed that the reaction is mildly endothermic. Theoretical value of optimum temperature was found to be 420 K. The synthesized catalysts were characterized for their morphological, structural and textural properties using field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), N2 adsorption/desorption, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and Raman spectroscopy. Optimization studies were carried out to study the effect of different reaction conditions like temperature (140 °C to 180 °C), catalyst dosage (0.102 g to 0.255 g) and time (0.5 h to 5 h) on the yield of DEC. Amongst the various synthesized catalysts, 1% rGO-CeO2 gave the maximum yield of DEC.


Almost 200 years ago, a young naturalist named John James Audubon decided to paint pictures of all the birds of North America. Wherever Audubon went to look for birds, he saw blue jays. These long-tailed, robin-size birds show up in woodlands, farm fields, parks, and back yards. They are hard to miss, traveling in flocks that stay in touch by calling out loudly—Jay! Jay jay jay. Audubon thought the blue jay (Cyanocitta cristata) was beautiful, but he didn't always understand its behavior. His painting shows three jays eating another bird's eggs. He wrote that blue jays attack rival birds and mammals. Today, scientists know that blue jays are not likely to go after other birds unless usual foods are scarce. When Audubon heard jays mimicking hawk calls, he mistakenly thought jays were trying to scare smaller birds away from food. Some people still think blue jays are bullies that chase other birds away from bird feeders. In fact, blue jay calls can alert other birds when a predator is nearby. Though sometimes noisy and rowdy, blue jays are actually good neighbors. Y u n g


In March 2017, the issue of urban poor housing was exposed on a national scale when thousands of members of the urban poor group Kadamay forcibly occupied nearly 6,000 abandoned housing units meant for members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police in Pandi, Bulacan. Kadamay members were accused of being mendicant anarchists by their critics, while their supporters lauded their determination in demanding, and winning, their rights to housing. While the issue polarized Philippine society, it is evident that the Occupy Pandi movement revitalized urban poor discourse, and brought back to the fore the contradictions between the promises of the city and the prevalence of poverty and lack of opportunity for the majority of its inhabitants, those belonging to the urban poor sector. This paper aims to contribute towards this discussion by attempting to present urban poor mentalities as formulated by the members of the urban poor themselves, and how they have manifested through art. Among the various member organizations of Kadamay is the cultural group Sining Kadamay or SiKad. Initially formed by Kadamay to serve as its cultural arm, SiKad grew into an organization-member of Kadamay. While Sikad has several art programs, this paper will focus on its theater program, the Teatro Mulong Sandoval, and its one-act play Gapok. Set in an urban poor community threatened by poverty and demolition, what makes Gapok unique is its intimacy, not just in content but also in terms of space, as the play was designed to be performed in urban poor communities, and transform its audience from spectators to spectactors. The paper will scrutinize the dynamics of the art production in Gapok, how accurately it reflects the discourses that the urban poor engage in, and the role of the urban poor in (trans)forming art to serve their sector.


