SCHULER, JAMIE LEE. Stand Dynamics and Ecological Constraints on Growth in Young, Naturally Regenerated Hardwood Stands. (Under the direction of Dr. Daniel J. Robison) In the southern U.S., forests are generally managed as even-aged entities, and commonly regenerated using a clearcut reproduction method. Alternatives to clearcutting, namely lowand medium-density shelterwood methods, were assessed in North Carolina, South Carolina and West Virginia. Results suggested that the alternative methods afforded little to no advantage over traditional clearcut methods. Weeding, fertilization and thinning treatments were employed post-harvest on rising 1-yr-old Hill Forest and rising 3-yr-old Duke Forest upland Piedmont sites. Stems at both sites responded to fertilization. Individual stem volumes increased 2 to 3-fold after three years. Weeding-alone increased growth on the Hill Forest. The response to weeding and fertilization treatments was usually additive. Thinning-alone had little effect on stem growth. However, thinning + weeding treatments simulated large increases in stem growth. For thinned stems, weeding generally had a greater affect on growth than fertilization at both sites. Stems on the rising 1-yr-old Hill Forest site were tagged (>3000 stems) and monitored over three years. Stem survival was greatly affected by the weeding and fertilization treatments. Fertilization reduced survival for most species, especially for the lower initial height and diameter size classes. Weeding, by contrast, tended to increase survival in the small initial size classes. The survival data indicated that some of the growth response associated with fertilization might be due to mortality in the smaller sized stems. Three-year growth and survival models based on initial stem size were generated for each species and treatment combination at the Hill Forest site. Comparisons were made between treatments for each species, and between Liriodendron tulipifera L. and Cornus florida L., Prunus serotina Ehrh., Pinus spp., Acer rubrum L. and Quercus alba L. for each treatment. Generally, most species responded favorably to weeding and fertilization treatments, although these responses were not always statistically significant. However, individual species differed in respect to their ability to increase growth and survival, although yellow-poplar ranked among the fastest growing species in every treatment after 3 years. These last data can be used to develop floristic models to predict species composition for other upland stands. STAND DYNAMICS AND ECOLOGICAL CONSTRAINTS ON GROWTH IN YOUNG, NATURALLY REGENERATED HARDWOOD STANDS


Child advocacy groups argue with increasing force that children's lawyers should function as traditional, client-directed attorneys and that lawyers overstep their professional role when they represent children's interests rather than children's wishes. Consistent with this trend, the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers recently revised its standards for representation of children to flatly oppose the appointment of lawyers for children who lack capacity to direct counsel. This Article questions the Academy's stance and contends that the professional role of an attorney is sufficiently flexible to encompass the representation of children who are unable or unwilling to provide coherent direction for counsel. Acting as fiduciary, counselor, and advocate, a lawyer for the non-directive child can maintain professional boundaries and still ensure that the decision-maker acts with knowledge of the child's perspective. Even for the pre-verbal child, a lawyer can take legal actions to protect the child in the litigation process and convey the child's world to the court through traditional avenues, including witness testimony and documentary evidence. Because Arizona court rules have authorized the appointment of best interests attorneys in family court since 2006, the Arizona experience is instructive. This article reports on a series of interviews in which Arizona family and juvenile court judges share their perspectives on children's representatives in general and best interests attorneys in particular.


This study has critically emphasized the prevalence and associated comorbidities of Multiple sclerosis along with brief discussion on the current treatment and developments in line with this disease state. More than 2.3 million people around the world have been witnessed affected though this chronic disease and most importantly, it significant impacted 1 in 1000 people in the western countries. The most critical prevalence of this disease state is depression which sometimes leads to increase suicidal risks. It has been found in the studies that due to the nature of overlapping symptoms with time carrying out effective treatment facilities have been a major challenge for the medical practitioners even until now. Different psychiatric comorbidities are associated with this chronic disease such as anxiety disorders, substance misuse and personality disorders along with cognitive changes includes attention, learning and language deficits are very common among the patients having Multiple sclerosis. This study has undertaken PRISMA model as a methodology to select the standardized papers followed by succinct inclusion and exclusion criteria. From the PRISMA model 10 journals publications have been selected and based on the study findings the reliable findings have been withdrawn. The findings of the study suggested that there are various psychiatric issues mainly depression, anxiety and other associated mental disorders critical impact the social, family and working environment of an individual. It has been suggested that MS patients need to visits psychiatric personal for early stage detection which would help in finding out the correct pathway for recovery or minimize the adverse impact of the disease states and further extensive studies needed to be carried out to understand the in-depth knowledge regarding this chronic diseases impacting lives of million people worldwide.


This research was conducted at the botanical garden of the Usman Danfodiyo University Sokoto Nigeria, using digested plant materials of Oryza sativa, Commelina diffusa, Sorghum vulgare, Vigna unguiculata, Pennisetum typohides and Pistia stratiotes to test the effect of biofertilizer on early growth of maize. The undigested plant materials of the same sources were used as control for comparison. 3 kg of sand was mixed with 500 g of each of the plant materials (digested and undigested) to serve as sowing medium. The same contents were put in labeled plastic containers for growing maize. The potting mixtures were watered thoroughly before sowing. Data were collected on weekly intervals for 42 days and subjected to simple descriptive statistics to compare the mean values of maize growth parameters. These include stem height, number of leaves, stem girth and root length. The results indicated highest stem height of 80.3 cm in sowing medium containing digested sorghum against 65.5 cm stem height recorded with the control at 6 WAP. The same treatment had the highest number of 7 leaves per plant at 6 WAP as against 6 leaves in the control. Stem girth ranges from 1 cm in rice treated medium at 1 WAP to 9.7 cm in sorghum treated medium at 6 WAP over and above 0.5 cm to 8.9 cm in the control treatments at 6 WAP. The highest root length of 19.8 cm was obtained in sorghum treated medium against 15.5 cm root length in the control at 6 WAP. Sorghum treated medium yielded the best results in terms of stem height, number of leaves, stem girth size and root length and is therefore recommended for use as bio-fertilizer in maize production.


We introduce a compiler that automatically inserts software countermeasures to protect cryptographic algorithms against power-based side-channel attacks. The compiler first estimates which instruction instances leak the most information through side-channels. This information is obtained either by dynamic analysis, evaluating an information theoretic metric over the power traces acquired during the execution of the input program, or by static analysis. As information leakage implies a loss of security, the compiler then identifies (groups of) instruction instances to protect with a software countermeasure such as random precharging or Boolean masking. As software protection incurs significant overhead in terms of cryptosystem runtime and memory usage, the compiler protects the minimum number of instruction instances to achieve a desired level of security. The compiler is evaluated on two block ciphers, AES and Clefia; our experiments demonstrate that the compiler can automatically identify and protect the most important instruction instances. To date, these software countermeasures have been inserted manually by security experts, who are not necessarily the main cryptosystem developers. Our compiler offers significant productivity gains for cryptosystem developers who wish to protect their implementations from side-channel attacks.


The state of the atmosphere regarding the air density profile, the vertical distribution of aerosols, and the location of clouds is closely monitored at the Pierre Auger Observatory because the troposphere serves as a giant calorimeter for the air fluorescence technique. We present an overview of the atmospheric monitoring instruments at our disposal, with a focus on their capabilities for real-time measurements and their importance to extensive air shower reconstruction. We detail the improvement of our database of aerosol attenuation measurements that has been extended by two more years to the end of 2017 and fully recalculated with new software that brings a range of enhancements. We also address the importance of using hourly measurements of aerosol distributions for analyses rather than static models of average atmospheric conditions.


This paper briefly considers the objectives of road congestion pricing and identifies prerequisites to the successful application of such a pricing scheme. The paper is divided into two sections. In the first section, a mathematical analysis of the constituents of an optimal road congestion price is offered. The eliminated inefficiency loss achieved by the introduction of a congestion levy is usually evaluated by means of an integral involving marginal trip cost, travel demand and average trip cost in two-dimensional (travel time, traffic flow)-space. In this section we show that this loss may, in fact, be evaluated more easily for a general marginal trip cost function and a linear demand function as the difference between the areas of a rectangle (representing the part of road agency revenue that lies below the original trip cost) and a triangle (representing the loss of consumer surplus of the reduced traffic) in (travel time, traffic flow)-space, eliminating the need to use integration. The next section deals with the application of the illustrated mathematical principles and proofs to a hypothetical case study relating to road congestion pricing in Cape Town.


Observations with the Kepler space telescope are revealing details of the internal structure of distant stars. The primary objective of the Kepler mission is the discovery of Earth-like planets that are transiting their central stars. Its exquisite photometric precision also makes it the ideal instrument for measuring low-amplitude brightness variations in a broad range of stars. In a great many cases, these stellar variations represent modes of oscillation of the star, and their study can yield information on its interior structure. On page 213 of this issue, Chaplin et al. (1) make use of recent Kepler observations to examine the ensemble properties of more than 500 "Sun-like" stars. On page 205, Beck et al. (2) describe results for a red giant star. Finally, on page 216, Derekas et al. (3) present data on an exotic triple-star system with multiple eclipse components. Taken in combination, these latest results illustrate the power of the Kepler space telescope to probe the internal structure of distant stars.


