This paper investigates the role of the vapor barrier in exterior wood-frame stucco walls with the help of a two-dimensional hygrothermal simulation tool, hygIRC-2D. For this purpose, the wall is subjected to the exterior weather conditions of six different North American geographic locations and three different interior climatic conditions. Seven different vapor diffusion strategies, generated by varying the water vapor permeance of the vapor barrier, installed outboard of the interior finish, have been studied to generate critical understanding on the role of vapor barrier in the wood-frame stucco walls. The outputs from the simulations have been analyzed with the help of a novel moisture response indicator called RHT index. Simulation results indicate that the vapor transmission characteristics of the vapor barrier, in terms of water vapor permeance, play a very important role in the overall moisture response of the wood-frame stucco wall. A very high or low vapor permeance of the vapor barrier does not produce the optimum moisture management strategy for the wood-frame stucco wall. Moreover, simulation results indicate that the removal of vapor barrier from the wall system can result in a heightened moisture response and a considerable accumulation of moisture in the interior gypsum board that may lead to severe consequences in particular, the premature deterioration of the interior facing gypsum board. It has also been observed from the simulation outputs that the optimum vapor diffusion strategy, that of limiting the vapor permeance of the vapor barrier, is not a function of interior climatic conditions considered in this study. It is hoped that the results reported in this paper will shed some light on a number of concerns raised in recent years on the role of vapor barrier in wood-frame stucco wall construction.


This study investigates the spatial distribution of
direct solar irradiation on rugged terrain over Pakistan. Digital elevation
model (DEM), observational data of solar radiation from 6 meteorological
observatories located in Pakistan and 5 meteorological observatories located in
China were used in the present study. This conjunction is based on the same
climatic conditions. MODIS Level-2 (L2) cloud fraction products and
observational data of cloud cover from 21 meteorological observatories in
Pakistan were incorporated to quantify the cloud cover influences on solar
radiation amount and spatial distribution. The emerging field of remote sensing
and GIS makes it possible to calculate solar radiation with finer spatial
resolution and better understanding of terrain and cloud effects. ArcGIS with
RS platform were used to simulate the model for direct solar radiation for the
first time over Pakistan region. The results show clear quantitative influences
of local topography and cloud cover on the DSR. Similarly, the area (east of
Indus river) affected by monsoon receives less solar radiation during summer
compared to the west of the Indus River.


We present Grammar-Based Grounded Lexicon Learning (G2L2), a lexicalist approach toward learning a compositional and grounded meaning representation of language from grounded data, such as paired images and texts. At the core of G2L2 is a collection of lexicon entries, which map each word to a tuple of a syntactic type and a neuro-symbolic semantic program. For example, the word shiny has a syntactic type of adjective; its neuro-symbolic semantic program has the symbolic form {\lambda}x. filter(x, SHINY), where the concept SHINY is associated with a neural network embedding, which will be used to classify shiny objects. Given an input sentence, G2L2 first looks up the lexicon entries associated with each token. It then derives the meaning of the sentence as an executable neuro-symbolic program by composing lexical meanings based on syntax. The recovered meaning programs can be executed on grounded inputs. To facilitate learning in an exponentially-growing compositional space, we introduce a joint parsing and expected execution algorithm, which does local marginalization over derivations to reduce the training time. We evaluate G2L2 on two domains: visual reasoning and language-driven navigation. Results show that G2L2 can generalize from small amounts of data to novel compositions of words.


This paper explores the findings of a small‐scale empirical study of social work admissions data. It is designed to be exploratory in nature and used to illustrate key themes discussed in a previous paper. The study has been designed as a comparator to a Canadian study with the aim of building upon their findings within the current UK/England context. The research examines the relationship between applicants' pre‐admission information and their subsequent performance on the programme. Data relating to a sample of students and available at the pre‐admission stage (from application forms and interviewer report forms) and data relating to students on the programme who had been identified (by faculty) as having difficulties in one or more areas of their learning, are compared to a sample of those not identified as having experienced such problems. The two groups (total sample size = 150) are drawn from one university in southern England and comprise students from both undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. Methodological issues are critically analysed and findings are explored and compared to that of the Canadian study. Key themes regarding the seemingly complex relationships between performance on the programme and academic background, extent of previous experience and a range of other factors are discussed and examined in relation to other available literature. Implications are explored in relation to current practice and development needs within social work education.


This project explores the do-it-yourself ("DIY") practices of Melbourne experimental and independent music initiatives from the late 1970s until today. Through primary archival research and interviews with key practitioners, this project provides new research into Australian arts practices currently underrepresented in existing scholarship. I argue that DIY musicians in Melbourne as well as their international counterparts have developed new ways of using technological media in the production, distribution and consumption of music. In doing so these DIY musicians have contributed to the means in which communication and collectivity is mediated more generally.


A method was developed for quantification of sulfite in beer based on derivatization with the maleimide-derived probe ThioGlo 1 followed by separation of fluorescent adducts by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography and fluorescence detection. Sulfite gave two ThioGlo 1 derivatives and it was shown by mass spectrometry that both had identical mass spectra. Matrix effects were observed when constructing sulfite standard curves in different beers and, therefore, use of a matrix-matched calibration curve is proposed. ThioGlo 1 was found to generate fluorescent adducts with both bound and free sulfite, providing a quantification of the total sulfite content in beer. The limit of quantification of sulfite was 0.6 mg/L and the method can be used for quantification of sulfite in highly colored beers.


Smart grids and the semantic web are two recent paradigms that come hand in hand. On the one side, the evolution of current power networks demands dealing with big amounts of data that must be processed to gain valuable information. On the other, semantic web technologies that directly address this data enrichment and knowledge extraction. Further, smart grids will be formed of a galaxy of intelligent nodes controlling one or more network components; therefore, we propose a tree architecture inspired by the actual hierarchy of the power network and claim that, in this domain, regarding the tangled bunch of standard protocols, one global ontology based on the CIM (Common Information Model) suffices, since it may be extended, combined with other existing protocols, and divided into smaller, interoperable profiles stored in each node of the grid. To this end, we present a comparison among several local semantic knowledge repository solutions and cope with the query federation problem: how to retrieve and manipulate this distributed information. Finally, we illustrate this novel scenario with a real-world implementation.


AIMS
To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of a specialist smoking cessation package for people with severe mental illness DESIGN: Incremental cost-effectiveness analysis was undertaken from the UK National Health Service and Personal Social Services perspective over a 12 month time horizon. Total costs, including smoking cessation, healthcare and social services costs, and quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), derived from EQ-5D-5L, collected from a randomised controlled trial, were used as outcome measures. Bootstrap technique was employed to assess the uncertainty.

SETTING
Sixteen primary care and 21 secondary care mental health sites in England PARTICIPANTS: Adult smokers with bipolar affective disorder, schizoaffective disorder or schizophrenia and related illnesses (n=526).

INTERVENTION AND COMPARATOR
A bespoke smoking cessation (BSC) package for people with severe mental illness offered up to 12 individual sessions with a mental health smoking cessation practitioner versus usual care (UC). Of the participants who were randomised, 261 were in UC group and 265 were in BSC group.

MEASUREMENTS
BSC intervention cost was estimated from treatment log. Costs of UC, healthcare and social services, and EQ-5D-5L were collected at baseline, six- and 12-month follow-ups. Incremental costs and incremental QLAYs were estimated using regression adjusting for respective baseline values and other baseline covariates.

FINDINGS
The mean total cost in the BSC group was £270 (95% CI -£1,690 to £1,424) lower than in the UC group while the mean QALYs were 0.013 (95% CI -0.008 to 0.045) higher, leading to BSC dominating UC (76% probability of cost-effective at £20,000/QALY).

CONCLUSIONS
A bespoke smoking cessation package for people with severe mental illness is likely to be cost-effective over 12 months compared with usual care provided by the UK's National Health Service and personal social services.


The essay aims to analyse Francis's pontificate in the context of globalisation. First of all, it sights to understand the conception of time and the role of the Church in contemporary history according to Bergoglio. Secondly, it is Pope Francis' own report to globalisation that is examined. The main axes of the mission of the Church traced by the pontificate of Francis draw inspiration from the Second Vatican Council, in a non-static and formalistic way, but rather dynamic, in order to give strength to the announcement of the Gospel of mercy in contemporary history and to help humanity overcome its dramatic conflicts.