We simulate the soil organic carbon (SOC) dynamics at a chronoseqeunce site in France, using the Rothamsted Carbon model. The site exhibits a transition from C3 plants, dominated by pine forest, to a conventional C4 maize rotation. The different 13C signatures of the forest plants and maize are used to distinguish between the woodland derived carbon (C) and the maize derived C. The model is evaluated against total SOC and C derived from forest and maize, respectively. The SOC dynamics of the five SOC pools of the model, decomposable plant material (DPM), resistant plant material (RPM), biomass, humus and inert C, are also compared to the SOC dynamics measured in different soil size fractions. These fractions are > 50 mum (particulate organic matter), 2-50 mum (silt associated SOC) and 50 mum and the sum of the other pools corresponds well to the SOC measured in the soil size fraction < 50 mum. Default model applications show that the model underestimates the fast drop in forest C stocks in the first 20 years after land-use change and overestimates the C accumulation of maize C. Several hypotheses were tested to evaluate the simulations. Input data and internal model parameter uncertainties had minor effects on the simulations results. Accounting for erosion and implementing a simple tillage routine did not improve the simulation fit to the data. We therefore hypothesize that a generic process that is not yet explicitly accounted for in the ROTHC model could explain the loss in soil C after land use change. Such a process could be the loss of the physical protection of soil organic matter as would be observed following cultivation of a previously uncultivated soil. Under native conditions a fraction of organic matter is protected in stable soil aggregates. These aggregates are physically disrupted by continuous and repeated cultivation of the soil. The underestimation of SOC loss by the model can be mainly attributed to the slow turnover of the humus pool. This pool was shown to represent mainly the SOC associated with the silt and clay soil fraction. Here, the clay associated SOC shows as similar turnover time as the humus pool in the model. We split the humus pool into a clay and a silt associated pool. The clay pool now corresponds to the clay associated SOC with the turnover time of the humus pool. The silt pool now corresponds to the silt associated SOC. From the measurements, the latter has a turnover time similar to the turnover time of the particulate organic matter. We therefore use the turnover time of the RPM pool for the silt pool. These modifications improve the simulations of the forest derived C significantly and improve the simulations of the maize derived C. Future work will further evaluate and refine this approach to eventually capture the SOC dynamics associated with physical protection, including the effect of tillage/no-tillage, in a simple approach.


Three different types of sugar surfactants, octyl-β-glucoside, maltose 6'-O-dodecanoate, and N-dodecyllactobionamide have been investigated to examine the effect of the structure of the sugar headgroup on the adsorption to liquid/vapor and solid/liquid interfaces using a number of techniques (surface tension, surface force apparatus, MASIF, and wetting). It was found that all the surfactants form monolayers when adsorbed to a hydrophobic interface at high concentrations. Increased headgroup flexibility leads to the adsorption of higher amounts on both the liquid/vapor and solid/liquid interfaces, resulting in a higher van der Waals attraction between two such monolayers. Increased hydrogen bonding within layers of more flexible surfactants is suggested to explain this difference. The most flexible surfactant, N-dodecyllactobionamide, is the least efficient wetting agent with the highest γSL. The behavior of the receding contact angles indicates the importance of intralayer hydrogen bonds between larger an...


Abstract The paper distinguishes two forms of intercultural exchange, negotiation between cultures at a personal level and global exchange. In the first case, Ostensive Definition appears to be crucial. The paper attempts an intersemiotic rehabilitation of OD in response to Wittgenstein and Quine. In global intercultural exchange the 'universal grammar' of digital reason appears to be the crucial component to be analysed. Both forms of negotiation, the paper argues, rely on Vorstellung as an essential ingredient. Yet Vorstellung is missing from the traditional theorisation of both OD and the digital bitstream. The paper concludes with a ubiquity thesis of Vorstellung.


Recent decades have been marked by many disasters caused by natural hazards.Gravitational phenomena in particular have resulted in several deaths and extensive damage to infrastructure. Nearly 10% of Swiss territory is considered unstable. It therefore requires an effective methodology for the mapping of areas likely to be affected by this type of hazard. The aim of this project is to establish the bedrock of a new methodology for the implementation of hazard maps related to landslides based on the evaluation of slope instability predisposition. The first step of this methodology is a systematic field survey on a given study area. The information is organized by type (faults, dip, formations, boreholes, springs, streams, etc..) and then imported into a GIS. Once these data interpolated and converted into a grid of points, we obtain on the one hand a three-dimensional geological model (supplemented by geotechnical and hydrodynamic parameters measured in situ and extrapolated to the entire study area) and on the other hand an approximation of the gradient of hydraulic potential in the area.It is then possible to calculate a safety factor at each point of the model and thus to assess the susceptibility of the slope to instabilities. After crossing with a map of moderating factors (altitude, aspect, vegetation) in order to take into account the context of the slopes, it is validated by comparison with the map of phenomena to obtain the final hazard map. Achieving it is thus entirely transparent.