Why are there so few women elected to positions in both gubernatorial and senatorial contests? Since the ratification of the nineteenth amendment in 1920—through which women obtained the right to vote and the right to full political participation—few women have actually held elective office. While women have increased their political participation by means of voting and activism, they are still vastly underrepresented in terms of elected positions (Clark, 1991: 64). Women make up over 50 percent of the United States population; however, they only comprise about 10 percent of the U.S. Congress (McGlen, 1995: 77). The problems women encounter are not only found on a domestic level, but on a global level as well. A 1986 study of women legislators in Western democracies determined that only three countries, Greece, Japan, and Australia, had smaller percentages of women in their national legislatures than the United States (McGlen, 1995: 85).


This paper proposes a solution to the present bulky external capacitor low-dropout (LDO) voltage regulators with an external capacitorless LDO architecture. The large external capacitor used in typical LDOs is removed allowing for greater power system integration for system-on-chip (SoC) applications. A compensation scheme is presented that provides both a fast transient response and full range alternating current (AC) stability from 0- to 50-mA load current even if the output load is as high as 100 pF. The 2.8-V capacitorless LDO voltage regulator with a power supply of 3 V was fabricated in a commercial 0.35-mum CMOS technology, consuming only 65 muA of ground current with a dropout voltage of 200 mV. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed capacitorless LDO architecture overcomes the typical load transient and ac stability issues encountered in previous architectures.


It is well-documented experimentally that the influence of hydrogen on the mechanical properties of structural alloys like austenitic stainless steels, nickel superalloys, and carbon steels strongly depends on temperature. A typical curve plotting any hydrogen-affected mechanical property as a function of temperature gives a temperature THE,max, where the degradation of this mechanical property reaches a maximum. Above and below this temperature, the degradation is less. Unfortunately, the underlying physico-mechanical mechanisms are not currently understood to the level of detail required to explain such temperature effects. Though this temperature effect is important to understand in the context of engineering applications, studies to explain or even predict the effect of temperature upon the mechanical properties of structural alloys could not be identified. The available experimental data are scattered significantly, and clear trends as a function of chemistry or microstructure are difficult to see. Reported values for THE,max are in the range of about 200–340 K, which covers the typical temperature range for the design of structural components of about 230–310 K (from −40 to +40 °C). That is, the value of THE,max itself, as well as the slope of the gradient, might affect the materials selection for a dedicated application. Given the current lack of scientific understanding, a statistical approach appears to be a suitable way to account for the temperature effect in engineering applications. This study reviews the effect of temperature upon hydrogen effects in structural alloys and proposes recommendations for test temperatures for gaseous hydrogen applications.


Previously, we have reported the use of a recombinant adenovirus (Ad)-based host cell reactivation (HCR) assay to examine nucleotide excision repair (NER) of UVC-induced DNA lesions in several mammalian cell types. The recombinant non-replicating Ad expresses the Escherichia coli β-galactosidase (β-gal) reporter gene under control of the cytomegalovirus immediate-early enhancer region. We have also used methylene blue plus visible light (MB + VL) to induce the major oxidative lesion 7,8-dihydro-8-oxoguanine (8-oxoG) in the recombinant Ad-encoded reporter gene in order to study base excision repair (BER). The reported variability regarding 8-oxoG's potential to block transcription by RNA polymerase II and data demonstrating that a number of factors play a role in transcriptional bypass of the lesion led us to examine the repair of 8-oxoG in the Ad reporter and its relationship to HCR for expression of the reporter gene. We have used Southern blotting to examine removal of UVC- and MB + VL-induced DNA damage by loss of endonuclease-sensitive sites from the Ad-encoded β-gal reporter gene in human and rodent cells. We show that repair of MB + VL-induced 8-oxoG via BER and UVC-induced cyclobutane pyrimidine dimers (CPDs) via NER is substantially greater in human SV40-transformed GM637F skin fibroblasts compared to hamster CHO-AA8 cells. We also show that HCR for expression of the MB + VL-damaged and the UVC-damaged reporter gene is substantially greater in human SV40-transformed GM637F skin fibroblasts compared to hamster CHO-AA8 cells. The difference between the human and rodent cells in the removal of both 8-oxoG and CPDs from the damaged reporter gene was comparable to the difference in HCR for expression of the damaged reporter gene. These results suggest that the major factor for HCR of the MB + VL-treated reporter gene in mammalian cells is DNA repair in the Ad rather than lesion bypass.


An approach to the automatic generation of efficient Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) circuits for the Regular Expression-based (RegEx) Pattern Matching problems is presented. Using a novel design strategy, as proposed, circuits that are highly area-and-time-efficient can be automatically generated for arbitrary sets of regular expressions. This makes the technique suitable for applications that must handle very large sets of patterns at high speed, such as in the network security and intrusion detection application domains. We have combined several existing techniques to optimise our solution for such domains and proposed the way the whole process of dynamic generation of FPGAs for RegEX pattern matching could be automated efficiently.


Supplemental feeding for ungulates is a widespread practice in many human-dominated landscapes across Europe and North America, mainly intended to seasonally support populations. Surprisingly, little consideration was given so far to the effect of supplemental feeding on ungulate spatial ecology at a large scale, in management and conservation studies. Analyses of the main ecological drivers influencing the use of supplemental feeding sites by ungulates across a gradient of abiotic and biotic factors are currently lacking. We conducted a large-scale assessment of ecological and management drivers of use of feeding station sites in roe deer (Capreolus capreolus), a small cervid widely distributed across Europe that is particularly sensitive to winter severity. We tested four competing hypotheses by comparing the time spent at feeding station sites by 180 individual Global Positioning System-collared roe deer from nine populations spanning a wide latitudinal and altitudinal gradient. We found that roe deer used feeding station sites highly opportunistically in response to winter severity across its range. The harshest weather conditions at the northern range limit or the highest elevations provoked an intense use of feeding station sites, which typically peaked at the end of winter, in accordance with the adverse weather and nutritional condition hypotheses. Consistently, milder winters corresponded to a reduced and/or more homogeneous use of supplemental feeding. In general, intensively used feeding station sites heavily conditioned spatial behavior of roe deer. Importantly, biotic factors such as the presence of competitors decreased roe deer use of supplemental feeding station sites. Our results emphasize the importance of this human-induced alteration to resource distribution, especially in the context of the rapidly occurring climate change that is modifying resource availability for ungulate populations.


We present a novel formulation for B-spline snakes that can be used as a tool for fast and intuitive contour outlining. We start with a theoretical argument in favor of splines in the traditional formulation by showing that the optimal, curvature-constrained snake is a cubic spline, irrespective of the form of the external energy field. Unfortunately, such regularized snakes suffer from slow convergence speed because of a large number of control points, as well as from difficulties in determining the weight factors associated to the internal energies of the curve. We therefore propose an alternative formulation in which the intrinsic scale of the spline model is adjusted a priori; this leads to a reduction of the number of parameters to be optimized and eliminates the need for internal energies (i.e., the regularization term). In other words, we are now controlling the elasticity of the spline implicitly and rather intuitively by varying the spacing between the spline knots. The theory is embedded into a multiresolution formulation demonstrating improved stability in noisy image environments. Validation results are presented, comparing the traditional snake using internal energies and the proposed approach without internal energies, showing the similar performance of the latter. Several biomedical examples of applications are included to illustrate the versatility of the method.


Societal threats such as global warming and terror attacks make crisis preparedness and crisis training a major priority in governments worldwide. Unfortunately, training is limited, partly due to complex and resourcedemanding planning of traditional exercises. Several crisis training software have been developed as a complement. However, reports in research on their usage are rare, which indicates that the diffusion is limited. A potential explanation is that the systems fail to meet important needs in the organizations and/or sound information systems (IS) design principles. This paper describes the first phase of a design science research (DSR) project aiming at developing information systems for disaster management (ISDM) training, and accompanying training methods in local and regional governments. The purpose of this paper is to investigate perceived problems in current crisis training and identify opportunities for ISDM training in the application domain. Another purpose is to outline expected artifacts in the project.


This article presents the formulation of a novel method for applying the FEA code ANSYS to large-scale study of drug distribution and chemical transport in the human body. The methods described here can be used in combination with other simulation methodologies developed for studying mechanical responses of biological tissue. Various single-tissue or single-system models have been executed, as well as more traditional analytical treatments or physiologically based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) simulations, but to date, large-scale numerical models are not in use. In order to provide a complete picture of varying drug transport in different tissue on a macro scale, a more sophisticated modeling effort is necessary. This paper incorporates finite element theory and various clinical studies to propose an approach for expanding the scope and scale of delivery mechanisms, and convection-diffusion transport analyses.


This article provides a comprehensive analysis of the concept of "state immunity" as reflectedin the legislation and judicial practice of the Russian Federation. A study in decisions ofRussian courts prior to the adoption of the Federal Law on Immunities of 2016 leads to theconclusion that, even during the juridical consolidation of the theory of absolute immunity inRussia, on a number of questions Russia in fact adhered to a theory of functional immunity.The concept of absolute immunity which the USSR followed (and which Russia as itslegal successor subsequently also followed) gradually began to conflict with the RussianFederation's foreign economic activity and contract practices, and instances of Russia'srenunciation of absolute immunity increased in frequency. This tendency clearly shows that inthe 21st century the state cannot have absolute immunity because that version of sovereigntyconflicts with the global practice of state participation in private international relations. Inother words, the Russian Federation with the adoption of its Federal Law on Immunities hasmoved away from a theory of absolute immunity to acknowledge and employ a theory of thefunctional immunity of the state. At the same time, the Law on Immunities of 2016 alreadyrequires more elaboration and corrections even though it was only recently passed andimplemented. The methodology of study is based on the application of formal, logicaland comparative research methods together with general systematic methods of analysisand synthesis, deduction and induction. Questions touched upon in this article are widelydiscussed in establishing doctrines of private international law in both foreign and in Russianstudies. Issues connected with state immunity are raised by the authors and suggestions fortheir resolution are formulated based on the legal experience of contemporary Russia.


