The purpose of this novel research was to understand the flow behaviour and improve the efficiency of the Volumatic™ spacer, using a combination of engineering tools such as CFD, Laser Doppler Anemometry (LDA) and Row visualization techniques. The lack of information on the Volumatic /A/ spacer meant that, initial understanding had to be gained into the flow behaviour within the spacer. This was initially performed by injecting air carrying a tracer concentration to represent t li<^drug portion of the medicine. The efficiency (volume of drug collected at the mouth piece) was found to be about 6.5% which was in the same order as the figure quoted in the literature Chuffart A series of parametric studies were carried out to discover the effects of various parameters on The overall efficiency of the spacer. In the initial part a series of jet profiles were studied at the inlet, these were in the shape of straight, cone shape and spray jet profiles. It was concluded that the jet with a cone angle of 5° increased the efficiency of the spacer from G.5% to 9.4%.

The next stage of parametric study involved reducing the length of the spacer from 0.24 m to 0.12 m and varying the inlet velocity from 40 m/s down to 10 m/s. The findings concluded that t in1 efficiency of the spacer could be increased to 23%, using a velocity of 40 m/s at inlet. The length was reduced from 0.12 m to 0.06 m and a similar study as described above was carried out. This time it was concluded that reducing the velocity to 30 m/s increased the efficiency to 30%. The other interesting feature to come out of this study was that the whole of tIk1 spacer volume was used, hence the drug was mixing better than in the original Volumatic /A/ spacer, where about one third of the spacer volume remained completely empty of the drug.

The studies carried out so far had shown that the additional increase in drug delivery efficiency in the case of the Volumatic 7 A/ spacer, was not substantial enough to justify the considerable manufacturing costs which have to be met, if the Volumatic 7 A/ spacer was to be remanufactured in its improved design. The way forward seemed to be in the development of a new design. The new design had to be small enough, so that it could be carried around easily by patients, who do not use1 the current spacer due to its size. The new design had to be economical in terms of manufacture, simple to use and easy to clean. The reasons mentioned above and the current trend towards the tube type spacer designs, implied the logical approach would be to base the design on a similar geometry. A tube type spacer was modelled with two holes drilled directly opposite each other, a distance of 10 mm away from the pMDI's nozzle. The holes introduced a pressure difference, hence directing the drug towards the patient's airway system. The new spacer had a length of 0.1 m. The computational results showed that the efficiency had increased to 71% for this particular design.

The CFD results obtained from the initial study on the Volumatic 7 M spacer were validated using LDA measurements. The velocities along four different locations were measured. At each location the velocities were measured at increments of 5 mm for a distance of 50 mm inside the spacer. The LDA results showed very good agreements with those obtained from CFD. The volume of data sampled experimentally at each point was 25,000 data points. This large volume of data eliminated any random sources of error, and as the CF D simulations were carried out some six months prior to LDA results, it was safe to assume that the drug had been modelled accurately. The same experimental set up was used to measure velocity values for the tube spacer, but in this instance, velocity measurements were made only along two planes, due to limited time and availability of the drug source.

Finally laser light sheeting was used to illuminate the Volumatic T spacer and a high speed KODAK camera capable of capturing 4500 frames per second was used. The visualization study proved that there was a portion of the Volumatie /A/ spacer which at times was free of any drug.

The originality of the work has been described in the following paragraph: Prior to this research there was no comprehensive study available combining engineering tools such as Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), Laser Doppler Anemoinetry (LDA) and High Speed Photography to study the (low pattern within the current Volumatic /A/ spacer design and hence analysing its efficiency. The studies carried out were of the impaction type. The results of this study have confirmed that there are several parameters contributing to the efficiency of the Volumatic' A/ spacer. This knowledge was not available in the open literature previously.

The initial part of this study has provided a scientific approach to analysing the flow patterns, hence obtaining an accurate value for the efficiency of the current device. This part of the study alone is a valuable tool for industry, because it has given industry data which has not been previously available. The results from this study have indicated that, the Aero Chamber Spacer type design has an efficiency of 71% compared to the current 10% efficiency of the Volumatic 7 A/ spacer. The efficiencies discussed are measured in terms of the percentage of the drug delivered to the mouth piece. The benefit to industry would be saving at a conservative estimate in terms of millions of Pounds annually. This can be calculated from industry's own figures that, 1 out of every 5 new born baby suffers from asthma in various degrees. The drug is the most expensive component of the device, hence a more efficient device would use a lesser quantity of the drug.

Finally the combination of techniques used, and the number of data samples taken for example in the case of LDA measurements some 25000 data samples were taken and averaged at each point, has ensured a high degree of accuracy and confidence in the results presented.


Donna Bowman utilizes the work of process thinker Alfred North Whitehead to develop a doctrine of election that dialogues with the view of Reformed theologian Karl Barth. Taking seriously Barth's contention that election is the best of all words that can be spoken about God, Bowman reinterprets Whitehead's description of God's provision of the initial aim to each entity as the central cosmological and theological fact of universal election. By combining Barth's concerns with process categories, she concludes that both systems are aimed at common theological and philosophical enemies.


This article takes issue with a recent book by Ziliak and McCloskey (2008) of the same title. Ziliak and McCloskey argue that statistical significance testing is a barrier rather than a booster for empirical research in many fields and should therefore be abandoned altogether. The present article argues that this is good advice in some research areas but not in others. Taking all issues which have appeared so far of the German Economic Review and a recent epidemiological meta-analysis as examples, it shows that there has indeed been a lot of misleading work in the context of significance testing, and that at the same time many promising avenues for fruitfully employing statistical significance tests, disregarded by Ziliak and McCloskey, have not been used.


The pressures and opportunities of globalization have dramatically changed the nature of legal practice. How and why we practice law? For whom and whose benefit? In what contexts? And on what terms? The answers to these questions are continuously changing as a result of current global trends. The communities served by lawyers, the practice contexts in which they work and the issues that they face are increasingly diverse, complex, transnational and global in character. All of these challenges demand new competencies and raise a host of new issues about ethics and professionalism. As a threshold matter, more and more lawyers engage in transnational practices, including, for example, corporate, family, labour and human rights practices. Knowledge of international and comparative legal systems and the norms of professional conduct in other jurisdictions is increasingly essential in such settings. However, beyond these self-consciously transnational contexts, it is perhaps even more important to acknowledge that few if any areas of practice remain in which legal professionals can rely solely on the knowledge of a single, domestic legal system. Local communities are microcosms of global diversity in which a multiplicity of official and unofficial legal orders and ethical systems overlap. The increasingly pluralistic nature of modern local communities demands that the vast majority of lawyers will be required to work in contexts that require cross-cultural competencies and sensitivities to diverse legal and moral perspectives. Put simply, the complexity of today's world is not just an issue for international lawyers – it is an issue for all lawyers. As such, thinking about lawyering in a global community and how we not only practice it, but also how we learn about and regulate it, has become of central concern for practitioners, educators and regulators. That central concern is the subject of this lecture, which asks the following question: why should lawyers care about being more open to the global? In developing a response to this question, this lecture looks at three issues: pluralism, professionalism and pragmatism, all of which, together, provide a basis for an answer to this inquiry.


The commission of mass atrocities — genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes — inevitably generates clarion calls for accountability from a range of international actors, including civil society organizations, governments, and United Nations bodies. These demands often center on an appeal that the situation be taken up by the International Criminal Court (ICC) via a Security Council referral or action by the Prosecutor herself. Although the ICC is now fully operational, its jurisdiction remains incomplete and its resources limited. Furthermore, the ICC is plagued by challenges to its legitimacy, erratic state cooperation, and persistent perceptions of inefficacy and inefficiency. Originally envisioned as a standing institution that would obviate the need for new ad hoc courts, it is now clear that the ICC cannot handle all the atrocity situations ravaging our planet. As such, there is an enduring need for the international community to create, and enable, additional accountability mechanisms to respond to the commission of international crimes when the political will for an ICC referral is lacking, the ICC is inappropriate or foreclosed for whatever reason, or only a fraction of the abuses or perpetrators in question are before the ICC. This contribution analyzes the accumulated experience with international, hybrid, and internationalized judicial institutions prior to and since the establishment of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in 1993 and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in 1994. This paper assumes the continuing utility of such mechanisms as tools to provide accountability for mass violence amounting to international crimes, particularly in situations requiring an alternative or supplement to the ICC. It thus focuses on practical elements of institutional design, with particular attention to the origins, structure, jurisdictional limitations, financing, and procedures of the hybrid courts, dedicated chambers, specialized prosecutorial cells, and other accountability innovations established to prosecute atrocity crimes at the domestic level with some measure of international support, expertise, and/or personnel. From this historical and comparative analysis, the paper develops a taxonomy of models and a "menu" of elements that can be mixed and matched as new accountability mechanisms are under consideration for historical, current, and emerging atrocity situations, such as Syria, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia, North Korea, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Libya, Burundi, and even the July 2014 downing of Malaysian Air Flight 17 (MH-17) over rebel-controlled Ukraine.