This book has been written by two people who really understand children. [They show how to] create opportunities to reduce the trauma of the interview and significantly improve the quality of the information obtained. Chief Constable A.J. Butler Gloucestershire Constabulary A few years ago, a Chief Justice said that it was unnecessary to educate lawyers and judges in the techniques of interviewing children because it was 'just common sense'. The authors show that successful interviewing requires much more than 'common sense'. Freda Briggs, Professor of Child Development, University of South Australia...an excellent book for students and professionals in forensic psychology, policing and social work.Helen Westcott, PhD, The Open UniversityIt is critical that children are interviewed properly in cases of suspected abuse or where the children may be witnesses to or victims of a crime. Poor questioning can upset the child further and contaminate evidence that may be needed in court. Interviewing Children is a practical guide to interviewing techniques for a range of professionals including welfare workers, psychologists, schoolteachers and counsellors, police officers and lawyers. Step by step, it outlines the key stages of an interview, and how to respond to the child's needs during an interview. It explains how to deal with children of different ages and from different backgrounds, and also how to work with their parents. Particular attention is paid to the sensitive issue of sexual abuse, and the problems created by multiple interviews.Clare Wilson lectures in the Department of Psychology at the University of Sydney. Martine Powell lectures in the School of Psychology at Deakin University. Both have trained police officers, social workers and legal professionals in interviewing techniques in Australia and the UK.------------------Full quotes to go on half-title page:This book has been written by two people who really understand children. In passing on their knowledge to professionals who engage with children in the interview room, they create opportunities to reduce the trauma of the interview and significantly improve the quality of the information obtained. Writing in a clear and fresh style, the authors have produced a book which is valuable as a point of reference, a day to day tool and as a training aid to develop skills.Chief Constable A.J. Butler Gloucestershire ConstabularyThis book should be read by all professionals who work with children and could findthemselves receiving disclosures of abuse. It is practical, easy to read and full of examples and hints. It should be a compulsory text for social work studen


To develop the prototype vibration pumping device for an artificial heart (Hashimoto et al., 1994, ASME J. Fluids Eng., 116, pp. 741-745), the flow patterns in the casing were analyzed experimentally and numerically from the viewpoint of biomechanical engineering. Considering not only the mechanical performance of the pump, but also the hemolysis, was very important to design the artificial heart. In the present study, the curvilinear coordinate transformation technique and the finite difference technique were used to numerically solve the unsteady, incompressible, and axisymmetric Navier-Stokes equations for the flow field in the various casing configurations of the vibration pumping device. The validity of numerical analysis was confirmed by comparison with the experimental data obtained by the flow visualization technique. Furthermore, the strong dependence of the hemolysis on the flow patterns in the casing was recognized. In particular, the relationship between the vorticity field in the casing and the hemolysis was elucidated. The results obtained here would provide the useful suggestions for future research and the basic design concept of vibration pumping device for the left ventricular assist device.


ABSTRACT This study investigates the utility and validity of the MacArthur–Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) for use with low-income parents and their 24- to 36-month-old Spanish–English bilingual children (n = 79). Issues in the interpretation of the integrated CDI/Inventarios del Desarrollo de Habilidades Comunicativas (IDHC) score to index bilingual children's overall conceptual knowledge are also considered. Results indicate that the CDI/IDHC can be used with this population through at least age 36 months and parents are accurate reporters of their children's Spanish and English vocabulary. The value of the integrated score was confirmed. However, given the lack of norms associated with the integrated score, the complexity of determining how best to interpret this score was underscored.


ABSTRACT The purpose of this research is to analyze the effects of the entry of foreign banks on the technical efficiency performance of the domestic banking sector over the period 2000 - 2008. This study uses a sample of 23 banks (3 state banks, 9 private domestic banks and 11 foreign banks) and a two-stage approach for the data analysis. The researcher first uses the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach to estimate technical efficiency scores of all 23 banks used in research. The results indicate that banking technical efficiency performance of the banking industry has been fluctuating over the study period. To investigate the effect the entry of foreign on the domestic bank, we run a Tobit regression. The regression focuses on the determinants of technical efficiency of the domestic banks, using variables like return on assets, liquidity ratio, inflation, etc. In this same regression, a proxy labelled as foreign share is added as one of the independent variables in order to help us test how the entry of the foreign banks has affected the domestic banks. The study suggests that factors which affect the technical efficiency of domestic banks in Ghana include return on assets, liquidity ratio, bank capitalization, and concentration/competition. The findings further suggest that the domestic banks have been positively affected by the entry of the foreign banks. The implication of this is that the domestic banks are probably cashing in on the benefits such new technologies and know-how, new processes and practices, etc. foreign banks provide when they enter any economy. Hence, the policy implication is for Bank of Ghana to continue to encourage profitable foreign banks to come into Ghana. The ultimate beneficiary would be the final consumer because they stand to benefit from improved services and service delivery, competitive/low prices.


STUDY QUESTION
Is exposure to gestational stress in the critical time window for the normal differentiation and growth of male reproductive tissue associated with male reproductive function in offspring in later life?

SUMMARY ANSWER
Exposure to stressful life events (SLEs) in early, but not late gestation, are associated with reduced adult male reproductive function, consistent with the hypothesis that events during early prenatal life programme adult male reproductive function.

WHAT IS ALREADY KNOWN
Animal studies suggest that gestational stress may impact on the reproductive function of male offspring, but human evidence is sparse.

STUDY DESIGN, SIZE AND DURATION
Using a prospective longitudinal cohort, we examined the association between number and type of maternal stressors during pregnancy in both early and late gestation and reproductive function in 643 male Generation 2 (offspring) at age 20 years. Mothers and their male Generation 2 (offspring) from The Raine Study participated. Mothers prospectively reported SLEs during pregnancy recorded at gestational weeks 18 and 34 using a standardized 10-point questionnaire.

PARTICIPANTS/MATERIALS, SETTING, METHODS
The 643 male Generation 2 (offspring) underwent testicular ultrasound examination and semen analysis and provided serum for reproductive hormone analysis. Multivariate linear regression analysis was used to examine associations.

MAIN RESULTS AND ROLE OF CHANCE
Of 643 recruited males, 407 (63%) were exposed to at least one SLE in early gestation. Fewer SLEs were reported in late gestation (n = 343, 53%). Maternal SLE exposure in early gestation was negatively associated with total sperm count (β = -0.31, 95% CI -0.58; -0.03), number of progressive motile sperm (β = -0.15, 95% CI -0.31; 0.00) and morning serum testosterone concentration (β = -0.04, 95% CI -0.09; -0.00). No similar effects of maternal SLE exposure in late pregnancy were detected. The large sample size and an objective detailed direct assessment of adult male reproductive function with strict external quality control for sperm quality, as well as detailed prospectively collected information on prenatal SLEs in two distinct time windows of pregnancy reported by the women in early and late gestation along with other risk factors, imply minimal possibility of recall, information bias and selection bias. When assessing our results, we adjusted for a priori chosen confounders, but residual confounding or confounding by factors unbeknown to us cannot be ruled out.

LIMITATIONS, REASONS FOR CAUTION
It is not possible to measure how SLEs impacted differently on the mother's experience or perception of stress. Resilience (coping) gradients may alter cortisol levels and thus modify the associations we observed and the mothers' own perception of stress severity may have provided a more precise estimate of her exposure.

WIDER IMPLICATIONS OF THE FUNDINGS
Our findings suggest that exposure to SLEs in early, but not late gestation, are associated with reduced adult male reproductive function. Improved support for women with exposure to SLEs during pregnancy, particularly during the first trimester, may improve the reproductive health of their male offspring in later life. Intervention studies of improved pregnancy support could provide more insight into this association and more information is needed about the potential specific epigenetic mechanisms underlying this association.

STUDY FUNDING/COMEPETING INTEREST(S)
The male fertility sub-study was funded by NHMRC Grant 634 457. The core management of the Raine Study is funded by University of Western Australia, Curtin University, Telethon Kids Institute, Women and Infants Research Foundation, Edith Cowan University, Murdoch University, The University of Notre Dame Australia and Raine Medical Research foundation. Dr Bräuner's salary was supported by Læge Sofus Carl Emil Friis og Hustru Olga Doris Friis foundation in Denmark. All authors declare no competing interests.

TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER
N/A.


ABSTRACT The synthesis and characterisation of a range of non-symmetric liquid crystal dimers designed to exhibit the twist-bend nematic phase is reported. Beginning with 1-(4-cyanobiphenyl-4′-yloxy)-6-(4-cyanobiphenyl-4′-yl) hexane, each nitrile group is exchanged systematically for a methoxy group. The behaviour of these dimers is interpreted in terms of their bent shape being the predominant driving force for the formation of the twist-bend nematic phase, and the small differences between the twist-bend nematic–nematic transition temperatures are attributed to the differences between the interaction strength parameters of the mesogenic units. The 4-alkyloxyphenyl 4-[6-(4′-cyanobiphenyl-4-yl)hexyloxy]benzoates with ethyl, butyl, hexyl and octyl chains show the twist-bend nematic phase, whereas the corresponding 4-alkyloxyphenyl 4-[5-(4′-cyanobiphenyl-4-yloxy)pentyloxy]benzoates do not. This difference in behaviour is attributed to the more bent structure of the former. Increasing the terminal chain length initially decreases the twist-bend nematic–nematic transition temperature and this suggests that the chain disrupts the interactions between the mesogenic units. Subsequent increases in chain length have a smaller effect suggesting that the chain can be accommodated within an intercalated arrangement. The transitional behaviour of 1-(4-cyanobiphenyl-4′-yloxy)-6-(4-butyloxybiphenyl-4′-yl) hexane is compared to that of 1-(4-cyanobiphenyl-4′-yloxy)-6-(4-((S)-2-methyl)butyloxybiphenyl-4′-yl) hexane, and it is shown that chain branching strongly destabilises the twist-bend nematic phase. This is attributed to difficulties associated with packing the dimers. Graphical Abstract


Eight of 57 water buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) died after grazing 30 days on 38-hectare pasture contaminated with Baccharis coridifolia in the north of the Province of Corrientes (northeastern Argentina). Most were found dead, others showed depression, anorexia, diarrhea, incoordination of movements and collision against fences. The conditions that caused the poisoning were overgrazing, poor pasture and lack of aversion to the consumption of Baccharis coridifolia. Gross findings included necrotic rumenitis, necrotic-hemorrhagic abomasitis, necrotic-hemorrhagic enteritis and marked brain edema. The histopathological findings were necrosis of the epithelium of the mucosa of the forestomachs, necrosis and hemorrhage in mucosa of the small intestine, necrosis of lymphocytes in lymph follicles in spleen and thymus and vasogenic brain edema. The lesions, except for brain edema, are typically reported in cattle intoxicated by Baccharis coridifolia. Vasogenic brain edema is not described in any animal species naturally or experimentally intoxicated with this plant; this change may be due to direct toxic effect of Baccharis coridifolia that cause vascular injury or was a secondary injury.