Extracted from text ... SYNDROMIC VIGNETTES IN ANAESTHESIA
Southern African Journal of Anaesthesia & Analgesia - February 2004 11
Anaesthetic considerations in little people
Part 1: Campomelic Dysplasia
Campomelic dysplasia was first described in the 1950's2, 3
but recognised as an entity in 1970.4 The term campomelia,
from the Greek word campos meaning curved and melia meaning
limb, was adopted5 although camptomelic from a Greek
word camptos meaning bent was first suggested by Bianchine.6
Both are used interchangeably in the literature. The condition
is also known as CMD1 and CMPD1. The syndrome has many
other skeletal and extra-skeletal manifestations7 but the bent
limbs ..


AbstractPhotooxidations of CH3Cl, CH3Br, CF3Br, and CHBr3 with dry-air have been investigated at 298 K in a static reaction vessel by means of FTIR spectroscopy. Irradiation of the reaction mixtures has been performed by Hg-resonance lamps (184.9 nm and 253.7 nm lines) and broad band UV-fluorescence lamps (300-400 nm). The photooxidation mechanism of CH3Cl and CH3Br is governed by two different pathways: 1) photolytical release of halogen atoms and subsequent oxidation of the CH3 radical, 2) abstraction of an H-atom and oxidation of the respective CH2Cl and CH2Br-fragment. The second path leads to the formation of the formyl-halides HClCO and HBrCO which are tranferred to CO and HCl or CO and HBr, respectively. Addition of trace amounts of NO to the gas mixture decreases the HClCO yield strongly. We suggest that NO reacts with the transient H2ClCO-radical to ClNO + H2CO. HBrCO, Br2CO and the final products CO, CO2, and HBr could be identified after Hg-resonance lamps induced photooxidation of CHBr3. The Cl2/fluorescence lamps induced photooxidation, however, yielded solely Br2CO, CO2, and HBr. In contrast to the labile species HClCO, HBrCO, and Br2CO, the photooxidation product of CF3Br, carbonyl fluoride (F2CO) is relatively inert under our reaction conditions.


Today, interpreting data is a critical decision-making factor for businesses and organizations. If your job requires you to manage and analyze all kinds of data, turn to "Head First Data Analysis", where you'll quickly learn how to collect and organize data, sort the distractions from the truth, find meaningful patterns, draw conclusions, predict the future, and present your findings to others. Whether you're a product developer researching the market viability of a new product or service, a marketing manager gauging or predicting the effectiveness of a campaign, a salesperson who needs data to support product presentations, or a lone entrepreneur responsible for all of these data-intensive functions and more, the unique approach in "Head First Data Analysis" is by far the most efficient way to learn what you need to know to convert raw data into a vital business tool. You'll learn how to: determine which data sources to use for collecting information; assess data quality and distinguish signal from noise; build basic data models to illuminate patterns, and assimilate new information into the models; cope with ambiguous information; design experiments to test hypotheses and draw conclusions; use segmentation to organize your data within discrete market groups; visualize data distributions to reveal new relationships and persuade others; predict the future with sampling and probability models; clean your data to make it useful; and, communicate the results of your analysis to your audience. Using the latest research in cognitive science and learning theory to craft a multi-sensory learning experience, "Head First Data Analysis" uses a visually rich format designed for the way your brain works, not a text-heavy approach that puts you to sleep.


Background The miniaturised and portable DNA sequencer MinION™ has demonstrated great potential in different analyses such as genome-wide sequencing, pathogen outbreak detection and surveillance, human genome variability, and microbial diversity. In this study, we tested the ability of the MinION™ platform to perform long amplicon sequencing in order to design new approaches to study microbial diversity using a multi-locus approach. Results After compiling a robust database by parsing and extracting the rrn bacterial region from more than 67,000 complete or draft bacterial genomes, we demonstrated that the data obtained during sequencing of the long amplicon in the MinION™ device using R9 and R9.4 chemistries was sufficient to study two mock microbial communities in a multiplex manner and to almost completely reconstruct the microbial diversity contained in the HM782D and D6305 mock communities. Conclusions Although nanopore-based sequencing produces reads with lower per-base accuracy compared with other platforms, we presented a novel approach consisting of multi-locus and long amplicon sequencing using the MinION™ MkIb DNA sequencer and R9 and R9.4 chemistries that help to overcome the main disadvantage of this portable sequencing platform. Furthermore, the nanopore sequencing library constructed with the last releases of pore chemistry (R9.4) and sequencing kit (SQK-LSK108) permitted to retrieve the higher level of 1D read accuracy sufficient to characterize the microbial species present in each mock community analysed. Improvements in nanopore chemistry, such as minimising base-calling errors and new library protocols able to produce rapid 1D libraries, will provide more reliable information in near future. Such data will be useful for more comprehensive and faster specific detection of microbial species and strains in complex ecosystems.