From at least 3.4 million years ago to historic periods, humans and their ancestors used stone as the raw material for tool production. Archeologists find stone tools on all the planet's habitable landmasses, even in its cold and ecologically sparse Arctic regions. Their ubiquity and durability inform archeologists about important dimensions of human behavioral variability. Stone tools' durability also gives them the ability to contribute to the study of long-term historical processes and the deeper regularities and continuities underlying processes of change. Over the last two millennia as ceramics, livestock, European goods, and eventually Europeans themselves arrived in southern Africa, stone tools remained. As social, environmental, economic, and organizational upheavals buffeted African hunter-gatherers, they used stone tools to persist in often marginal landscapes. Indigenous Africans' persistence in the environment of their evolutionary origins is due in large part to these "small things forgotten." Stone tools and their broader contexts of use provide one important piece of information to address some of archaeology and history's "big issues," such as resilience in small-scale societies, questions of human mobility and migrations, and the interactions of humans with their environments. Yet, stone tools differ in important ways from the technologies historians are likely to be familiar with, such as ceramics and metallurgy, in being reductive. While ceramics are made by adding and manipulating clay-like substances, stone tools are made by removing material through the actions of grinding, pecking, or fracture. Metals sit somewhere in between ceramics and stone: they can be made through the reduction of ores, but they can also be made through additive processes when one includes recycling of old metals. Stone-tool technologies can also be more easily and independently reinvented than these other technologies. These distinctions, along with the details of stone tool production and use, hold significance for historians wishing to investigate the role of technology in social organization, economy, consumption, contact, and cultural change.


Numerous  Islamic  groups  in  Indonesia  use  the  internet  to  offer  ideology  against  other  groups  or other sects to internet users. This study focuses on sectarian ideology on Islamic online media in Indonesia. Having combined and sought this media, I found that lppimakassar.com and manhajsala- fi.com  are  the  most  intensive  sites  in  offering  sectarian  ideology.  This  study  aims  to  examine  the ideological identity and pattern of the websites linked to the administrators or writers of the web- sites. To find their ideology, this article uses topic headings, news, and articles to analyze. This meth- od has led me to find two Islamic online media: lppimakassar.com and manhajsalafi.com. The former is affiliated to the Salafi group while the latter to the Aswaja group. These two websites adopt their thoughts abroad. DOI:  10.15408/insaniyat.v1i2.5468


Real estate prices more than doubled in many countries of Central and Eastern Europe from 2003 to 2008. In this paper, I provide one of the first assessments of whether housing prices in this region correspond to rents, i.e. to cash-flows related to an apartment purchase. State-of-the-art panel data stationarity and Granger causality techniques are employed to test the implications of the standard present value model using regional data from the Czech Republic. Apartment prices are only slightly overvalued. In addition, changes in prices are helpful in predicting changes in rents and vice versa.


Changes in complex phenotypes, such as exercise tolerance, are often mediated by the
co-adjustment of many components. For example, hypoxic exercise tolerance (HET) is typically
enhanced by the myriad physiological adjustments that accompany acclimation to hypoxia.
Further, exercise tolerance is strongly influenced by genetic background, but the effect of genetic
variation is largely unknown. The present study sought to examine the consequence of reduced
genetic variation, in the context of inbreeding, and its effect on the relationship between hypoxic
exercise tolerance (HET), maximal aerobic capacity (VO2max), and myoglobin concentration
([Mb]) in Mus musculus. I hypothesized that the increased homozygosity found in inbred strains
would lead to reduced phenotypic plasticity, resulting in more variable responses to chronic
hypoxia. In addition, I hypothesized that HET and VO2max would be positively correlated.
Hypoxia led to decreases in body mass as well as increases in HET and hypoxic VO2max in all
strains. While there was no significant effect of breeding on HET, the change in VO2max and the
cost of exercise following hypoxic acclimation were greater among inbred than outbred strains.
The response of [Mb] to hypoxia was generally greater among inbred than outbred strains as
predicted, but the differences were mostly non-significant. HET and VO2max were positively
correlated, but [Mb] was not correlated with either of these variables. The consistent influence of
inbreeding on body mass, VO2max, and cost of exercise suggest an underlying consequence of
genetic uniformity. While there was some support for the hypothesis that reduced phenotypic
plasticity in inbred strains leads to a more variable response to hypoxia, on the whole the results
were not consistent with this view.


Abstract 3D printing technologies are beginning to be employed to fabricate new food products. One of the more unusual and potentially controversial adoptions of this novel food technology involves the use of laboratory-cultured meat or insect-based ingredients to support ethical consumption, food security, and environmental sustainability initiatives. In this article, we discuss findings from our study involving an online discussion group with Australian participants concerning their attitudes to a novel technology that combined new food processing and presentation devices (the 3D printer) with a range of ingredients. The participants recognized the potential benefits of insect- and cultured-meat-based printed food for society. However, their own priorities for food consumption choices centered more on the qualities of health, taste, and naturalness. We found that overall, few participants articulated interest in or support for consuming or serving 3D-printed food products made from cultured meat or insects. Most expressed their disquiet about the degree of processing cultured meat undergoes. It was considered to be "unnatural," and therefore not fresh, potentially harmful, lacking taste or not nutritious. Most of the participants also expressed antipathy towards the idea of eating printed products containing insects. While such products were considered more "natural" and nutritious than cultured meat, the idea of eating insects was predominantly greeted with disgust. As these findings suggest, plans to use 3D printing technologies to render ingredients such as cultured meat and insects more acceptable and appealing to consumers in countries like Australia have major cultural barriers to overcome.


The cicada genus Procollina Metcalf, 1952 is redescribed. Procollina minima n. sp., P. parva n. sp., P. ustulata n. sp. and P. webbi n. sp. are described from Costa Rica, P. guatemalensis n. sp., P. mayaensis n. sp. and P. nigrapilosa n. sp. are described from Guatemala, P. hondurensis n. sp. is described from Honduras, P. convexa n. sp. and P. mesomaculata n. sp. are described from Guatemala and Honduras, P. ulnamaculata n. sp. is described from Guatemala and Mexico, P. nuevoleonensis n. sp. and P. tamaulipasensis n. sp. are described from Mexico, and P. nicaraguaensis n. sp. is described from Nicaragua. The current eighteen species of Procollina are listed along with their synonymies and known distribution of each species. The tribe Dazini Kato, 1932 is moved from the Cicadettinae Buckton, 1889 to the Cicadinae Latreille, 1802, synonymized with the Zammarini Distant, 1905, and revised to the subtribe Dazina rev. stat. based on the morphological characters of the representative genera. A key to the species of the Dazina rev. stat. is provided. Aragualnini n. tribe is erected for the genus Aragualna Champanhet, Boulard Gaiani, 2000 as it exhibits morphological characteristics of the Cicadettinae Buckton, 1889 rather than the Cicadinae as do the rest of the genera previously assigned to the Dazini. Finally, Cicada pennata (Distant, 1881) is reassigned to Neocicada Kato, 1932 to become Neocicada pennata (Distant, 1881) n. comb..


The latest research indicates that children experience traumatic events more frequently than ever expected. As a result, many youth carry symptoms of their trauma that put them at risk for diminished academic and social success. School-based mentoring programs (SBMPs) are one support that has historically been utilized as an intervention for at-risk youth, but that has not specifically targeted children who have experienced trauma. Unfortunately, the literature available on SBMPs is neither comprehensive nor uniform, which prevents cross-comparison between interventions to determine best practice methods for SBMPs supporting youth who have experienced trauma. This research used a systematic review to determine whether SBMPs are able to address the needs of this population. Findings from this review noted that relational impact, even in the short term, was a significant factor in all types of outcomes, and despite a behavioral focus in the referral process few programs carried behavioral support through program implementation. Implications for practice and further research include: the importance of proactively preventing slow program start-up, improvement of data collection practices to differentiate between influencing variables, and further exploration into specific SBMP interventions that more fully support populations that do not see the same positive effects from SBMPs as their peers.


Abstract In order to define the cathodoluminescence (CL) properties of magmatic topaz and its relation with traceelement composition, we studied topaz phenocrysts from the Ary-Bulak ongonite massif, Russia using a wide array of analytical techniques. Scanning electron microscopy CL panchromatic images reveal strong variations, which define micrometre-scale euhedral growth textures. Several truncations of these growth textures occur in single grains implying multiple growth and resorption events. The CL spectra of both CL-bright and -dark domains have a major peak in the near-ultraviolet centred at 393 nm. Cathodoluminescence images taken after several minutes of electron bombardment show decreasing emission intensity. Electron microprobe analyses indicate high F concentrations (average OH/(OH + F) = 0.04 calculated by difference, 100 wt.% - total from electron probe microanalyses), consistent with what has been found previously in topaz-bearing granites, and the OH stretching vibration (~3653 cm−1) was detected in Raman spectra. Laser ablation inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometry traverses performed across the CL textures detected trace elements at ppm to thousands of ppm levels, including: Fe, Mn, Li, Be, B, P, Nb, Ta, W, Ti, Ga, light rare-earth elements, Th and U. Lithium,W, Nb and Ta appear to be correlated with CL intensity, suggesting a role for some of these elements in the activation of CL in topaz. In contrast, no clear correlation was found between CL intensity and F contents, despite the fact that the replacement of OH for F is known to affect the cell parameters of topaz.


Leukaemia means white blood. It is a disease of the white blood cells and was first described by Virchow in 1845. Leukaemia can present as an acute disease, occurring more often in the younger age groups, or as a chronic disease, usually in the older age group. Acute leukaemia is rare, but about 1 in 2 000 people will develop the disease. The two acute forms in children are acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) and acute myeloid leukaemia (AML). The chronic form is chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML).