Mixed US southern hardwood chips were impregnated and cooked under various conditions in the laboratory. Kappa numbers between 15 and 55 were obtained. The reject content, kappa number, and yield were studied as a function of time, temperature, and alkali charge in the cooking. The results indicate that by using modern cooking technology, i.e. CompactCookingTM, an optimal point with respect to the studied pulp parameters can be found. Selected pulps were bleached to high brightness with several different bleaching sequences. These pulps were beaten in a PFI mill and their physical properties were compared at a constant bulk. High kappa, well impregnated fully bleached pulps exhibited improved yield with equivalent or better physical properties as compared to conventional kraft pulps. The high kappa, well impregnated pulps were also found to have improved bleachability as compared to conventionally cooked, bleachable grade kappa number pulps.


This study was concerned with preferences for inpatient models of care by the HIV/AIDS client group, in particular the difference between gay white men (European) and black heterosexuals of African/Caribbean origin. Satisfaction with the care currently provided was also an area of interest. Thirteen per cent ( n = 79) of the clients were surveyed. Seventy per cent ( n = 56) of the HIV/AIDS client group indicated a preference for a dedicated care model. Significant results were obtained demonstrating differences in the care model preferred by gay white men and black heterosexuals ( p 0.01). Gay white men were much more likely to state they would leave the trust to receive dedicated care ( p 0.01). Black heterosexuals were more likely to state that they would change treatment areas to avoid dedicated care ( p 0.01) Differences in concern about confidentiality were noted between the two groups. Confidentiality may be one of a number of factors influencing preference of care for African/Caribbeans and this needs to be studied further. The clients surveyed were not universally satisfied with the care they had been receiving. Following the results of the survey radical changes in the management of HIV inpatient care were made.


Using the predictive power of the effective field theory approach, we present a physical parametrization of the leading effects beyond the standard model (BSM), which gives us at present the best way to constrain heavy new physics at low energies. We show that other BSM effects are not independent from these ones, and we provide the explicit correlations. This information is useful to know where to primarily look for new physics in future experiments, and to know how this new physics is related to previous measurements, most importantly in electroweak symmetry breaking processes or Higgs physics.


While it is widely acknowledged that carbon pricing plays an important role in driving the transition towards a low-carbon energy system, its interaction with complementary instruments is discussed controversially. The analysis of combining carbon pricing with complementary policies has been mostly focused on the electricity sector, while the role of carbon pricing in the buildings sector has received only minor interest. In view of the newly introduced carbon pricing scheme for the buildings and transport sector in Germany, we analyze the interactions between the carbon pricing scheme with the existing policy instruments and assess the consistency of the policy mix for decarbonizing the buildings sector. Our analysis finds that the introduction of carbon pricing has a reinforcing effect on the instrument mix and adds to the consistency of the policy mix. The results highlight the importance of complementary policies in order to achieve deep decarbonization in the buildings sector. We conclude that carbon pricing, preferably implemented as a tax with a predictable and increasing price level, needs to be supplemented with a powerful mix of complementary measures.


The present study provides the first detailed phytosociological description of the plant communities of Hulunbeier grassland, the easternmost part of the Eurasian steppe. Using phytosociological methods, vegetation data were collected from 109 plots in six areas spanning 300 km and covering a large proportion of the east-west axis of Hulunbeier steppe. Five main phytosociological plant communities were identified: meadow steppe of Veronico incanae-Stipetum baicalensis, ruderal vegetation of Cannabi-Sphallerocarpetum gracilis, steppe of Poo attenuatae-Stipetum grandis, heavily grazed steppe of Allium polyrhizum community, and Glycyrrhizo uralensis-Achnatherum splendens. The Poo attenuatae-Stipetum grandis was divided into two subunits: a Potentilla acaulis subassociation and a Caragana microphylla subassociation. The ordination of the communities showed a strong gradient from the drier western steppe to the wetter eastern steppe. Compared with 20 years ago, the zonal floristic composition had drastically changed from S. krylovii being dominant to the salt-tolerant A. polyrhizum and A. splendens becoming dominant. Species richness was lower in the communities nearby water sources suggesting intensive grazing and tramping than in the typical community of the steppe zone. Species richness was lower in the abandoned fields than in adjacent uncultivated sites. These results suggest that both grazing pressure and cultivation had changed the floristic composition and decreased the species richness in the area.


We have studied integrations of micro/nano machining (MEMS/NEMS) technologies and biomaterials. One of our research directions is to utilize biomaterials in MEMS/NEMS to reveal new functions that could not be achieved by MEMS/NEMS alone. Here a motor protein system will be introduced as a nano actuator. The motility of kinesin and dynein motor proteins has been integrated with MEMS/NEMS or a microfluidic system. Since these motor proteins move on cytoskeletal filaments—microtubules (MTs)—depending on MT polarity, a key technology is to develop methods to orient MT polarities and then immobilize them. We have developed three methods to define MT polarities by (i) shared flow in a microfluidic channel, (ii) nanostructures and (iii) MEMS tweezers. Once MT polarities were oriented and fixed on a chip, they were ready to serve as rails for nano transport by kinesin and dynein motility. The motility was visualized by attaching cargos to motors, where the cargos were microbeads, silicon structures and quantum dots (Q-dots). This nano transport system can achieve a transport distance of up to ∼100 μm, which enables us to focus on the transport of molecules not on bulk molecular flow by conventional microfluidics. Such a bio-hybrid system will be a key factor in realizing nano-scale system integration at the molecular scale.


Informatics is a relatively young field within science and engineering. Its research and development methodologies build on the scientific and design methodologies in the classical areas, often with new elements to it. We take an in-depth look at one of the less well-understood methodologies in informatics, namely experimentation. What does it mean to do experiments in informatics? Does it make sense to 'import' traditional principles of experimentation from classical disciplines into the field of computing and information processing? How should experiments be documented? These are some of the questions that are treated. The report argues for the key role of empirical research and experimentation in contemporary Informatics. Many IT systems, large and small, can only be designed sensibly with the help of experiments. We recommend that professionals and students alike are well-educated in the principles of sound experimentation in Informatics. We also recommend that experimentation protocols are used and standardized as part of the experimental method in Informatics.


Objectives: The cellular immunity was compared between patients who received different types of anesthesia and analgesia after radical resection for lung cancer.
Methods: Forty patients receiving elective thoracotomy for lung cancer were randomly divided into two groups. Patients in Group I received total intravenous anesthesia combined with intravenous analgesia and those in Group II received general anesthesia combined with epidural anesthesia and post-operative epidural analgesia. The T cell subsets and NK cell functions were compared at different time points of peri-operative period.
Results: The CD8+ cells increased significantly (P<0.01), but the CD3+ cells, CD4+ cells and NK cells decreased significantly after surgery in both groups (P<0.05). The cellular immunity returned to preoperative level at T3 in Group II, but that in Group I was still significantly different from those at T0.
Conclusions: General anesthesia combined with epidural anesthesia and post-operative epidural analgesia has little influence on the cellular immune function in patients receiving radical resection for lung cancer and thus patients recover more rapidly.


Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) are increasing in prevalence worldwide, including in developing countries like South Africa. If the assumption that ASDs manifests similarly across all cultures, then the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS), the western gold standard for diagnosing ASDs, will be able to accurately discriminate those children that have ASDs from those that do not. The ADOS was designed to increase the likelihood of children displaying ASD type behaviours to facilitate a diagnosis, but this may negatively impact on scores obtained by African children which are socialised to be respectful as opposed to spontaneous. This research study formed part of the larger KwaZulu-Natal-ASD (K-ASD) study, and aimed to explore the diagnostic ability of the ADOS in special needs schools in the greater eThekwini area. The study design used a matched blinded sample comprising of an atypically developing ASD and non-ASD group from Black, White and Indian ethnicities. The sample came from special needs schools. The experimental group thus comprised people with ASD and the control group was a learning disabled group that did not have ASD. This study compared Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS) algorithm scores of a sample of 26 children (6-11 years of age) who were administered modules 1-3 of the ADOS with the clinical diagnoses for each of these children. Using McNemar's Westlake Schuirmann Test of equivalence it was found that the clinician diagnoses and the ADOS coding algorithm results were statistically equivalent. Thus, no significant difference existed between the two methods of diagnosis. The ADOS showed greater sensitivity in identifying symptoms associated with ASD than did the clinician diagnoses. An ANOVA revealed significant differences in the communication and the reciprocal social interaction algorithm's. This indicates a cultural variation in behaviours, since Black participants behaved in various gestural ways that were significantly different to the manner in which Whites behaved to the ADOS testing. 1 Principal Investigators: Dr S. Kauchali; Dr. B.J. Killian; Dr M. Chhagan.