Collective liability—defined as the imposition of liability on a group that may include innocent actors—is commonplace. From ancient to modern times, legislators, regulators, and courts have imposed such liability when they believe that the culprit is a member of the group. Examples of collective liability abound: from surgical teams held jointly liable for a misplaced sponge to entire families evicted from their homes for the drug-related activity of a single person under the "One Strike Rule." Courts recognize, of course, that collective liability punishes the innocent, but they view it as a necessary evil to smoke out and punish an unknown wrongdoer in a known group.

Despite the ubiquity of collective liability regimes, they remain under-theorized and under-studied. Proponents of collective liability justify its imposition on two grounds. First, claims of deterrence suggest that the threat of collective liability incentivizes innocent actors to monitor each other and take preventative measures. The second claim is that once a harm occurs, potential liability will encourage innocent actors to share information that would identify the wrongdoer.

Drawing on economic theory and empirical evidence, this Article sheds light on the dark side of collective liability. It concludes that, disconcertingly, collective liability regimes may lead to contrary results and perverse outcomes. Through clear examples, this Article reveals that collective liability can (1) erode actors' incentives to monitor and take preventative measures, (2) incentivize those knowledgeable about the culprit's identity to keep quiet, lie, or even plot with others to lie, and (3) help service providers (e.g., physicians) engage in forms of harmful practices not heretofore known. Fortunately, in certain situations, some of the faults of collective liability are remediable. This Article provides a practical proposal that would minimize strategic behaviors, reduce the detrimental effects of collective liability, and bypass the identification problem altogether. This proposal offers a new path in medical malpractice, civil rights violations, assault, larceny, and a variety of other cases that are subject to group liability.


Develop an efficient system is one of the main challenges for software developers, who has been concerned with reliability related issues as they build and deployed. This paper surveys various fault prediction techniques and measuring quality parameters in object oriented systems. The survey includes traditional techniques like Fault tree analysis , Information theoretic approach , coupling & cohesion measurement and conceptual cohesion and coupling. The utility of each technique based on structural and instructor information of class. Each technique deals with various parameters for predicting the software fault .The fault prediction improves the software reliability and quality.


Managers who implement stakeholder participation often have to navigate a complex subsystem of actors, policy-making institutions, and varying problem definitions. This paper examines how these managers' values affect decision-making and the operationalisation of stakeholder participation, and how the institutional framework in which the managers are embedded affects these values. It is based on the inside views of 23 managers and expert consultants involved in nine projects implemented by international organisations. Their values and preferences were captured through a review of project documents and interviews. The results demonstrate that the managers' personal value orientations affect the participatory process when there is a lack of control and support from their commissioning organisation, and also in cases where policy is ambiguous. The decision-making freedom accorded to the project manager defines whether they design stakeholder participation in accordance with personal value orientations, the organisation or policy. This study suggests that more stringent regulations and guidelines, as well as improved educational and awareness-raising activities, are required to resolve this problem. It is also suggested that evaluation tools should be improved to account for the impact that stakeholders have. This may encourage managers to become more actively involved in the use of stakeholder input.