Honduran farmers are at a disadvantage when dealing with intermediaries because they lack timely information about market prices. This paper first analyzes which information and communications technology (ICT) would be most suitable for sending price information to producers scattered throughout the country at a reasonable cost and in a sustainable way. Negotiations by two groups of farmers were compared: one to which market prices were not sent (control) and one to which prices were sent (treatment). A simple uninterrupted time series research design was used, followed by linear regression analysis and univariant analyses to determine the cases in which the treatment had an impact on farmers' negotiations. Findings are reported, as well as recommendations and lessons learned.


We determine the exact and asymptotic number of unlabeled outerplanar graphs. The exact number gn of unlabeled outerplanar graphs on n vertices can be computed in polynomial time, and gn is asymptotically g n −5/2 ρ , where g ≈ 0.00909941 and ρ ≈ 7.50360 can be approximated. Using our enumerative results we investigate several statistical properties of random unlabeled outerplanar graphs on n vertices, for instance concerning connectedness, chromatic number, and the number of edges. To obtain the results we combine classical cycle index enumeration with recent results from analytic combinatorics.


The end of the Cold War was a "big bang" reminiscent of earlier moments after major wars, such as the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and the end of the world wars in 1919 and 1945. But what do states that win wars do with their newfound power, and how do they use it to build order? This book examines postwar settlements in modern history, arguing that powerful countries do seek to build stable and cooperative relations, but the type of order that emerges hinges on their ability to make commitments and restrain power. The book explains that only with the spread of democracy in the twentieth century and the innovative use of international institutions—both linked to the emergence of the United States as a world power—has order been created that goes beyond balance of power politics to exhibit "constitutional" characteristics. Blending comparative politics with international relations, and history with theory, the book will be of interest to anyone concerned with the organization of world order, the role of institutions in world politics, and the lessons of past postwar settlements for today.


Lightning strikes to man-made systems can include lightning strikes to telecommunication subscriber lines (TSLs) and electrical power lines, the two systems that are almost always affected by nearby lightning activities. Better designs of lightning protection systems can be realised if data on lightning strike distribution in a given region is known. Lightning mapping or locating systems can be based on several of technologies [1,2]. The two most popular methods are those based on the Time of Arrival (ToA) and the Directional Finder (DF). The Malaysian wide lightning locating system (LLS) owned by TNB is known to be able to determine the coordinate of the cloudto-ground lightning strike within 500m accuracy. In this chapter, we will propose a new method to determine the coordinate of any cloud-to-ground lightning strike within a certain local region with an improved accuracy of up to within 20m. Although the covergae area of our new system is much smaller than the LLS, it can be used for specific local needs as well as to function as a calibrating system for the LLS. This new LLS is based on the measurement of induced voltages due to lightning strikes in the vicinity of an existing overhead telephone lines [3, 4, 5, and 6]. Many studies were done by several researchers in relation to the lightning induced voltages and their models. Diendorfer [7] numerically calculates the wave shape of the induced voltage on an overhead line due to nearby lightning return stroke by solving the transmission line equation using Agrawal's time domain approach [3]. The return stroke's vertical and horizontal electric fields were calculated using the travelling current source model. The same method is applied to calculate the induced current and voltage on the inner conductor of shielded cable [8]. Pokharel [9] studies the transient-induced voltages on a distribution line over finitely conducting ground. Using a different method, Piantini [10] studies the lightning induced voltages on overhead lines of power distribution systems using the scale model technique which are prohibitively complex to be treated theoretically. The contribution of the electromagnetic field components in field-to-transmission line interaction based on the transmission line approximation using three different equivalent formulations was studied by Nucci [11]. The effect of distances and height of TSL to lightning strike position was studied in [12] and the induced voltage in a complex TSL as well as a simplified wire model was studied in [13]. Other studies include the observation of lightning surges induced in a telecommunication building [14], the effect of strike locations along the telecommunication line on the amplitude and shape of the induced voltages [15], and the calculation of corresponding electromagnetic fields from known lightning sources [16]. The experimental approach to test the theory of lightning induced voltages on an overhead wire was carried out in [17,18]. In this work, the time difference of arrival method is implemented in a localised lightning locating system, in particular, to calculate the lightning strike coordinate based on the lightning induced voltage timing information measured from a purposely installed telephone overhead lines.


We address complications in the coupling of a dynamic ice sheet model (ISM) and forcing from an Earth system model (ESM), which arise because of the unknown ISM initial conditions. Unless explicitly accounted for during ISM initialization, the ice sheet is far from thermomechanical equilibrium with the surface mass balance forcing from the ESM. Upon coupling to ESM forcing, the result is a shock and unphysical and undesirable transients in ice geometry and other state variables. Under the assumption of thermomechanical equilibrium, we present an approach for finding ISM initial conditions—characterized by optimization of the basal sliding coefficient and basal topography fields—that balance a best fit to surface velocity and basal topography observations against the minimization of unphysical transients when coupling to surface mass balance forcing. A quasi‐Newton method is used to solve the resulting large‐scale, partial differential equation‐constrained optimization problem, where the cost function gradients with respect to the parameter fields are computed using adjoints. After studying properties of our approach on a synthetic test problem, we apply the method toward obtaining optimal initial conditions for a model of the Greenland ice sheet. Our results show that, in the presence of uncertainties in the basal topography, ice thickness should also be treated as an optimization variable. While the focus here is on the coupling between an ISM and ESM‐derived surface mass balance, the method is easily extended to include optimal coupling to forcing from an ocean model through submarine melt rates.


In this paper, we present an efficient protocol for the delay-limited fading automatic retransmission request single relay channel. The source is using an ARQ retransmission protocol to send data to the relay and the destination. When the relay is able to decode, both the relay and the source send the same data to the destination providing additional gains. The proposed protocol exploits two kinds of diversity: (i) space diversity available through the cooperative (relay) terminal, which retransmits the source's signals, (ii) ARQ diversity obtained by leveraging the retransmission delay to enhance the reliability. The performance characterization is in terms of the achievable diversity, multiplexing gain and delay tradeoff for a high signal-to-noise ratio (snr) regime


We describe an efficient learning algorithm for aligning a symbolic representation of a musical piece with its acoustic counterpart. Our method employs a supervised learning approach by using a training set of aligned symbolic and acoustic representations. The alignment function we devise is based on mapping the input acousticsymbolic representation along with the target alignment into an abstract vector-space. Building on techniques used for learning support vector machines (SVM), our alignment function distills to a classifier in the abstract vectorspace which separates correct alignments from incorrect ones. We describe a simple iterative algorithm for learning the alignment function and discuss its formal properties. We use our method for aligning MIDI and MP3 representations of polyphonic recordings of piano music. We also compare our discriminative approach to a generative method based on a generalization of hidden Markov models. In all of our experiments, the discriminative method outperforms the HMM-based method.


Legal regulation of surnames provides a fascinating venue for examining how women negotiate their interests of autonomy and of stable personhood vis a vis a patriarchal naming structure. This is a study of 25 years of adjudication of surnames and personal status at the European Court of Human Rights. It explores the intricate ways in which legal norms governing surnames (and their judicial interpretation) sustain, shape, and reify social institutions such as gender, family, and citizenship. As a pan European court, the adjudication of the ECHR operates within the framework of human rights. The universal characteristics of human rights principles allow for an analysis that goes beyond the jurisdiction-specific doctrines of the different countries in Europe, relying on a more general protection of basic rights such as equality and privacy.All of the cases studied here originated in civil law countries. Unlike the common law, the civil law has a highly regulated approach to name-giving and name-changing, a fact that results in litigation in cases that would not reach courts in contemporary common law countries. The rulings in such cases provide a unique opportunity to learn about judicial assumptions regarding gender roles and their symbolic representation through names. This study is part of a larger project that explores the legal treatment of "external" personal markers such as clothes, hairstyle, names, and accent. Adding an important comparative dimension to the overarching project, this article further illustrates the difficulty of modern legal logic to be humble about its ability to classify and categories legal subjects in fixed rubrics of identity. Employing theoretical tools from feminist jurisprudence, semiotics, and textual analysis, this article lays out an alternative legal approach, which would perceive the subjects of law as multidimensional and complex persons, engaged in an ongoing project of finding ways of expressing themselves meaningfully.


Marketing science has earned a special status among industrialists and academic circles over the past few decades. Scientific marketing has entered into business arena for a long time. Moreover, in the last three decades, we have seen that marketing science has entered to politics affairs which have its own proponents and opponents. Political marketing is a well-known phenomenon in western liberal democracies and has many similarities with free market economic system, so we can consider political marketing as a very complicated business which competition is the most important factor in this field like commercial market. The aim of this study is to investigate impact of political marketing tools on the behavior of voters and their priorities in the eleventh Iranian Presidential Elections. The statistical population included people living in Mashhad city which 384 persons selected randomly. The results showed that TV Ads, comparative advertising ,Network Advertising, finding someone's fault, automated messages, pre-election campaigning, and using celebritieshave a significant impact on voters' behavior. However, there was not significant relationship between fake polls, destructive promotional plans, video imaging and voters' behavior.


Ambient mechanical energy, which is abundant in the living environment, is a promising energy harvesting source. This technology can provide an eco-friendly and sustainable form of energy. Here, a novel solution-processed aluminum coating (SC) method to create an electrode, consisting of sandpaper, is demonstrated for a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG). The proposed SC method harnesses the strong adhesion of Al to the target substrate, with conformal deposition of Al following a pre-existing nano-to-micro surface morphology, and offering good thickness controllability without discontinuities, and the ability to coat an Al film in a manner unrestricted by the size or type of substrate. The fabricated TENG using the SC method is capable of serving as an energy supplier and can be commercialized for the Internet of Things (IoT) due to its high output power and low-cost.