During the last nine years, a couple of prototype ITS applications based on Floating Car Data (FCD) of taxi fleets have been developed at German Aerospace Center (DLR). A core application is a route guidance and monitoring system based on current and historical road segment travel times. Recently, it has been extended for use in the German funded project SmartTruck, run by a consortium consisting of the logistics key player DHL, DLR and the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI). An important aim of the project was the use of historical and current traffic information for energy-efficient, optimized offline planning and dynamic re-planning of the tours of DHL express trucks in Berlin, Germany. This paper discusses the architecture of the SmartTruck system and the methodology used to generate historic and current road segment travel times from positional data.


Cloud computing is a disruptive technology, one that embodies a major conceptual shift and is rapidly changing the way users, developers, and organizations work with computing infrastructure. Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar offered a one-semester undergraduate course to introduce students to cloud computing. In this paper we describe our approach and experiences in designing the course. We describe course elements (lectures, assignments, case study, and projects) in detail and recount course delivery during the 2010 spring semester. Finally, we analyze our efforts and make recommendations for others who are planning to offer similar courses in cloud computing.


A powerful exploration of the role of women in the Republican Party that enhances readers' understanding of gender representation in the GOP and suggests solutions to address the partisan gender gap.
 Why is the Republican Party dominated by men to a far greater extent than its primary rival? With literature on conservative women in the United States still in its infancy, this book fills an important gap. It does so by examining Republican women as distinct from their male Republican and Democratic female counterparts and also by exploring the shifting role of Republican women in their party and in politics overall. The book brings those subjects together in one volume that will provide fascinating reading to students, scholars, and anyone else interested in U.S. politics.
 The analysis is presented in four parts, beginning with a look at the role of women as voters and activists in the GOP. The second section explores the process of candidate emergence, tackling the question as to why so few women run as Republicans and why those who do are less successful than their Democratic female and Republican male counterparts. In the third part, the contributors shed light on Republican women in Congress and state legislatures and their behavior as lawmakers. The final section assesses the outcome of the 2016 election for Republican women in general and, specifically, for Carly Fiorina, the only female candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. Each section of the book concludes with a short "guide to action" that takes the insights set forth and applies them to suggest ways to promote a greater involvement of women in the Republican Party.
 • Analyzes the role of women in the Republican Party, something that must be understood if America is to achieve equal representation of women in the U.S. Congress and state governments
 • Fills an important gap in knowledge regarding the presence and impact of women in the Republican Party
 • Suggests ways members of the Republican Party can remedy the underrepresentation of women in their ranks
 • Brings together chapters contributed by leading experts in the field of women and politics


The present thesis investigates the relationship between foreign aid and economic growth in Vietnam from 1993 to 2012. The main objective is to contribute to a better understanding of the reality of aid-growth relationship in Vietnam, how and through which channels aid may influence outcomes, and what make aid works better or less well. In the research, growth accounting analysis is conducted to regconize contributions of foreign assistance to production factors. An empirical model is estimated using the Autoregressive Distributed Lagged (ARDL) approach to cointegration for the purpose of evaluating of the direct impact of aid on final economic outcome. Additionally, the study conducts an analysis reviewing both positive and negative effects of foreign aid across different sectors. The empirical results indicate that foreign aid has a significantly positive role in promoting economic growth in Vietnam. The results of growth accounting exercise and the analysis of fundamental channels through which aid has contributed to development outcomes also obtain more evidence supporting the beneficial impacts of aid, especially on macroeconomic management, infrastructure, and human capital accumulation. However, at the same time, such aidrelated problems as high volatility and unpredictability of the inflow, absorptive capacity constraints, and rent seeking behavior could burden the recipient's administration and in turn, undermine the aid effectiveness. Based on these findings, a set of policy implications has been suggested. Firstly, Vietnamese government and its donor community should put more effort into improving the coordination among involved parties. Secondly, the analysis implies the importance of systematic evaluations of completed aid programs and projects. Thirdly, the quality of institution and managerial capacity should be strengthened in addition to aid effort. Fourthly, Vietnam needs to be acutely conscious of the problems involving due to high volatility and unpredictability of aid and then implement necessary measures to alleviate pressure on fiscal management. Finally, there is a need to adopt a more self-sustainable approach in enhancing economic growth in the long-run.


In May 2008, the World Health Organization (WHO) adopted the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Framework for the Sharing of Influenza Viruses and Access to Vaccines and Other Benefits (PIP Framework). The PIP Framework's adoption ended years of difficult negotiations, which began after Indonesia refused to share samples of avian influenza A (H5N1) with the WHO in late 2006. Indonesia justified its actions on the need to create more equitable access for developing countries to benefits, such as vaccines and antivirals, derived from research and development on shared influenza virus samples. The global health community feared that failure to share influenza virus samples would jeopardize surveillance and response efforts against the threat of pandemic influenza. The PIP Framework seeks to improve pandemic influenza preparedness by addressing virus and benefit sharing on an equal footing and establishing mechanisms to achieve more equitable access to benefits. To facilitate virus sharing, the PIP Framework encourages WHO member states to share influenza virus specimens. It also creates a virus tracking mechanism that features two standard material transfer agreements to increase transparency concerning the use of shared viruses. This mechanism represents the Framework's most significant contribution to strengthening pandemic influenza surveillance and response. The Framework's benefit-sharing system contains many components, but its most notable accomplishment for increasing equitable access to benefits is the pharmaceutical industry's agreement to provide monetary and in-kind contributions. The PIP Framework is a landmark for global governance for health because it is the first international agreement facilitating influenza virus and benefit sharing. However, the Framework is not legally binding, avoids intellectual property issues that complicated the negotiations, does not include commitments from developed countries to donate portions of influenza vaccines they purchase, and faces implementation challenges in an increasingly difficult global health environment.


The paradox of a service that seems to do all the right things but does not always deliver the right results was never quite resolved at a conference in London on primary care on 11 March.

Ara Darzi, the former Labour health minister and now co-director of the Centre for Health Policy at Imperial College London, organised the conference with the aim of harnessing international experience to raise the quality of primary care in the NHS.

He called primary care the "rock" of the NHS. David Nicholson, chief executive of the NHS in England, added that it was its cornerstone. And the conference watched a slide presentation by Robin Osborn, vice president of the New York based Commonwealth Fund, who extolled the NHS as the exemplar of what a health service should be.

On almost every slide Osborn showed (except the one on outcomes) the NHS came out best or nearly best in an international comparison of 11 advanced countries: on access, out of hours care, patient engagement, shared care plans, electronic medical records, and patients' and doctors' opinions.

She …


This paper presents a novel analytic technique to perform shape-driven segmentation. In our approach, shapes are represented using binary maps, and linear PCA is utilized to provide shape priors for segmentation. Intensity based probability distributions are then employed to convert a given test volume into a binary map representation, and a novel energy functional is proposed whose minimum can be analytically computed to obtain the desired segmentation in the shape space. We compare the proposed method with the log-likelihood based energy to elucidate some key differences. Our algorithm is applied to the segmentation of brain caudate nucleus and hippocampus from MRI data, which is of interest in the study of schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease. Our validation (we compute the Hausdorff distance and the DICE coefficient between the automatic segmentation and ground-truth) shows that the proposed algorithm is very fast, requires no initialization and outperforms the log-likelihood based energy.


Scientists and casual users need better ways to query RDF databases or Linked Open Data. Using the SPARQL query language requires not only mastering its syntax and semantics but also understanding the RDF data model, the ontology used, and URIs for entities of interest. Natural language query systems are a powerful approach, but current techniques are brittle in addressing the ambiguity and complexity of natural language and require expensive labor to supply the extensive domain knowledge they need. We introduce a compromise in which users give a graphical "skeleton" for a query and annotates it with freely chosen words, phrases and entity names. We describe a framework for interpreting these "schema-agnostic queries" over open domain RDF data that automatically translates them to SPARQL queries. The framework uses semantic textual similarity to find mapping candidates and uses statistical approaches to learn domain knowledge for disambiguation, thus avoiding expensive human efforts required by natural language interface systems. We demonstrate the feasibility of the approach with an implementation that performs well in an evaluation on DBpedia data.


Abstract The literature on creativity has often focused on the analysis of artists and scientists. The ability to generalize these findings to respective professional sub-disciplines is examined. In particular, the present study addresses the generalizability of the personality profile of creative scientists to creative social scientists. Autonomy was found to be the most important personality feature for creativity in social sciences. These results suggest the importance of fostering an autonomous working style.


Apple designed OS X with advanced technologies that work together to constantly keep your Mac safe. Some of these features are turned on by default, whereas others are turned off or aren't dialed up to full strength. Some features are front-and-center in System Preferences or the Applications folder, whereas others are buried deep in the user interface. This book covers the whole range of OS X's security and privacy tools and explains the best practices for defending your Mac and data. Create user accounts to protect against the biggest security threat: other people in your home or office. Enable parental controls to prevent harm from young, naive, overwhelmed, or not-entirely-trustworthy users. Set up the login process to tighten security at the login window. Secure your Mac completely by turning on the firmware password. Recover forgotten passwords. Share files and folders securely across accounts and networked computers. Use fast user switching to leave your programs running and documents open securely and invisibly in the background while someone else logs in. Protect your Mac from viruses, spyware, and other malicious software. Use FileVault to encrypt your entire drive. Use Firewall to screen out hackers and malware that try to reach your computer over the internet. Use Keychain Access to manage your passwords for secure websites, FTP sites, network servers, encrypted folders and volumes, and other secure items. Prevent specific applications from learning your location or accessing your personal data and internet accounts. Covers El Capitan and earlier OS X versions. Plenty of tips, tricks, and timesavers. Fully indexed and cross-referenced. Contents 1. Getting Started 2. User Accounts 3. Creating an Account 4. Parental Controls 5. Editing Accounts 6. Setting Up the Login Process 7. Logging In and Out 8. Sharing Across Accounts 9. Fast User Switching 10. OS X and Malware 11. Gatekeeper 12. FileVault 13. Firewall 14. Password Assistant 15. Keychain Access 16. Privacy Settings 17. Other Security Measures Index About the Author Diane Yee is a technical writer in Sunnyvale, California.