This dissertation focused on the potential use of highly charged nanoparticles to stabilize dispersions of weakly charged microparticles. The experimental components of the project centered on a model colloidal system containing silica microparticles at the isoelectric point where the suspensions are unstable and prone to flocculation. The stability of the silica suspensions was studied in the presence of highly charged nanoparticles. Initial experiments used polystyrene latex with either sulfate or amidine surface groups. Effective zeta potentials were measured with nanoparticle concentrations ranging from 0.001% to 0.5% vol. Adsorption levels were determined through direct SEM imaging of the silica microparticles, showing that the nanoparticles directly adsorbed to the microparticles (amidine more than sulfate), producing relatively large effective zeta potentials. However, stability experiments showed that the latex nanoparticles did not stabilize the silica but merely provided a reduction in overall flocculation rate. It was concluded that the zeta potential was an insufficient predictor of stability as there was still sufficient patchiness on the surface to allow for the silica surfaces to aggregate. Experiments using zirconia and alumina nanoparticles did achieve effective stabilization; both types stabilized the silica suspensions for longer than the observation period of approximately 15 hours. Stability was observed at concentrations of 10% to 1.0% (zirconia) and 10% vol. (alumina). These particles adsorbed directly to the microparticles (confirmed via SEM) and produced increasing effective zeta potentials with increasing nanoparticle concentrations. The adsorption resulted in significant electrostatic repulsion that was determined to be effectively irreversible using colloidal probe AFM. The improved stabilizing ability was attributed to the increased van der Waals attraction between the oxide nanoparticles (compared to polystyrene). Finally, an unexpected result of the CP-AFM force measurements showed that the repulsive forces between a nanoparticle-coated particle and plate lacked the normal dependence on the radius of the probe as predicted by the Derjaguin approximation. The forces observed in nanoparticle suspensions were virtually identical for 5 μm and 30 μm probes. Based on calculations of the shear rate in the gap, it was theorized that this phenomenon may have resulted from the shearing of adsorbed particles from the surfaces, which leads to similar interaction geometries for the two probe sizes.


1. Renal cortical and medullary tissue and aortic wall were removed from spontaneously hypertensive rats and from age-matched Wistar-Kyoto control animals at ages 30, 60, 90 and 120 days. The tissues were incubated and the release of prostaglandins into the incubation medium was measured. 2. Compared with Wistar-Kyoto control animals, the release of prostaglandin E from renal medullary tissue in spontaneously hypertensive rats was raised at 30 days (pre-hypertensive stage) and 90 days (early hypertensive stage), but decreased later with further establishment of hypertension. No such trend was seen with renal cortical tissue. Tissue release of prostaglandin F tended to be generally high in the spontaneously hypertensive rats compared with that in the control animals, but the difference was not significant. 3. The release of prostaglandin I 2 , as indicated by measurements of 6-keto prostaglandin F 1α , from aortic wall tissue in the spontaneously hypertensive rat during its pre-hypertensive and early hypertensive stages was similar to values obtained in the age-matched control animal. However, aortic wall prostaglandin I 2 release in spontaneously hypertensive rats increased thereafter, and was significantly raised at 90 and 120 days. No similar trend was observed with thromboxan A 2 release. Release of prostaglandin I 2 and thromboxan A 2 from renal tissues in spontaneously hypertensive rats did not differ significantly from that in control animals. 4. It is suggested that indomethacin-induced aggravation of hypertension in the spontaneously hypertensive rat may result from suppression of aortic wall prostaglandin I 2 formation rather than from the suppression of renal prostaglandin E 2 production.


Modern consumers have been familiar with using online product reviews for their pre-purchase information gathering. In response, brands are increasingly taking advantage of this opportunity by using influential individuals such as bloggers to post favourable product reviews to promote their products. However, these word-of-mouth marketing strategies are not always welcomed by consumers, especially when they prefer unbiased, organic reviews to make informed choices. Thus, it is important to understand how consumers make decisions to adopt product reviews and what factors might affect this process. This dissertation aims to explore consumers' information adoption when receiving skincare and makeup product reviews from beauty bloggers on social media platforms. The study examined 8 sites of 4 beauty bloggers in Vietnam as well as interviewed users and beauty bloggers to uncover how reviews are adopted. The dissertation proposes an integrative model of information adoption on social media platforms and identifies complex interconnections between the factors. Moreover, this study takes into account new social media platforms and compares their effects on information adoption. The findings extend extant knowledge of information adoption and suggest the factors that marketers should pay attention to when designing an influential product review.