Given today's new market reality and rapid changes in the business world, companies need to select and develop high potential talent who can maneuver in a hypercompetitive market and ultimately fill its top-tier jobs. Organizations can utilize the Human Resource Leadership Development Program (HRLDP) as a tool to attract, develop and retain high potentials to fill the future HR leadership pipeline. However, an HRLDP can be controversial and tricky to implement and maintain. The goal of this report is to provide useful guidelines for those interested in designing, managing and/or evaluating the effectiveness of such programs. If carefully designed and managed well, the HRLDP can provide an effective way for organizations to train and develop the HR leadership of tomorrow.


Hot (≥ 88-120 °C) and acidic (pH ≤ 2.1) hydrothermal fluids rich in sulfate were discovered venting in the DESMOS caldera (depth = 1926 m), eastern Manus back-arc basin, Bismarck Sea, surrounded by Papua New Guinea. The abundant sulfate (≥ 32.8 m M , higher than the seawater value of 28 m M ) with elemental sulfur deposition around the vents, and remarkably low δD(H 2 O) and δ 34 S(H 2 S) values (−8.1‰ and −5.6‰, respectively), are suggestive of the incorporation of a magmatic fluid and the disproportionation of the exsolved SO 2 from a magma body. The DESMOS fluid may be similar in origin to the acidic sulfate-chloride hot springs associated with subaerial volcanic activity. In contrast to the typical hydrothermal end member Mg concentration of 0, the DESMOS fluids are rich in Mg (46–52 m M ), probably because of Mg dissolution by acid attack upon magnesium silicate minerals.


It is presently acknowledged and scientifically proven that climate related hazards have the potential to substantially affect the lifespan and effectiveness or even destroy of European Critical Infrastructures (CI), particularly the energy, transportation sectors, buildings, marine and water management infrastructure with devastating impacts in EU appraising the social and economic losses. The man strategic objective of EU-CIRCLE is to move towards infrastructure network(s) that is resilient to today's natural hazards and prepared for the future changing climate. Furthermore, modern infrastructures are inherently interconnected and interdependent systems; thus extreme events are liable to lead to "cascade failures". EU-CIRCLE scope is to derive an innovative framework for supporting the interconnected European Infrastructure's resilience to climate pressures, supported by an end-to-end modelling environment where new analyses can be added anywhere along the analysis workflow and multiple scientific disciplines can work together to understand interdependencies, validate results, and present findings in a unified manner providing an efficient "Best of Breeds" solution of integrating into a holistic resilience model existing modelling tools and data in a standardised fashion. It will be open & accessible to all interested parts in the infrastructure resilience business and having a confirmed interest in creating customized and innovative solutions. It will be complemented with a webbased portal. The design principles, offering transparency and greater flexibility, will allow potential users to introduce fully tailored solutions and infrastructure data, by defining and implementing customised impact assessment models, and use climate/weather data on demand.


Models and model quality are prime concerns for most design issues in control and system analysis. The success of a simulation study hinges upon the reliability of the model used. In this contribution we discuss how to build mathematical models that given certain constraints, are of optimum quality for a prespecified application. We then taken into account the influence of both bias errors and random errors on the model. It turns out that for a fairly broad class of identification methods in the prediction error family, the optimal choices of design variables can be given in an explicit form.


This thesis is concerned with the nature of biomaterial interactions with compromised host tissue sites. Both ocular and dermal tissues can be wounded, following injury, disease or surgery, and consequently require the use of a biomaterial. Clear analogies exist between the cornea/tear film/contact lens and the dermal wound bed/wound fluid/skin adhesive wound dressing. The work described in this thesis builds upon established biochemistry to examine specific aspects of the interaction of biomaterials with compromised ocular and dermal tissue sites, with a particular focus on the role of vitronectin. Vitronectin is a prominent cell adhesion glycoprotein present in both tear fluid and wound fluid, and has a role in the regulation and upregulation of plasmin. The interaction of contact lenses with the cornea was assessed by a novel on-lens cell-based vitronectin assay technique. Vitronectin mapping showed that vitronectin-mediated cell adhesion to contact lens surfaces was due to the contact lens-corneal mechanical interaction rather than deposition out of the tear film. This deposition is associated predominantly with the peripheral region of the posterior contact lens surface. The locus of vitronectin deposition on the contact lens surface, which is affected by material modulus, is potentially an important factor in the generation of plasmin in the posterior tear film. Use of the vitronectin mapping technique on ex vivo bandage contact lenses revealed greater vitronectin-mediated cell adhesion to the contact lens surfaces in comparison to lenses worn in the healthy eye. The results suggest that vitronectin is more readily deposited from the impaired corneal tissue bed than the intact healthy tissue bed. Significantly, subjects with a deficient tear film were found to deposit high vitronectin-mediated cell adhesion levels to the BCL surface, thus highlighting the influence of the contact lens-tissue interaction upon deposition. Biomimetic principles imply that adhesive materials for wound applications, including hydrogels and hydrocolloids, should closely match the surface energy parameters of skin. The surface properties of hydrocolloid adhesives were found to be easily modified by contact with siliconised plastic release liners. In contrast, paper release liners did not significantly affect the adhesive surface properties. In order to characterise such materials in the actual wound environment, which is an extremely challenging task, preliminary considerations for the design of an artificial wound fluid model from an animal serum base were addressed.


A flight investigation was made of the increase in effectiveness of ailerons that can be obtained by preventing flow of air through the wing at the hinges and of the possibility of reducing the aileron operating force by replacing ailerons having normal open hinge gaps with narrower but equally effective ailerons having sealed hinge gaps. Tests were made with a Fairchild 22 airplane with two sizes of plain unbalanced ailerons, one set having a chord equal to 0.18c, and the other chord equal to 0.09c. The results of the investigation show that improvement of the lateral-control effectiveness is obtained by completely preventing the flow of air through the wing at the hinge axis of conventional ailerons. The magnitude of the improvement depends on the aileron chord. For the 0.18c ailerons the gain in aileron effectiveness due to sealing the gap at the hinge axis was of the order of one-fifth and for the 0.09c ailerons the gain was about one-third. The importance of sealing the gap was demonstrated by the fact that the 0.09c ailerons with a slight increase in deflection range were made as effective as the 0.18c ailerons with an unsealed gap but required only about one-third as large an operating force.


We present a study of the effect of time-dependent ionization on harmonic generation by bound–bound transitions. The introduction of tunneling and above-barrier ionization rates in a simple bound system, a two-level atom, induces an unexpected richness in the harmonic spectra, leading to the production of radiation at high frequencies. Such frequencies are not reached when no ionization or steady ionization is considered. Time-dependent ionization is, therefore, a key process in the understanding of generation of middle plateau frequency harmonics from atoms in the tunneling ionization regime and shows that bound–free transitions are not uniquely responsible for the higher-harmonic frequencies in realistic atoms. Following previous authors' studies, we use an adiabatic approach to understand the presence of these higher frequencies.


In recent years there has been much talk of a new abstraction. But what is new about this tendency? It is the thematic freedom and the overwhelming aesthetic bandwidth that characterizes these variations on the abstract. There are ultimately no dominant schools or -isms any more; choice is free, and free, what's more, from the necessity to justify itself. Accordingly, self-centred abstraction plays almost no role any more, but rather the references to what Wassily Kandinsky called 'Realistics'. In the exhibition 'Straight Lines Always Lie', then, the focus is on the thematic and formal interrelationship between Realism and Abstraction. There are, in equal measure, individual escapist tendencies just as there are continuations and transformations of historical references with varying frames of reference. The specific elements and inventions of historical abstract and realist production have become the pool on which the artists draw, using them effortlessly in the manner of sampling agents, who select, deconstruct, combine, celebrate or destroy, depending on individual preference and attitude. Today's exponents of abstraction cannot be reduced to a common denominator; the variations cover a broad spectrum, not only aesthetically, but also thematically, ranging from historical references across architecturally inspired abstract fantasms, the processing of patterns and ornaments, experiments with material, light, and perception, ironic treatments and discursive questioning, all the way to subjectively based approaches. The crossing of genre boundaries is taken for granted, and provides additional new creative impetus.

This sort of creative thinking, in a kind of visual cycle, can be metaphorically explained by reference to a scene in Nietzsche's 'Zarathustra'. The title of this exhibition, in German 'Alles Gerade lugt', is also taken from this dialogue. In the chapter 'Face and Riddle' Zarathustra says to the dwarf: "Stop. I! Or You!" The two are standing in front of a gateway, which has two 'faces', which Zarathustra explains thus: "Two paths come together here, which no one ever travelled to the end. Back along this long lane, that takes an eternity. And out along that long lane, that is a different eternity. They contradict each other, these paths, they bang their heads together, and here, at this gateway, they meet. The name of the gateway is written above it: 'Moment'." […] Zarathustra goes on to ask: "Do you believe, dwarf, that these paths contradict each other eternally?" – "Straight lines always lie", murmurs the dwarf, "all truth is crooked, time itself is a circle."

Reto Boller will show a sculpture and works on paper, Lothar Gotz two new paintings and one of his early works of 1993, David Reed two of his studies, Gert & Uwe Tobias a coloured woodcuts and Pae White a tapestry.