Milton Friedman hung up the phone in disgruntlement. The most influential economist of the postwar era had just called three different banks, one in Chicago and then two in New York, in order to initiate a financial transaction. He wanted to sell short $300,000 in pound sterling. Short selling is a technique for speculating on falling prices. Initially, speculators can only speculate on rising prices: they buy something and hope that it gains value, so that they can sell it at a profit. If the price for this asset goes down instead, the speculator incurs a loss when he resells it. So in order to profit from falling prices, speculators need to sell first and buy later – which is indeed possible if what is sold now is in fact only to be delivered a few weeks later. If the speculator is right and prices fall in the interim, he can buy cheap just before delivery is due and thus profit from having already sold what, at the time, he had not yet owned.


This research builds upon a body of work on the development and introduction of information systems in the UK National Health Service following the implementation of the White Paper 'Working for Patients'. None of the earlier studies examined the use of the information from those systems for costing health care services, the methodologies used by hospitals for costing their products or the comparability of the output from the costing methodologies used, thereby making this study different from prior work.
Costing methodologies cited in the literature are described from the perspective of single organisations. This research analyses the development of an aggregated costing approach, focusing on the issues laced when trying to develop a costing methodology that will be applied to a group of autonomous organisations.
The research provides a comparison of health care costing methodologies in both the United Kiiigdom and Ontario, Canada. Collected through interviews and a postal survey tool, data from NHS hospital care providers are analysed to identify both the conformity of the approach and the results of the costing methodologies eniployed. Information from an extended field study is used to review the development of a micro-costing framework in Ontario for radiation therapy services. These findings are then synthesised into a generic framework applicable within other health care organisations seeking to
implement a comparative costing methodology. This lramcwork is used to identify possible causes of variance in health care costing approaches.
Elements of the framework requiring modification to account for local conditions, such as salary rates or provider availability, are identified and suggestions are made for further work resulting from this research to increase understanding about variability in health care costing methodologies and test the implementation of the generic costing methodology.


Abstract. In Anatolia, the history of geophysical sciences may go back to antiquity (600 BC), namely the period when Thales lived in Magnesia (Asia Minor). In the modern sense, geophysics started with geomagnetic works in the 1600s. The period between 1600 and 1800 includes the measurement of magnetic declination, inclination and magnetic field strength. Before these years, there is a little information, such as how to use a compass, in the Kitab-i Bahriye (the Book of Navigation) of Piri Reis, who is one of the most important mariners of the Ottoman Empire. However, this may not mean that magnetic declination was generally understood. The first scientific book relating to geophysics is the book Fuyuzat-i Miknatissiye that was translated by Ibrahim Muteferrika and printed in 1731. The subject of this book is earth's magnetism. There is also information concerning geophysics in the book Cihannuma (Universal Geography) that was written by Katip Celebi and in the book Marifetname written by Ibrahim Hakki Erzurumlu, but these books are only partly geophysical books. In Istanbul the year 1868 is one of the most important for geophysical sciences because an observatory called Rasathane-i Amire was installed in the Pera region of this city. At this observatory the first systematic geophysical observations such as meteorological, seismological and even gravimetrical were made. There have been meteorological records in Anatolia since 1839. These are records of atmospheric temperature, pressure and humidity. In the Ottoman Empire, the science of geophysics is considered as one of the natural sciences along with astronomy, mineralogy, geology, etc., and these sciences are included as a part of physics and chemistry.


The effect of the liquid fuel in the intake manifold, the ring pack crevices and the oil film on the unburned hydrocarbon (HC) emissions of a spark-ignited, carbureted, air-cooled V-twin engine was studied. Tests were performed for a range of engine load, two engine speeds, various air-fuel ratio and with a fixed ignition timing. To isolate liquid fuel effects due to the poor atomization and vaporization of the fuel when using a carburetor, a specially conditioned homogeneous, pre-vaporized mixture system (HMS) was developed. The results from carburetor and HMS are compared. To verify the existence of liquid fuel in the manifold, and to obtain an estimate of its mass, a carburetor-mounted liquid fuel injection (CMLFI) system was also implemented. Stop-injection tests performed with the CMFLI system show that 60-80 cycles worth of liquid fuel is held in the intake manifold depending on operating condition. The results of the comparison show that the liquid fuel in the intake manifold does not have a statistically significant influence on the averaged HC emissions. In addition, the cycle-resolved HC emissions for both systems follow the same trends and are comparable in magnitude. Heat release analysis showed little difference between fuel mixture delivery system. These results suggest that under steady state operation the HC emissions for this engine are not sensitive to the presence of liquid fuel in the intake manifold. The ring pack contribution to the engine-out HC emissions was estimated using a simplified ring pack gas flow model; the model was tested against the experimentally ii measured blowby. The tests were performed using the homogeneous fuel mixture system. The integrated mass of HC leaving the crevices from the end of combustion (the crank angle that the cumulative burn fraction reached 90%) to exhaust valve closing was taken to represent the potential contribution of the ring pack to the overall HC emissions; postoxidation in the cylinder will consume some of this mass. Time-resolved exhaust HC concentration measurements were also performed, and the instantaneous HC mass flow rate was determined using the measured exhaust and cylinder pressure. At high load the model predicts that the ring pack returns approximately three times as much HC mass to the cylinder as is measured in the exhaust, indicating that the HC emissions are dominated by the ring pack contribution. At the lightest load condition tested, the ring pack model predicts less mass returning to the cylinder from the ring pack than is observed in the exhaust, clearly indicating that another HC mechanism is significantly contributing to the exhaust HC emissions. The integrated exhaust HC mass from the time-resolved HC measurement was found to correlate inversely with the IMEP on a cycle-by-cycle basis, which strongly suggest that incomplete combustion is materially contributing to the exhaust HC emissions. A statistical analysis showed that the correlation was significant. The intermediate load condition represents a combination of these two extremes. The ensemble-average ring pack model results indicate that the mass returned to the cylinder from the ring pack is slightly higher than the amount measured in the exhaust. But, a conditional sampling analysis indicates that there are sub-groups, i.e. late-burning cycles, for which this is not true. There is expected to be some in-cylinder post-oxidation of the ring pack HC mass at this condition, and the late burning cycles iii were not found to excessively contribute to the HC emissions, which both strongly suggests that there are other mechanisms besides the ring pack that are significantly contributing to the HC emissions at this condition. The most likely mechanism is incomplete combustion. The contribution of fuel adsorption in engine oil and its subsequent desorption following combustion to the engine-out hydrocarbon (HC) emissions was studied by comparing steady state and cycle-resolved HC emission measurements from operation with a standard full-blend gasoline, and with propane, which has a low solubility in oil. Experiments were performed at two speeds and three loads, and for different mean crankcase pressures. The crankcase pressure was found to impact the HC emissions, presumably through the ringpack mechanism, which was largely unaltered by the different fuels. The average and cycle-resolved HC emissions were found to be in good agreement, both qualitatively and quantitatively, for the two fuels. Further, the two fuels showed the same response to changes in the crankcase pressure. The experiments were supported by a numerical analysis. The simulation of the liquid-gas phase equilibrium of the fuel-oil system showed the solubility of propane in the oil was approximately an order of magnitude lower than for gasoline. Further the numerical analysis of the adsorptiondesorption of the fuel in the oil along the cycle showed that the oil layer contribution is very small compared with the ring pack contribution. This suggests that the effect of fuel adsorption in the oil is not significant for small air-cooled utility-type engines.


PERFORMANCES BY CONCERT PIANISTS in the Western classical tradition are normally highly prepared, yet must sound fresh and spontaneous. We propose that musicians achieve the necessary spontaneity by strategic management of the variability inherent in any action. Musical gestures that make up the artist9s interpretation (e.g., crescendos, ritardandos) are attenuated or exaggerated to different degrees in each performance, while movements critical for technique are less varied.We examined 7 highly polished performances of J.S. Bach9s Italian Concerto (Presto) by a concert pianist. There were small but consistent differences between performances in 4 of 9 identified musical gestures, each of which occurred in several locations. In contrast, at points where the pianist reported attending to technique during performance, slower tempi and lower dynamic variability suggested that she controlled execution of planned movements more closely. Increased control at technical difficulties permitted more spontaneous variation in the musical gestures important to her interpretation.