Objective The female breast is a passive tissue with little intrinsic support. Therefore, women rely on external breast support (sports bras) to control breast motion during athletic tasks. Research has demonstrated that lower levels of breast support are associated with altered trunk and pelvis movement patterns during running, a common athletic task. However, no previous study has identified the effect of sports bra support on movement patterns during other athletic tasks including landing. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the effects of breast support on trunk and knee joint biomechanics in female collegiate athletes during a double-leg landing task. Methods Fourteen female collegiate athletes completed five double-leg landing trials in each of three different sports bra conditions: no support, low support, and high support. A 10-camera motion capture system (250 Hz, Qualisys, Goteburg, Sweden) and two force platforms (1,250 Hz, AMTI, Watertown, MA, USA) were used to collect three-dimensional kinematics and ground reaction forces simultaneously. Visual 3D was used to calculate trunk segment and knee joint angles and moments. Custom software (MATLAB 2021a) was used to determine discrete values of dependent variables including vertical breast displacement, knee joint and trunk segment angles at initial contact and 100 ms post-initial contact, and peak knee joint moments. A repeated measures analysis of covariance with post-hoc paired samples t-tests were used to evaluate the effect of breast support on landing biomechanics. Results Increasing levels of breast support were associated with reductions in peak knee flexion (Right: p = 0.008; Left: p = 0.029) and peak knee valgus angles (Right: p = 0.011; Left: p = 0.003) as well as reductions in peak knee valgus moments (Right: p = 0.033; Left: p = 0.013). There were no changes in peak knee extension moments (Right: p = 0.216; Left: p = 0.261). Increasing levels of breast support were associated with greater trunk flexion angles at initial contact (p = 0.024) and greater peak trunk flexion angles (p = 0.002). Conclusions Lower levels of breast support are associated with knee joint and trunk biomechanical profiles suggested to increase ACL injury risk.


HIV-associated tuberculosis (HIV-TB) remains a global public health challenge, with the major burden being borne by countries in low-resource settings. If World Health Organization targets to reduce TB deaths by 95% and new cases by 90% are to be met by 2035, major improvements in diagnostic strategies are among the most pressing needs. HIV coinfection presents particular challenges in the diagnosis of TB due, for example, to the relatively low mycobacterial burden in sputum specimens and rapid dissemination beyond the lungs. Low and middle-income countries still typically rely on traditional diagnostics such as chest radiology and sputum microscopy, which lack sufficient accuracy. Desired characteristics for an HIV-TB diagnostic test are well described and include the ability to test a wide variety of clinical samples, diagnose extra-pulmonary TB, have good accuracy to detect low mycobacterial burden disease, and be deployable at the peripheries of healthcare systems. Following a long period of under-investment in TB research, development of TB diagnostics has progressed rapidly over the past decade and the technology landscape looks much more promising. This article will summarise advances in diagnostics that are particularly relevant to HIV-TB. The Xpert® MTB/RIF and Determine™ TB LAM assays have the most evidence assessing their use in HIV-TB. In addition to nucleic-acid amplification tests and antigen detection we will review new diagnostic technologies. Finally, we discuss whether use of empirical TB treatment offsets the potential impact and reduces the need for new diagnostics.


Transients in speech and other acoustic signals are usually irregular and very difficult to analyze because of their short and nondeterministic duration. Therefore the traditional Fourier analysis technique does not give satisfying results. The classical Gabor technique uses a Gaussian waveform window. However, it is not numerically stable and it has slow convergence. In order to do time‐frequency analysis of acoustic signals, a window transform is proposed that is derived from a Gaussian using the Zak transform. The resulting window possesses good locality properties in both the time and frequency domains. The computational procedure, which based on the FFT algorithm, is robust and fast. It will be shown that transform yields accurate estimates of onset and offset times for periodic and aperiodic signals as well as for vowel centers and the ramp frequencies of formant transitions.


In all countries of the European Union domestic work performed by migrant women, often in an irregular legal status, is increasing. Many workers face poor living and exploitative working conditions. Over the last decades, migrant domestic workers and advocacy organizations have developed multi-level strategies to improve those living and working conditions. In the contribution different and sometimes contradicting strategies of how a European network of migrant domestic workers and other actors mobilize will be identified and analyzed. It will be argued that the resonance the network achieved in the European Union was ambivalent and encompassed unintended consequences: On the one hand it allowed structural access to EU policy makers but on the other hand it narrowed down the political opportunities due to a fusion of migration policies and security policies.


Background Problem-based learning (PBL) was introduced in Malawi in 2002 in order to improve the nursing education system and respond to the acute nursing human resources shortage. However, its implementation has been very slow throughout the country. Objectives The objectives of the study were to explore and describe the goals that were identified by the college to facilitate the implementation of PBL, the resources of the organisation that facilitated the implementation of PBL, the factors related to sources of students that facilitated the implementation of PBL, and the influence of the external system of the organisation on facilitating the implementation of PBL, and to identify critical success factors that could guide the implementation of PBL in nursing education in Malawi. Method This is an ethnographic, exploratory and descriptive qualitative case study. Purposive sampling was employed to select the nursing college, participants and documents for review. Three data collection methods, including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and document reviews, were used to collect data. The four steps of thematic analysis were used to analyse data from all three sources. Results Four themes and related subthemes emerged from the triangulated data sources. The first three themes and their subthemes are related to the characteristics related to successful implementation of PBL in a human resource-constrained nursing college, whilst the last theme is related to critical success factors that contribute to successful implementation of PBL in a human resource-constrained country like Malawi. Conclusion This article shows that implementation of PBL is possible in a human resource-constrained country if there is political commitment and support.


Acid formation in Aspergillus niger is known to be subjected to tight regulation, and the acid production profiles are fine-tuned to respond to the ambient pH. Based on transcriptome data, putative trans-acting pH responding transcription factors were listed and through knock out studies, mutants exhibiting an oxalate overproducing phenotype were identified. The yield of oxalate was increased up to 158% compared to the wild type and the corresponding transcription factor was therefore entitled Oxalic Acid repression Factor, OafA. Detailed physiological characterization of one of the ΔoafA mutants, compared to the wild type, showed that both strains produced substantial amounts of gluconic acid, but the mutant strain was more efficient in re-uptake of gluconic acid and converting it to oxalic acid, particularly at high pH (pH 5.0). Transcriptional profiles showed that 241 genes were differentially expressed due to the deletion of oafA and this supported the argument of OafA being a trans-acting transcription factor. Furthermore, expression of two phosphoketolases was down-regulated in the ΔoafA mutant, one of which has not previously been described in fungi. It was argued that the observed oxalate overproducing phenotype was a consequence of the efficient re-uptake of gluconic acid and thereby a higher flux through glycolysis. This results in a lower flux through the pentose phosphate pathway, demonstrated by the down-regulation of the phosphoketolases. Finally, the physiological data, in terms of the specific oxygen consumption, indicated a connection between the oxidative phosphorylation and oxalate production and this was further substantiated through transcription analysis.


The paper presents an application of a recently developed adaptive posicast controller (APC) for time-delay systems to the idle speed control (ISC) problem in spark ignition (SI) internal combustion (IC) engines. The objective is to regulate the engine speed to a prescribed set-point in the presence of accessory load torque disturbances such as those due to air conditioning and power steering. The adaptive controller, integrated with the existing proportional spark controller, is used to drive the electronic throttle actuator. We present both simulation and experimental results demonstrating the performance improvement by employing the adaptive controller. We also present the modifications and improvements to the controller structure which were developed during the course of experimentation to solve specific problems. In addition, the potential for the reduction in calibration time and effort which can be achieved with our approach is discussed.


The paper reviews and explains a new course format at West Virginia University. The content of this course focuses on initiating exporting by companies located in the home state of the university. The attendees include university students and representatives of companies that are interested in starting to export. The content of the course and the participation by company representatives created the need for an atypical delivery of Friday evenings and all day Saturday meeting at two to four week intervals between class sessions. Practical exporting experience is shared by experts from the Department of Commerce, the Export Council, and representative of companies that are successful exporters. As noted in the paper the dynamics of the course delivery as well as the practical nature of the content leads to substantial student learning while promoting the economic benefits of exporting to the companies in particular and the state economy in general.