Causal models can provide richly-detailed knowledge bases for producing explanations about behaviors in many domains, a task often termed interpretation or diagnosis. However, producing a causal explanation from the model can be time-consuming. This paper describes a system that solves a new problem by recalling a previous, similar problem and modifying its solution to fit the current problem. Because it is unlikely that any new problem will exactly match a previous one, the system evaluates differences between the problems using a set of evidence principles that allow the system to reason about such concepts as alternate lines of evidence, additional supporting evidence, and inconsistent evidence. If all differences between the new situation and the remembered situation are found to be insignificant, the previous causal explanation is adapted to fit the new case. This technique results in the same solution, but with an average of two orders of magnitude less effort. The evidence principles are domain independent, and the information necessary to apply them to other domain models is described.


STKE
Omega-3 fatty acids, which are found in marine organisms, have been associated with beneficial health effects. One mechanism for their anti-inflammatory effect is via competitive inhibition of the enzymatic activity of cyclooxygenase (COX), which is the rate-limiting step in the biosynthesis of prostaglandins. Massaro et al. report that exposure of vascular endothelial cells to the omega-3 fatty acid docosahexaenoate (DHA) for periods long enough for it to be incorporated into cellular membranes inhibits the activation of nuclear factor κB (NF-κB) and, subsequently, the expression of COX-2 and prostaglandin production in response to the proinflammatory signal interleukin-1α (IL-1α). Treatment of endothelial cells with DHA altered their responses to IL-1α by (i) decreasing the activation of extracellular-stimulated kinases 1 and 2, without changing the activation of p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase; (ii) decreasing reactive oxygen species production through inhibiting the membrane association of the p47phox subunit of NADPH oxidase, and (iii) decreasing the membrane association of protein kinase Cϵ (PKCϵ), but not PKCα or PKCζ. Thus, it appears that the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids may be due in part to their effects on membrane lipid composition, which reduces signaling in response to inflammatory stimuli. — NRG

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 103 , 15184 (2006).


As a major component of Internet routing infrastructure, the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is vulnerable to malicious attacks. While Secure BGP (S-BGP) provides a comprehensive framework to secure BGP, its high computational cost and low incremental deployment benefits seriously impede its wide usage in practice. Using a lightweight symmetric signature scheme, SPV is much faster than S-BGP. However, the speed boost comes at the price of prohibitively large signatures. Aggregated path authentication reduces the overhead of securing BGP in terms of both time and space, but the speed improvement is still limited by public key computation. In this paper, we propose a keychain-based signature scheme called KC-x. It has low CPU and memory overheads and provides strong incentive for incremental deployment on the Internet. As a generic framework, KC-x has the flexibility of using different signature algorithms, which can even co-exist in a hybrid deployment. We investigate two implementations of KC-x: KC-RSA based on RSA and KC-MT based on Merkle hash tree. Using real BGP workloads, our experimental results show that KC-RSA is as efficient as SAS-V (the most efficient software approach for aggregated path authentication), and KC-MT is even three times faster than SPV with 40% smaller signatures. Through the hybrid deployment of KC-MT and KC-RSA, KC-x can achieve both small signature and high processing rate for BGP speakers.


Actor-critic (AC) algorithms, empowered by neural networks, have had significant empirical success in recent years. However, most of the existing theoretical support for AC algorithms focuses on the case of linear function approximations, or linearized neural networks, where the feature representation is fixed throughout training. Such a limitation fails to capture the key aspect of representation learning in neural AC, which is pivotal in practical problems. In this work, we take a mean-field perspective on the evolution and convergence of feature-based neural AC. Specifically, we consider a version of AC where the actor and critic are represented by overparameterized two-layer neural networks and are updated with two-timescale learning rates. The critic is updated by temporal-difference (TD) learning with a larger stepsize while the actor is updated via proximal policy optimization (PPO) with a smaller stepsize. In the continuous-time and infinite-width limiting regime, when the timescales are properly separated, we prove that neural AC finds the globally optimal policy at a sublinear rate. Additionally, we prove that the feature representation induced by the critic network is allowed to evolve within a neighborhood of the initial one.


A creditor holding a claim against a debtor typically holds the right, subject to the debtor's default, to obtain a judgment against the debtor, liquidate the debtor's assets, and apply the proceeds against his claim. If the debtor's assets are insufficient to satisfy the creditor's claim, the creditor is usually, but not always, out of luck. Under limited circumstances, a creditor can reach property the debtor transferred to a third party and apply the value of such property to satisfy his claim. The creditor can undo the transfer and obtain the property or its value from the transferee as though the debtor had never transferred it. The circumstances under which the creditors can undo or "avoid" a transfer of the debtor's property, deprive the transferee of the value of the property, and apply such value to satisfy their claims are the subject of fraudulent transfer law.Part II of this article sets out the fraudulent transfer rules and explains in basic terms how they work. It then examines and criticizes the prevailing normative explanations for fraudulent transfer law. Part III explains the respective abilities of creditors and transferees to avoid loss and the economic purpose of the rule that permits to creditors to undo some transfers of the debtor's property at the expense of transferees. Part IV of this article reveals how the definitions of actually and constructively fraudulent transfers can be understood as identifying those transfers in which the transferee is likely to be able to avoid the loss more cheaply. Part V considers some implications of this economic perspective on fraudulent transfer law.


ABSTRACT The caenogastropod family Ampullariidae Gray, 1824 is a family of freshwater snails predominantly distributed in humid tropical and sub-tropical habitats in Africa, South and Central America and Asia. They include the largest of all freshwater snails and frequently constitute a major portion of the native freshwater mollusc faunas of these regions. Ampullariid taxonomy is confused, primarily because most species were described on the basis only of shell morphology, which is highly variable within species yet relatively conservative among species within the family. The need for rigorous taxonomic treatment of the group is acute and the basis for such research is comprehensive study of type material. With type material of 56 nominal species-group taxa belonging to the genera Afropomus Pilsbry & Bequaert, 1927, Asolene d'Orbigny, 1838, Lanistes Montfort, 1810, Marisa Gray, 1824, Pomacea Perry, 1810, Pomella Gray, 1847 and Pila Röding, 1798 (31 from the New World, 14 from Africa, 11 from Asia) the Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, Paris (MNHN), holds one of the largest collections of ampullariid type material, for which we provide this annotated catalogue. To stabilise the nomenclature, we designate lectotypes for 24 species-group taxa. Two new synonymies are established: Ampullaria castelnaudii Hupé, 1857 with Ampullaria insularum d'Orbigny, 1835, and Ampullaria elegans d'Orbigny, 1835 with Helixphtae Maton, 1811.


Luminescent lanthanide complexes have proven to be a productive area of research due in essence to their unique emission properties enabling their use in a variety of applications. A major drawback to using lanthanides is their low extinction coefficients, so that the antenna effect is often used to overcome this problem. In this way, the antenna chromophore absorbs incoming radiation and transfers the energy to the ion, leading to indirect excitation of the lanthanide. Understanding this mechanism of energy transfer is of fundamental importance both for the theory of the photophysical processes, and for the development of more efficient materials. In this thesis, many of the areas of both the population and the deactivation of the lanthanide excited states are discussed. The time resolved data of the Tm(^3+) ion in a variety of solvents and chelate systems have been measured, and the effects of deuteration on the decay kinetics investigated. The mechanism of energy transfer is followed by detailed kinetic measurements of a complex with a benzophenone containing chromophore. The calculation of the pure radiative lifetime allowed the efficiency of each of the steps involved in the sensitisation process to be determined for the first time. Changing the coordination environment around the ion, even slightly, by the addition of a single CH(_2) group into the arm of the ligand affects the oscillator strength of the hypersensitive transitions in both the Eu(^3+) and Tb(^3+) complexes, and influences the efficiency of energy transfer. Intramolecular sensitisation of Eu(^3+) ions by acetophenone containing ligands was investigated in a series with increasing electron donating ability of the chromophore. It was found that the efficiency of energy transfer increases with the polarity of the antenna, but that in the case of a dimethylamino substituted ligand, the solvent also has a profound effect on the intensity of Eu(^3+) emission. Energy transfer to bound Eu(^3+) and Tb(^3+) ions in aqueous micellar systems is demonstrated, with the process dependent on the hydrophobic properties of the chromophore and the properties of the surfactant. Photoinduced electron transfer reactions are found to occur in ethoxybenzyl substituted complexes with the emission from the chromophore and from the lanthanide ion dependent upon the lanthanide reduction potential and the AG value of both the forward and backward electron transfer reactions.


Product quantization (PQ) coupled with a space rotation, is widely used in modern approximate nearest neighbor (ANN) search systems to significantly compress the disk storage for embeddings and speed up the inner product computation. Existing rotation learning methods, however, minimize quantization distortion for fixed embeddings, which are not applicable to an end-to-end training scenario where embeddings are updated constantly. In this paper, based on geometric intuitions from Lie group theory, in particular the special orthogonal group $SO(n)$, we propose a family of block Givens coordinate descent algorithms to learn rotation matrix that are provably convergent on any convex objectives. Compared to the state-of-the-art SVD method, the Givens algorithms are much more parallelizable, reducing runtime by orders of magnitude on modern GPUs, and converge more stably according to experimental studies. They further improve upon vanilla product quantization significantly in an end-to-end training scenario.


This Special Issue is devoted to Russia's welfare state during the years of economic stagnation that began in 2013. Twelve experts assess social conditions and reforms in poverty, labor market, pension, housing and education policies. They show that social mobility has stagnated in conditions of deep inequality and just-above-poverty incomes for many. Innovative labor market and anti-poverty policies are hampered by low productivity and wages, both features of an oligarchic economic model that blocks competition and development. Welfare commitments heavily burden the state budget, producing reforms that transfer costs to users. The authors find that popular protests have forced government to partially mitigate these reforms. Putin's government appears trapped between oligarchic economic interests and popular expectations for welfare. The final article compares China's comparatively successful welfare trajectories with those of Russia, and proposes an agenda for further research.