These are unprecedented times for public service workers and the unions that represent their interests. The largest of these unions is the 1.4 million-member American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), AFL-CIO. In recent years, AFSCME has been thrust into the role of defending sweeping attacks on public employees and public budgets at every level of government. Throughout its 70-year history, AFSCME has waged effective battles that have enabled public employees to join the ranks of the middle class—winning collective bargaining rights, facilitating the adoption of merit-based job performance systems, growing public employee pension plans, securing wage increases, and helping create a vibrant public sector that provides effective services to citizens and helps local economies realize their potential. Today, much of the historic progress achieved by public workers is at risk. Ultimately, how successfully AFSCME and its fellow public unions meet five core challenges in the areas of privatization—fiscal limits, civil service reform and pension reform—will determine the future of America's public sector.


The late Proterozoic rocks of Central Brittany, represented essentially by Upper Brioverian sediments, are considered to be a late to post-tectonic molasse to the Cadomian chain. The poly-orogenic character (Cadomian and Hercynian) of the deformation structures affecting these rocks is noted from the Baie de Douarnenez to the Rennes region. However, the main syn-metamorphic deformation event is clearly of Hercynian age. Furthermore, we show that this event and the associated metamorphism are directly related to the emplacement of the Hercynian leucogranites. The syntectonic nature of the leucogranites, with respect to the deformation of their envelope, is therefore affirmed and the concept of a 'Brioverian basement', in the mechanical sense of the term and contrasted with a 'Palaeozoic cover', must be abandoned.


Site-specific probability density rainfall forecasts are needed to price insurance premiums, contracts, and other financial products based on precipitation. The spatiotemporal correlations in U.K. daily rainfall amounts over the Thames Valley are investigated and statistical Markov chain generalized linear models (Markov GLM) of rainfall are constructed. The authors compare point and density forecasts of total rainfall amounts, and forecasts of probability of occurrence of rain from these models and from other proposed density models, including persistence, statistical climatology, Markov chain, unconditional gamma and exponential mixture models, and density forecasts from GLM regression postprocessed NCEP numerical ensembles, at up to 45-day forecast horizons. The Markov GLMs and GLM processed ensembles produced skillful 1-day-ahead and short-term point forecasts. Diagnostic checks show all models are well calibrated, but GLMs perform best under the continuous-ranked probability score. For lead times of greater than 1 day, no models were better than the GLM processed ensembles at forecasting occurrence probability. Of all models, the ensembles are best able to account for the serial correlations in rainfall amounts. In conclusion, GLMs for future site-specific density forecasting are recommended. Investigations explain this conclusion in terms of the interaction between the autocorrelation properties of the data and the structure of the models tested.


The concept of city or urban resilience has emerged as one of the key challenges for the next decades. As a consequence, institutions like the United Nations or Rockefeller Foundation have embraced initiatives that increase or improve it. These efforts translate into funded programs both for action on the ground and to develop quantification of resilience, under the for of an index. Ironically, on the academic side there is no clear consensus regarding how resilience should be quantified, or what it exactly refers to in the urban context. Here we attempt to link both extremes providing an example of how to exploit large, publicly available, worldwide urban datasets, to produce objective insight into one of the possible dimensions of urban resilience. We do so via well-established methods in complexity science, such as percolation theory --which has a long tradition at providing valuable information on the vulnerability in complex systems. Our findings uncover large differences among studied cities, both regarding their infrastructural fragility and the imbalances in the distribution of critical services.


This article compares and contrasts the policy context of Vocational Education Teacher Training (VETT) in Scotland and England by setting this within its wider socio‐economic context, one emphasising lifelong learning and competitiveness. This facilitates a comparison of the two nations and enables an analysis of VETT responses to globalisation and lifelong learning. It allows an exploration of policy continuities and breaks across Scotland and England, leading to a consideration of the limits and possibilities of the different 'solutions' adopted. In these nations VETT is somewhat marginal having only recently become mandatory, unlike many other European responses. The article's policy analysis is complemented by a small scale illuminative case study of VETT educators in Scotland and England, which explores the way policy is lived and mediated at the site of practice. The research suggests that whilst both systems are compromised, VETT educators seek to work on the 'good' side of the system in which they are placed.


Low-energy electron-beam (e-beam) lithography using ZEP-520 as a positive resist has been investigated in the energy range between 0.5 and 20 keV. The interaction between electrons and ZEP-520 resist, and its effect on the exposure dose and the penetration depth of the electrons have been studied as a function of electron energy. At 10 keV ~ 20 keV energy, we were able to achieve line gratings of about 25 nm width and 80 nm pitch in ZEP-520 films of 180 nm-thickness on silicon substrate. It is found that the main limitation in achieving high resolution and dense pattern exposure at low energy is the electron forward scattering effect for thicker resist film. Using 60nm thickness of ZEP-520 resist, we have achieved 15 nm line width with 60 nm pitch grating structures


In this investigation, the preparation and gas selectivity characteristics of an 'ultrafine' composite ceramic membrane are reported. A dip-coating technique was used to prepare a thin selective membrane on a commercially available ceramic macroporous filter (SCT, France). The permeabilities of H2, N2 and CO2 were measured at temperatures of 25–470°C and average pressures of 1–2 bar. The separation of CO2/N2 binary mixtures was also performed. The separation factors for CO2 were found to be higher than that of the Knudsen separation mechanism at room and high temperature. The potential applications of these membranes to CO2 separation at these temperatures are discussed on the basis of measured selectivity values.


We describe, build, and evaluate Lockdown, a system that significantly increases the level of security for online transactions, even on a platform infested with malicious code. Lockdown provides the user with a highly-protected, yet also highly-constrained trusted environment for performing online transactions, as well as a high-performance, general-purpose environment for all other (non-security-sensitive) applications. A simple, user-friendly external interface allows the user to securely learn which environment is active and easily switch between them. We focus on making Lockdown deployable and usable today. Lockdown works with both Windows and Linux, and provides immediate improvements to security-sensitive tasks while imposing, on average, only 3% memory overhead and 2–7% storage overhead on non-security-related tasks.


Despite its reputation as a car-oriented city, the Los Angeles metropolitan area has made substantial investments in developing rail transit since 1990. Most new stations were added to an already dense built environment, with auto-oriented zoning and established land use patterns. In this paper we ask whether redevelopment is occurring around Los Angeles rail stations, and whether zoning and related policies are facilitating or constraining transit-oriented development. We conduct case studies of five stations, documenting zoning near stations, as well as the amount and type of new development after stations opened. Results illustrate that incompatible zoning and related land use policies may constrain growth near stations, but TOD-friendly zoning alone is not sufficient to spur development.


An effective proteolytic enzyme producing microbial strain has been isolated from marine habitats and evaluated its extracellular protease production properties with respect to different fermentative physiological parameters. The strain has been identified based on biochemical tests according to Bergey's Manual of Systematic Bacteriology as Serratia sp and designated as RSPB11. This strain has potential to hydrolyze chitin, gelatin and casein revealing its industrial potential for production of multi-enzyme complex. Since the isolated strain belongs to Serratia genus, the protease produced by this strain is considered as serralysin and which is not inhibited by PMSF suggesting the enzyme belongs to other than serine type of protease. Further analysis denoted that this enzyme belongs to metalloprotease which is confirmed based on negatively regulation of caseinolytic (proteolytic) activity by EDTA. The maximized enzyme production occurred at medium initially adjusted to pH 7.0 incubated at 33oC under aerated environment. Analysis of the pH profile before and after fermentation depicted that irrespective of initial medium pH, it is shifted to pH 9.0 after fermentation suggesting the enzyme produced is alkaline in nature.


Background Abiraterone was established in a randomised placebo-controlled multicentre phase 3 clinical study for patients who had received prior docetaxel (n = 1195). The median overall survival (OS) was 14.8 vs.10.9 months for abiraterone and placebo, respectively. The median progression-free survival (PFS) was 5.6 months vs. 3.6 months. Purpose To compare the OS and PFS characteristics of patients who received abiraterone in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) after docetaxel in our hospital with those of patients in the phase 3 clinical study (CS). Materials and methods Retrospective observational study, including all patients who received abiraterone from marketing to April 2013. Data collected: ECOG performance status, haematological, hepatic, renal and heart function before treatment, time to progression with docetaxel, PFS and OS. Results We investigated 6 patients. –Time to progression with docetaxel was less than six months in all patients. –100% of patients had ECOG ≤2. –Hepatic function was correct in all patients –Only one had poor renal and haematological function before treatment, with GFR = 39 ml/min and haemoglobin –Heart function was only studied in four patients who had FEVI > 50%. In April 2013, four patients had died and one patient had stopped treatment after progression. –The median OS was 1.9 months (n = 4). –The median PFS was 2.9 months (n = 5). Another patient is still being treated since March 2012. Five patients met the inclusion and exclusion criteria of CS (except serum testosterone levels that could not be verified due to the lack of analytical data). The patient who did not meet the CS exclusion criteria had brain metastasis, his OS and PFS was 20 days. Conclusions Although most of the patients met the inclusion criteria, OS and PFS results were much lower than those of the CS. Since February 2013 it has been mandatory in our hospital that only patients who meet the CS inclusion and exclusion criteria begin treatment. No conflict of interest.