Within this project methods for the preparation of the unnatural nucleic acids 3'-O-Methyl-pRNA and pDNA (3'-Desoxy-pRNA) were developed. The pairing properties of these two systems have been examined and compared with that of pRNA. All of the three systems do follow the same pairing rules. Pairing has been observed only on the Watson-Crick side forming duplexes in antiparallel direction. All three systems are autonomous pairing systems that do not interact with RNA or DNA. In this series pRNA forms the most stable duplexes. Nucleobase 9H-purin-2,6-diamin instead of adenin and 5-methyl-cytosine instead of cytosine were introduced to increase the stability of pDNA duplexes. A solution structure of the self-complementary pDNA sequence [MGAATTMG]2 was elucidated by NMR. It shows an antiparallel duplex twisted against the major groove with sligthly lefthanded helicity. In analogy to pRNA the interstrand stacking predominates with a inclination angel of approximately 45°. Proceeding form the NMR structure a MD simulation was performed, in which the duplex has strongly bent after a regeneration time of 1.5 ns; this bent shape was conserved during the remaining simulation time of 4.0 ns. Using automated solid phase synthesis pDNA/RNA hybrid sequences were prepared. Examining the pairing strength, the RNA-2'—>4'-pDNA linkage at the pDNA/RNA interface was observed to lead to more stable duplexes than the RNA-3'—>4'-pDNA linkage did. This kind of pDNA/RNA structures have been used to replace structure defining elements like hairpins or stem motifs by pDNA-duplexes in complex RNA structures. From the FMN binding RNA aptamer an analogous pDNA/RNA construct has been prepared, that was built of two hybrid sequences. The binding of FMN in the pDNA/RNA construct was shown by fluorescence spectroscopy and the dissociation constant K0 = 2.6·10-7 M was calculated. Using the same strategy a pDNA/RNA construct of the hammerhead ribozyme was prepared, having substrate cleavage activity in analogy to the natural ribozyme. Cleavage properties of the pDNA/RNA construct at different Mg2+ and Mn2+ concentrations and at different reaction temperatures showed the same trend as those from the natural ribozyme did. Under all measured conditions, the natural ribozyme was about 1.5 times as active as the pDNA/RNA construct. Additional functional groups were introduced at different positions of the pDNA/RNA hybrid sequences using a pre-functionalized 6'-bromopentyl allofuranosyl building bloc on which the bromide was substituted with MeNH2 resp. EtSH after solid phase synthesis. 25 different functionalized pDNA/RNA ribozyme constructs could be built up in a combinatorial way. From 17 out of the 25 constructs, the cleavage kinetics was measured and the cleavage rate evaluated. The substitution pattern of the most active pDNA/RNA ribozyme analogue was applied on the hammerhead RNA sequence and the doubly methylamino-substituted construct prepared. Compared to the natural hammerhead ribozyme, the cleavage rates of this construct were higher with a factor of 2.0 - 3.3 under all measured conditions.


This study describes the development of path loss prediction model for smooth and convex surfaces terrains in Malaysian environment. The measurement system consists of a spectrum analyzer and a log-periodic antenna. A computer program was developed to acquire measured field strength data from the spectrum analyzer and convert the values to path loss using Agilent Visual Engineering Environment (VEE). Both line-of-sight propagation (for smooth terrain) and non-line-of-sight propagation (for convex surface terrains) was investigated in the Serdang area. The measured path losses was compared with various path loss prediction models such as free space loss (FSL), plane earth loss (PEL), Walfisch-Ikegami LOS (WI), Epstein-Peterson (E-P), Deygout (D), Edward-Durkin (E-D), Blomquist-Ladell (B-L) and Giovanelli (G). The results show that these entire models gave unsatisfactory results when compared with the measured path losses, where for smooth terrain, the FSL, PEL and WI models overestimated the path loss as high as 72%, 70% and 23%, respectively and for single and double convex surfaces terrains, the E-P, D, E-D, B-L and G models overestimated the path loss as high as 25% in all measurement frequencies. Because of and an improved version of the E-P and G models have been developed to suit these three regions and the accuracy of these entire models was tested where the mean error values were found to be approximately 5% for all the measurement frequencies. An integrated UPMPL path loss model for both smooth and convex surfaces terrains has been developed and implemented using Agilent VEE. The UPMPL program provides the utility for calculating the signal characteristics of radio propagation paths and is realized in the run time format version. This program consists of four algorithms which are conversion formulas, smooth terrain, single convex surface terrain and double convex surfaces terrain.


Mercenary armies have long been stigmatized as profiteering opportunists devoid of any allegiance to the cause for which they fight. Today's mercenaries still fight for money, but in the context of global capitalism, some groups are becoming less morally objectionable. The organization of mercenaries into corporations that function like consulting firms has put distance between them and their activities. Mercenary corporations' increasing efficiency and self-regulation is influencing the way legitimate governments view mercenaries as instruments of state policy. Scanning the names of prominent mercenary groups, their corporate nature is immediately apparent. Sandline International, the now-disbanded Executive Outcomes (EO), Military Professional Resources, Inc. (MPRI)--these private military companies (PMCs) are all located in developed countries and sell their expertise and manpower to those who need it, just like consulting firms. Despite the prevailing distaste for mercenaries, the record of these companies speaks to their potential for resolving conflicts and establishing peace and order in countries that would otherwise be ignored by the world's leading powers. For example, both EO and Sandline were hired on separate occasions by President Ahmed Kabbah of Sierra Leone in his efforts to defeat the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), which had kept his democratically elected government from ruling the country. The initial deployment of EO in 1995 successfully quashed the rebel movement and maintained peace during the 1996 and 1997 elections. However, the withdrawal of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan due to the mercenaries' presence made it impossible for Kabbah to pay EO. The group's withdrawal led to a coup ousting Kabbah less than three months later. In 1998, Sandline was hired to finish what EO had started. Sandline's involvement in Sierra Leone again restored Kabbah to power, but controversy quickly arose in the United Kingdom when Sandline came under investigation by the Department of Customs and Excises for alleged violations of a UN arms embargo in Sierra Leone. The controversy only deepened when the company claimed that it had the support of the British High Commissioner in Sierra Leone and the tacit approval of the British Foreign Office. A House of Commons Select Committee inquiry eventually exonerated the company of wrongdoing, but only after a damaging political scandal in the British Foreign Office. Back in Sierra Leone, Sandline was forced to withdraw after a peace accord with the rebels was hastily signed and the RUF leader was installed as vice president under Kabbah. When further bloodshed followed Sandline's withdrawal, British troops were sent in along with a UN peacekeeping force, where they remain today. The example of Sierra Leone shows that mercenaries can be an effective tool in ending conflict, but can also lead to further chaos if not part of a long-term plan. The question is whether they are better suited to such efforts than UN peacekeeping forces or those of other governments. As Sandline's former chief, Tim Spicer, said in the year 2000, "It was a darn sight cheaper for the British Government to pay us than the 350 million pounds it is costing us to maintain our troops and the UN operation. …


Railways are the most common mode of transportation for both people and cargo due to its advantages in economy, safety, and comfort. The finite element method has been broadly used for more than three decades to model the different components of the railroad system such as rails, sleepers (cross ties), and substructure and has been used to investigate a variety of problems associated with rail mechanics. Different multibody systems dynamics software programs have also been developed to investigate the dynamic performance and contact behaviour between the rails and the wheels and to determine the contact forces. In this work, a full three-dimensional model that couples both the finite element method and the multibody systems dynamics has been used to study the railroad system. The main focus of this study is to model the bridge approach problem under dynamic load. The bridge approach problem arises from the sudden change in the foundation's stiffness under the rails at the bridge entry and exit, leading to high levels of stress and settlement that can also cause further problems over time. The effect of using a concrete slab at the bridge entry is also investigated in this study, using two slab designs: rectangular and inclined. The results show the effectiveness of the three-dimensional model and slab implementation on the forces and the vertical deformation, especially the inclined slab that applies a gradual change in the stiffness rather than a sudden change.


Personalization is the task that aims at improving quality of products and services by adapting itself to the current user. In the context of automotive applications, personalization is not only about how drivers sets up the position of their seat or their favorite radio channels. Going beyond that, personalization is also about the preference of driving styles and the individual behaviors in every maneuver executions.
One key challenge in personalization is to be able to capture and understand the users from the historical data produced by the users. The data are usually presented in form of time series and in some cases, those time series can be remarkably long. Capturing and learning from such data poses a challenge for machine learning models.

To deal with this problem, this thesis presents an approach that makes uses of recurrent neural networks to capture the time series of behavioral data of drivers and predict theirs lane change intentions. In comparison to previous works, our approach is capable of predicting not only driver's intention as predefined discrete classes (i.e. left, right and lane keeping) but also as continuous values of the time left until the drivers cross the lane markings. This provides additional information for advanced driver-assistance systems to decide when to warn drivers and when to intervene.

There are two further aspects that need to be considered when developing a personalized assistance system: inter- and intra-personalization. The former refers to the differences between different users whereas the later indicates the changes in preferences in one user over time (i.e. the differences in driving styles when driving to work versus when being on a city sightseeing tour). In the scope of this thesis, both problems of inter- and intra-personalization are addressed and tackled. Our approach exploits the correlation in driving style between consecutively executed maneuvers to quickly derive the driver's current preferences. The introduced networks architecture outperforms non-personalized approaches in predicting the preference of driver when turning left. To tackle inter-personalization problems, this thesis makes use of the Siamese architecture with long short-term memory networks for identifying drivers based on vehicle dynamic information. The evaluation, which is carried out on real-world data set collected from 32 test drivers, shows that the network is able to identify unseen drivers. Further analysis on the trained network indicates that it identifies drivers by comparing their behaviors, especially the approaching and turning behaviors.


More deaths of elderly people relating to hot weather, a longer hay fever season, and more people with asthma are just some of the public health implications of climate change predicted for the United Kingdom by a detailed report published today by the Health Protection Agency.1

There will also be more flooding, more ultraviolet light, and a greater potential for exotic, disease carrying mosquitoes to invade the UK, says the HPA's report, unveiled at its annual conference in Warwick.

Temperatures in the UK have been rising by around 0.25°C a decade since the 1960s, while the amount of summer rainfall has decreased and that of winter rainfall has increased. It is predicted that the mean average temperature will rise by another 2°C to 5°C by 2080 and that heat waves will become more frequent. Southern-central and eastern England are expected to see the largest temperatures rises, with rises being most pronounced in urban areas.