Background The FIFA 11+ was developed as a complete warm-up programme to prevent injuries in football players. Although reduced hip adduction strength is associated with groin injuries, none of the exercises included in the FIFA 11+ specifically target hip adduction strength. Objective To investigate the effect on eccentric hip adduction strength of the FIFA 11+ warm-up programme with or without the Copenhagen Adduction exercise. Design Randomised controlled trial. Setting U19 elite male football teams. Participants We recruited 45 eligible players from two teams. Per-protocol analyses were performed, with 12 players excluded due to low compliance (<67% of sessions completed). Interventions Players were randomized into two groups; one group was asked to carry out the standard FIFA 11+ program, while another group was asked to carry out the FIFA 11+, but to replace the Nordic Hamstring exercise with the Copenhagen Adduction exercise. Both groups performed the intervention three times weekly for 8 weeks. Players completed eccentric strength and sprint testing before and after the intervention. Main Outcome Measurements Eccentric hip adduction strength (Nm/kg). Results Between-group analyses showed that there was a significant difference in the change in eccentric hip adduction strength of 0.32 Nm/kg (10.1%) (p=0.006) on the left side and 0.24 Nm/kg (7.2%) (p=0.046) on the right side in favour of the group performing the Copenhagen Adduction exercise. There was no within-group change in eccentric hip adduction strength in the group that did not perform the Copenhagen adduction exercise (left side: −0.03 Nm/kg (−0.8%) p=0.79, right side: −0.02 Nm/kg (−0.7%) p=0.78). Conclusions Including the Copenhagen Adduction exercise to the FIFA 11+ programme increases eccentric hip adduction strength, while the standard FIFA 11+ programme does not. We therefore suggest adding the Copenhagen Adduction exercise to the FIFA 11+ to potentially prevent groin problems.


Counterparty credit risk (CCR), a key driver of the 2007-08 credit crisis, has become one of the main focuses of the major global and U.S. regulatory standards. Financial institutions invest large amounts of resources employing Monte Carlo simulation to measure and price their counterparty credit risk. We develop efficient Monte Carlo CCR estimation frameworks by focusing on the most widely used and regulatory-driven CCR measures: expected positive exposure (EPE), credit value adjustment (CVA), and effective expected positive exposure (EEPE). Our numerical examples illustrate that our proposed efficient Monte Carlo estimators outperform the existing crude estimators of these CCR measures substantially in terms of mean square error (MSE). We also demonstrate that the two widely used sampling methods, the so-called Path Dependent Simulation (PDS) and Direct Jump to Simulation date (DJS), are not equivalent in that they lead to Monte Carlo CCR estimators which are drastically different in terms of their MSE.


The article examines the present status of private military personnel under international criminal law. Perpetrators of international crimes are frequently integrated into a hierarchically structured collective, such as an army or police force. The system of order and obedience essential to the functioning of these entities, the existence of which underlies a number of principles of international criminal law, cannot be simply presumed to exist within a private military company (PMC) or between a PMC and the hiring state. As a consequence, the private nature of the company may become an issue, particularly when one considers the capacity of their personnel to commit war crimes or to incur superior or command responsibility. The article also considers problems of implementation and jurisdiction and touches briefly on the question of corporate criminal responsibility of the PMC itself. It will be argued that, in theory, international criminal law can be an efficient part of the legal regime governing the use and conduct of private military companies, although many of the legal issues discussed remain to be tested.


To analyze the consequences of new technologies, which make it possible to employ distant labour, we model a developed country with high and medium-skilled labour interacting with an emerging market economy (EME) with medium and low-skilled labour. Expansion in labour supply induces medium-skill biased technical change, which raises the demand for such labour. As a result, inequalities tend to fall in the developed country, skill premiums rise marginally in the EME, but equality rises because labour employed in the low-skilled sector shrinks. Inequality falls across the countries since average wages, information and access rise in the EME.


Internet shutdowns are on the rise. In the past few years, an escalation of this blunt censoring practice has affected different regions of the world, particularly Africa and Asia. Scholars and advocates have proposed no substantive solutions to effectively address Internet shutdowns, and analysis has largely been limited to examining the negative effects through data about their frequency, duration, and economic costs. This article attempts to move beyond the polarized debate between "keep it on" and "shut it off" to explore how there can be more transparency around decision-making processes behind Internet shutdowns. We also discuss the limits of law when it comes to the imposition and implementation of shutdowns. Shutdowns tend to be imposed somewhat arbitrarily with little process. Bringing back legal arguments into the exploration of the justifications around shutdowns may make the use of shutdowns less frequent and more limited, when they do occur.


This study submits to empirical investigation an old idea of Tsur's regarding the effect of enjambment on the perceived subtleness of irony in a poetic passage. We submitted two versions of a Milton passage to over 50 participants with "background in literary studies", ranging from undergraduates to tenured professors, asking them to rate the perceived subtleness of irony and forthrightness of expression. We received four incompatible combinations of relative subtleness and forthrightness in the two passages. Two of the combinations were logically reasonable (though resulting from opposite performances), and two were internally inconsistent. An analysis of these results revealed two sources of this discrepancy: enjambments can be performed in three different ways, and participants respond not to abstract enjambments, but to performed enjambments; and they act upon partly overlapping definitions of irony. Assuming different performances of the enjambment, both logically acceptable response patterns support our hypothesis. Yet, a large part of the responses in this study were incoherent to some extent. This highlights the difficulty in collecting subjective interpretations of complex aesthetic events. We discuss this methodological issue at length.


Cardiac control is mediated via a series of reflex control networks involving somata in the (i) intrinsic cardiac ganglia (heart), (ii) intrathoracic extracardiac ganglia (stellate, middle cervical), (iii) superior cervical ganglia, (iv) spinal cord, (v) brainstem, and (vi) higher centers. Each of these processing centers contains afferent, efferent, and local circuit neurons, which interact locally and in an interdependent fashion with the other levels to coordinate regional cardiac electrical and mechanical indices on a beat-to-beat basis. This control system is optimized to respond to normal physiological stressors (standing, exercise, and temperature); however, it can be catastrophically disrupted by pathological events such as myocardial ischemia. In fact, it is now recognized that autonomic dysregulation is central to the evolution of heart failure and arrhythmias. Autonomic regulation therapy is an emerging modality in the management of acute and chronic cardiac pathologies. Neuromodulation-based approaches that target select nexus points of this hierarchy for cardiac control offer unique opportunities to positively affect therapeutic outcomes via improved efficacy of cardiovascular reflex control. As such, understanding the anatomical and physiological basis for such control is necessary to implement effectively novel neuromodulation therapies. © 2016 American Physiological Society. Compr Physiol 6:1635-1653, 2016.


Using a dynamic-thermodynamic numerical sea-ice model, external oceanic and atmospheric forcings on sea ice in the Weddell Sea are examined to identify physical processes associated with the seasonal cycle of pack ice, and to identify further the parameters that coupled models need to consider in predicting the response of the pack ice to climate and ocean-circulation changes. In agreement with earlier studies, the primary influence on the winter ice-edge maximum extent is air temperature. Ocean heat flux has more impact on the minimum ice-edge extent and in reducing pack-ice thickness, especially in the eastern Weddell Sea. Low relative humidity enhances ice growth in thin ice and open-water regions, producing a more realistic ice edge along the coastal areas of the western Weddell Sea where dry continental air has an impact. The modeled extent of the Weddell summer pack is equally sensitive to ocean heat flux and atmospheric relative humidity variations with the more dynamic responses being from the atmosphere. Since the atmospheric regime in the eastern Weddell is dominated by marine intrusions from lower latitudes, with high humidity already, it is unlikely that either the moisture transport could be further raised or that it could be significantly lowered because of its distance from the continent (the lower humidity source). Ocean heat-transport variability is shown to lead to overall ice thinning in the model response and is a known feature of the actual system, as evidenced by the occurrence of the Weddell Polynya in the mid 1970s.


Purpose:The EQ-5D is a brief, multiattribute, preference-based health status measure. This article describes the development of a statistical model for generating US population-based EQ-5D preference weights. Methods:A multistage probability sample was selected from the US adult civilian noninstitutional population. Respondents valued 13 of 243 EQ-5D health states using the time trade-off (TTO) method. Data for 12 states were used in econometric modeling. The TTO valuations were linearly transformed to lie on the interval [−1, 1]. Methods were investigated to account for interaction effects caused by having problems in multiple EQ-5D dimensions. Several alternative model specifications (eg, pooled least squares, random effects) also were considered. A modified split-sample approach was used to evaluate the predictive accuracy of the models. All statistical analyses took into account the clustering and disproportionate selection probabilities inherent in our sampling design. Results:Our D1 model for the EQ-5D included ordinal terms to capture the effect of departures from perfect health as well as interaction effects. A random effects specification of the D1 model yielded a good fit for the observed TTO data, with an overall R2 of 0.38, a mean absolute error of 0.025, and 7 prediction errors exceeding 0.05 in absolute magnitude. Conclusions:The D1 model best predicts the values for observed health states. The resulting preference weight estimates represent a significant enhancement of the EQ-5D's utility for health status assessment and economic analysis in the US.