Japan's economy has enjoyed unprecedented technological growth in the decades since World War II. At first stereotyped as an exporter of shoddy good, Japan now enjoys a worldwide reputation as an efficient manufacturer of high-quality products. This book focuses on the unique experience of Japan's postwar industrialization. Although the literature of economics has frequently pointed out in passing that foreign technologies have been crucial to the formation of Japan's industries, until now there has been no detailed analysis to support this assertion. The book first describes the postwar technological environment in and outside of Japan. It identifies the Schumpeterian characteristics of economic development and the particular set of relationships that Japan had with the United States and with developing nations in Asia that provided it with the incentive and the necessary mechanisms to advance technologically. The book then examines the Japanese government's selective policy of importing technology for the development of key industries, government controls on imports and on foreign industrial ownership, the efforts of individual Japanese firms to choose, adapt, and perfect imported technologies, and the development of indigenous technologies and their export to the rest of the world. Two final chapters probe the social and psychological causes of Japan's century-old desire to catch up with and surpass the West in industrialization. They discuss the impact of recent changes in the international and domestic economic situation on both the traditional values of the Japanese and the direction of Japan's technological future, and take up some of the implications for the United States policy on technology and trade of Japan's rising competitiveness in the world market.


The tide of pro se litigation in the American justice system imposes significant constraints on self-represented litigants' (SRLs) access to justice and courts' ability to administer justice. Mitigating the challenges requires a systemic institutional and procedural reform. Advancing this approach, the Article proposes that online courts would alleviate many of the challenges associated with pro se litigation, and puts this proposition to an empirical test. Specifically, the article introduces a model for a Judicial Online Dispute Resolution (JODR) system for pro se litigation, and reports the findings of a study testing its effect on SRLs' procedural justice experiences.
Section I describes the realities of pro se litigation in the United States; the unique characteristics and challenges associated with it from the perspective of both SRLs and courts and the measures employed to address them. Section II introduces the field of ODR and reviews key JODR implementations. Section III proposes a framework for a JODR system for pro se litigation, focusing on non-prisoner civil and administrative proceedings between government agencies and self-represented individuals—whether in court or administrative trial-like hearings. Section IV reports the results of an experiment comparing the effect of JODR system designs that rely on asynchronous online text and video communication on SRLs' procedural justice experiences. Its two main findings are a) that the judicial officer's (judge) medium of communication has a consistent main effect on SRLs' procedural experiences (regardless of whether SRLs used text or video communications); and b) that a system design whereby the judicial officer (judge) communicates via video messages and the SRL communicates via text messages is advantageous in terms of SRLs' procedural justice experiences compared to both the prevalent ODR system design of two-way text communication as well as the theoretically celebrated two-way video communication. Finally, section V concludes the article, discussing implications and directions for future research.
"Held to appropriate process and technology design standards, online judicial dispute resolution systems can improve the quality of SRLs' participation, their procedural justice experiences, and the overall fairness of the process. Technology is at our fingertips; justice may very well be too."


This Note examines whether the current initiatives to deregulate export controls on computer and telecommunications to Russia pose threats to U.S. national security. Part I reviews the development of unilateral and multilateral controls that prevented the exportation of dual-use commodities to the former Soviet Union. Part II describes the current political and economic situation in Russia. Part II then discusses recent deregulation and pending legislation in the U.S. Congress that would further reduce the controls on computer and telecommunications exports to Russia. Part II also sets forth the arguments for and against deregulation. Part III argues that the instability in Russia warrants the continued restriction of dual-use technology to Russia in order to protect U.S. surveillance efforts and prevent the Russian government from using the technology for military purposes. This Note concludes that the United States must devise an export policy toward Russia that balances the need to eliminate export controls that are hindering U.S. economic competitiveness with U.S. security interests. DEREGULATING DUAL-USE EXPORTS TO RUSSIA: IS U.S. NATIONAL SECURIIY AT RISK? Rochelle M. Tarlowe*


Reinforcement learning algorithms for real-world robotic applications must be able to handle complex, unknown dynamical systems while maintaining data-efficient learning. These requirements are handled well by model-free and model-based RL approaches, respectively. In this work, we aim to combine the advantages of these approaches. By focusing on time-varying linear-Gaussian policies, we enable a model-based algorithm based on the linear-quadratic regulator that can be integrated into the model-free framework of path integral policy improvement. We can further combine our method with guided policy search to train arbitrary parameterized policies such as deep neural networks. Our simulation and real-world experiments demonstrate that this method can solve challenging manipulation tasks with comparable or better performance than model-free methods while maintaining the sample efficiency of model-based methods.


Philip Luginbill's 1928 treatise on the fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (J. E. Smith), long has been considered the source for authoritative information on the biology and dynamics of this pest. What makes Bulletin No. 34 so special? The information presented on the life history and habits of the fall armyworm is interesting and amazingly accurate as verified by numerous publications over the past half century. In view of Bulletin No. 34 and all that has been written on the fall armyworm since 1928, one cannot help but wonder why we are not further along in our efforts to control or suppress this pest.


This paper proposes a collaborative data mining technique to provide multi-level analysis from clinical trials data. Clinical trials for clinical research and drug development generate large amount of data. Due to dispersed nature of clinical trial data, it remains a challenge to harness this data for analytics. In this paper, we propose a novel method using master data management (MDM) for analyzing clinical trial data, scattered across multiple databases, through collaborative data mining. Our aim is to validate findings by collaboratively utilizing multiple data mining techniques such as classification, clustering, and association rule mining. We complement our results with the help of interactive visualizations. The paper also demonstrates use of data stratification for identifying disparities between various subgroups of clinical trial participants. Overall, our approach aims at extracting useful knowledge from clinical trial data in order to improve design of clinical trials by gaining confidence in the outcomes using multi-level analysis. We provide experimental results in drug abuse clinical trial data.


This thesis examines the integration experiences of a case-study group of international students undertaking postgraduate research degrees at a UK university. It places a deep focus on their individual stories, and situates these within the academic and policy discourses of integration, which are found to have a lack of consideration in terms of the integration of international students. The study uses key understandings of social capital to examine how the participants have mobilised the resources embedded within their social networks to enable their interaction and participation in society beyond the university campus.The specific aims of the research are to examine the nature of the social networks and social interactions of a case study group of international students, to decipher how their experiences relate to the discourses of integration, and to analyse how their integration experiences relate to the network theory of social capital. The study is qualitative, and uses interpretative phenomenology as a guiding framework to analyse and present the data. Three distinct methods of data collection were used:Ego-network mapping, sit-down interviews and walking interviews.

The situated case study was conducted in an ethnically diverse town in the north of England, which has been a significant factor in the participants' experiences. The findings show that the majority of the study's participants have each developed a substantial social network during their time in Britain. They have an even mix of co-national and international friends, and some have developed co-national friendships with British people with ancestral links to the their home country. Indeed, a substantial finding from this study, is that the 'host' community is seen as both the settled ethnic minority communities within which the participants interact, as well as the conveniently diverse nature of Hill town. The participants are strategic and often use rational choice when forming friendships, in particular when seeking friendships with 'local' people for help with language and local cultural knowledge.

Despite the consuming nature of their research, all participants acknowledge that they have to impose their own limits on how much time they spend working on it each day and look for ways to break up their routine and break free from the grasp of their studies, which leads to their interaction and participation in the wider society. The way they do this allows the study to interrogate key terms found in the integration discourse, such as 'shared' British values and sense of belonging, as the participants view the British ways of being and doing in a relative way. Nonetheless, they often show certain elements of integration that might be expected of permanent migrants such as an engagement with the local community or a wish to give back something to society.The study also reveals a certain resilience when faced with issues such as perceived discrimination or explicit racial abuse in the street.

The study expose a sense of appreciation as the participants are able to easily recreate their consumption habits from their home countries, owing to the presence of international chains as well as the multi-cultural nature of Hill town. In addition, the fact that the participants themselves all have some previous experience of working in different countries or for international companies means that they can be described as natural transnationals, and there is evidence that they become a useful social contact for others who arrive in Hill town. Finally, there is strong evidence within the participants' accounts that they mobilise the social capital resources from their social networks to find information, accommodation and employment.


Now readers can develop the solid conceptual, technical and managerial foundations needed for effective systems analysis design and implementation as well as the project management skills for systems development with SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND DESIGN IN A CHANGING WORLD, 6E. This popular text teaches both the traditional (structured) and the object-oriented (OO) approach to systems analysis and design. This book focuses on content that's most important to know with an emphasis on use case driven techniques for systems analysis and design. This edition introduces most recent developments and tools, with expanded coverage of project management for adaptive projects and content reflecting Microsoft Project 2010. A new continuing case study and "Best Practices" feature provide even more opportunities for readers to apply the skills learned.


Jewish copyright law is a rich body of copyright doctrine and jurisprudence that developed in parallel with Anglo-American and Continental European copyright laws and the printers' privileges that preceded them. Jewish copyright law traces its origins to a dispute adjudicated in 1550, over 150 years before modern copyright law is typically said to have emerged with the Statute of Anne of 1709. It continues to be applied today, notably in a rabbinic ruling outlawing pirated software, issued at Microsoft's request. In From Maimonides to Microsoft, Professors Netanel and Nimmer trace the development of Jewish copyright law by relaying the stories of five dramatic disputes, running from the sixteenth century to the present. They describe each dispute in its historical context and examine the rabbinic rulings that sought to resolve it. Remarkably, these disputes address some of the same issues that animate copyright jurisprudence today: Is copyright a property right or a limited regulatory prerogative? What is copyright's rationale? What is its scope? How can copyright be enforced against an infringer who is beyond the applicable legal authority's reach? This book introduces copyright scholars, students, and practitioners to an entirely new narrative and body of copyright jurisprudence. Presenting new material regarding the operation of the Jewish book trade and some of the leading disputes affecting it, Professors Netanel and Nimmer examine how copyright disputes arose from their respective historical contexts and, in turn, reverberated through Jewish life. From Maimonides to Microsoft examines how one area of Jewish law has developed in historical context and how Jewish copyright law compares with its Anglo-American and Continental European counterparts.