A 39 year-old female presented with progressive diminution of vision in the right eye for six months after sustaining an injury from a high-voltage electric current to the right side of her forehead, face, around the right eye and to the scalp. On examination with the slit lamp, the right eye showed a mature cataract and anterior subcapsular opacities, with early lental opacity in left eye. She suffered from lagophthalmos and slight conjunctival congestion in the right eye. Vision in the right eye was only perception of light and in the left eye accurate projection of rays and 6/24. From the history, the type of injury (wound of entry and exit), and slit-lamp examination confirmed a case of bilateral electric cataract. We performed manual smallincision cataract surgery with posterior chamber intraocular lens implantation in right eye and in the left eye, using local anesthesia. Postoperative visual acuity was only 3/20 in the right eye and 6/6 in the left eye. In this case we have seen three circumscribed retinal lesions in the right eye; the left eye it was normal. This has been documented.The second case was a 20-year-old male, who was admitted to our center with bilateral electric cataract. He was treated the same way as the first case. He regained normal BCVA after cataract surgery with posterior chamber intraocular lens implantation.


Abstract. Climate factors including soil temperature and moisture, incident solar radiation, and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration are important environmental controls on methane (CH4) emissions from northern wetlands. We investigated the spatiotemporal distributions of the influence of these factors on northern high-latitude wetland CH4 emissions using an enhanced version of the Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) land surface model. We simulated CH4 emissions from wetlands across the pan-Arctic domain over the period 1948–2006, yielding annual average emissions of 36.1 ± 6.7 Tg CH4 yr−1 for the period 1997–2006. We characterized historical sensitivities of CH4 emissions to air temperature, precipitation, incident long- and shortwave radiation, and atmospheric [CO2] as a function of average summer air temperature and precipitation. Emissions from relatively warm and dry wetlands in the southern (permafrost-free) portion of the domain were positively correlated with precipitation and negatively correlated with air temperature, while emissions from wetter and colder wetlands further north (permafrost) were positively correlated with air temperature. Over the entire period 1948–2006, our reconstructed CH4 emissions increased by 20 %, the majority of which can be attributed to an increasing trend in summer air temperature. We estimated future emissions in response to 21st century warming as predicted by CMIP5 (Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5) model projections to result in end-of-century CH4 emissions 38–53 % higher than our reconstructed 1997–2006 emissions, accompanied by the northward migration of warmer and drier than optimal conditions for CH4 emissions, implying a reduced role for temperature in driving future increases in emissions.


PURPOSE
Our eyes are chronically exposed to airborne particulate matter shown to adversely affect the ocular surface. This research examines size, type (organic vs. inorganic), and elemental composition of particles recovered from the ocular surface in 2 environments and their associations with dry eye (DE) metrics.

METHODS
Particles were recovered from the right eye using Schirmer strips obtained both in the clinic and home environments 9 ± 8 days apart. Particle size and elemental composition were assessed using scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive spectroscopy. The paired t test was used to evaluate the differences in the size and types of ocular surface particles recovered from the clinic and home settings. Associations of particle size and type with home environmental conditions and DE measures were evaluated using correlation analyses.

RESULTS
The mean age of the 15 patients was 56 years, standard deviation (±) 12 years; 93% were men and 53% self-identified as white. Size, type, and elemental composition did not vary significantly between clinic and home. Particle surface area was marginally associated with home indoor temperature (25 °C ± 2, ρ=-0.53, P = 0.06) and significantly associated with the select DE signs: tear osmolality (304 mOsm/L ± 14, ρ= -0.60, P = 0.02), inflammation (0.7 ± 0.8, ρ = 0.53, P = 0.04), and tear breakup time (7 seconds ± 3, ρ = 0.56, P = 0.03).