Currently around 2000 people die prematurely in the UK a year …


The increasing cost of randomised controlled trials is hindering the rate at which new, effective therapies reach patients. To accelerate drug development, more efficient clinical trial designs are needed. One such design which has had success in speeding up the evaluation of therapies in cancer is the multi-arm multi-stage (MAMS) design. This particular design compares multiple new treatments against a control in a single trial, obviating the need for multiple two-arm studies, and ceases recruitment to poorly performing arms during the study. To further increase efficiency, interim assessments can be based on an intermediate outcome which is on the causal pathway to the primary outcome of the trial, thus allowing phases 2 and 3 of evaluation to be incorporated into a single, seamless design. The MAMS design was initially developed for trials in cancer where time to event outcomes are commonly used. To make it more widely applicable to other disease areas, we first extend the design to other types of outcome measure such as binary. The new designs are then applied to trials in tuberculosis --- a disease area with many new treatments currently in the clinical pipeline and which may therefore benefit from using more efficient trial designs. We then consider more general design issues such as familywise error rate and expected sample size and present calculations of both measures using simulation. Methods are developed for finding designs which have the desired overall operating characteristics and which are the most efficient under particular optimality criteria, known as admissible designs. Guidance is provided for choosing the number of stages and allocation ratio for a particular number of arms and we apply the methods developed in the thesis to existing and hypothetical MAMS trials. Throughout, Stata programs are created and updated to accommodate the use of the methods in practice.


Face-to-face social interactions enhance well-being. With the ubiquity of social media, important questions have arisen about the impact of online social interactions. In the present study, we assessed the associations of both online and offline social networks with several subjective measures of well-being. We used 3 waves (2013, 2014, and 2015) of data from 5,208 subjects in the nationally representative Gallup Panel Social Network Study survey, including social network measures, in combination with objective measures of Facebook use. We investigated the associations of Facebook activity and real-world social network activity with self-reported physical health, self-reported mental health, self-reported life satisfaction, and body mass index. Our results showed that overall, the use of Facebook was negatively associated with well-being. For example, a 1-standard-deviation increase in "likes clicked" (clicking "like" on someone else's content), "links clicked" (clicking a link to another site or article), or "status updates" (updating one's own Facebook status) was associated with a decrease of 5%-8% of a standard deviation in self-reported mental health. These associations were robust to multivariate cross-sectional analyses, as well as to 2-wave prospective analyses. The negative associations of Facebook use were comparable to or greater in magnitude than the positive impact of offline interactions, which suggests a possible tradeoff between offline and online relationships.


Adhesins from oral bacteria perform an important function in colonizing target tissues within the dentogingival cavity. In Porphyromonas gingivalis certain of these adhesion proteins exist as a complex with either of two major proteinases referred to as gingipain R (arginine-specific gingipain) and gingipain K (lysine-specific gingipain) (R. N. Pike, W. T. McGraw, J. Potempa, and J. Travis, J. Biol. Chem. 269:406-411, 1994). With specific proteinase inhibitors, it was shown that hemagglutination by either proteinase-adhesin complex could occur independently of proteinase activity. Significantly, low concentrations of fibrinogen, fibronectin, and laminin inhibited hemagglutination, indicating that adherence to these proteins and not the hemagglutination activity was a primary property of the adhesin activity component of complexes. Binding studies with gingipain K and gingipain R suggest that interaction with fibrinogen is a major function of the adhesin domain, with dissociation constants for binding to fibrinogen being 4 and 8.5 nM, respectively. Specific association with fibronectin and laminin was also found. All bound proteins were degraded by the functional proteinase domain, with gingipain R being more active on laminin and fibronectin and gingipain K being more effective in the digestion of fibrinogen. Cumulatively, these data suggest that gingipain R and gingipain K, acting as proteinase-adhesin complexes, progressively attach to, degrade, and detach from target proteins. Since such complexes appear to be present on the surfaces of both vesicles and membranes of P. gingivalis, they may play an important role in the attachment of this bacterium to host cell surfaces.


Identification of driver mutations can lead to a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms associated with cancer. This can be a first step towards developing diagnostic and prognostic markers. Various driver mutation prediction tools rely on different algorithm for prediction and hence there is little consensus in the predictions. The input and output formats vary across the tools. It has been suggested that an ensemble approach that takes into account various prediction scores might perform better. There is a need for a tool that can run multiple such tools on a dataset in a more accessible and modular manner, whose output can then be combined to select consensus drivers. We developed wrappers for various driver mutation predictions tools using Galaxy based framework. In order to perform predictions using multiple tools on the same dataset, we also developed Galaxy based workflows to convert VCF format to tool specific formats. The tools are publicly available at: https://github.com/saketkc/galaxy_tools The workflows are available at: https://github.com/saketkc/galaxy_tools/tree/master/workflows


We present an evaluation of a nested high-resolution Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS)-Chem chemistry transport model simulation of tropospheric chemistry over tropical South America. The model has been constrained with two isoprene emission inventories: (1) the canopy-scale Model of Emissions of Gases and Aerosols from Nature (MEGAN) and (2) a leaf-scale algorithm coupled to the Lund-Potsdam-Jena General Ecosystem Simulator (LPJ-GUESS) dynamic vegetation model, and the model has been run using two different chemical mechanisms that contain alternative treatments of isoprene photo-oxidation. Large differences of up to 100 Tg C yr^(−1) exist between the isoprene emissions predicted by each inventory, with MEGAN emissions generally higher. Based on our simulations we estimate that tropical South America (30–85°W, 14°N–25°S) contributes about 15–35% of total global isoprene emissions. We have quantified the model sensitivity to changes in isoprene emissions, chemistry, boundary layer mixing, and soil NO_x emissions using ground-based and airborne observations. We find GEOS-Chem has difficulty reproducing several observed chemical species; typically hydroxyl concentrations are underestimated, whilst mixing ratios of isoprene and its oxidation products are overestimated. The magnitude of model formaldehyde (HCHO) columns are most sensitive to the choice of chemical mechanism and isoprene emission inventory. We find GEOS-Chem exhibits a significant positive bias (10–100%) when compared with HCHO columns from the Scanning Imaging Absorption Spectrometer for Atmospheric Chartography (SCIAMACHY) and Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) for the study year 2006. Simulations that use the more detailed chemical mechanism and/or lowest isoprene emissions provide the best agreement to the satellite data, since they result in lower-HCHO columns.


KEY BENEFIT: A conceptual approach to C and Unix programming with hands-on examples. KEY TOPICS: Readers are introduced to commonly used system tools (libraries, debuggers, system calls, shells and scripting languages) and an explanation of how to utilize these tools to optimize program development. The text also examines lower level data types with an emphasis on memory and understanding how and why different data types are used. MARKET: Ideal for introductory programmers.


NASA has embarked on a new program designed to improve the reliability of NASA systems. In this context, the goal for the ultra-reliability program is to ultimately improve the systems by an order of magnitude. The approach outlined in this presentation involves five steps: 1. Divide NASA systems into seven sectors; 2, establish sector champions and representatives from each NASA center; 3. develop a challenge list for each sector using a team of NASA experts in each area with the sector champion facilitating the effort; 4. develop mitigation strategies for each of the sectors' challenge lists and rank their importance by holding a workshop with area experts from government (NASA and non-NASA), universities and industry; 5. develop a set of tasks for each sector in order of importance for improving the reliability of NASA systems. Several NASA-wide workshops have been held, identifying issues for reliability improvement and providing mitigation strategies for these issues. Results from these workshops are presented.


The historic campuses of Historically Black Colleges and Universities inform a story that no other setting can tell. Since before the Civil War, through Reconstruction and the Civil Rights movement, and still today, these institutions have served as the backdrop for this country's greatest social justice struggles. They have functioned as free spaces and safe havens—places of reprieve from discrimination and inequity—where young African Americans were given the confidence and support to become leaders, innovators, and historymakers. Throughout history, these incredible institutions have nurtured an environment of empowerment, cultural reinforcement, and acceptance that has had immeasurable impacts on the lives of the students who walked their historic halls. The HBCU story, in its breadth over 150 years and across 20 states, celebrates both struggle and achievement, while foregrounding the role of education in the pursuit of racial justice. While it would be misleading to treat all HBCUs as a monolith—as they are large and small, public and private, well-funded and underfunded—it has been well documented than many HBCUs struggle with financial sustainability. This is in large part due to the double-bottom line of the HBCU mission—HBCUs seek to provide affordable access to higher education, principally to low-income and first generation students, students who were ill-served by their K-12 education, and communities that have been historically excluded from education. Despite making up less than 3% of all post-secondary institutions and enrolling only 8% of all African American students, HBCUs are responsible for 20% of all African American graduates. Their impact is undeniable. The economic and social realities that attend this noble mission demand a different frame of reference for understanding HBCU decision-making. HBCUs face the same challenges as any institution of higher education, but their mission calls them to a greater social purpose. On top of this charge, HBCUs also steward a heritage that is irreplaceable and vital to a true telling of this country's history. In the necessary balancing of often-competing priorities, such as institutional advancement, mission benefit, and preservation, too often the spaces that contribute meaning and depth to the campus landscape are neglected, altered, or demolished. At a moment when HBCU heritage is attracting national attention, this thesis presents the heritage work of HBCUs within its own context. This thesis makes the case for the internal integration of preservation planning into general campus planning, while laying the groundwork for further study and implementation. Preservation planning is a critical tool that can help these institutions navigate the difficult negotiations between growth and preservation by building internal capacity for responsible stewardship and creating appropriate processes for considering historic resources. As well, this process encourages a broader campus awareness and appreciation of historic campus resources. Campus heritage needs to be repositioned as an asset—an investment that strengthens the institution by reinforcing its noble historic mission.