During the late nineteenth century, a high percentage of male deaths in asylums was attributed to various forms of tertiary syphilis, most notably General Paralysis of the Insane (GPI) and tabes dorsalis. It was not unusual for patients to present symptoms of both conditions, the latter of which could be agonizingly painful. Some patients also suffered from persecutory delusions, believing that electricity was running through them or that their limbs were gnawed by lions and wolves at night. Drawing on a theory advanced by a number of key alienists and pathologists of the period, I suggest that these delusions were misinterpretations of felt sensations and, as such, illusions rather than delusions. Despite the well-known problems around using these historical sources, I contend that recorded delusions in asylum case notes can be treated as narratives of pain that provide invaluable insights into patients' subjective experiences.


This paper attempts at showing the basic principles according to which the Neoplatonist philosopher Proclus (412–485) formulated his theory on time. The argumentation basically focuses on his methodology, since whatever is included in this analysis is used by the Neoplatonist philosopher in almost all his references to the notion of time. His basic position is that time is not simply a cosmological factor, but possesses properties which connect it closely with the metaphysical world. Also, that it is essential to examine its relation with the Soul, as an ontological factor which connects the metaphysical with the natural world, and that this examination is necessary, so that the production of the natural world can be clarified with due exactness. The topics dealt with are included in Proclus' treatise In Platonis Timaeum, i.e. his extensive commentary on the Platonic dialogue Timaeus, on the basis of the new scientific and philosophical finds, which had became available since the time of Plato.


A series of 261 patients was followed up six months to six years after a subarachnoid haemorrhage. Personality change, assessed largely from the statements of other informants showed overall impairment in 41 per cent (mild in 22 per cent, moderate in 15 per cent and severe in 4 per cent). Personality improvement, apparently due to a leucotomy effect, was found in 5 per cent.

Personality impairment was largely proportional to the amount of brain damage, as indicated by CNS signs, and was most common in patients with middle cerebral artery aneurysms.

The commonest change was an increase in anxiety and irritability with loss of vitality and was correlated with brain damage at any site. The existence of the classical frontal lobe syndrome was confirmed. Patients with anterior communicating artery aneurysms (and probably frontal lobe damage) more often had personality change without intellectual impairment. Scores on the Benton Visual Retention Test and a modified Inglis Paired Associate Test were highly correlated with the presence of personality impairment but did not distinguish the mildly from the moderately impaired.

The method of study, relying largely on the statements of other informants and largely excluding affective symptoms from consideration, minimized the importance of previous personality.


Like many other states, Massachusetts has recently known a number of acknowledged miscarriages of justice. This article examines one of them, the Marvin Mitchell case, in order to ask two questions: "What went wrong?" and "What systemic reforms might have prevented this injustice?" In seeking ideas for reform, we look to English law. In 1990 Marvin Mitchell was convicted of rape in Massachusetts. Seven years later he became the first Massachusetts prisoner to be exonerated by DNA testing. In this article we describe the two key factors leading to Mitchell's wrongful conviction: faulty eyewitness identification procedures, and inadequate safeguards surrounding the recording and disclosure of Mitchell's allegedly incriminating statements to the police. We then ask how English prosecutors and courts would have responded to a police investigation conducted in the same way as Massachusetts police handled Mitchell's case. After describing the English safeguards applicable to eyewitness identification procedures and to the taking of suspects' statements to the police, we conclude that the investigatory flaws in Mitchell's case would have led to a radically different result in England: it is unlikely that Mitchell would even have been prosecuted, let alone convicted, for the crime with which he was charged. In view of the fact that a number of Massachusetts miscarriages of justice have resulted from unreliable eyewitness identification procedures, and from eleventh-hour revelations of previously undisclosed incriminating statements by defendants, we argue that Massachusetts should consider adopting stronger safeguards to protect the innocent from police error or abuse. In doing so, the state should look to English experience for plausible models.


Noise Suppression and Motion Estimation in Medical Ultrasound Imaging by Yong Yue Echocardiographic imaging is a primary modality in the diagnosis of heart disease. Compared to other imaging techniques, such as X-Ray, MRI, and PET, ultrasound imaging owes its great popularity to the fact that it is a safe and non-invasive procedure for visualizing the heart and vasculature. The ultrasound image however is corrupted by speckle noise, which is distinguished from Gaussian noise by its signaldependent nature. This dissertation focuses on two important issues for the clinical applications of medical ultrasound images: speckle suppression and motion estimation. The dissertation first describes the statistics of speckle and ultrasound image models, which are important for performance evaluation and further algorithm development. Secondly, a novel speckle suppression approach is developed for the purpose of visualization enhancement and auto-segmentation improvement. This method is designed to utilize the favorable denoising properties of two frequently used techniques: wavelet and nonlinear diffusion. Speckle is iteratively reduced by the multiscale nonlinear diffusion via the framework of dyadic wavelet transform. With a noise adaptive feature, our algorithm is versatile for both envelop-detected and log-compressed ultrasound image. We validate our method using synthetic speckle images and real ultrasonic images. Performance improvement over other despeckling filters is quantified in terms of noise suppression and edge preservation indices. We further extend the ultrasound statistical knowledge into the motion estimation, and develop a speckle tracking algorithm for myocardial wall motion estimation in intracardiac echocardiographic images. To achieve robust noise resistance, we employ maximum likelihood estimation while fully exploiting ultrasound speckle statistics, and treat the maximization of motion probability as the minimization of an energy function. Non-rigid myocardial deformation is estimated by optimizing this energy function within a framework of elastic registration. Accuracy of the method is evaluated by using a computer model and an animal model, which provides continuous intracardiac echocardiographic images as well as reference measurements for myocardial deformation. As a result, our approach achieves an accurate estimation of regional myocardial deformation from intracardiac echocardiography. This approach has important clinical implications for multimodal imaging during catheterization.


It is shown that any three-dimensional periodic configuration that is strictly stable for the area functional is exponentially stable for the surface diffusion flow and for the Mullins-Sekerka or Hele-Shaw flow. The same result holds for three-dimensional periodic configurations that are strictly stable with respect to the sharp-interface Ohta-Kawaski energy. In this case, they are exponentially stable for the so-called modified Mullins-Sekerka flow.


Forgiveness in the prayer of Daniel (Dan 9 : 4-19)
Daniel 9 : 4-19 is one of the important penitential prayers in the Old Testament. This prayer has been investigated from different perspectives, but the theological dimension of forgiveness is often neglected. In this article the understanding of divine forgiveness is studied and the following important elements are emphasised : (1) Forgiveness cannot be limited to one specific historical context; (2) The motivation for forgiveness does not lie in the people's obedience, but in God's grace and mercy; (3) The structure and content of the prayer implies that confession of guilt is an important element in the process of forgiveness. Everyone is guilty - the guilt is not placed on a certain person or king (cf. v. 7); (4) Forgiveness is meant for the "international" Israel and not limited to a specific geographical area.


Vocational education is formal education about work, and vocational programs of study typically target a narrow subset of middle-income occupations. In this chapter, we trace vocational education from competing 20th century education philosophies to its varied structures throughout the 21st century world. We then review the body of economic research on labor market returns to vocational education. Three themes from this rapidly expanding literature are that (1) workers with a vocational education tend to have a flatter age-employment profile than workers with an academic education, (2) individuals who seek and gain access to more secondary vocational education tend to have better attainment and early-career outcomes, whereas the effects of large-scale changes to tracking in secondary grades are more ambiguous; and (3) vocational postsecondary education is associated with improved labor market outcomes relative to no or incomplete postsecondary education, particularly for multi-year programs. We close by highlighting areas where more empirical research is needed, which include a deeper understanding of the long-term and inter-generational effects of vocational education on stability and growth in earnings, and the effects of vocational education in the developing world.


Why do some government formation periods end after a few days, while others last for several weeks or even months? Despite the rich literature on government formation, surprisingly little is known about the underlying bargaining processes. This article introduces a new dataset on 303 bargaining attempts in nineteen European democracies to analyse the duration of individual bargaining rounds. The study hypothesizes that (1) preference tangentiality, (2) ideological proximity, (3) incumbency and (4) party leadership tenure decrease the duration of coalition bargaining. Employing a copula approach to account for the non-random selection process of the observations, it shows that these actor-specific factors matter in addition to systemic context factors such as post-election bargaining and party system complexity. These findings highlight the need to consider both actor-specific and systemic factors of the bargaining context to explain government formation.


Many of our favourite brands now openly espouse 'ethical' credentials, so how is it that they can import billions of pounds' worth of goods from the developing world every year while leaving the people who produce them barely scraping a living? Are they being cynically opportunistic? Or is it that global commerce will always be incompatible with the eradication of poverty? And, if so, are charity and fair trade initiatives the only way forward? In Unfair Trade Conor Woodman travels the world - from Nicaragua to the Congo and from Laos to Afghanistan - to establish the truth. In the course of his journeys he uncovers some truly shocking stories about the way big business operates, but he also sees a way forward that could reconcile the apparently irreconcilable.


In this paper Voltage Source Inverter (VSI) is used to supply a variable frequency variable voltage to a three phase induction motor drive in a variable speed application. One important complication is that, Voltage Source Inverter (VSI) used in VFD causes non-sinusoidal output voltage and current due to presence of harmonics. Shunt active filter with VSI topology is proposed for current harmonic elimination. The current control scheme proposed for SAPF is Synchronous Reference Frame theory applied to SVPWM. The reference current can be calculated by using Reference Frame Transformation, reference current are transformed from a−b−c stationary frame to d−q rotating frame. In SVPWM technique, the Active Power Filter reference voltage is generated and desired Active Power Filter output voltage is generated by SVPWM. The analysis of simulation results are carried out in MATLAB/SIMULINK model.