CONCLUSIONS
Ocular surface particles were consistently detected across 2 different environments. Greater particle area detected on Schirmer strips correlated with some DE measures, suggesting that particles detected on the ocular surface may affect eye health.


There are many factors that explain this relation between APs and age, and one possible mechanical explanation may be differences in electrophysiological properties, such as conduction speed and refractory period of APs and atrio- ventricular nodes. The objective of this study was to evaluate the correlation between age groups and gender, presentation pattern (manifest or concealed) and anatomical distribution of APs. Although APs have a genetically mediated transmission model, there is no uniformity in their presentation, and differences can be observed in their distribution depending on gender and onset age, in clinical and electrocardiographic manifestations.


Elections are still often equated with modern democracy, which they are supposed to constitute by way of realizing bourgeois equality. By contrast, elections in pre-modern times are regarded as a mere ritual celebrated exclusively by a privileged male minority in order to cement a patronally prescribed corporate hierarchy. This volume shows that elections in different forms of society serve as a political tool par excellence for establishing the legitimacy of distributive justice in accessing offices and resources and for collective agreement concerning suitable candidates for them. One focus of the volume is on the early modern urban societies of Italy, whose oligarchic tendencies are paradoxically expressed in their intense preoccupation with electoral procedures which were therefore regarded as exemplary in their time.


To enable the reader to shape, or perhaps reshape, an understanding of the Islamic tradition, F. E. Peters skillfully combines extensive passages from Islamic texts with a fascinating commentary of his own. In so doing, he presents a substantial body of literary evidence that will enable the reader to grasp the bases of Muslim faith and, more, to get some sense of the breadth and depth of Islamic religious culture as a whole. The voices recorded here are those of Muslims engaged in discourse with their God and with each other--historians, lawyers, mystics, and theologians, from the earliest Companions of the Prophet Muhammad down to Ibn Rushd or "Averroes" (d. 1198), al-Nawawi (d. 1278), and Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406). These religious seekers lived in what has been called the "classical" period in the development of Islam, the era when the exemplary works of law and spirituality were written, texts of such universally acknowledged importance that subsequent generations of Muslims gratefully understood themselves as heirs to an enormously broad and rich legacy of meditation on God's Word. "Islam" is a word that seems simple to understand. It means "submission," and, more specifically in the context where it first and most familiarly appears, "submission to the will of God." That context is the Quran, the Sacred Book of the Muslims, from which flow the patterns of belief and practice that today claim the spiritual allegiance of hundreds of millions around the globe. By drawing on the works of the great masters--Islam in its own words--Peters enriches our understanding of the community of "those who have submitted" and their imposing religious and political culture, which is becoming ever more important to the West.


A plan to use government money intended to expand access to primary care to employ doctors who aren't trained as GPs to provide primary care medical services has been criticised by the BMA and the Royal College of General Practitioners.

The Shropshire Doctors Co-operative is recruiting a "community physician" to work in several practices across Shropshire and Staffordshire. The advertisement for the role does not require applicants to have completed GP training. It stated that the post was "an exciting opportunity for fully registered medical practitioners, having completed at least foundation year 2."

The BMA said that only GPs could provide certain primary care services and that the provision of such roles could be misleading. The Royal College of General Practitioners has asked Health Education England for "urgent clarification" about …


Focused ion beam technology is combined with chemical etching of specifically designed fibers to create Fabry-Perot interferometers. Hydrofluoric acid is used to etch special fibers and create microwires with diameters of 15 μm. These microwires are then milled with a focused ion beam to create two different structures: an indented Fabry-Perot structure and a cantilever Fabry-Perot structure that are characterized in terms of temperature. The cantilever structure is also sensitive to vibrations and is capable of measuring frequencies in the range 1 Hz - 40 kHz.


The paper deals with a comparison of two published approaches to modelling the properties of magnetic circuits leading to a dynamic description of hysteresis characteristic. The comparison of the two methods is carried out both theoretically and in practical measurements on instrument voltage transformer. The paper also deals with the possibility of employing the models for ferroresonance simulations in power systems.