We study the convergence of Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) for strongly convex objective functions. We prove for all $t$ a lower bound on the expected convergence rate after the $t$-th SGD iteration; the lower bound is over all possible sequences of diminishing step sizes. It implies that recently proposed sequences of step sizes at ICML 2018 and ICML 2019 are {\em universally} close to optimal in that the expected convergence rate after {\em each} iteration is within a factor $32$ of our lower bound. This factor is independent of dimension $d$. We offer a framework for comparing with lower bounds in state-of-the-art literature and when applied to SGD for strongly convex objective functions our lower bound is a significant factor $775\cdot d$ larger compared to existing work.


The worst-case model for algorithm design does not always reflect the real world: inputs may have additional structure to be exploited, and sometimes data can be imprecise or become available only gradually. To better understand these situations, we examine several scenarios where additional information can affect the design and analysis of geometric algorithms. First, we consider hereditary convex hulls: given a three-dimensional convex polytope and a two-coloring of its vertices, we can find the individual monochromatic polytopes in linear expected time. This can be generalized in many ways, eg, to more than two colors, and to the offline-problem where we wish to preprocess a polytope so that any large enough subpolytope can be found quickly. Our techniques can also be used to give a simple analysis of the self-improving algorithm for planar Delaunay triangulations by Clarkson and Seshadhri [58]. Next, we assume that the point coordinates have a bounded number of bits, and that we can do standard bit manipulations in constant time. Then Delaunay triangulations can be found in expected time O(n √ log log n). Our result is based on a new connection between quadtrees and Delaunay triangulations, which also lets us generalize a recent result by Loffler and Snoeyink about Delaunay triangulations for imprecise points [110]. Finally, we consider randomized incremental constructions when the input permutation is generated by a bounded-degree Markov chain, and show that the resulting running time is almost optimal for chains with a constant eigenvalue gap.


This SIG focuses on the engineering of automation in interactive critical systems. Automation has already been studied in a number of (sub-) disciplines and application fields: design, human factors, psychology, (software) engineering, aviation, health care, games. One distinguishing feature of the area we are focusing on is that in the field of interactive critical systems properties such as reliability, dependability and fault-tolerance are as important as usability or user experience. The SIG targets at two problem areas: first the engineering of the user interaction with (partly-) autonomous systems: how to design, build and assess autonomous behavior, especially in cases where there is a need to represent on the user interface both autonomous and interactive objects. An example of such integration is the representation of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) (where no direct interaction is possible), together with aircrafts (that have to be instructed by an air traffic controller to avoid the UAV). Second the design and engineering of user interaction in general for autonomous objectssystems (for example a cruise control in a car or an autopilot in an aircraft). The goal of the SIG is to raise interest in the CHI community on these aspects and to identify a community of researchers and practitioners interested in those more and more prominent issues of interfaces for interactive critical systems. The expected audience should be interested in addressing the issues of integration of mainly unconnected research domains to formulate a new joint research agenda.


This paper represents classical propositional proofs as *combinatorial proofs*, which are more abstract than proof nets: superposition (contraction/weakening) is modelled mathematically, as a lax form of fibration, rather than syntactically (as in proof nets, which involve contraction and weakening nodes). A combinatorial proof is a `fibred' multiplicative linear proof net, hence the slogan in the title. Cut elimination retains its richness from sequent calculus: its non-determinism does not collapse to become confluent. [Note: this is merely a 2-page synopsis, accepted for a short presentation at Logic in Computer Science '05.]


Modern Urban and Regional Economics explains the spatial economic underpinnings of the behaviour of urban and regional economies in order to highlight the differences between the two types of economy. The explicitly spatial approach enables the author to present both urban economics and regional economics within a single integrated framework, using clear model-based explanations from first principles and extensive graphic illustration of the theories discussed. Online Resource Centre For Lecturers: PowerPoints Figures from the book For Students: Questions and cases


Intersecting pairs of simultaneously active faults with opposing slip sense present geometrical and kinematic problems. Such faults rarely offset each other but usually merge into a single fault, even when they have displacements of many kilometers. The space problems involved are solved by lengthening the merged fault (zippering up the conjugate faults) or splitting it (unzippering). This process can operate in thrust, normal, and strike-slip fault settings. Examples of conjugate pairs of large-scale strike-slip faults that may have zippered up include the Garlock and San Andreas faults in California (USA), the North and East Anatolian faults (Turkey), the Karakoram and Altyn Tagh faults (Tibet), and the Tonale and Giudicarie faults (southern Alps). Intersecting conjugate ductile shear zones behave in the same way on outcrop and micro-scales. Zippering may produce complex and significant patterns of strain and rotation in the surrounding rocks, depending on the angle between the faults and the relative strength of the blocks they bound. A zippered fault will have a slip rate equal to the vector sum of the slip rates on the merging faults, unless that displacement is transferred into or out of the system by distributed strain in the surrounding rocks.


This study highlights the spatial and temporal impacts of climate change on rice–wheat cropping systems, focusing on irrigation water requirement (IWR) in the Bagmati River Basin of Nepal. The outputs from a general circulation model (HadCM3) for two selected scenarios (A2 and B2) of IPCC and for three time periods (2020s, 2050s, and 2080s) have been downscaled and compared to a baseline climatology. CROPWAT 8.0 model is used to estimate the water requirements. IWRs show different trends in different physiographic regions and different growth stages of rice and wheat. A decreasing trend of IWRs in the Mid Hills and the High Hills indicates that farmer-based small irrigation schemes are sufficient to meet the requirements. However, in the Terai region, where there is an increasing trend in IWRs, the deficit volume of water needs to be supplied from potential large-scale irrigation schemes.


Abstract Background Many clinical trials have evaluated the oxidative stress reduction and enhancement of antioxidant status following yogic practices, but a review has not been reported earlier. Present study is designed to systematically review the effect of yogic practices on oxidative stress and antioxidant status. Content Using the MEDLINE, EMBASE SCOPEMED, and Indian database electronic searches were performed through August 2016 using the keywords yoga AND oxidative stress OR antioxidant which yielded 97 studies. Selections were made to include only experimental studies written in English, published in peer-reviewed journals and investigating the effects of regular yogic practices on oxidative stress and antioxidant status in these studies. Summary and outlook Search yielded a total of 97 trials, 11 met rigorous criteria for final systematic review. Healthy population showed overall enhancement of antioxidant status and reduced oxidative stress following yogic practices. Diabetic patients showed increased glutathione, vitamin C content and superoxide dismutase activity and decreased malondialdehyde content following yogic practices. Prediabetic and hypertensive patients showed reduced malondialdehyde content following yogic practices. Renal disease patients showed decreased protein oxidation, and increased superoxide dismutase activity following yogic practices. Regular yogic practices can improve antioxidants and reduce oxidative stress in healthy, diabetic, prediabetic, hypertensive and renal disease patients. Studies on other disease population have rarely been reported and studies are very few to conclude strongly.


With the advent of PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants), smart phones, and other forms of mobile and ubiquitous computers, our computing resources are increasingly moving off of our desktops and into our everyday lives. However, the software and user interfaces for these devices are generally very similar to that of their desktop counterparts, despite the radically different and dynamic environments that they face. We propose that to better assist their users, such devices should be able to sense, react to, and utilise, the user's current environment or context. That is, they should become context-aware. In this thesis we investigate context-awareness at three levels: user interfaces, applications, and supporting architectures/frameworks. To promote the use of context-awareness, and to aid its deployment in software, we have developed two supporting frameworks. The first is an application-oriented framework called stick-e notes. Based on an electronic version of the common Post-It Note, stick-e notes enable the attachment of any electronic resource (e.g. a text file, movie, Java program, etc.) to any type of context (e.g. location, temperature, time, etc.). The second framework we devised seeks to provide a more universal support for the capture, manipulation, and representation of context information. We call it the Context Information Service (CIS). It fills a similar role in context-aware software development as GUI libraries do in user interface development. Our applications research explored how context-awareness can be exploited in real environments with real users. In particular, we developed a suite of PDA-based context-aware tools for fieldworkers. These were used extensively by a group of ecologists in Africa to record observations of giraffe and rhinos in a remote Kenyan game reserve. These tools also provided the foundations for our HCI work, in which we developed the concept of the Minimal Attention User Interface (MAUI). The aim of the MAUI is to reduce the attention required by the user in operating a device by carefully selecting input/output modes that are harmonious to their tasks and environment. To evaluate our ideas and applications a field study was conducted in which over forty volunteers used our system for data collection activities over the course of a summer season at the Kenyan game reserve. The PDA-based tools were unanimously preferred to the paper-based alternatives, and the context-aware features were cited as particular reasons for preferring them. In summary, this thesis presents two frameworks to support context-aware software, a set of applications demonstrating how context-awareness can be utilised in the ''real world'', and a set of HCI guidelines and principles that help in creating user interfaces that fit to their context of use.


To consider look at the effects of legal liability as it pertains to Internet Intermediaries. Such examples would include defamation and copyright violations on ISP's where a subscriber has breached their legal obligations as well as the hosting of illicit materials (such as child porn).