In the last few decades, hook‐like structures have been reported in the Mesozoic ammonite family Scaphitidae. Despite their exceptional preservation and debates about their function, no detailed reconstruction has been available until now. For the first time, we describe the composition and details of the morphology of these structures found in the body chambers of six specimens of the Campanian ammonite Rhaeboceras halli (Meek & Hayden) using high resolution x‐ray imaging. The hook‐like structures are composed of a thin layer of brushite. The base of each hook is open on one side forming an internal cavity, now filled with sediment. The tips of the hooks end in one or two cusps or, rarely, exhibit a blunt end. We used geometric morphometrics to capture the morphological disparity of the bicuspidate morphotypes comprising 98% of the hooks. Principal component analysis revealed chirality among the hooks and a cluster analysis recognized five morphologies. Contrary to the previous interpretation of these structures, we conclude that they are not radular teeth. They are much larger and more variable in size and shape than any known ammonite radulae and completely out of proportion with respect to the size of the jaw. The chirality, the hook‐like shape, and the absence of a size relationship between the hooks and the body chambers in which they occur, lead us to propose that these hooks could represent elements of the brachial crown related to copulatory behaviour. If so, these would be the first reported remnants of brachial crowns in ammonites.


Introduction HIV-infected patients require antiretroviral treatment for life. To improve access to care, CD4 enumeration and viral load tests have been redesigned to be used as point-of-care techniques using finger-stick blood. Accurate CD4 counting in capillary blood requires a free flowing blood drop that is achieved by blade incision. The aim of this study was to assess the attitude of the patients toward blade-based finger-stick blood donation. Methods Four hundred and ninety-nine patients were included (299 patients from South Africa and 200 from Belgium). They completed a questionnaire to express their preference for finger stick or venipuncture, after undergoing both. The South African patient cohort was divided in two groups, receiving either single or multiple finger stick for CD4 and other HIV-related tests. The Belgian patients received a single finger stick for CD4 testing, and were asked to respond directly and again after two days. Results The majority of the patients preferred the finger stick to the venipuncture. The perceived pain using the blade was superior to a small needle, but similar to a large needle. They preferred up to three finger sticks over one venipuncture. Up to 30% of the patients changed their mind over two days. The main reason for choosing a finger stick was continued bleeding after venipuncture. The most cited objection to finger stick was pain/soreness. Conclusion Patient perceptions support the implementation of donating capillary blood with blade-based finger stick during CD4 point-of-care testing.


Born Southern: Childbirth, Motherhood, and Social Networks in the Old South. By V. Lynn Kennedy. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010. Pp. 277. Cloth, $65.00.)Reviewed by Rebecca SharplessFor many women across time and space, childbirth and child-rearing have been the centerpieces of their adult lives, and this was the case in the antebellum South. Lacking effective contraception, both African American and white women could expect to be pregnant or nursing much of the time, often bearing ten or more children. Lynn Kennedy successfully uses birth and motherhood as a lens to investigate the complexities, difficulties, and social meanings of race and gender in the midnineteenth-century South. She looks not only at the actual experiences of women but also how southern society used those experiences to shape the region's identity.Kennedy argues that motherhood had great meaning not only for individual women but for southern society as a whole: "Birth and motherhood shaped the identities of all individuals within the antebellum South and . . . these experiences created family and community bonds that developed into the foundations of a broader southern identity" (7). Slavery, of course, put a different spin on the institution of motherhood in the South, and Kennedy carefully outlines the contrasts that slavery created between women. She also investigates the ways in which gender bound women into common experiences.Kennedy begins her discussion with the idealization of birth and motherhood common in the early nineteenth century. While southern white women shared the ideals of womanhood with other European and American cultures, southerners tied a woman's fulfillment of these standards to her status and identity within the southern community, giving a regional cast to the expectations. Southern society wanted mothers to be virtuous, monogamous, and pious, even expecting slave women to adhere to the "principles of virtuous motherhood" (13). Southerners boasted about the fecundity of the region's women, although the birthrate actually declined.The reality of childbirth and parenting was something altogether different from the ideal, Kennedy reveals, and it gave women an occasion for cross-racial sympathy. Some southern women feared and dreaded motherhood, and both African American and white women tried actively to limit their fertility. Their efforts largely failed, of course, and many women bore more than five children. Privileged white women often received careful attention during pregnancy. Conditions for slaves varied with the owners, as some took extra care of pregnant slaves while others refused to lessen the workload and even devised special methods of corporal punishment. The actual occasion of childbirth provided respite from patriarchy, as women alone controlled the birthing room for both slaves and their owners. African American midwives provided a crossracial experience for both races and often held esteemed positions within their communities. After the births, however, white women received care that the African Americans could only dream of, as they returned to their work routines in short order.Once children were born, most white women nursed and cared for their children themselves, although wet nurses and mammies did exist. The nurture of white children by African American women was somewhat controversial, as it implied that black women might be better than white women in caring for babies. On large plantations, slave children often had communal care; in smaller settings, their mothers had to figure out how to juggle childcare with their workload. …


Student learning gaps result in today's most serious education challenges retention and dropouts. This learning gap passed to the next grade become significant, often unsolvable problems that cause teachers to intervene more. This action research was designed to determine the effectivity of instructional scaffolding through Zap the Gap materials in the improvement of academic achievement in Science for students-atrisk. Fifty-five (55) selected grade 6 students were selected and were divided into two groups, the experimental group which used the zap the gap approach in retaining Science concepts in preparation for the National Achievement Test and control group used the reviewer in NAT Science 6. Based on the results, there was no significant difference in the experimental and control group of the selected grade 6 students of Tunasan Elementary school. This means that pupils from both groups had the same understanding of the lesson before the lesson was taught. But after the zap the gap approach was taught, it showed significant difference. This means that the experimental group which used the Zap the Gap Intervention was effective in creating instructional scaffolding and mastery learning which successfully addressed the learning gaps in science concepts.


Men and women on average report growing power and freedom to shape their lives as well as declining poverty in their villages across the 137 GENNOVATE village-level case studies. Wider forces in the macro environments as well as improvements in rural livelihoods due to agricultural innovation contribute importantly to these promising trends. Yet, beneath these broad patterns, the GENNOVATE data show strong differences in how men and women – and their communities – experience and benefit from innovation processes. The research communities experiencing more inclusive innovation processes and rapid poverty reduction offer valuable lessons on which agricultural research and development (R&D) can build.


Abstract Edscottite (IMA 2018-086a), Fe5C2, is a new iron carbide mineral that occurs with low-Ni iron (kamacite), taenite, nickelphosphide (Ni-dominant schreibersite), and minor cohenite in the Wedderburn iron meteorite, a Ni-rich member of the group IAB complex. The mean chemical composition of edscottite determined by electron probe microanalysis, is (wt%) Fe 87.01, Ni 4.37, Co 0.82, C 7.90, total 100.10, yielding an empirical formula of (Fe4.73Ni0.23Co0.04)C2.00. The end-member formula is Fe5C2. Electron backscatter diffraction shows that edscottite has the C2/c Pd5B2-type structure of the synthetic phase called Hägg-carbide, c-Fe5C2, which has a = 11.57 Å, b = 4.57 Å, c = 5.06 Å, b = 97.7 °, V = 265.1 Å3, and Z = 4. The calculated density using the measured composition is 7.62 g/cm3. Like the other two carbides found in iron meteorites, cohenite (Fe3C) and haxonite (Fe23C6), edscottite forms in kamacite, but unlike these two carbides, it forms laths, possibly due to very rapid growth after supersaturation of carbon. Haxonite (which typically forms in carbide-bearing, Ni-rich members of the IAB complex) has not been observed in Wedderburn. Formation of edscottite rather than haxonite may have resulted from a lower C concentration in Wedderburn and hence a lower growth temperature. The new mineral is named in honor of Edward (Ed) R.D. Scott, a pioneering cosmochemist at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa, for his seminal contributions to research on meteorites.


A wireless relay network allows relays to cooperate with each other, emulate a virtual array of transmit antennas, and perform distributed space-time modulation of the source signals. In this paper, two types of relay networks are considered-one with no channel state information (CSI) (i.e., the noncoherent networks) and one with only the information of the relay-to-destination channels (i.e., the partially coherent networks) at the destination. First, a new optimal power-allocation (PA) scheme is derived to maximize the average signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the destination while minimizing the amount of fading experienced over the network. Second, the Fourier-based unitary space-time modulation (USTM), which was originally proposed for multiple colocated transmit antennas, is applied to wireless relay networks. The receivers for such distributed USTM over noncoherent and partially coherent networks are developed, and their error performances are shown to be asymptotically the same. The impact of different PA schemes on the error performance of distributed USTM is thoroughly illustrated with simulation results.


Financialization and sustainable urban planning are now two major components of urban production and landscape change in Western cities. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how the intervention of financial actors influences urban sustainability in the building of megaprojects, by developing a conceptual framework for analysis and interpretation. This framework aims first to examine the way in which sustainability has been produced by the different actors involved in a real-life situation, and then to place these interactions in their institutional, spatial and temporal context. Consequently, sustainability is understood as a social construct which is the object of negotiations that have led to the making of institutional arrangements in order to allow the project to be carried through. This framework has been constructed from the financial geography and urban geography literature on 'finance, the city and sustainability' and from a case study. The latter looks at the regeneration of a brownfield site to create a shopping and leisure complex that was the biggest in Switzerland and was purchased by financial actors.