Keratohyalin granules were isolated in the native form from the epidermis of newborn rats by the use of citric acid and a detergent. The isolated granules revealed a fine granular substructure in the electron microscope similar to that seen in situ. Analyses of amino acids by automated column-chromatography showed that proline and cystine are present in large proportions whereas histidine is present in a small amount. Accordingly, it was concluded that keratohyalin represents a sulfur-rich amorphous precursor of the horny cell content, rather than a sulfur-poor side product of the keratinization process, or a unique histidine-rich protein as proposed by in situ histochemical and radioautographic studies.


As our world grows smaller, opportunities for conflict multiply. Ethnic, religious, political, and personal differences drive people apart--with potentially disastrous consequences--and it's the task of perceptive leaders to bring them together again World-renowned mediation expert Mark Gerzon argues that leaders have failed to rise to this challenge. Our organisations, schools, and governments remain filled with divisive dictators and everyday managers, instead of what he calls mediators--leaders who transform conflict so that everyone can move forward together. Through absorbing examples drawn from decades of work with organisational, political, and global conflicts of all kinds, Leading Through Conflict provides a powerful new framework for the leader as mediator, and outlines eight specific tools these leaders use to transform seemingly intractable differences into progress on deep-seated problems. Both practical and passionate, this book makes the tools of cross-border leaders accessible to anyone who wants to help create healthier companies, communities, and countries.


Abstract. The Mediterranean Sea transforms Atlantic Waters inflowing through the Strait of Gibraltar into saltier, cooler and denser Mediterranean Waters that outflow into the Atlantic Ocean. A theoretical steady state functioning of the Mediterranean Sea would be the result of the balance between the net heat and volume transports through the Strait of Gibraltar and the heat loss to the atmosphere through the sea surface and the net evaporation. The salt transport for the inflow and outflow should be balanced. Changes in the heat content, temperature and salinity of the Mediterranean waters reveal that the present Mediterranean functioning is out of this equilibrium state. A new analysis for MEDAR data shows that the temperature and salinity averaged for the Mediterranean Waters in the whole basin increased at rates of 0.0020 ± 0.0018 oC/yr and 0.0007 ± 0.0003 psu/yr. This temperature trend is equivalent to a 0.43 ± 0.38 W/m2 heat absorption. This warming trend would have increased during the beginning of the twenty first century at the Western Mediterranean, maybe linked to the Western Mediterranean Transition. Results from a simple box model using heat, volume and salt conservation laws indicate that the observed changes cannot be attributed only to an increase of the net evaporation, nor to a salinity increase of the Atlantic Waters flowing through the Strait of Gibraltar as previous hypotheses suggested. An increase of the net evaporation ranging between 5 and 7 % combined with a reduction of the heat losses to the atmosphere ranging between 0.4 and 0.5 W/m2 could explained the observed changes.


Electrical double layer (EDL) thin film transistors (TFTs) are an interesting class of transistors that use an electrolyte as the gating medium. Recently it has been demonstrated that pure organic solvents can also be used as gating media for TFTs without the addition of exogenous electrolytes. Here we present a systematic study of the performances of TFTs based on two different semiconductors (P3HT and ZnO) gated through nine different solvents either pure or loaded with NaCl. The nature of the solvent impacts the transfer characteristics of the TFT through a change in the gating capacitance while the threshold voltage remains unaffected. Depending on the polarity of solvents, addition of NaCl gives rise to different responses. TFTs gated through highly polar solvents are unaffected by the salt concentration while for low polarity solvents the output current increases with salt up to a plateau. Furthermore, when the semiconductor surface is covered with a high capacitance thin dielectric layer, the TFT output current becomes dependent on the NaCl concentration also for high polarity solvents. This phenomenology was rationalized considering the different contributions of Helmholtz and Guy-Chapman EDLs to the capacitance and the dielectric saturation that decreases the solvent dielectric constant within the Helmholtz EDL.


As 3D point clouds become the representation of choice for multiple vision and graphics applications, the ability to synthesize or reconstruct high-resolution, high-fidelity point clouds becomes crucial. Despite the recent success of deep learning models in discriminative tasks of point clouds, generating point clouds remains challenging. This paper proposes a principled probabilistic framework to generate 3D point clouds by modeling them as a distribution of distributions. Specifically, we learn a two-level hierarchy of distributions where the first level is the distribution of shapes and the second level is the distribution of points given a shape. This formulation allows us to both sample shapes and sample an arbitrary number of points from a shape. Our generative model, named PointFlow, learns each level of the distribution with a continuous normalizing flow. The invertibility of normalizing flows enables the computation of the likelihood during training and allows us to train our model in the variational inference framework. Empirically, we demonstrate that PointFlow achieves state-of-the-art performance in point cloud generation. We additionally show that our model can faithfully reconstruct point clouds and learn useful representations in an unsupervised manner. The code is available at https://github.com/stevenygd/PointFlow.


The nutrition transition in diets and health is closely tied to other aspects of economic development, including agricultural transformation and urbanization as well as demographic change and epidemiological transition from infectious to noncommunicable disease. Over time, dietary patterns typically shift from widespread inadequacy of many foods and nutrients, especially for children and mothers, into surplus energy intake and rising obesity with continued inadequacy of healthier foods. Diet-related diseases remain the largest single cause of premature death and disability in all regions. This article combines food availability and dietary intake data from more than 100 countries over 30 years with a wide range of other evidence to characterize the nutrition transition and its association with changes in agricultural production and the food environment, asking how future dietary patterns might be steered toward healthier outcomes as national incomes grow.


Educating for Diversity and Social Justice foregrounds the personal stories of educators who are engaging the space of schooling as a site of possibility for realizing the goals of social justice. it is a book inspired by a vision of education as a practice of freedom where young people – especially those who are marginalized – can learn that they have a voice and the power to change their world for the better. Drawing on the work of US philosopher Nancy Fraser, the book examines issues of justice and schooling in relation to three dimensions: political, cultural and economic. While its focus is on research within three Australian case study schools, the book provides an international perspective of these dimensions of justice in western education contexts as they impact on the schooling performance of marginalized students. Towards greater equity for these students, the book presents a comprehensive scaffold for thinking about and addressing issues of schooling, diversity and social justice. Through practical examples from the case study research, the book illustrates the complexities and possibilities associated with schools providing inclusive environments where marginalized voices are heard (political justice), where marginalized culture is recognized and valued (cultural justice) and where marginalized students are supported to achieve academically towards accessing the material benefits of society (economic justice).


We compared indices of total hard mast production (oak and hickory combined) in 20, second growth, pine-hardwood stands under five treatments to determine the effects of different reproduction treatments on mast production in the Ouachita Mountains. We evaluated mast production in mature unharvested controls and stands under four reproduction cutting methods (single-tree selection, group selection, shelterwood, and clearcut with wildlife tree retention) during the first 6 yr after initial harvest. Mean Whitehead mast production indices were greater in shelterwoods and clearcuts with wildlife tree retention than in unharvested stands 5 of the 6 yr of study, indicating individual trees in these stands produced greater amounts of hard mast. Stand production values for the 6 yr combined indicated group selections generally produced the greatest amounts of total hard mast, probably because competing pines in the matrix were thinned and hard mast-producing tree densities were unchanged after harvest. However, wide variation in residual density of mast trees existed among stands of the same treatment. Our results indicate hard mast production can be affected by different silvicultural treatments and managers should consider the importance of residual mast production along with other objectives when determining silvicultural treatments to apply. South. J. Appl. For. 27(4):253-258.


The elliptic flow of muons from the decay of charm and bottom hadrons is measured in pp collisions at sqrt[s]=13  TeV using a data sample with an integrated luminosity of 150  pb^{-1} recorded by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The muons from heavy-flavor decay are separated from light-hadron decay muons using momentum imbalance between the tracking and muon spectrometers. The heavy-flavor decay muons are further separated into those from charm decay and those from bottom decay using the distance-of-closest-approach to the collision vertex. The measurement is performed for muons in the transverse momentum range 4-7 GeV and pseudorapidity range |η|<2.4. A significant nonzero elliptic anisotropy coefficient v_{2} is observed for muons from charm decays, while the v_{2} value for muons from bottom decays is consistent with zero within uncertainties.


This paper contributes to the literature measuring the response of stock markets to monetary policy actions. We analyse the reaction of European stock market returns to unexpected interest rate decisions by the European Central Bank (ECB). Endogeneity between interest rate changes and stock returns is taken into account using the identification through the heteroscedasticity approach. Relying on different methods to extract monetary policy shocks, we find a negative and significant relation between unexpected ECB decisions and European stock market performance. Moreover, monetary policy decisions of the ECB are well anticipated by the market, implying that the central bank successfully communicates its monetary policy. Copyright 2008 The Authors. Journal compilation 2008 Blackwell Publishing Ltd