In carrying out my project my aim is to:

1. Analyse English law as it relates to Internet Intermediary liability.

2. Review the current cases.

3. Consider the opinions of practitioners, academics, the Law Commission and the press/public.

4. Analyse reforms/proposals for reform in other jurisdictions and the changes to the EU and the consequential effects that this will have on Internet Intermediaries.

5. Suggest how, if reform is needed, this should be effected.

6. Detail the Impact of Internet Intermediary Liability across different groups and the economy.


The prevalence of obesity has received global attention in recent years, and lipid consumption has been considered as one of the direct reasons for obesity and related diseases. However, increasing evidence has indicated that edible vegetable oils could exert non-negligible physiological benefits in the daily diet, including suppression of appetite, lowering of blood lipids, prevention of adipocyte synthesis, and reduction of inflammatory response. Bioactive phytochemicals in lipids and oils, such as tocopherol, phenolic compounds, and phytosterol, play an important role in these effects according to in vitro and in vivo studies. For these reasons, the present review focusses on minor bioactive components in oil and their anti-obesity effects, aiming to provide a systematic overview of the relationships between these minor components and obesity and related diseases.


Decision trees have been widely used as classifiers in many machine learning applications thanks to their lightweight and interpretable decision process. This paper introduces Tree in Tree decision graph (TnT), a framework that extends the conventional decision tree to a more generic and powerful directed acyclic graph. TnT constructs decision graphs by recursively growing decision trees inside the internal or leaf nodes instead of greedy training. The time complexity of TnT is linear to the number of nodes in the graph, and it can construct decision graphs on large datasets. Compared to decision trees, we show that TnT achieves better classification performance with reduced model size, both as a stand-alone classifier and as a base estimator in bagging/AdaBoost ensembles. Our proposed model is a novel, more efficient, and accurate alternative to the widely-used decision trees.


Dynein light chain 8 (LC8) interacts with intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) and influences a wide range of biological processes. It is becoming apparent that among the numerous IDPs that interact with LC8, many contain multiple LC8-binding sites. Although it is established that LC8 forms parallel IDP duplexes with some partners, such as nucleoporin Nup159 and dynein intermediate chain, the molecular details of these interactions and LC8's interactions with other diverse partners remain largely uncharacterized. LC8 dimers could bind in either a paired "in-register" or a heterogeneous off-register manner to any of the available sites on a multivalent partner. Here, using NMR chemical shift perturbation, analytical ultracentrifugation, and native electrospray ionization MS, we show that LC8 forms a predominantly in-register complex when bound to an IDP domain of the multivalent regulatory protein ASCIZ. Using saturation transfer difference NMR, we demonstrate that at substoichiometric LC8 concentrations, the IDP domain preferentially binds to one of the three LC8 recognition motifs. Further, the differential dynamic behavior for the three sites and the size of the fully bound complex confirmed an in-register complex. Dynamics measurements also revealed that coupling between sites depends on the linker length separating these sites. These results identify linker length and motif specificity as drivers of in-register binding in the multivalent LC8–IDP complex assembly and the degree of compositional and conformational heterogeneity as a promising emerging mechanism for tuning of binding and regulation.


The imaging speed of conventional OCT is limited to a few hundred A-scans/s. We report on two new OCT techniques based on transverse scanning and on spectral interferometry that overcome these limitations, allowing to record retinal images with ultrahigh speed and to acquire 3D data sets within ~ 1 sec.


The aim of this manuscript is to provide the mathematical and statistical foundations of actuarial learning. This is key to most actuarial tasks like insurance pricing, product development, claims reserving and risk management. The basic approach to these tasks is regression modeling. This manuscript describes the exponential dispersion family which is the most commonly used family of distributions in actuarial modeling. It discusses model fitting and parameter estimation using classical tools from mathematical statistics. It then introduces the crucial tools for prediction and forecast evaluation. Based on these statistical concepts various regression models are studied such as generalized linear models, mixture models and neural network regression models. We explore these modeling approaches from a theoretical and a practical viewpoint on publicly available data and we discuss their applications to insurance modeling. This involves model fitting using Fisher's scoring method, gradient descent algorithms or the expectation-maximization algorithm, model selection, parameter selection, regularization, etc.


MICRO, MESO AND MACRO MATERIAL PROCESSING USING HIGH-SPEED LIQUID PROJECTILES by Veljko Samardzic The objective of this research is development of a knowledge base of materials processing by the impact of high-speed liquid projectiles. The work involved experimental study of generation and applications of high-speed liquid projectiles. The projectiles were generated by the launchers, which used gunpowder as an energy source. The experiments were carried out at the low (0.35g of the powder), middle (I.2g) and high (10g to 70g) levels of energy consumptions and at several different launchers modification. Experimental investigation of effect of gun powder mass on energy of projectile was conducted for ductile and brittle targets. An array of experimental techniques for projectile's external ballistics investigation was developed. Laser Particle Velocitimeter (PIV) and high speed filming were used for velocity measurements and visualization of images of water projectiles high speed filming revealed pulsing nature of projectile. A piezoelectric sensor and a pendulum were used to monitor the impact force and the projectile momentum. Range of materials was investigated in this study. Namely, investigation of deformation, forming, micro-forming, and welding of ductile materials was carried out. Demolition and boring of brittle materials was performed. Modes and mechanisms of deformation of ductile and brittle materials were studied and explained. High plasticity, high rate of deformation, temperature at the impact zone, hardness and micro-hardness distribution and degree of deformation work for ductile materials were determined and materials behavior knowledge base needed for materials processing was acquired. Modes and mechanisms of failure of ductile, brittle and composite materials were studied. Fractography study revealed three mechanisms: ductile overload fracture, brittle fracture and combination of the two. Six failure modes: brittle fracture, radial fracture, ductile hole growth, plugging, fragmentation and petaling were identified. An array of material processing operations using high speed projectiles impact was investigated. Full scale experimental investigation of terminal ballistics of high speed water projectiles was performed. Material processing operations included: piercing of metals, piercing of composite targets, explosive set ups neutralization, demolition of brittle materials, boring of granite and marble, punching of steel plates, complex shape punching in steel, forging of metals on macro and meso scale. Mechanisms of punching and forming of metals were identified and proposed. Welding of similar and dissimilar metals was conducted and high potential for novel stitch and spot welding formations was confirmed. Micro scale materials processing investigation involved range of studies. Submilimeter geometry scale forming of metals, fine stamping, micron scale forming and micron scale extrusion investigation were conducted and validation of novel technologies was achieved. Full scale topography and surface characterization of generated geometries was conducted and obtained quality proved to be at a competitive level with existing technologies. State of the art methods were used for investigation of generated samples. Scanning electron microscopy, infinite focus microscopy, 3 D digital microscopy, optical microscopy, 3-D digital profiler, Knoop and Vickers micro hardness testers, nano hardness indenter were used for characterization of generated samples. Full scale characterization on all levels of conducted materials processing was conducted and effect of high speed water projectile impact on mechanical properties of impacted materials was quantified and presented. Investigation of peculiarities of impact based micro-forming was conducted. The info acquired as result of investigation of geometry and topography of micro-forming processing. Accuracy of micro scale deformation was estimated, particularly it was shown that deviation of actual part from the die was at the acceptable level. Also was shown that size of generated parts was rather stable and roughness and waviness of the generated surfaces was in the acceptable range. The foundation of knowledge base for liquid based forming, welding and demolition processes was developed and the process technology will be developed on the base of the acquired knowledge. Theory of impact based high rate material deformation was enhanced. The emerging industrial scale demolition, forming and welding technologies will utilize the acquired knowledge. MICRO, MESO AND MACRO MATERIALS PROCESSING USING HIGH-SPEED LIQUID PROJECTILES


We study the verification problem for closed-loop dynamical systems with neural-network controllers (NNCS). This problem is commonly reduced to computing the set of reachable states. When considering dynamical systems and neural networks in isolation, there exist precise approaches for that task based on set representations respectively called Taylor models and zonotopes. However, the combination of these approaches to NNCS is non-trivial because, when converting between the set representations, dependency information gets lost in each control cycle and the accumulated approximation error quickly renders the result useless. We present an algorithm to chain approaches based on Taylor models and zonotopes, yielding a precise reachability algorithm for NNCS. Because the algorithm only acts at the interface of the isolated approaches, it is applicable to general dynamical systems and neural networks and can benefit from future advances in these areas. Our implementation delivers state-of-the-art performance and is the first to successfully analyze all benchmark problems of an annual reachability competition for NNCS.


63 species of the thelephoroid fungi (Basidiomycota) are reported from the Sverdlovsk region (Russia), including fifteen new species for the region. One of them, Phellodon secretus is reported for the first time from Russia. This study is based on 931 collections and observations, as well as on literature data. The most frequent species are Hydnellum aurantiacum, H. ferrugineum, Sarcodon imbricatus, S. squamosus, Thelephora palmata, Th. terrestris, Tomentella bryophila, T. ellisii, T. ferruginea, T. radiosa, T. sublilacina . These species comprise 52% of all observations, but only 17.5% of all species found in the region. Nine species (14.3%) were collected only once, seven species (11.1%) twice, and six species (9.5%) three times, respectively. Some rare species are also infreguently collected in other regions of Russia, viz.  Amaurodon cyaneus, A. mustialaensis, Hydnellum auratile, H. geogenium, H. peckii, Pseudotomentella flavovirens, P. nigra, Tomentella galzinii, T. viridula . The highest richness of species was in the southernmost areas of the region, esp. in mixed or broad-leaved forests. Only 4.8% of the total number of the species has been recorded in all biogeographical provinces and 20.6% of species were found only in one province.


We present a novel and uniform formulation of the problem of reinforcement learning against bounded memory adaptive adversaries in repeated games, and the methodologies to accomplish learning in this novel framework. First we delineate a novel strategic definition of best response that optimises rewards over multiple steps, as opposed to the notion of tactical best response in game theory. We show that the problem of learning a strategic best response reduces to that of learning an optimal policy in a Markov Decision Process (MDP). We deal with both finite and infinite horizon versions of this problem. We adapt an existing Monte Carlo based algorithm for learning optimal policies in such MDPs over finite horizon, in polynomial time. We show that this new efficient algorithm can obtain higher average rewards than a previously known efficient algorithm against some opponents in the contract game. Though this improvement comes at the cost of increased domain knowledge, simple experiments in the Prisoner's Dilemma, and coordination games show that even when no extra domain knowledge (besides that an upper bound on the opponent's memory size is known) is assumed, the error can still be small. We also experiment with a general infinite-horizon learner (using function-approximation to tackle the complexity of history space) against a greedy bounded memory opponent and show that while it can create and exploit opportunities of mutual cooperation in the Prisoner's Dilemma game, it is cautious enough to ensure minimax payoffs in the Rock–Scissors–Paper game.


Real-world data often exhibits long tail distributions with heavy class imbalance, where the majority classes can dominate the training process and alter the decision bound-aries of the minority classes. Recently, researchers have in-vestigated the potential of supervised contrastive learning for long-tailed recognition, and demonstrated that it provides a strong performance gain. In this paper, we show that while supervised contrastive learning can help improve performance, past baselines suffer from poor uniformity brought in by imbalanced data distribution. This poor uni-formity manifests in samples from the minority class having poor separability in the feature space. To address this problem, we propose targeted supervised contrastive learning (TSC), which improves the uniformity of the feature distribution on the hypersphere. TSC first generates a set of targets uniformly distributed on a hypersphere. It then makes the features of different classes converge to these distinct and uniformly distributed targets during training. This forces all classes, including minority classes, to main-tain a uniform distribution in the feature space, improves class boundaries, and provides better generalization even in the presence of long-tail data. Experiments on multi-ple datasets show that TSC achieves state-of-the-art performance on long-tailed recognition tasks.


With chip manufacturers such as Intel, IBM, and ARM offering native support for transactional memory in their instruction set architectures, memory transactions are on the verge of being considered a genuine application tool rather than just an interesting research topic. Despite this recent increase in popularity on the hardware side of transactional memory (HTM), software support for transactional memory (STM) is still scarce and the only compiler with transactional support currently available, the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC), does not generate code that achieves desirable performance. For hybrid solutions of TM (HyTM), which are frameworks that leverage the best aspects of HTM and STM, the subpar performance of the software side, caused by inefficient compiler generated code, might forbid HyTM to offer optimal results. This article extends previous work focused exclusively on STM implementations by presenting a detailed analysis of transactional code generated by GCC in the context of HybridTM implementations. In particular, it builds on previous research of transactional memory support in the Clang/LLVM compiler framework, which is decoupled from any TM runtime, and presents the following novel contributions: (a) it shows that STM's performance overhead, due to an excessive amount of read and write barriers added by the compiler, also impacts the performance of HyTM systems; and (b) it reveals the importance of the previously proposed annotation mechanism to reduce the performance gap between HTM and STM in phased runtime systems. Furthermore, it shows that, by correctly using the annotations on just a few lines of code, it is possible to reduce the total number of instrumented barriers by 95% and to achieve speed-ups of up to 7× when compared to the original code generated by GCC and the Clang compiler.1


Mesenchymal stem/stromal cells (MSCs) display potent immunomodulatory and regenerative capabilities through the secretion of bioactive factors, such as proteins, cytokines, chemokines as well as the release of extracellular vesicles (EVs). These functional properties of MSCs make them ideal candidates for the treatment of degenerative and inflammatory diseases, including multiple sclerosis (MS). MS is a heterogenous disease that is typically characterized by inflammation, demyelination, gliosis and axonal loss. In the current study, an induced experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) murine model of MS was utilized. At peak disease onset, animals were treated with saline, placenta-derived MSCs (PMSCs), as well as low and high doses of PMSC-EVs. Animals treated with PMSCs and high-dose PMSC-EVs displayed improved motor function outcomes as compared to animals treated with saline. Symptom improvement by PMSCs and PMSC-EVs led to reduced DNA damage in oligodendroglia populations and increased myelination within the spinal cord of treated mice. In vitro data demonstrate that PMSC-EVs promote myelin regeneration by inducing endogenous oligodendrocyte precursor cells to differentiate into mature myelinating oligodendrocytes. These findings support that PMSCs' mechanism of action is mediated by the secretion of EVs. Therefore, PMSC-derived EVs are a feasible alternative to cellular based therapies for MS, as demonstrated in an animal model of the disease.


In this dissertation we argue that the development of software for dedicated clusters requires a particular programming model in order to maximize runtime performance and programmer productivity. We define dedicated clusters as groups of computers connected by a local network, under a single administrative domain, which act as a single entity and do not perform any tasks unrelated to the cluster. We propose an alternative model, called infrastructural transparency, which offers the notion of virtual locations, or isolates, that are decoupled from physical locations, and guarantees that no application-level sharing occurs between programs hosted by isolates. The model also provides a location-independent communication infrastructure, a rich programmer interface form management of isolate lifecycle and resources, cluster-wide failure detection and coarse-grained failure handling. We present Crusoe, an execution environment for dedicated clusters that supports the proposed programming model. Crusoe offers cross-isolate method invocation abstractions as well as high level mechanisms for management of isolates through a uniformized interface based on futures and executors. Crusoe offers a flexible resource management API that uses isolates as units of resource accounting and allows to interpose on the handling of incoming remote invocations, in order to enforce resource management policies when strict isolation is traded for the ability to communicate. Crusoe also allows to interpose on the creation of isolates, thus enabling a variety of resource management and security policies. We present implementation techniques that allow to achieve a 8–70 fold performance improvement over Java RMI when communicating between isolates within a single operating system process.


Objectives The study examines whether hospital discharge practices and care-transition preparedness mediate the association between patients' cultural factors and readmissions. Methods A prospective study of internal medicine patients (n=599) examining a culturally diverse cohort, at a tertiary medical centre in Israel. The in-hospital baseline questionnaire included sociodemographic, cultural factors (Multidimensional Health Locus of Control, family collectivism, health literacy and minority status) and physical, mental and functional health status. A follow-up telephone survey assessed hospital discharge practices: use of the teach-back method, providers' cultural competence, at-discharge language concordance and caregiver presence and care-transition preparedness using the care transition measure (CTM). Clinical and administrative data, including 30-day readmissions to any hospital, were retrieved from the healthcare organisation's data warehouse. Multiple mediation was tested using Hayes's PROCESS procedure, model 80. Results A total of 101 patients (17%) were readmitted within 30 days. Multiple logistic regressions indicated that all cultural factors, except for minority status, were associated with 30-day readmission when no mediators were included (p<0.05). Multiple mediation analysis indicated significant indirect effects of the cultural factors on readmission through the hospital discharge practices and CTM. Finally, when the mediators were included, strong direct and indirect effects between minority status and readmission were found (B coefficient=−0.95; p=0.021). Conclusions The results show that the association between patients' cultural factors and 30-day readmission is mediated by the hospital discharge practices and care transition. Providing high-quality discharge planning tailored to patients' cultural characteristics is associated with better care-transition preparedness, which, in turn, is associated with reduced 30-day readmissions.


. Published data related to javelin throwers remain poorly documented. The objectives of this study were therefore to compare isokinetic strength profile of the shoulder rotator muscles between javelin throwers and sedentary persons and to correlate isokinetic data with different field performance parameters. Eleven male javelin throwers and ten sedentary subjects participated in the study. Shoulder internal (IRs) and external rotators (ERs) were isokinetically assessed at 60, 240 and 400°/s in concentric and 60°/s in eccentric exertions. Subjects also performed throwing tests successively using a javelin and a ball (both of 800 g mass). Side to side comparison in the throwers group revealed a dominance effect in the concentric mode for the IRs at all speeds, and for the ERs at 240°/s. Sedentary subjects showed a dominance effect for the IRs at 60°/s and 240°/s. Simple isokinetic concentric-concentric ratios and mixed velocity DCRs (eccentric60/concentric240) of the dominant shoulder were significantly lower in comparison to the non-dominant side values, in the throwers population. Only the simple ratio at 400°/s and the mixed ratio were significantly lower in the sedentary subjects (dominant versus non dominant side). With respect to the dominant shoulder, no significant difference was noted between the groups the peak torque was bodyweight normalized. However, throwers showed a significant reduction of the DCR when compared to the control group. In addition, throwers exhibited moderate to strong correlations (0.61 ≤ r ≤ 0.89) between IRs and ERs strength and either the javelin throw test or the personal throwing record. For the sedentary subjects the javelin throw test was correlated only with the IRs concentric strength at 240°/s. In conclusion, javelin throwers showed a significantly reduced mixed ratio in comparison with a control group, even though body weight normalized peak torques did not differ between both populations. Significant correlation was established between rotator peak-torques and javelin throw test among the thrower athletes. Although training program in thrower athletes classically focuses on IRs strengthening, our findings strongly suggest the need for ERs performance improvement.